Wild Thought: Not So Sori Now?
Posted by Steve L. on October 8th, 2009 · Comments (12)
So, six years later, is anyone in Yankeeland missing Alfonso Soriano? Remember, back in the day, when he finished 3rd in the 2002 A.L. MVP voting, as a member of the Yankees?
And, do you think, it’s possible, we’ll be asking the same questions about Robinson Cano in 2016?
Anywho, that’s today’s wild thought…
Lol, good title. And no, I don’t miss him striking out 4 times a playoff game.
No, I don’t miss Soriano one bit. Not only is A-Rod a much better player on his own merits, Soriano’s game has slipped badly over the past few years. I will never forget Soriano (and Aaron Boone) helplessly flailing away at sliders in the lefty batter’s box all throughout the ’03 World Series. Soriano had a lot to do with the Yanks losing that World Series.
I’m not sure I get your reference to Robbie Cano in 2016. Are you saying he’ll be traded by then or that he’ll resemble Soriano’s swing-and-miss tendencies?
@ MJ:It’s funny. I fully expect to see Cano playing for another team before he’s 30 years old. Just a gut feeling. Not sure which team, or if it will be a trade, but, I see it coming…
As far as the Sori-tie-in…here’s the connection.
Both played 2B for the Yankees. Both were young when the came up. Both, when young and N.Y., were ticketed by many to be future MVPs or batting champs, etc. Both have had questions about their work ethic. Both have an element of the game that suggests future decline – being hackers at the plate, although Soriano has/had more holes in his swing than Cano…
That’s the connection, for me.
MJ wrote:
Here’s how he got 2016:
2009 – 2002 = 7 years ago
2009 + 7 years = 2016
@ Steve Lombardi:
Gotcha. The whole work-ethic thing has to be dropped eventually, right? You can’t hold it over someone’s head forever if he had one bad year, right? Did we see any signs this year that he was dogging it? By all accounts, he not only had a great year at the plate but improved his defense back up to previous levels.
I understand the notion that he’s got to prove that it wasn’t just a one-year thing but I think I feel pretty comfortable in saying that the point was made last year that he had to show up big in ’09 or else. He did that and I’m satisfied that he’s not a dog.
As for the hacker element…he’s no OBP machine, that’s for sure. I guess we’ll see what the future holds but I don’t see why they’d want to trade him unless they get another stud like A-Rod.
buh…buh…buhhhht….
I thought trading Soriano brought us the Curse of A-Rod???
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It didn’t help the Rangers and the Cubs that Soriano turned out to be a couple of years older than he said, because that cut his productive career by a couple of years.
But seriously, how can anyone regret the trade of Cano and Arias for Rodriguez?
@ Corey:
Actually, IIRC, I just looked to see when Cano would be the age Soriano is now.
Evan3457 wrote:
I think you mean Soriano?
Well, here’s another timeline for you. They don’t trade for A-Rod. Instead, they use a bunch of guys like Mike Lamb, who suck, at 3B, in 2004. After this, they realize they need a better plan, so, in the 2005 draft, instead of taking C.J. Henry with the 17th overall pick, they pick Yunel Escobar – who ended up going 75th overall in the same draft.
Then, they get another scrub to play 3B in 2005. And, he bombs.
So, then you get a slick fielding SS for 2006 and move Jeter to 3B. The following year, you have Yunel Escobar playing SS for you with Jeter at 3B.
Yes, A-Rod’s bat in 2004-2005-2006 would be missed. But, in the long run, would this have been a better move? Maybe?
But, then again, we’re talking about a team who passed on Yunel Escobar to take C.J. Henry, right?
Getting more serious – on the A-Rod trade – let’s not forget TWO HUGE things: Boone’s knee and the MLBPA nixing the trade of A-Rod to the Red Sox. Without those happening, there’s no A-Rod in New York.
Steve Lombardi wrote:
D’oh! :-/
Two problems here. The minor problem is that if they don’t take Henry, they don’t take Escobar there. How do I know? Because they and 29 other major league teams, didn’t consider Escobar a 1st-round talent. How do I know that? Because nobody, not even the Braves took him until the late 2nd round, almost 60 picks later. The Braves didn’t take him in the 1st round; they took a lefty pitcher named Beau Jones, who, 5 years later, has yet to pitch above AA ball, and has been converted to reliever to try to salvage something from his career.
If they don’t take Henry, the Yanks are much more likely to take Craig Hansen there. The Yanks were widely criticized, at the time, for gambling on Henry, and passing up the “sure thing” in Hansen…
The other problem, which I would describe as…well, insurmountable, inconceivable, insuperable, intractable, inexorable, unworkable, unattainable and fuhgeddaboutit, is…well, at the risk of permanently exposing my sheer unmitigated geekdom, let me analogize…
There’s an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, called “Parallels“. In this episode, on the way back to the Enterprise after winning a bat’leth tournament on Forcas III (never mind, just go with it) Worf accidentally takes his shuttlecraft through a quantum fissure, which causes him to start jumping from “his” universe through several parallel universes every time he’s near Jordi LaForge (Jordi’s visor is triggering the jumps; oh, why did I ever start this…).
Anyway, he jumps through a dizzying array of universes, culminating with meeting up with approximately a bazillion other Enterprises as the fissure worsens, and the barriers between all the universes start to disintegrate. In one of them, the Borg have won and are taking over the whole galaxy, and that universe’s Enterprise is desperate to keep the fissure open, so as to escape being hunted down and assimilated…but anyway…
…in none of those bazillion universes has Derek Jeter moved off shortstop in 2006 for anyone. In 2004, he didn’t move for A-Rod, who was only the best shortstop on the planet, including having won two Gold Gloves ahead of Jeter in 2002 and 2003, when he got traded over to the Yanks. It’s 2009, and Jeter hasn’t moved yet.
Jeter…making way for Escobar? Not happening. Much more likely had the Yanks drafted him, they would’ve traded Escobar to the Braves for oh, I dunno, Mike Gonzalez, or something, after Jeter forced him to spend two extra years at AAA. Or maybe traded Cano for Matt Kemp, and moved Escobar in at 2nd.
Steve Lombardi wrote:
First, Yanks don’t make the playoffs without A-Rod in 2005. Let’s just get that out of the way right there.
Second, hard to see how keeping Soriano from ’04 to at least ’06 (where your timeline ends) would’ve made the ballclub better than it was with A-Rod. You’re forgetting Soriano’s free agency which means that you’re implying the Yanks have signed him to same contract he signed with the Cubs. Think that’s a good move? No matter what you think of the A-Rod contract — it’s indefensible, I completely agree — that doesn’t make Soriano’s contract any better.
Third, as Evan pointed out, if Jeter didn’t move off SS for every bit the superior player in A-Rod in ’04, why would he move off for some rookie named Escobar in ’07?
Guys, I was just playing around with that scenario…please don’t take it seriously.
@ Evan3457:
lmao