St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Paul Goldschmidt isn’t having his best season,
but he was able to bask in the moment after reaching his 2,000th career hit.
“This hasn’t been my best year—it’s probably been my worst year in the big
leagues performance-wise—but hopefully I can change that going forward,” said Goldschmidt,. “That’s the
goal. At some point — maybe after the season or when my career is over—that’s when I can say, ‘Oh, that’s pretty cool to have accomplished that.'”
Goldschmidt hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the 10th inning for his 2,000th hit, but the Cardinals still fell to
the Nationals 10-8 on Friday. He is one of five active players with 2,000 hits, joining
Freddie Freeman, Jose Altuve, Joey Votto and Andrew McCutchen.
In his 13th MLB season, Goldschmidt is in the midst of the worst hitting stretch
of his career. He’s hitting .227/.286/.379 with 15 home runs and 40 runs batted in through 100 games.
Largely healthy throughout his career, he has played in at least 145 games in eight of the last nine full seasons.
Reaching the 2,000-hit mark may be the thing needed to turn Goldschmidt’s
season around. He’s not only struggled to put the ball in play, striking out 125 times
this season, but he’s also been walking at a significantly lower rate than previous seasons.
As he approaches his 37th birthday, it’s fair to wonder if Goldschmidt is simply losing the battle to father time. That said,
he still has plenty of milestones remaining in his career if he chooses to keep playing.
