Thursday, October 13, 2011

Before we trade Jesus, consider this: The Tigers are in the ACLS thanks to the two players most compared to him

The latest Yankiverse parlor game is to smoke crack and fantasize what we'll get for Jesus Montero in a trade, because we have no place for him in our star-dappled lineup.

Too bad Detroit wasn't similarly inclined when it stupidly snagged Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez. We'd still be playing.

In fact, if you wrestled Cabrera and Martinez in a time machine/blender and turned the knob to "2005-Puree," you'd get Jesus Jelly. He's got the hitting potential of Cabrera, back when Mig crashed his way into the Marlins lineup, and the catching question marks of young V-Mart, lumbering into Cleveland long ago.

Both players bounced around, in part because Cabrera likes to party and Martinez couldn't hold baserunners. Last week, they were the Scilla and Carybdis of the Tiger batting order, reminscent of Manny and Big Papi in the mid-2000s, in the way they decimated Yankee pitchers.

So we now look to jettison Jesus? Truth be told, nobody knows if he will have a Cabrera/Martinez career. He could be the next Ruben Rivera. But in his best year, sometime around age 28, Jesus could be an MVP-level hitter -- the kind of rock other teams -- like us? -- desperately try to pitch around.

Any other team in baseball can somehow find a place for a guy like that.

If we cannot, something is seriously, ridiculously askew.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Members of the blog can comment. To receive an e-mailed invitation, write to johnandsuzyn@gmail.com. And check spam if it doesn't show up. (Google account required.)

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.