In our weekly Happy Birthday segment we have featured Boston legend Carl Yastrzemski and fringe major leaguer Nate Minchey. This week we find a solid player who lands somewhere in the middle: Ellis Burks. The former Red Sox, who began (1987-92) and ended (2004) his career in Boston, turns 45 on 9/11. Burks had a solid rookie season, becoming the 3rd Red Sox in history to join the 20/20 club and being named to the All Rookie team. After improving his stats each of his first 3 seasons, in 1990 he was named an A.L. All Star and won a Gold Glove for his work in centerfield. However in 1991 he took a step backward, in 1992 he was injured for all but 66 games, and following the '92 season he left to join the White Sox via free agency. After just 1 season in Chicago he went on to play for the Colorado Rockies (1994-98), San Francisco Giants (1998-2000) and Cleveland Indians (2001-03) before returning to Boston for a final season and a first World Series title. The 2-time All Star finished his career with a .291 average, 2,107 hits, 352 home runs and 1,206 RBI. Happy 45th Ellis!
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4 comments:
I remember Burks being called a player with "Willie Mays talent" when he first came up for the Sox and the older I get the more unfair I realize that was. After he went 20/20 his rookie year (which was a much bigger accomplishment then than it may seem now) I think folks expects him to go 30/30 the next year and so on. Overall a very solid career and nice that he was able to finish it where he started and be part of that '04 team.
Interesting note: Burks played in 2,000 games exactly in his career. Although that has been accomplished 217 in MLB history, there are only 12 active players with 2,0000+ games, so it is becoming a more rare feat.
Active players:
1. Omar Vizquel
2. Ken Griffey
3. Gary Sheffield
4. Ivan Rodriguez
5. Jim Thome
6. Manny Ramirez
7. Chipper Jones
7. Alex Rodriguez (tied)
9. Garrett Anderson
10.Derek Jeter
11.Johnny Damon
12.Carlos Delgado
Your first comment is very true. There seemed to be unreasonably high expectations of Burks and Mike Greenwell when they both came up from the minors.
In fact I recall that Burks was considered a disappointment when he left Boston. Greenwell got bashed also and he almost won the MVP award in 1988.
When I think of Burks I think of 3 things
1. The word "potential" hung around his neck like an anchor.
2. One of the smoothest right handed swings I have ever seen.
3. Peter Gammons couldn't pick an MVP if I spotted him the M and the V. I think he picked Burks for MVP as recently as 2007.
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