As a kid ,In little league,I had the utmost respect for kids who wanted to be catchers.They had balls.I had them too but they were much easier to get a beat on out in center ,the furthermost part of the playing field.I knew this one kid,Eric was his name,he'd sit behind the plate without a face mask,just a helmet turned backwards ,taking fastballs behind live batters like It was nothing.It made me cringe!He was fearless behind as well as at the plate.Most catchers are If you really think about It,though.They're like Liam Neeson out there grinding It out on the field,calling the shots,throwing runners out and getting between pitchers and would be mound chargers.They're grizzled and staunch defenders of home plate who don't take shit from anyone ,and will even let a fellow teammate have It If he gets out of line or fails to hustle out there on the field.Guys like Fisk,I-Rod and Yadier Molina come to mind.I never paid much attention to Yadi early In his career with the Cards because of his offensive numbers,or lack there of.Then I began to watch more of his games and realized that offensive numbers aside, Yadi called one hell of a game.Now that his offense has come around he's become the total package and one that has been with his parent club,the Cardinals ,since day 1.I decided to look through my collection last night to dig up any and every Molina card I could ,because he's just too damn awesome of a player to not collect. To my surprise I didn't have many.Just the ones you see below.I'll be looking to add more Yadi to the collection as soon as I can afford to because he's quickly becoming one of my favorite players. I've also decided to start a collection of cards depicting catchers either throwing,catching or sitting behind the plate.They have to have most of their gear on In some kind of game situation ,though.Stay tuned for that.
