Jon Weber, 32-year-old career minor leaguer who hit .452 this spring, won the once-prestigious James P. Dawson Award as the outstanding Yankee rookie in spring training.
He gets a watch.
Hopefully, it glows in the dark, because they're Weber to the Scranton coal mine, where he might never be heard from again, except for an occasional tapping on the walls.
The Dawson Award, named for a NYT sportswriter, began in 1956 with Norm Siebern. Since then, it's illustrious winners have included Gordon Windhorn, Arturo Lopez, Rusty Torres, Otto Velez, Tom Busky, George Zeber, Kevin Hughes, Hensley Muelens, Mike Humphreys, Mark Hutton, Bubba Crosby and -- of course -- Kei Igawa.
More painful are the winners who turned out to be great players -- against us: Bill Robinson, Tippy Martinez, Jose Rijo, Bob Tewskbury, Al Leiter, Sterling Hitchcock...
Of course, Don Mattingly won in 1983. Roy White won in 1965. Willie Randolph in 1976.
Marinano never won. Jorge has no watch. Andy? Nope. Phil Hughes? Joba? Uh-uh. Nada.
Behold the last 10 Watchmen:
1999 – None
2000 – None
2001 – Alfonso Soriano, 2B
2002 – Nick Johnson, 1B
2003 – Hideki Matsui, OF
2004 – Bubba Crosby, OF
2005 – Andy Phillips, INF
2006 – Eric Duncan, INF
2007 – Kei Igawa, P
2008 – Shelley Duncan, INF/OF
2009 – Brett Gardner, OF
Message of this Holy Weekend: Good luck Jon Weber.
3 comments:
As long as everyone knows that Alphonso won it, I'm down with it.
Chad Jennings over at LoHud said that Posada won it in '97...
Let's hope they'll have the decency to call up Weber in September.
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