SB Nation: I Used To Hate Ripken's Streak

http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2015/9/4/9261565/cal-ripken-record-anniversary-sorry-dave-matthews-herrna-gerrna-hoooo-mama-yeah

Then he turned 30. The first season was brilliant, but that was just about the last we saw of the old, MVP-winning Ripken. He stopped aping Honus Wagner and morphed into a Jhonny Peralta-type shortstop. Which is fine, great, grand, still a perennial All-Star, but there was always a cloud of "what-if" hanging over those seasons. What if Ripken played 150 games, even? What if he could rest those aging bones in the middle of a slump, or in the middle of a particularly grueling road trip? What would his production look like? Why was the streak more important?

Baseball players don't have to be in their late-30s to figure this out. Even the 20-somethings on your favorite team are dealing with something right now. Tightness here, soreness there. Sleep deprivation and general fatigue. It's a grind for the rookies, and it's a grind for the veterans. It has to be so easy to start feeling sorry for yourself, to want a mental day off followed by a physical day off.

And in the corner of the clubhouse, there's a dude who shuts up and plays every day. Who absolutely prides himself on shaking off those cobwebs and bruises. Toward the end, the streak did become about catching Gehrig, at least . For so many years, though, the Gehrig record was so absurd, so out of reach, it was only an abstract consideration. Before that, Ripken played every day because that's just what he did. He didn't want the day off. The streak happened organically.

It happened organically....

Well, that was unnecessary