To the glue mill you go, old boy.

  • To the glue mill you go, old boy.

Jhonny Peralta needs to go away. I know it’s a drum that has been beaten in recent weeks, but his play has truly reached some deplorable and inexcusable levels. It reminds me of something I wrote about Joe Borowski when it was clear the old horse of a closer needed to go away also.

My mother’s parents lived on a farm in Farmer City, Illinois. Population 2055, according to the 2000 census. We’d go out there once or twice a year to visit, frolic in the middle of nowhere, and check out what the whole farming life was like. My grandfather had a horse named Pinky that had been around since my mother was a child. Pinky was small and generally useless, but she was great with kids, prancing around eating grass and taking us out for rides to look at silos and such. She was good with kids — for a while. … There came a distinct point when you knew Pinky was too damn old and went beyond uselessness territory and straight into being dangerous.

There were a lot of us grandkids, so Pinky worked hard. If you happened to be at the end of the line to board the pony, you were taking a chance that she was old, tired, worn out and pissed off. I found myself in that unlucky position once. I climbed on, she took off on a death sprint. Her mission seemed to be to kill you, and if she broke her legs trying, that just meant the sweet release of death would come all the sooner, and at the very least, the rest of the kids would be too scared to saddle up anymore. My grandfather eventually saw this, and knew there was no hope that Pinky would return to her sweet ole self. Pinky was old; Pinky needed to go.

There’s really few areas where Jhonny hasn’t actively caused the Indians to lose ball games. Three-run errors? He’s got it. Regular errors? Of course. Epic hitting slumps? Yep. His patented late-season surge during meaningless games when he makes his numbers look somewhat respectable even though there’s no pressure and nothing on the line and we all want to kill him still? I’m sure that’s in the forecast as well.

This article appears in Apr 21-27, 2010.

Vince Grzegorek has been with Scene since 2007 and editor-in-chief since 2012. He previously worked at Discount Drug Mart and Texas Roadhouse.

4 replies on “Jhonny Peralta is to a Dying Horse as Joe Borowski Was to a Dying Horse”

  1. Not to defend Jholtin’ Jhonny too vigorously, but it should be noted that last night, one person with a 2-out RBI was Peralta. One person to get a hit with RISP was Peralta. The other person to do EITHER of these things? Imaginary Johnson.

    Now, if you want to talk about dropping Hafner in the order …

  2. swb, Your a moron. The indians lost that game you referred to. and if you look at the box scores this year. Jhonny leads the team w/runners LOB…it’s not even close. The last 5 games he’s stranded 9 guys. If he’s not stranding guys, he’s hitting in DPs. He also never hustles up to 1B. The infield should be LaPorta, Grudz (2b), Cabrera & Marte (3b).

  3. Sad thing is, Jhonny looks like he cares and pays attention even more than Choo.

    WHERE is the fan outcry over Choo’s subpar defense? Where’s the outcry over his horrendous base running blunders? Where’s the outcry over getting picked off after the pitcher threw over FOUR TIMES!?

    Peralta is hitting .368 in his last 6 games.

    Fans love to hate, when in reality Jhonny is the most underrated Indians player of the last 20 years.

    Just 2 years ago the guy was the best hitting SS in the AL. Was a better defensive SS than Young and Jeter for a few years as well. Improved each of his last two years at the position to the point wehre he was actually league average….but hey, fans don’t care.

    He’s not Omar or Choo so they hate him.

    And if Jhonny lost us that game when he made the 3-run error. You have to say he won us the game when he had the 2 out RBI double to tie the game up that went into extra innings againt the Sox that we won. Without his hit we lose.

    Jhonny is frustrating…but he’s been one of our best hitters the last week. Of ALL the players to get on, Jhonny is definitely not it.

    Hafner, Grady, LaPorta, Marson, and Valbuena all deserve the fans scorn more. But again, fans just underrate Jhonny. Always have and always will.

    Guy is second on the team in walks too by the way. Took him til nearly Memorial Day last year to be at these walk levels. I’m expecting Jhonny to have a big year. Had a 2 week slump to start the year….join the club that is the Indians.

  4. @Manning. Over the last 3-4 years. Victor Martinez has actually hit into more DPs than Peralta. He never hustled to 1B either.

    Again, fans just fall in love with certain players and hate others. Where was the outcry everytime Vic was jogging to 1B and bouncing into easy DPs?

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