Overkill

Boy, I haven’t seen Bobby Witt Jr.’s name mentioned lately. I wonder why? Up until last week, MLB.com couldn’t get enough of Witt and a handful of other players. Shohei Ohtani, Aaron Judge, Francisco Lindor—you get the drift. The names power the brand, and baseball these days is all about branding. And heaven help those who fall by the wayside in the postseason, like Witt or Gunnar Henderson or Tarik Skubal. Everybody loves a winner, the baseball establishment hates all losers. So, it goes. Which makes me wonder what’ll happen when the next Ernie Banks comes along. Like that falling tree in the woods, will anybody notice? Banks spent most of his career on woeful Cubs’ teams; think a skooch better than the present-day Sad Sox. And what positive coverage did they get? At some point, we’ll get to the World Series MVP; that’s the guy who’ll matter the most, according to Rob Manfred and MLB.com. Something about that doesn’t feel right. I’ve got to stop looking at the photos around me, of Minnie Minoso and Monty Stratton and Smead Jolley and…