Arod, Verlander, and other’s trending this weekend

It’s early Monday morning, and I’m catching up on what’s been trending this past weekend.  I spent the last week in Houston, and while there, I paid attention to what was trending in sports in the local sporting news.  For the most part it had much to do with the controversy surrounding the issues involving the Cardinals and the Astros.  When I returned to New York, I was just in time to catch the New York Yankees pounce on the Tigers after a very emotional Old Timers game at Yankee Stadium.  The night prior, Twitter was all abuzz due to the controversy surrounding Alex Rodriquez’s 3000th hit off of Tiger’s former ace, Justin Verlander.  Basically, everyone was talking about whether he deserves praise for the accomplishment or does his cheating taint him a bit too much?

Additionally, there was a lot of chatter about the man who caught the ball.  People were talking about the man who caught the ball almost as much as they were talking about Alex’s hit.  Apparently the buzz stemmed from the fact that the man who caught the ball, that would be Alex’s 3000th hit, declared almost immediately he had not intention of giving it back.

That’s right, one of the top trends this weekend besides Arod’s  3000th hit was  Zack Hample, the man who has caught quite a bit of baseballs from where he sits in the stands.   Why one earth would you give the ball back?  Supposedly the guy collects baseballs, has caught thousands of them, and according to the NY Post, has been a guest on Jay Leno, to talk about his balls.

Besides talking about the ball itself, friends and foes of the Yankee’s controversial slugger hit a milestone, that some thought was meaningful and others thought meaningless. It was interesting to me how people seemed to focus on the issue of whether the guy who caught the ball should give it back, more so than the message that embracing Alex back into the good graces of the Yankees starting lineup, was doing for the fans everywhere.  It seems that lots of people are forgiving Alex, because it’s better for baseball.  “He’s a good player, so what if he took steroids, he will pay for that but it shouldn’t take away from the milestone.” What do you think?

I’ll be back later with a look at what else in trending.  For now I just wanted to share the top trend, which was pretty much all about Arod’s 3000th hit.

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AP Photo