I think there's absolutely a racial component to the Martinez criticism that people fall back on. If nothing else, personal presuppositions that don't mesh with reality.
I think most of us are willing to consider that there's a racial component, if you can point us to the specific comment here that you're referring to. Brendan Ryan was called a headcase. Steve Kline also. They're white, right?
You can't simply say "you guys are racist" because you feel like saying it. That's really really dangerous for people of every race.
No one has said "you guys are racist". People have said that criticism of Carlos's temperament plays into a lot of very lazy stereotypes about latinos. There's even a Wikipedia page about it if you're really claiming to be completely unaware of the very long history. Why escalate this?
Educate yourself, don't ask other people to do it for you. Very very few people who ask for a "specific comment" are arguing in good faith, like anyone would go back through years of Carlos starts and listen to hundreds of hours of commentary to prove a point in an argument on the internet with someone who thinks anti-Latino racism doesn't exist.
educate yourself...lmao.
"i'm calling you a racist now prove to me you aren't a racist [expletive]."
C-Mart generally struck me as immature, both on and off the field. Immature can sometimes be funny. It can sometimes be annoying. It doesn't prevent you from being great, but I find in pretty much any walk in life immature people struggle to reach their full potential.
You think being an above average MLB player for years, who at his brief peak was arguably one of the top 25 pitchers in all of MLB, did not reach his "full potential"? OK.
I think the real issue with Carlos is fan expectations were sky high with him for whatever reason. They expected him to be winning Cy Young awards, or at least contending for them. It's not his fault that the expectations were that high. I'm not sure why expectations were so high with him. He was darn good for several years.
Well a quick search for “blue hair” and any term like “CMart” or “Carlos” on Twitter is one place you can look. I did count at least two dog whistles (different terms) on this very board when searching.
I do think it’s fine to say you think the racial aspects of CMart criticism is overblown, but it’s equally silly to pretend it never existed. Or that posters have to cite some pre-approved example when we all have been on Cards Talk and know how this fanbase can get. Is it unique to Cardinals fans? No. But it definitely happened, a lot.
I don't have a Twitter account. I assume that people mentioned his blue hair, not because they're racist, but because, you know, his hair was blue.
Again, nobody has said that racism doesn't exist anywhere. That wasn't the discussion that we were having.
C-Mart generally struck me as immature, both on and off the field. Immature can sometimes be funny. It can sometimes be annoying. It doesn't prevent you from being great, but I find in pretty much any walk in life immature people struggle to reach their full potential.
You think being an above average MLB player for years, who at his brief peak was arguably one of the top 25 pitchers in all of MLB, did not reach his "full potential"? OK.
I think the real issue with Carlos is fan expectations were sky high with him for whatever reason. They expected him to be winning Cy Young awards, or at least contending for them. It's not his fault that the expectations were that high. I'm not sure why expectations were so high with him. He was darn good for several years.
Expectations were high because they should have been. He has/had a live arm with electric stuff, consistently ranked in the top 100 prospects and was towards the upper end of the list, which raised expectations as he succeeded at a young age in the minors and then saw that success translate when he was 23 and 24 years old in the majors to the tune of a 130 and 133 ERA+ in those respective years. Fair or not, people had high expectations for a reason.
He really was pretty damn good until the shoulder. Consistently 3+ WAR pitcher. You take that all day. We barely have 5 WAR as an entire team in 2021.
100% agree. I think the expectations were unrealistic. As soon as he was mentioned in the same breath as Pedro Martinez, he was pretty much doomed. I'd agree that it was unfair, and that he was really good for awhile.
Cmart was basically Flaherty, in terms of his prospect pedigree and performance at a young age. He posted ERA+ of 130 and 133 in his first two seasons as a starter at ages 23 and 24, then put up a few more solidly above-average seasons (and I'd include 2019 in the bullpen).
It's really sad, but I think we all know that shoulder injuries are unpredictable. Not every pitcher comes back from them (cue montage of Mark Mulder mixed with xrays of his rotator cuff, set to Elliott Smith's "Needle in the Hay").
He was very good; our expectations were very high; we had some good times together; now, alas, that's probably over.
Is there a typical pitchers WAR graph by age? Hitters peak early and are certainly in the downhill decline after the age of 30. Seems like pitchers don't peak as early though and typically go through a significant surgery (usually TJ) early on, then take a year or two to recover/relearn to pitch, and only then peak. As such, I think it's pretty obvious, trade all young stud starting pitchers for ungodly returns. *Looking at...Flaherty*, yeah that would bring a good return if he can come back and be health this year. Ahhh, we may have already missed his peak trade value, nevermind.
Is there a typical pitchers WAR graph by age? Hitters peak early and are certainly in the downhill decline after the age of 30. Seems like pitchers don't peak as early though and typically go through a significant surgery (usually TJ) early on, then take a year or two to recover/relearn to pitch, and only then peak. As such, I think it's pretty obvious, trade all young stud starting pitchers for ungodly returns. *Looking at...Flaherty*, yeah that would bring a good return if he can come back and be health this year. Ahhh, we may have already missed his peak trade value, nevermind.
Is there a typical pitchers WAR graph by age? Hitters peak early and are certainly in the downhill decline after the age of 30. Seems like pitchers don't peak as early though and typically go through a significant surgery (usually TJ) early on, then take a year or two to recover/relearn to pitch, and only then peak. As such, I think it's pretty obvious, trade all young stud starting pitchers for ungodly returns. *Looking at...Flaherty*, yeah that would bring a good return if he can come back and be health this year. Ahhh, we may have already missed his peak trade value, nevermind.