In baseball, timing is everything. Timing the delivery to
the plate. Timing your swing. Or, in the case of Will Middlebrooks and Ben
Cherington, timing a trade.
This is one thing that Theo was pretty good at. When he traded
a popular player, the schedule often worked in his favor. Trading Manny? Better
make sure your next ten games or so are against lesser opponents. That way the
team will win right after the trade, and make the deal look good. When Ben
Cherington traded Kevin Youkilis, he got that part pretty well take care of. He
got the next nine games to be against Toronto, Seattle, and Oakland. The Sox
should cruise through those series. The trade will look better with every
victory. But, he didn’t exactly do Will Middlebrooks any favors.
Middlebrooks was off to a blazing hot start to his career.
He can’t keep up that pace. Mike Schmidt would have had trouble keeping up that
pace. He was going to cool off. The problem came down to timing.
Kevin Youkilis was traded at Middlebrooks’s peak. He was
even named the AL player of the week for the week prior to the trade. That’s a
pretty good peak. Then Youkilis was traded. The third base job was given to
Middlebrooks. I actually heard a radio moron ask on Monday if Will would be
able to handle the pressure of being an everyday third baseman. They were
already setting him up. Would he be able to keep up his production under the
intense pressure of being a starter in Boston? Of course the radio moron knew
the answer was “no.” Middlebrooks would not be the player of the week every
week for the rest of his career. His production was going to fall off. Bingo. A
story was created.
Naturally, Middlebrooks has cooled a bit. He has something
like one hit since Youkilis was traded. Chances are he won’t be going 3-3
tonight against King Felix. Even if he goes 1-3 in Seattle, the radio moron
will be able to talk about him batting .150 since the trade. The story he
invented will suddenly have legs. And that’s all the media needs. Legs. Callers
will call in supporting this ridiculous theory. Callers will call in opposing
the idea. Then, writers will ask Middlebrooks about it. Is the pressure getting
to you? They’ll ask his teammates. Is Will crumbling under the expectations
that come with being a starter? He’s only 1-11. He made that error, remember?
The made up story keeps going.
If only Cherington had traded Youkilis this weekend instead
of last. Middlebrooks could have been spared all this nonsense. He could have
come back next week and performed well. Then, instead of “crumbling under
pressure” he could have “seized his opportunity.”
The only difference would have been timing.
No comments:
Post a Comment