The video of Marcus Stroman winning a $100 Toys “R” Us gift card on Nickelodeon surfaced again yesterday (link available until Viacom blocks it for copyright infringement), which has us all thinking: Which other Major League Baseball players would have been fun to see win a $100 Toys “R” Us gift card on Nickelodeon at the age of six or seven?
Here’s a non-comprehensive list:
Anthony Rizzo
He’s already kind of a child, and he probably had very chubby cheeks.
Tim Anderson
Unless swagger is something that develops in puberty, seeing a young Tim Anderson celebrate this kind of haul would be exhilarating.
Yasiel Puig
You might think I’m saying this because of Yasiel Puig’s boundless energy, penchant for doing weird things, or presumably chubby childhood cheeks. But I’m actually saying it because it would have meant U.S. relations with Cuba must have thawed by around 1996, which in turn would probably have meant Fidel Castro was done maintaining his reign of terror by then. Perhaps Cuba would have even steered away from their “socialist” dictatorship and into a political and economic structure conducive to the reduction of poverty and hardship for the good people of that nation.
Trevor Bauer
Dude was probably even weirder as a six-year-old.
Mike Trout
Had Mike Trout gone on a Nickelodeon show designed to give a child a $100 gift card, he would have walked away with a $400 gift card and the right to ride Geoffrey the Giraffe to school every day.
Brock Holt
As with Rizzo, already kind of a child. Also has a very cute child of his own, which means genetically he’s more likely to have been a cute kid.
Franmil Reyes
How big do you think this man was back then?
Buster Posey
Because he’s called Buster.
Max Scherzer
This is not so much because I think Max Scherzer was a particularly affection-inducing child. He might have been. He might not have been. Instead it’s because the more footage we can get of his early years, the better our idea will be of whether or not he’s a risk to mankind.
CC Sabathia
Again, chubby cheeks.
