Tuesday, February 2, 2010

What Were You Doing?


On your 22nd birthday. Likely reveling in the awesomeness of youth; imbibing alcohol heavily and fooling around with a girl out of your league. A student winding down your undergrad studies perhaps. Wearing your unemployment beard with pride while wearily considering another night at a local bar named for animal anatomy.

What you certainly WERE NOT doing on your 22nd was carrying the hopes and dreams of thousands of middle-aged obsessives around. You certainly didn't Google your own name and find page after page of written decrying your inability to play right field, your inability to control the strikezone, or your inability to gel with The Benevolent Manger. You didn't have grown men &mdash many of whom proudly carry their weight across the midsection and likely bleed high fructose corn syrup &mdash question your conditioning and dedication to fitness. You didn't have anonymous weirdos calling you fat and deciding another year in the minors was "best for you" from their cubicles at Soulsuckers Inc.

You didn't have 11 major league home runs to your name and 101 strikeouts. You didn't own a .915 career minor league OPS. You, dear reader, definitely had something to prove at the minor league level. Travis Snider does not.

Let him play. In the Big Leagues. Every day. Let no Ruiz nor Delgado; no Damon, Lind, Wallace nor Gathright stand in his way. Let him play and grow and we'll all be better for it.

One other minor detail: when you were 22 years old, you hadn't received a $1,700,000 signing bonus upon graduation of high school. You didn't earn $401,400 last year and you sure as shit aren't going to earn a little more next year. He is. Go earn it Snider.

Update: fixed some grammar in the last paragraph.

Reuters Image courtesy of Daylife
Posted by Drew
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7 comments:

  1. Wouldn't it be best for the organization long term if they kept him in the minors for a month or so, then brought him up? Or has the free agent clock started ticking already and any demotion will no longer prolong his time before becoming free agent eligable?

    Regardless, I agree, let him play.
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  2. I want to watch the all Snider, all the time channel. I want my angry young man. And even though he walks 13% of the time, I want no part of Bautista in the leadoff spot. Its nothing personal, but I want what I want for the price of the ticket.
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  3. And you are more than entitled to that sir/madam. My contempt for Bautista is well documented, I'd rather watch Snider struggle and LEARN than Bautista suck for four months then finally figure it out in September.
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  4. Good point...If this is a rebuilding year, it won't hurt having Snider at least attempt to get better in the outfield, rather than Bautista eat up is developmental time. The whole team shouldn't suffer to make our young pitchers feel more "confident"...they (and Cito) need to understand the whole team is young and needs to build confidence.
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  5. I'd like to see Snider get a fulltime job unless he shows he shows he can't at least have average production, and I'd like to see Ruiz get the same opportunity. I feel like Bautista's ceiling is pretty obvious - he should spell players at a bunch of positions and play every game that a lefty is on the mound, but don't make him the regular lead-off.
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  6. When I was 22 I definitely did not receive a 1.7 million dollar signing bonus upon graduation of high school. Huh?
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  7. Sorry, my tenses didn't agree. I fixed it. Thanks for the input.
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