Comments on: Luis Gomez

By: Monkey Head

Monkey Head — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 01:21:28 +0000

21. Well, you've put the kiss of death on Downing's Hall of Fame chances.

By: Josh Wilker

Josh Wilker — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 22:14:04 +0000

20. To be fair, Downing did show flashes of power in a couple part-timer seasons early in his career before blossoming into a lock for 20-plus homers in the '80s. Also, he could have just been what everyone thought he was back then--a weightroom fanatic--and nothing more. Nobody was really pumping iron back in those days, so when someone did they stood out.

By: Peanut

Peanut — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 21:52:23 +0000

19. Brian Downing does seem like the perfect steroid suspect. He was injured in 1980, then 1981 was the strike year. In 1982 he started hitting home runs all of a sudden at age 32. I remember him hitting a home run that put him into the top 100 at the time (baseballreference.com says he's #143 now) and he talked about how he didn't have any power at all until his 30s. Nobody would say that about himself now.

By: Josh Wilker

Josh Wilker — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 19:58:47 +0000

18. Welcome aboard, Haus. As I remember it, Brian Downing was the geek who wore glasses who after getting sand kicked in his face sent away for Charles Atlas’ Dynamic Tension booklet and grew muscles and went back to the beach and punched out his former bully. Or at least improved his ability to hit home runs. Check out the “before and after” quality of his power stats from the ’70s and the ’80s:
http://tinyurl.com/2vk293

By: Haus

Haus — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 19:05:55 +0000

17. I'm new and this is the best goddamn website out there. Wasn't Brian Downing the geek who wore glasses?

By: Josh Wilker

Josh Wilker — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 18:36:20 +0000

16. 15 : If so, I think it's safe to say the angel won that argument. I wonder if such inner arguments were occuring at that time (1979); I think there are some who say that there were. I also wonder who the Jackie Robinson of steroids was. I'm not at all saying the guy I'm about to mention should have any suspicion thrown his way, but the first guy I remember being suddenly, you know, huge, was Brian Downing. He was like one of those inflexible plastic He Man dolls, especially with his awkward-looking facing-the-pitcher batting stance.

By: rangers1994

rangers1994 — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 18:25:04 +0000

15. I think it's the proverbial angel and devil on either shoulder, with one telling Luis, "Take steroids" and the other countering, "But that's cheating."

By: wireroom

wireroom — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 17:31:03 +0000

14. I would take Luis Gomez' career. Ever since I read somewhere that in the clubhouses they keep large barrels of bubble gum and beef jerky and ice cold beer in coolers, I have always related that to the wonderment of making it in the big leagues rather than the money you earn. Kind of like the song "Big Rock Candy Mountain." Even though he struggled for most of his career, I am sure that those struggles were the most accomplished the guy probably ever felt. But maybe my perspective is that of someone who probably never had a chance of making it in the big leagues. For Luis Gomez, who was probably growing up, the best athlete around, he may have expected more from his career.

By: Im So Blue

Im So Blue — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 08:21:19 +0000

13. Luis Gomez was the star quarterback at my alma mater, Belmont High in Los Angeles. He attended UCLA on a baseball scholarship, and played freshman basketball with Bill Walton. According to BaseballLibrary.com, in 1975, while with the Twins, he set an ML record of playing in 89 games w/o an extra base hit.

By: sly jones

sly jones — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 03:25:52 +0000

12. I don’t know what it is — maybe the oddly fitting uniform with the high waistline — but this card suggests to me a JV ballplayer standing outside the cage, waiting somewhat resentfully for the turn he probably won’t get.

Kinda like Linus Van Pelt waiting at the tennis courts in “You’re A Good Sport, Charlie Brown,” if anybody remembers that.