All last year, the Jesus Montero trade - (I believe I called it "the debacle") - looked like a long range Yankee death and the reason to - as Hunter Thompson would say - stuff Brian Cashman into a bottle and put him out with the Japanese tide.
Today, vindication - maybe?
The Mariners sent Montero to Triple A, where he increasingly looks like the ghost of Sam Horn, the man, not the website. The guy wasn't hitting or playing well at catcher. He'll now DH, play 1B and try to forget the seven years of idolatry that was bestowed upon him by the Yankiverse while he climbed through the system, apparently neglecting the finer points of defense despite the warnings by his coaches.
Hector Noesi, a disaster last year for Seattle, recently shut us down for several innings in a Mariner victory. He is now Seattle's jewel of the trade.
Michael Pineda - aka "Pinata" - is pitching in extended spring training, and hopefully completed the 12-step program he likely was ordered to take after his embarrassing DUI last year. By the way, that could be the best thing that ever happened to him. We still don't know what to expect - if anything - from the guy.
And then there is Jose Campos, the sleeper cell the deal, who likely was over-hyped last year after Pineda went down, and the Yankees desperately tried to save face. He's in Charleston, throwing games with pitch counts so severe that it's impossible to gauge how he's doing.
Right now, I score the trade:
SEATTLE .0005
NEW YORK .0000
Two words: Ricky Ledee. A cheerful young man whose dream was to play with the Yankees, but when he was traded, you could see it on his face and in his body language--devastation. Except for one .285 year, he never recovered from the trauma. Career also-ran.
ReplyDeleteNow, he didn't set the world on fire with the Yankees at the beginning of his major league career, true. But this is one of those cases of 'who knows'. Would he have blossomed, or at least blossomed more than he ever did? Was the psychological shipwreck he became avoidable had he remained with us?
We will never know. Just as we will never know about Jesus.
Seattle is a cold, gloomy, damp place when you've been raised to bleed blue pinstripes.
The ballplayer's psyche can be the most injury-prone thing of all.
(Cue violin)
dang! little jesus sure looked like the second coming in the Bronx. consider that seattle has gotten negative returns from montero and from smoak, who came over in the cliff lee deal. maybe the climate is bad for hitting, as John suggests, or maybe their coaches suck.
ReplyDeleteThey're all on Prozac ins Seattle. What a depressing place.
ReplyDelete