One of the things that I’ve come to appreciate about the Cubs second-year catcher Willson Contreras is the energy he brings to the field day in and day out. He always seems to be in the middle of every single big play in every game and because he always finds himself on center stage, Contreras has developed a pretty sick arsenal of celebrations.
We’ve seen the traditional chest pound.
A Dikembe Mutumbo style finger wave on a would be base stealer.
And just an old fashioned scream job after a big play.
As a fan of baseball, I’m OK with watching players like Contreras celebrate. It shows the passion they have for the game and I don’t think anything that Contreras does is a way to “show up” other teams. Hell, Joe Maddon encourages his players to have fun and no other player embodies that mindset more than the man better known as Willy.
While every Cubs fan loves watching Willy do his thing, other organizations and their fan bases hate the concept of playing baseball with emotion and just hate the idea of fun in general.
(I’m looking at you Cardinal fans)
After hitting a huge two-run home run tonight against the anti-lovers of fun St. Louis Cardinals, Contreras crossed home plate and appeared to kiss each of his biceps.
Willson Contreras kissing his biceps after a 2-run HR. I love the #Cubs pic.twitter.com/FlVLuWZO3e
— Aldo Soto (@AldoSoto21) July 24, 2017
After that alleged celebration, St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Derrick Goold took to Twitter to do some investigating on why Willson Contreras would decide to give his biceps some love.
Does Willson Contreras kiss his biceps after every home run he hits? Can't say I've seen that many in person. Anyone? #Cubs #Cardinals
— Derrick Goold (@dgoold) July 24, 2017
While I can’t say that I’ve agreed with everything Goold has written in the past, I genuinely think he was asking an honest question about the celebration. I don’t know this for a fact but I’m pretty sure Willy was kissing the compression sleeves that he wears on each of his arms that are decorated in his home country of Venezuela’s colors.
Even after a Cubs fan pointed that out to Goold, Goold himself called the celebration a “nice tribute” and boy did that piss off fans of the St. Louis Cardinals. Not only did Goold get destroyed for being a Cardinals beat writer who used logic to form an opinion that the celebration was harmless, Cardinal fans then shifted their anger to the 25-year-old Cubs catcher.
What a freaking clown. Needs drilled in his ribs next ab. And why was he yelling at the Cards bench??
— Mark Fisher (@Sadsushi) July 24, 2017
He's such a clown. It's 7/23 and he show boats it like it just won them the World Series
— Darren Kostecki (@kosteckigolf) July 24, 2017
I hope he gets hit in the ear hole next at bat so hard that he feels the seems on the inside of the other side of his skull… #AssHat
— STLCardsFansFriends (@CardFansFriends) July 24, 2017
He can kiss my ass every time.
— Nick Roseman (@309ROSEMAN) July 24, 2017
And my personal favorite comes from Elena a.k.a. Ol’ Skool G, and her great concern that Willson Contreras has become too cocky.
The guy has a swelled head.
— Elena D/OlSkoolG (@OlSkoolG) July 24, 2017
Well I’ll tell you this Elena (and every other Cardinals fan reading this): when your OPS is 1.127 post All-Star break and you’re carrying the hottest bat on a team that has made up a 5.5 game difference in the division in about ten days — you can pound your chest, kiss your biceps, hell you can do a back flip for all I care because you’re playing great baseball and having fun doing it.
Somewhere Mike Matheny’s head just exploded from the thought of having this much fun on a baseball diamond.
