Roberto Alomar of the Mets: an all-around performer - A Student of The Game - Gold Glove Award winner, New York Mets - Cover Story

Baseball Digest, July, 2002 by T.J. Quinn

OMAR VIZQUEL THOUGHT HE KNEW how good Roberto Alomar was. He knew about the Gold Gloves, the steady bat, the ability to steal bases. But he didn't know.

"He said he is married to baseball and I didn't understand what that meant until I played with the guy," says Vizquel, a nine-time Gold Glove winner. "He sees things nobody sees. Every day he pointed out to me something I didn't know or something I didn't see." Cito Gaston thought he knew how good Roberto Alomar was.

The former Toronto manager had heard about the young second baseman from San Diego when he came to Gaston's Blue Jays in 1991. He knew Alomar was a talented athlete, but he had no idea how talented.

"It didn't take long to figure out," Gaston says. "He can hit anywhere in the lineup. He can hit a home run, he can bunt, he can steal a base. He keeps up with the pitchers on his team and the other team. He's a superstar."

Yet, this man who has been recognized by some sources as the greatest second baseman in the history of the game and maybe the best all-around player in the game today, is clearly not treated like a superstar.

He does not draw crowds the way Mike Piazza, Ken Griffey Jr. and Alex Rodriguez do. He is not mobbed when he walks down a street in the United States and he does not appear in television commercials.

But to his peers and those who make their living in baseball, he is another Joe DiMaggio. Not because they share a style of play--DiMaggio was a true power hitter and played a different position. But Alomar plays with a completeness and elegance that even veterans such as Vizquel and Gaston had to see every day to believe.

"He is like DiMaggio in that sense," Gaston says. "I'm just thankful I got to watch him every day."

Last December 10, the Mets' front office went deep into the night in talks with the Indians over Alomar and came away with a deal that stunned me baseball world. Manager Bobby Valentine even wondered aloud later why the Mets had been able to get him at all.

If there were ever a perfect marriage of player and team, though, this might be it. Alomar suspects that playing on the biggest stage in baseball might let the world see just how good he really is.

But many in baseball wonder whether those who don't play the game at the highest level can ever appreciate what it is that makes Alomar exceptional. Somehow, a 12-time All-Star and 10-time Gold Glove winner has slipped under the radar of the American public.

Part of the problem is perception. Many peripheral fans knew little about Alomar beyond his resume before he spit in the face of umpire John Hirschbeck in September 1996. Those same fans probably have no idea how close the two men eventually became.

"Everybody knows he's one of the greatest players in the game, but that one little incident he had, that took some points from him," Vizquel says.

Alomar says he does not know why his is not a bigger name, but he suspects it is partly because, before this year, he never played in one of America's great baseball towns. "When you play in New York and you make a play everyone knows about it," he says. "When I played in Toronto I was in Canada. San Diego is not a baseball city. Cleveland and Baltimore are great baseball cities, but they're small towns."

He is congenial but often distant and he keeps his private life private. But even if he were as engaging as Babe Ruth, his excellence lies in his unequaled knowledge of and instinct for the game, and that is something the average fan cannot always understand. "I definitely think he's underappreciated," says Dodgers coach Jim Riggleman, who managed against Alomar in Double-A and managed him in winter ball. "He thinks like a manager on the field. He understands the whole scheme of things that go on out there."

Al Leiter says that when he played with Alomar in Toronto, Alomar used to study opposing hitters to the point that he would offer suggestions on pitch selection during games.

"He said once I was working to the guy's strengths and to do something else," Leiter says. "Instead of the catcher coming out, here comes the second baseman. Not only does he evaluate it and figure it out, he takes advantage."

Riggleman says he saw how Alomar could take advantage of the slightest mistake when he was managing the Cubs against Cleveland in a 1999 game.

"It was a play where he chopped one to first and the pitcher had to cover the base, and the flip (from the first baseman) got away," Riggleman says. "The pitcher, just for one second, went `aaah' and shrugged his shoulders, and Robbie takes off for second, beats the throw, the lead runner scores and Robbie ends up at third."

All because Alomar, who slid into first base and had his back to the play, heard the pitcher groan. He knew that meant the pitcher had hesitated in his pursuit of the ball, and Alomar knew he had an opening to exploit.

"I remember that play," Alomar says, smiling. "He was seven feet from the ball. I knew I could make it."

Alomar dismisses the idea that his vision of the game--his ability to decode pitchers and hitters and anticipate situations--is a product of nature. He learned from his father, Sandy, a player who made a career out of doing little things like sacrificing runners and stealing bases.