Does anybody really remember Gregg Jefferies after he left the Mets? Doubtful. He was pretty good with the Royals, but he actually lived up to the hype of being Gregg Jefferies during his two years with the Cardinals. His slash line for the two years was .335/.401/.487 with 28 home runs, 51doubles, and 58 steals. He made the All-Star team twice and posted an OPS+ of 132 in 1993 and 130 in 1994. Outside of Ray Lankford he was my favorite Cardinals player in the mid 1990s. Naturally, that meant I collected his baseball cards.
My favorite was his 1993 Flair. Beautiful card.
After two successful season with the Cardinals many expected the team to resign Jefferies. However, he bolted to the Phillies and his career seemed to take a turn downward. Still pretty fond memories of Jefferies playing time with Cardinals. He was temperamental and did things like threw his batting helmet at least twice a game, but I guess you can get away with those things when you are hitting .330. Wonder what would have happened to Gregg Jefferies if he had stayed a Cardinal?
A quote from the movie Bull Durham comes to mind. "Show me that million dollar arm cause I got a good idea about that 5 cent head." Jefferies had a million dollar bat and a 5-cent head. They said his dad wrote numbers on tennis balls and throw Gregg batting practice with them. He had to call out the numbers as the pitch was coming in and, from what I understand, was phenomenal at it. He was also one of my favorite players when he was with the Cardinals, but my dad always referred to him as a head case. I was never a big fan of Joe Torre as the Cardinals manager, but what he did with Gregg may have been Hall-worthy in itself.
ReplyDeleteI remember when Gregg Jefferies was a 20 year old minor leaguer in 1987. He instantly became my favorite baseball player. I thought he was going to be Mickey Mantle, Ted Williams and Pete Rose rolled into one. As a Mets fanatic, he was going to be Mike Trout before Trout was even born. I followed his entire career especially with stints on the Tigers and Angels. Gregg Jefferies was an example of how not to handle a prodigy.
ReplyDelete