Oakland A’s pitcher Dallas Braden is coming off the DL to pitch against the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday. Braden had been sidelined with elbow stiffness.
↵Dallas Braden, to the Bay Area, is one of the young pitchers on the A’s staff that is trying to find some consistency in his game. To the rest of America, he’s the guy that caused up a stir with New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez.
↵That incident alone caused a very huge ripple effect. It became the talk of the sports media world. Even the A’s marketing team put together the “GET OFF MY MOUND” shirts for sale — inspiring me to try to make an extra buck off the frenzy.
↵But with that hopefully in the rear view mirror, will Braden be able to return to the mound without that hovering over him?
↵Before this season, Braden was just a young pitcher trying to make an impression on the team. This season, his brush with A-Rod, along with his perfect game and the t-shirts have brought a lot of mixed perceptions of him. Even though Braden himself has said that he doesn’t want all this kind of attention, it seems that it might stay with him throughout his career.
↵The national media’s going to remind the public about his “feud” with Rodriguez. And it seems like his more important career achievement, the perfect game, will take a backseat to the pitching mound incident.
↵So let’s hope that Braden gets himself his next win since the perfecto and moves on from the “feud” with A-Rod. If not, the media’s going to continue bringing up the mound incident. And that’s going to be no fun for the Bay Area.