Mike Schmidt is perhaps the greatest third baseman in baseball history. He’s also a pretty major jackwagon.
Here’s what Schmidt said on 94WIP in Philly today while talking about whether the Phillies can or should build their team around outfielder Odubel Herrera:
“My honest answer to that would be no because of a couple of things. First of all, it’s a language barrier. Because of that, I think he can’t be a guy that would sort of sit in a circle with four, five American players and talk about the game. Or try and learn about the game or discuss the inner workings of the game. Or come over to a guy and say, ‘Man, you gotta run that ball out.’ Just can’t be — because of the language barrier — that kind of a player.”
David Ortiz and Adrian Beltre were unavailable for comment, probably because they injured themselves rolling their eyes too hard.
Herrera, from Venezuela is not a native English speaker, of course, but he routinely gives interviews in English. English, I am 100% certain, is much, much better than Schmidt’s Spanish or the Spanish of whoever it is he does think could be a team leader for the Phillies.
In other news, Schmidt won a World Series championship with Venezuelan Manny Trillo as a teammate in 1980 and a pennant in 1983 with Venezuelan Bo Diaz as a teammate. No word on whether or not he gave them instruction or encouragement in their native language during those seasons.
