When players age, the become known, to me at least, as travelers. I'm not referring to people like Chipper Jones and Mariano Rivera, who thankfully decides to stay the same place for a while. No. I'm referring to players who used to be regular players on teams for stretches of time, but now that they're older, they resort to thinking teams one year at a time.
Most of the time it's the career hitter nearing the end of his rope. He always sides with fun teams, and never brings me against him. Also, players like these have a tendency to always appear on the wrong team in the Topps regular series. Hell, sometimes they're on the wrong team in the update set, thanks to the Waiver Deal Firesale of 2009.
But it's usually somebody who used to be a really great player for a great team...who can't seem to find a place to stay more than one season at. And there are lots of players like this- Hideki Matsui, Vladimir Guerrero, Jim Thome, Manny Ramirez...the list goes on and on.
But one that kinda perplexes me is Johnny Damon.
Sure, he's getting old, and he won't always hit homers for you, but I never understood why the Yankees shunned him like they did after the 2009 season. He was a pretty good outfielder, he could definitely hit, and he established a pretty good career with the previous teams. Is he a Hall of Famer? Probably not. But was he a good piece to our lineup? Yeah. And we should have kept him around.
Unfortunately, Cashman saw that Randy Winn would be a better left fielder than Damon. And we all know where that went.
Damon has spent the last two seasons in two uniforms, and is now residing in his fourth uniform in four years. True, that's no Octavio Dotel ratio, but it's kinda mind boggling considering that he's a decent player. Yeah, he's a DH, but he at least is a bit more mobile than most of the other DH's out there.
Either way, I hope Cleveland enjoys him. And vice versa. And I hope he at least sticks with this team.
Coming Tomorrow- Hidden behind the failure of Tim Lincecum is the #2 guy, a recently contracted youngster who's finally earning to become the superstar.
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