The Strange Case Of Luis Rivas

Everybody, from the coaching staff to the fans in the chat rooms, has been hard on Luis Rivas the last couple years. Most of the criticism directed at Rivas has been justified. The guy had obviously developed some bad work habits that were showing up on the field with a glaring regularity. At times –most of the time– he seemed to be in a state of either depression or profound indifference.
Rivas, like his old double-play partner Cristian Guzman, is a tough guy to read, and I’m sure much of that has to do with the language barrier. There isn’t a coach with the major league club who speaks much Spanish, and there are few –if any– Spanish speakers among the regular contingent of local media, with the result that Latin players seem to rely on each other to work their way through translations of messages from on high. They also tend to stick together in the clubhouse, playing cards and hanging out at their lockers.
Rivas, though, is an interesting case. I’m not sure how tight he and Guzman were, but they lockered next to each other, and I’ll be curious to see how he responds to Guzman’s absence.
This is obviously a pivotal year for Rivas, one way or the other. Despite four full seasons in the major leagues he is still just 25 years old, the same age as prospects Jason Bartlett and Terry Tiffee, as well as Michael Cuddyer, the guy who assumed much of his playing time down the stretch last year.
Rivas’s recent reputation as something of a lazy player is sort of difficult to get your head around. In 2002, when the Twins took the unusual step of honoring Cleveland’s Travis Fryman with a pre-game ceremony on the occasion of his retirement announcement –the sort of thing clubs usually do for Hall-of-Fame-caliber players– Ron Gardenhire said the gesture was a tribute to the way Fryman had played the game. I remember going around the clubhouse afterwards asking various guys which of their teammates was Frymanesque in that regard. The experience stuck with me because two out of the four or five players I queried mentioned Luis Rivas. I actually dug out my old notebook just to make sure I was remembering correctly.
So what happened between then and now? Who knows, really. Rivas had some injuries, most notably late in that 2002 season. Maybe after having a job handed to him at the age of 21 he got complacent. Perhaps he should have spent a couple more seasons getting seasoned and hungry in the minor leagues.
Whatever the case, he’s still pretty damn young for a major league veteran, and though you’d like to have seen more improvement in his numbers and performance over the last four seasons –Luis’s been nothing if not consistently mediocre across the board– maybe it’s not too late for him to figure it out. Conventional wisdom has always suggested that for the the majority of players the key –often peak– years are between the ages of 25 and 27, so I’d guess this is the season we’re going to find out what’s up with Rivas, one way or another. He certainly doesn’t figure to get too many more chances, and he’s been lucky the Twins haven’t had a lot of other options.