We should all be collecting Mike Sweeney’s baseball cards. A mainstay with the Royals between ’95 and ’07, Sweeney put up a .299 career batting average and 199 home runs through 2008. More than respectable stats. But that isn’t why we should collect Sweeney’s cards.
We should collect Sweeney’s cards because he is a role model for children. We should collect Sweeney’s cards because he’s a genuinely good guy and a high quality major league ballplayer.
Check out this link to learn more about why Sweeney is such a good guy and why he is so admired by fans.
He also took out the following full page ad on 9/27/07, just before his final game in a Royals uniform, in The Kansas City Star:
“Dear Kansas City:
The past 17 years have been the greatest of my life both on the field and off. I want to take this opportunity to thank all the truly special people in Kansas City who have helped make these years such a blessing.
Thank you to the greatest fans in baseball for your passion and support through both the mountain tops highs and stormy lows. Thank you to the Glass Family for giving me an opportunity to live out my dreams and be part of the most loving organization in the game. Thank you to all my coaches and teammates for being the greatest brothers a man could ask of having each and every season.
I also want to thank the entire Kansas City Royals organization for taking a chance on a 17 year-old kid from California way back in 1991. I’m so grateful for everything you’ve done to help me develop into the player–and more importantly the man–I’ve become.
And to all my friends and “family” in Kansas City, thank you for all the love you’ve shown me through the years. Faith, Hope, and Love… and the greatest of these is Love. God Bless Kansas City!
Thank You and… GO ROYALS!
Mike Sweeney”
(courtesy: Wikipedia)
So why can’t or rather why shouldn’t we collect the role models just as much or more than the “stat generators”?
Guys like Derek Jeter and David Wright, who are good guys and also put up decent stats are easy to collect. But what about those guys who aren’t in the largest baseball market city, and who are real good ball players AND role models nonetheless? Guys like Sweeney, Jamie Moyer, Raul Ibanez and Tim Wakefield.
We should be collecting these players and encouraging others, especially youngsters, to collect these types of players.
To find more good guys check out the past winners of the Lou Gehrig Memorial Award, the Branch Rickey Award, the Roberto Clemente Award and the Man of the Year Award.
