Griffey to Atlanta? Sounds Like It.
The Atlanta Journal Constitution reports that Griffey has agreed to terms with the Braves, though the physical hasn’t been taken and no press conference is expected until tomorrow (Edit: Link corrected – earlier link led to wrong page.
No official announcement yet, but just as it seemed 99.99% likely that Griffey would be a Mariner last week, it’s now 99.99% likely that he’ll be a Brave. Apparently, he chose proximity to his family over playing in Seattle… again.
For those of you who were itching to see Junior play in Safeco, I’m sorry. I obviously wasn’t as enthusiastic as you were, but I can still at least sympathize with your dashed hopes. I do wonder, though, if Junior spurning the fans again will burn some bridges. It’s obviously more important to a lot of Mariner fans to see him play in Seattle than it is to Griffey himself.
So, with Griffey (likely) out of the picture, where does that leave the M’s. Well, first off, let me make one request to the front office.
We Don’t Want Garret Anderson.
Barring the M’s doing something pointless like bringing in Anderson, hopefully this will push the M’s towards other options. Like, say, Nick Swisher or Nick Johnson. The Braves were seemingly the top destination for Swisher, so perhaps this pushes the Yankees to call the M’s and see if something can be worked out. Barring a move to pick up an actual productive player, though, the M’s should be willing to just go forward with what they have. There is no “washed up veteran LH hitter” position that the team has to fill. If they can’t find a potentially productive, low cost OF/DH type, they can go forward with what they have.
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Not happy.
I didn’t think it would hurt if Griffey went to Atlanta, but it does.
Yeah, we all know he is a shell of his former self. However, it sure would have been nice to see Griffey wearing #24 for the Mariners one last season. I might be living in the past, but what team doesn’t? Griffey is our Mickey Mantle. The past brings great memories and to just ignore it is difficult.
I hate this feeling… again.
This story just posted claims that Griffey hasn’t decided where he’s going yet.
http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090217&content_id=3839426&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb
The beat continues.
Unfortunatly, I live in Bakersfield…
Got to see Triunfel in person a few times though…
That’s a plus…
We should all hate Griffey just for dragging this out so long.
Just make a decision already.
So according to Street, apparently Griffey hasn’t, in fact, made up his mind yet.
“We are still kicking things around with my family and have not made a decision,” Griffey said from his Orlando, Fla., home. The 39-year-old said he hopes to make a decision “later today or early tomorrow morning.”
I bet he still winds up gimping around in a left field platoon situation with Matt Diaz in ATL.
False hope before the KO punch. I love it.
End. END.
yeah i saw him once last year — be nice if the team stuck around just to have some baseball to watch
This has been one of the best off seasons for drama! Will he, won’t he! Ichiro is a cancer!
New GM who thinks. Etc.
Wow, just like a man soap opera.
Hmm. Not to be the party pooper, and I certainly don’t view this as a mistake on Z’s part – but if Griffey does rebound to 30 HR form (what did Dave give? 5% odds?). Then Z could be in for a local media storm. Just imagine what they would say about “the guy who wouldn’t give Griffey a ‘lousy” 5 mil’ to ‘come home'” if he ends up hitting 50 HRs in Atlanta over the next two seasons?
I hate to root against Griffey, but for Z’s sake I sure hope Grif doesn’t surge in Atlanta and we can all just forget about the last two weeks and simply applaud him when he goes into the Hall in an Ms cap.
maybe he’s dragging it out so that he can capture the air time now that Alex has finally had his press conference.
Brett Favre called, he wants his flip-flopping shtick back.
It appears to me, from the Baker articles, like his “sources” are inside the Atlanta organization. No reason to fault Griffey if Atlanta is leaking to try to swing things their way. There’s also no reason to fault Griffey for the Branyan “leak” last week.
I have no reason to believe Griffey or his agent have been leaking this. It’s an important decision for him — if Atlanta came into the picture late and he wants to think about it for a couple days it’s not fair to criticize him for that.
Man, that’s the best line I’ve heard all week. (Granted, it’s Tuesday; but it’s Tuesday *afternoon* here.)
Reminds me of an electronic baseball game we played when we were kids: it determined outcomes based on career batting averages, power #s etc. We did things like put Babe Ruth at short, Ty Cobb at catcher, Ted Williams in Center, and Barry Bonds at pitcher.
Of course, that’s the Jim Bowden school for fielding (punny!) a baseball team: screw second base; I’m going have a guy at short-center. With a fly-ball oriented staff, I’ll field 4– no 5– outfielders and we’ll all be ok. In fact, unless a guy’s on base, I’m going to move the “catcher” into the field too– just have the pitcher toss fastballs at the ump’s gut, like Ethan Martin’s brother.
The lust for Griffey around these parts has nothing to do with being rational. None of these sentiments are rational either:
This is purely sentiment (and there’s no wrath like a mancrush scorned). Rationality has exactly zero to do with it, so making rational arguments is just wasted effort. As much of the output on this site over the past week demonstrates.
I doubt Zduriencik has this high on his worry list. He could get hit by a bus crossing the street, too, but I doubt that stops him from leaving the house. At this point, the odds of a complete financial meltdown causing him to have to cut the payroll in half probably worry him more.
The Rays say “hi.”
It’s also known as “negotiation” — you mean you’ve never tried to walk out of the car dealership to see if they’ve really given you their “best deal”? Griffey isn’t deciding to retire and then un-retiring; he (or his agent) now have two live fish so they’re trying to play them off against each other. Bargaining 101.
I keep thinking Anderson is a lock, then i remembered we no longer have Bavasi and his love of being the Angel’s retirement home.
Losing Griffey does suck, but in reality it is probably better for the team to not have him.
I’d love to get Swisher/Nady but i just don’t see it, but i remain hopeful that Washburn+$ for Johnson can happen, especially with Perez going back on his verbal agreement. If not we could bring in Jim Edmonds to be our Washed Up Veteran Club House leader.
Yeah, this is pretty obvious, especially with him txting Z. “There’s still time for you to up the ante!” Let him go; let’s talk about how awesome a fielder Endy Chavez is some more.
I don’t think Zduriencik is necessarily concerned about it at all. However, I’m concerned about it on his behalf. Based on what I’ve seen so far the last thing I want is to see Z not getting the true chance he deserves because LincStrong prematurely bows to the talk radio/casual fan lobby.
None of that means we should throw more money at Griffey, just that it would be a nightmare scenario for our shiny new GM.
Just sign w/ Atlanta already, Junior. Enough talk about someone who’ll mostly be a non-factor in the field.
Jr. can come back for a day next year to retire, and see his jersey put up in Safeco. Surely, that’s enough for the fans to get their Griffey fix?
I do wonder, though, if Junior spurning the fans again will burn some bridges.
I doubt it. If they weren’t put off by how he left town in the first place, why would they be disillusioned by this? He can always come back to Seattle next year, the logic will go.
“TumwaterMike on February 17th, 2009 9:18 am
Do you think the Yankees would go for a Jarrod Washburn for Nick Swisher deal, if the M’s took up some of Washburns salary? The Yankees still need another starter so they can keep Joba in the pen where he’s better suited.”
Aaaaaaaargh. Can we please kill this proposal? Please? It’s not going to happen. I’m pretty sure that Cashman realizes that:
1) Joba is better as a starter (just like Morrow).
2) Washburn is awful, and with Wang, Sabathia, Pettitte, Burnett, Chamberlain, Hughes, Kennedy, Coke and Aceves, the Yankees don’t need a crappy, overpaid fifth starter.
3) Just because a team gives up very little to acquire a player doesn’t mean he has no value.
4) Swisher is better than Nady and is under team control longer.
5) There’s no real imperative to trade him.
6) The Yankees actually have a relatively thin outfield, since Matsui can only DH and CF is a question mark.
So why, exactly, would a team take on an elderly, expensive pitcher they have very little need for in exchange for a relatively young, cheap outfielder who’s probably in line to start?