David Eckstein is an odd case. People forget this, but when he was a prospect he was much-loved by the stat-boy set. And throughout his career, he got on base at a healthy clip. It was his playoff exploits that gained him the reputation as a “scrappy” guy -- way more the fault of broadcasters and the media than anything he did himself -- then people turned on him because, well, I was never really clear on that. I’m pretty sure he was merely a pawn in media/analysis pissing match.
But Eckstein was a fine player. He just didn’t have much power in a power-happy era and no one in the sabermetric world gave credit for durability and defense like they should have back then. It happened a lot back then and it resulted in people heaping hate on Eckstein.
Good thing he’s a good sport about it. Like here, via the MLB Fan Cave, where Eckstein reads some of the hate that was thrown on him by the baseball blogosphere over the years.
*Craig checks to make sure nothing he wrote about Eckstein made the list; sees none did; exhales*
[mlbvideo id="36806225" width="600" height="336" /]
