The Kid bows out of the picture

Ken Griffey Jr. may have been our generation's Mickey Mantle, the player who was admired and beloved beyond his home stadium, the kid who managed to do things on a baseball field that few other players of his time could do.

I have vivid memories of Griffey's career from start to finish, which came yesterday when he announced his retirement. His decision came 23 years to the day after he was drafted first overall by the Mariners and 75 years to the day that Babe Ruth ended his career. Griffey's will undoubtedly lead to the same place: a plaque on a wall in Cooperstown six years and one month from now.

My first Griffey memory comes not from a play or a home run, but from a card. Many of us had it, the 1989 Upper Deck, No. 1. Card No. 1 in set No. 1, it turns out. Griffey didn't just turn around a franchise in the Mariners and get a new ballpark built in Seattle, he launched a business when Upper Deck came onto the scene. (And Junior may have indirectly sunk an industry, because after Upper Deck's emergence on the scene, the baseball card market quickly became saturated and the bubble -- such as it was -- burst.) So here's the story of how I came to own my 1989 Upper Deck #1, Ken Griffey Jr.

In August 1989, my family was on its annual vacation to visit family in Maine, my mother's brother and his family. With my most recent issue of Beckett Baseball Card Monthly packed in my bag, I noticed that there was a pretty sizeable baseball card show about half an hour away. With an idle afternoon at our disposal, I convinced my dad to drive me up to Augusta, the state capital, and drop me off at the convention center where the show was. Uninterested in browsing, Dad went off to check out a bait-and-tackle shop or some similar fishing outpost with the understanding that he'd pick me up an hour later at the spot where I got out of the car.

I went inside and sauntered up and down the aisles, buying a few individual cards and packs here and there. I may have blown through my vacation budget in that hour, or I may have wisely left some cash back at my uncle's in order to limit how much I spent on baseball cards. Either way, I walked out of the card show with exactly $4 in my wallet.

Dad wasn't there yet, so I sat down on a bench to wait, looking through my new purchases. I don't remember a single thing I bought at that show, but I remember a collector stopping to chat with me as he headed inside with a briefcase of cards. I don't remember what we talked about to break the ice, but I do know that he asked where I was from and when I said I grew up near the Jersey Shore and Sandy Hook, he knew that area. At some point, the Griffey card came up and he opened his brief case and handed me one. I looked it over closely; I had never held one -- it was in a protective sleeve, but it was still the first time I'd been able to examine one so closely, on my own terms. As Darren Rovell wrote in that Slate piece (also linked above), this was a card that came to define a generation of collectors. At the time, we couldn't see it in that light, but we still knew it was a collecting status symbol, a benchmark, a cardboard holy grail to attain.

It was beautiful. The smiling kid -- I'm guessing he had to be 16 or 17 in that picture, likely taken in his high-school uniform -- in a navy-blue turtleneck with gold chains resting on it, a white jersey, an "S" airbrushed onto his cap, a bat resting on his left shoulder. In place of the team logo was a "Rookie" banner, so looking at the front of the card, the gold "S" on the blue cap is the only indication that the kid from Florida was the Mariners' -- and baseball's -- No. 1 prospect.

I handed the card back to the collector, who then went into his sales pitch. At the time, the card was valued at $10 -- to a kid a few weeks away from his 13th birthday, a pretty substantial price for a picture of a baseball player -- but the collector offered to sell it to me for half that, $5. Knowing he'd already cut the price in half, I didn't even try to negotiate it further. "I'm sorry," I said, "but I literally only have $4." He understood and put the card back into his briefcase.

We chatted for a few more minutes before he got up to go into the convention center to do business. But then he turned and put the briefcase down on the bench and opened it. "Here you go," he said, handing me a Griffey card. "You sound like a big fan and collector. You should have one." Stunned, I went for my wallet to give him my last $4. "Don't worry about it," he said. "Just take the card."

He wouldn't take my money, so I got the hottest card of the year for free. I still have it, in what I imagine is the same protective sleeve, kept in a narrow cardboard box -- pretty much exactly the width of a hard protective baseball card sleeve -- with my other most-prized cards.

My next lasting encounters with Griffey were on TV, watching him rob a disbelieving Jesse Barfield of a home run at Yankee Stadium and his dash home in Game 5 of the 1995 ALDS.

And then came the saga of 1999, leading up to The Kid ultimately being traded to the Reds for Mike Cameron, Brett Tomko, Antonio Perez and Minor Leaguer Jake Meyer. Sad day for the Mariners, but at least Cameron has had a productive Major League career -- and he once hit four home runs in a game, one more than Griffey ever did. I hoped Junior would be dealt to the Mets, but it was not to be. So my friends and I made a point to go to Griffey's first appearance at Shea Stadium, on April 25, 2000, and watch him go 0-for-3 with two walks and three strikeouts -- twice against Al Leiter and once against Armando Benitez to end the game, a 6-5 Mets win, with Sean Casey on first base as the tying run. We sat in the left-field mezzanine, in a box at the front of the section in fair territory. As the game went on, fans in that corner increased their razzing of Rickey Henderson. By the late innings, the field was littered with hot dogs, likely thrown from one of the suites below us, because I can't imagine anyone in the stands paying $5 for a hot dog only to throw it onto the field a dozen times over to make a statement at a player.

I saw Griffey again at Shea on June 19, 2006. He homered off of Orlando Hernandez that night, the 548th home run of his career, No. 12 of 27 that season. He hit just 82 more, the last coming in the final game of 2009. The third and final chance I got to see him came last summer, when my wife and I planned a visit to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland for a weekend when the Indians were home. The Mariners were in town and Griffey went 0-for-3 as the DH, walking once and scoring on Franklin Gutierrez's home run. Junior was batting .215 after that game, one point higher than he'd finish the season. At .184 through 98 at-bats this season, it was clear that the time had come.

I'm glad he decided to bow out now. The whole clubhouse nap flap was the beginning of the end, and once that controversy came to light, it really became a matter of whether he'd try to finish the season or hang 'em up before then. It was starting to become depressing to see him come to bat as a pinch-hitter and ground out or do little more than punch a soft single into the shallow outfield, then jog to the bench as a pinch-runner. As a fan, I like to see players go out on their own terms, but I don't want to see them hanging on for one last shot at glory. They can't all have Ted Williams endings, hitting a home run in the final at-bat, at home no less. In many ways, it's a shame Griffey didn't decide to retire after last season, when he homered in the final game of the season, in Seattle. Whether he announced it at the start of the homestand, the start of the series, before that final game or after, or even a week later, to know that that game was the last time he'd button up the jersey and tie on his cleats would have been a fitting finale.

Last night was nice as the highlight film rolled on MLB Network, ESPN and MLB.com and the Mariners broadcast became a 10-inning retrospective on his career. To me, the only thing that could've made it better was if Griffey had been there. If I were scripting it, Griffey would've made the announcement at a pregame press conference, then taken the lineup card out to the umpires before the game. As far as I know, there was no transaction made, so he was still on the active roster and could have been in uniform. He then could've spent the game the way Cal Ripken did when he stopped his consecutive-games played streak in September 1998 against the Yankees: watching from the bullpen, warming up the outfielders, shaking hands and chatting with fans between innings. Ripken did it because he'd never had a chance to do those things after playing in every game for 16 years. If Griffey had done it, it would've served as a reminder that he was once The Kid who took batting practice wearing his cap backward, loving the game. But at least, in the end, Junior went out when he wanted to go out, not when he kept looking for a team to sign him when none would. He may have left a little later than his ability allowed, but at least he chose when to go.

Well played, Kid.

Snow day

After one round of shoveling, the snow's still coming down here in New Jersey and the sidewalks and steps are again beneath a few inches. The plows haven't been back in hours, but at this point I may just wait for the morning, when it's all finished. At least I won't have to shovel all 12 inches at once.

What better weather to think ahead to one week from today, when the first groups of pitchers and catchers will stroll into spring camps in Florida and Arizona, a day before their first workouts. But it also reminds me of three years ago, when the Indians and Mariners had their opening series in Cleveland snowed out. I wonder how long before we see a scene like that at Target Field.

The breezy comfort of a Midwestern, Rust Belt summer evening

This is the problem with having a blog but not being diligent about updating it through the season. I'll start a post but then get distracted or bored or tired and will leave it for later. And then it will completely slip my mind, and "later" is then defined as "months after I started." So in an effort to turn some of these drafts into posts, I'm going back to finish them off, continuity and relevance be damned. Sadly (for me), this first effort, a review of a visit last July to Cleveland, will be truncated and less detailed than if I'd written upon returning home -- or even returning to our downtown hotel, within a convenient walk and with a top-floor room with a view of the ballpark. Procrastination: It kills (memories).



Progressive Field, home of the Indians, was my 24th ballpark (16th active), and though it's considered one of the "new" ones because it opened in 1994, after Comiskey Park and Camden Yards, it's now the 13th-oldest ballpark in baseball. That is, more than half of the current parks are newer. I mean seriously, think about that: More than half of baseball's 30 teams play in stadiums built in the last 20 years. In the NL East, the home of the Marlins is the oldest park, opened in 1987. In other words, the Mets' last World Series title predates every ballpark in the division. When the Marlins move into their new stadium in two years, Atlanta's Turner Field -- built for the 1996 Olympics -- will then be the oldest of the five in the NL East, meaning each one will have opened since I graduated from high school.

Jacobs Field was actually the next stadium to open after Oriole Park, so the two of them share the distinction of being at the front of the "retro trend" in stadium design, the move away from grand, hulking, massive arenas on the edge of the city limits to more cozy, intimate parks nestled into downtown or other neighborhoods. But what if the White Sox had accepted the Oriole Park blueprint instead of going big when they built the new Comiskey Park? The whole alignment of new parks as we know them might've been skewed.

My wife and I were there on one of the Indians' "retro Saturdays," when the team wore their off-white alternate uniforms, the night had a theme (ours was Beach Night) and the fans walked the concourse with their bobblehead giveaways -- Surfin Sizemore in our case -- in their arms. We watched a cover band sing Jimmy Buffett tunes from a stage set up by a temporary beach on the plaza outside the left-field gate, then took our time walking around the concourse to our seats on the first-base side. We got dinner, sampled several local brews and enjoyed the breezy comfort of a Midwestern, Rust Belt summer evening. At a souvenir stand on the right-field concourse, I chose my retro hat as Casey tried to convince a middle-aged man to buy a four-foot tall Chief Wahoo statue for $250.

From our seats just past first base, we had a great view as the players hustled down the line on groundouts and base hits. Ken Griffey Jr., Ichiro, Grady Sizemore, Shin-Soo Choo, Victor Martinez and the rest made the turn to the infield on a base hit or veered into foul territory when their batting average took a hit. When Franklin Gutierrez hit a two-run homer with Griffey on in the fourth, the two met at home plate and tapped their helmets against one another to celebrate.

That homer proved to be the difference as the Mariners won, 3-1, and with a listless Indians offense against Jarrod Washburn, it was clear when the Tribe scored in the seventh that it would be too little, too late. We spent the last few innings walking the concourse some more, getting one last beer in the bottom of the seventh and pausing at different vantage points for a different view. On the way out, Casey stopped to photograph the vegetable mosaics lining the walkway along 6th St. past Quicken Arena (home of LeBron) as the ballpark crowd filed past us. The pedestrian mall of 4th St. was loud and lively, the neon of the restaurants and bars casting a Kodachrome glow over our faces. We walked into the majestic lobby of our hotel in the historic Guardian Bank Building and rode the elevator to our top floor. Out our corner window, I looked over the rooftops to the soft glow coming from the ballpark. The toothbrush-like light towers were dimmed, leaving enough light to illuminate the seats and field for cleanup crews to finish their tasks for the night. Just to the right, 4th St. glowed with a bright energy.

Just a little this 'n that

This year's Hot Stove, Cool Music event features Mets GM Omar Minaya during the roundtable discussion at Fenway Park. It will be interesting to see what he has to say. (It will also be interesting to see what Bill Janovitz has to say after the music portion in the evening.)

Matt Holliday switched his number from 15 to 7, so tweets Matthew Leach. Passaic, N.J.'s own Mark DeRosa wore it last year, essentially by virtue of getting traded to St. Louis before Holliday.

The Rangers may have finally figured out how to pitch to Vladimir Guerrero: In batting practice. They've reportedly offered the former MVP a $7 million contract. Among American League teams, only Seattle has allowed more home runs (28) and RBIs (84) to the aging slugger than Texas has (24 and 68, respectively). And Vlad's .396 career batting average against Rangers pitching is his best mark against any team.

2008 preview: AL West

I'm not sure how much predicting, per se, I'm going to do with my previews this year. I didn't even do any last year, so I think I'd grown tired of the standard prognostication that everyone does this time of year and over the next six weeks. I will still list the teams in each division in the order I think they'll finish, and in that space between the Red Sox-A's series in Japan and the true opening of the season on March 31, I may take a crack at how the postseason might shake out, but I don't know that I want to put numbers on player performances like I have in the past. There's a lot I'm looking forward to seeing this season, and I think I'll make that the focus of these posts. That's not to say I won't change my mind by the time I'm through with the divisions, but it's how I'll start.

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LOS ANGELES ANGELS OF ANAHEIM

In general

Don't underestimate the Angels' ability to add another starter (Jon Garland) and the right-handed power bat they needed (Torii Hunter) -- if not the one they wanted (Alex Rodriguez or Miguel Cabrera) -- without having to give up young pitching or their top young hitters in established second baseman Howie Kendrick or shortstop/third base prospect Brandon Wood. Now the question remains is whether or not Wood can win a job and stick with the club -- and produce the 25-30 home runs he's capable of in his first full big-league season. Down the road, he could be a 40-homer guy.

Shortstop Orlando Cabrera is the only significant loss from last year's AL West champions, and his departure brought in Garland. Erick Aybar will man shortstop to start the season and the flexible Chone Figgins will take third, but Wood will be waiting in the wings for one of those spots. The Angels in the outfield will be the best in the game, particularly when Gary Matthews Jr. plays left field, with Hunter in center and Vladimir Guerrero in right. Hunter and Matthews will run down just about everything with loft underneath it, while Guerrero will fire anything that hits the grass into the infield so quickly that the runners will hesitate to take an extra base or be thrown out trying. It's not a bad hitting group, either, though Matthews' 18 homers and 72 RBIs weren't really what owner Artie Moreno paid for when he signed him to a five-year, $50 million deal last winter. Garret Anderson is a liability because of his injury history and advancing age (36 on June 30), but he's penciled in as the cleanup hitter between Guerrero and Hunter. The young right side of the infield -- Casey Kotchman and Kendrick -- will be a joy to watch as they gain experience.

The rotation is stacked with Cy Young contender John Lackey at the front, followed by Garland, Jered Weaver, the only Santana left in the AL (Ervin) and Joe Saunders, who is a fill-in until No. 2 Kelvim Escobar recovers from his shoulder soreness. Lackey and Escobar would actually match up well with Erik Bedard and Felix Hernandez in Seattle, but Anaheim clearly has the better depth through the back end. The bullpen, anchored by Francisco Rodriguez and set up by Scot Shields and Justin Speier, remains one of the best in the league, so to beat these Angels, you're going to have to keep them to four or five runs -- or fewer -- on most nights.

What I look forward to seeing


How good will this outfield be? They all can hit and they all can field, even when Anderson is out in left with Matthews at DH. Hunter has a new home for the first time in his career, which may make a difference, and it will be interesting to see how he responds to the life-altering contract he signed minutes before Thanksgiving. Figgins' six-hit game last year was thrilling to watch, particularly because he won it with that sixth hit, and he's a fun player to focus on each time he's on the field. He's got the speed to swipe 80 bases, which is something you don't see in today's game outside of Shea Stadium. But I'll be most interested in Wood's progress. His arrival would give the Angels a potential homegrown infield of future All-Stars. And I think he's got the kind of power that makes it a risk to leave your seat if he's due to bat in the inning.

SEATTLE MARINERS

In general

Adding Bedard to the rotation in front of Hernandez easily gives them the most impressive young 1-2 punch in the division, but where do they go after that? Jarrod Washburn, Carlos Silva and Miguel Batista? Does that scare anyone? The Mariners have the modern-day equivalent of Spahn and Sain and pray for rain. Except that they have a retractable roof at Safeco Field, so that approach won't help them at home. Beyond the starters, they have a closer in J.J. Putz who won't lose many -- if any -- games with a lead after eight innings, but the question will be getting the lead to him. Slated to set him up are untested second-year man Brendan Morrow and unheard-of Sean Green.

Offensively, Ichiro will rap out 200 hits and cover the ground in center field, but Jose Vidro batting second as the powerless DH and Raul Ibanez in the three-hole? Adrian Beltre can slug 30 homers as the cleanup guy, Kenji Johjima should provide decent protection as the fifth hitter, but then you fall into the abyss of inconsistency and, in two cases, longevity issues with Richie Sexson and Brad Wilkerson. Rounding out the order are middle infielders Jose Lopez and Yuniesky Betancourt.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Just how good will Bedard and Hernandez be? It'll be a treat for fans in other AL cities when the Mariners come to town with the two both slated to pitch. Can Ichiro keep it up? I love watching him hit and hope his career carries on into his 40s to see just how many base knocks he piles up. Can Putz put up Eckersley numbers? His 1.38 ERA and 0.70 WHIP are on the block, and 82 strikeouts with just 13 walks are in the neighborhood. Does he get even better this year? And does Sexson become this generation's Rob Deer?

TEXAS RANGERS

In general

They didn't really lose anything in bidding adieu to Sammy Sosa, Wilkerson and Akinori Otsuka, but the additions of Josh Hamilton, Kazuo Fukumori, Milton Bradley, Ben Broussard, Jason Jennings and Eddie Guardado don't do much for me beyond Hamilton and Fukumori. Bradley could pay off, but the question remains if he'll be ready by Opening Day after his knee injury last year. And Jennings is coming off that horrendous year in Houston, while Guardado is starting a season for the first time after Tommy John surgery. A former closer, he'll probably start out as a setup man along with Fukumori and one of last year's co-closers at the end of the season, C.J. Wilson and Joaquin Benoit. The other will finish off games.

But how many? A rotation that starts with Kevin Millwood -- an ace by default only -- and pencils in Jennings as its No. 2 ahead of Vicente Padilla, Brandon McCarthy and Kason Gabbard isn't going to inspire many pitching duels.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre lineup we've come to know in recent years is a shell of its former self. Mark Teixeira is gone and Hank Blalock was -- or wasn't -- on the trading block this winter; if he was, it doesn't look like he drew much interest. Setting the table ahead of No. 3 hitter Michael Young will be left to a possible platoon of Frank Catalanotto and Nelson Cruz leading off followed by Ian Kinsler. The duo at the top leaves a lot to be desired (though Cruz is an unknown quantity and could pay off), but Kinsler may be ready to make another step toward being the heir to Alfonso Soriano that the Rangers think he can be. Bradley, Hamilton and Blalock will form the meat of the order, while the bottom third should feature super stud Jarrod Saltalamacchia (got that spelling correct on the first try, without looking), either as the catcher over Gerald Laird or as the first baseman over -- or along with -- Broussard. One-time Phillies prospect Marlon Byrd likely will man right.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Just how good will Kinsler be? Can he keep improving? He got off to a hot start last year -- .298, nine homers, 22 RBIs in April -- but had just six homers and 26 RBIs after the All-Star break, despite hitting .288 in the second half (as opposed to .241 overall in the first half). Fatigue may have been a factor in his second-half power decline, but his .045 rise in OBP in the second half helped Kinsler post a .807 post-break OPS after just .786 in the first half. Can Salty be as big as his name? Will the Hamilton feel-good story continue? And when will Bradley snap? Watching him in each new city is like watching the Grammys last Sunday to see whether Amy Winehouse could keep it together for her performance, which took place live from a London studio -- meaning she had to sit around until about 4 a.m. with any manner of elixirs to pass the time.

OAKLAND ATHLETICS

In general

I put them last because just who are these guys? Gone are Dan Haren, Nick Swisher, Mike Piazza, Shannon Stewart and Mark Kotsay. In are Emil Brown, Joey Devine and Mike Sweeney? They even lost catching prospect Jeremy Brown, one of the stars of Moneyball (along with Swisher). GM Billy Beane set himself up well for the future, but he's left with nearly nothing -- especially if he deals now-No. 1 Joe Blanton before April.

I'll start with the offense this time, where Jersey boy Jack Cust gets the cleanup spot and DH role all to himself, but he could hit 35 home runs but drive in just 75 runs if Travis Buck, Daric Barton and the oft-injured, shell-of-his-former-self Eric Chavez can't get on base. But getting on base is what Beane builds his teams for, so the BBC top of the order should be expected to do just that. But after Cust? Mark Ellis is your five-hole protection, with Emil Brown behind him followed by DL resident Bobby Crosby, Chris Denorfia and Kurt Suzuki. Though I don't agree with the assessment, ESPN.com's A's fantasy preview projects only Ellis, of all people, to be drafted from that lineup, and in the 20th round at that. But there's just one opinion of what the Oakland lineup will produce this year.

The rotation doesn't fare much better in the fantasy projection. Only Blanton stands to be drafted, in the 19th round they say. In between Blanton's starts will be Rich Harden -- once again coming off injury -- Year-After Effect risk Chad Gaudin, converted setup man Justin Duchscherer and soft-tosser Lenny DiNardo. If Blanton goes, Dana Eveland and his 7.55 career ERA is next in line to step into the rotation. Yikes.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Does Harden stay healthy? I've given up caring whether or not Crosby does. I'd also like to see Chavez bounce back a bit, if only because he's the one Beane chose to keep, letting Johnny Damon, Jason Giambi and Miguel Tejada leave via free agency rather than spend the money. Interesting how he let the hitters leave, but traded the pitchers -- Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder and Haren (with the exception of Barry Zito) -- in order to get something in return. And Cust is a good story -- always a big hitting prospect, he never stuck with his previous clubs (Baltimore, Colorado, Arizona, San Diego) because he was a disaster in the outfield. It was always clear that he'd have to be a DH somewhere, and when he got that chance last year, he provided some exciting moments.