Does Matt Kemp Have Star Potential?

When I turn on ESPN every morning as of late all I see is Women’s World Cup, Women’s Tennis, and as much as it pains me to say it…. I even saw Women’s Golf on SportsCenter. Besides thinking “Why in the name of Antoine Walker is the world ending so soon?”, I had to ask myself why is a major sport like baseball not in the sports television equation more than a bunch of short haired women with calves more muscular than Adrian Peterson? I think the answer to that question is that Major League Baseball doesn’t have a “face”. They don’t have interesting characters, personalities, and storylines that drive leagues like the NBA and the NFL; The Lebron James’ or the Rex Ryans of the MLB so to say. So I began to examine what MLB player could potentially get the sports world talking more than a blonde housewife during her husband’s favorite football game. I immediately jumped to Matt Kemp of the Los Angeles Dodgers. The 26 year old Kemp is one of the quickly rising stars in Major League Baseball, and so he has the perfect potential to be that spark that baseball needs.

There’s a formula when determining a players star potential. It goes:

Personal Brand = Personality + Performance x Visibility

So let’s first look at Personality

Personality

Matt Kemp’s personality could beat Anne Frank in a hide and go seek contest. It’s nowhere to be found. To be honest, I couldn’t tell you the difference between Matt Kemp’s voice and the governor of Ohio’s . We need to see more of Matt Kemp’s personality. He’s in the city of Los Angeles where outspoken, bright, lovable personalities shine. Take advantage of that. Do a few major interviews and let your personality shine.

Performance

Now performance is a different subject. Since he came into the league in 2006, Kemp has increased his at bats and games played each season. Only 88 games into this current season, Kemp has the 6^th best batting average in the league, 9^th in Hits, 6^th in RBIs, the 5^th best on base percentage, and the 3^rd best slugging percentage. Needless to say, he’s dominating the league and is a clear contender in the NL MVP race. Not too add, he's an NL All-Star and will be participating in the leagues Homerun Derby. But the only problem is, his team makes the Astros look like they deserve to be in the Majors. They’re last in their division, and haven’t been a contender since Manny Ramirez left the team (and were they even a TOP contender then?).

Visibility

Matt Kemp had a recent romance with R&B singer Rhianna (Yes, the I got my a** whooped by Chris Brown and turned into a goth Rhianna) which put him into the limelight and made his name a bit more well known than it was before. But that being said, he still doesn’t have the endorsement deals and media coverage that he needs to get that visibility. If he’s ever going to become a star, he needs to become more visible to the public’s eye. And again, he’s in LA so he has the prime opportunity and potential to do that. A break out performance at the Homerun Derby might help give him some visibility as well.

So with all this said Matt Kemp has the POTENTIAL to be a star that puts baseball in the forefront again. He’s had a taste of the Hollywood limelight dating Rhianna, he’s got the performance to back it up, and he’s in the right environment in Los Angeles. Now we just need to see WHO Matt Kemp is, a better team placed around him, and see him start to build on his brand.

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