Every day this week, and I think a few days last week, members of the Kansas City mainstream media have written about Zack Greinke. (Here’s today’s.)
That would be perfectly acceptable if we had rewound ourselves and it was 2010 again. Zack Greinke played for the Royals a year ago. He does not now. So why are Royals.com and the KC Star still slavishly devoted to covering his every word? (And also his new jersey number and his new hair style and what he had for breakfast yesterday and if that’s different from the breakfasts he ate in Kansas City and if that will affect his pitching now that he is with a new team.)
Is this healthy? Are Dick Kaegel and Sam Mellinger the media equivalent of the guy* who goes on Facebook after a breakup and constantly refreshes his ex-girlfriend’s profile to see what she’s up to without him?
*I was going to write that with the gender roles reversed, but 87% of stalkers are actually male, so I’ll go with statistical accuracy over tired gender stereotypes.
I don’t think we need to pretend Greinke no longer exists. But this seems to be an unprecedented amount of coverage of an ex-Royal, and I don’t understand it. It’s normal to casually mention which guys on the roster were brought in in the Greinke trade. A story about Lorenzo Cain or Alcides Escobar or Jake Odorizzi or Jeremy Jeffress warrant mentions of ZG’s name, for sure. That makes sense. How those players got here is significant.
But multiple feature stories about a fellow who is in camp for the Brewers now? What is that? What does it accomplish? I know Kaegel has a special place in his heart for Greinke – he wrote a very heartfelt personal essay after the trade – but shouldn’t Royals.com feature stories about Royals?
Again – we shouldn’t erase Greinke from our memories. Or if we want to return to the ex-girlfriend analogy, we don’t have to erase all pictures of him from our Facebook after deleting his number and unfollowing him on Twitter. But I hope that soon, our mainstream media members are able to let go of Zack and write features about current Royals.
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4 comments
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Mark LaFlamme
March 2, 2011 at 5:49 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
I went through all my scrapbooks and cut Grienke’s face out of our photos. My vanity license plate no longer says “ZacknMe.” Everywhere I turn, our song is playing on the radio (Pink’s ‘Perfect’) and the smell of his glove oil is still on my pillow. I’m okay, though. Ready to start seeing other pitchers.
I know most of Royal fandom is divided on this, but I’m totally cheering against Zack this season. It’s petty and mean-spirited, but you know what they say about a baseball fan scorned.
Minda Haas
March 2, 2011 at 5:54 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
So YOU’RE the jerk who stole the license plate idea I wanted?! Rage!
I’m actually a little surprised that you’re in the “root against Zack” camp, Mark. Not sure why, though.
I’m still rooting for him, for sure, so you and I will have to be enemies now! :P
Mark LaFlamme
March 2, 2011 at 6:03 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
It IS a little out of character. I’m still friends with most of my ex-girlfriends, for chrissakes. Zack’s whole “I wanna be a with a winner” rant kind of got to me, though.
All in all, I miss DDJ way more than I’ll ever miss Zack.
DrVoxHumana
March 2, 2011 at 5:52 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
I really don’t find it that odd. Combine the jilted attitude of passive Royals fans due to what they perceive as the franchise trading away all its talent and Zack’s demeanor and behavior and people are going to pay attention.
The public craves Zack news and I think any good writer should write about what the fans want to hear.
I will agree that some of the details are a bit odd, but Zack articles are going to grab headlines over topics that are probably more relevant and frankly I’d rather read.