"Acquired OF-L Ken Griffey Jr. from the Reds for 2B-L Danny Richar and RHP Nick Masset. [7/31]
Getting Griffey cost the Sox nothing that they'll miss, so on that level, this is a great deal. Setting aside where he'll play for a moment, a team counting on a notoriously fragile player like Jim Thome could use an extra bat in case the DH breaks down, or if Jermaine Dye has another one of his catastrophic injuries, or should plunk-happy Carlos Quentin run one risk too many hanging over the plate and taking one for the team that he should have ducked. Strictly as a matter of depth, it's a good pickup. As a way to take Paul Konerko out of the lineup now and again, it also makes sense, sort of, but keep in mind that Griffey really isn't hitting well, having only delivered a pretty pedestrian .277 EqA (the position's average is .271), with his best feature being a park-aided .261/.373/.452 against right-handers (while disappearing against lefties), but that immediately invites a reference to his hitting only .237/.347/.411 outside of the Rhineland bandbox that the Reds call home. If that's more along the lines of what the Sox might expect, you can reasonably wonder if they weren't better off just accepting that kind of production from a person named Dewayn Wise instead of one named Ken Griffey.
Playing Griffey also comes with risks, unless of course he dons a glove and plays a bit of first. That's because Griffey in the lineup could also involve the risk of their employing Thome at first base, or Griffey in center, and of those two options, the former's a potentially unacceptable risk, while the latter simply is an unacceptable risk. As Marc Normandin noted in anticipation of the deal, three-fifths of the Sox rotation is made up of fly-ball pitchers, and while they've survived Nick Swisher's game efforts in center, running Griffey back out there might test those hurlers beyond a defensive breaking point. If, as rumored, Griffey only agreed to the deal in return for a guarantee that he'd start in center, you wind up with a player demanding and getting something he shouldn't have asked for if helping his new team was on his agenda, and worse yet getting it from a team that should know better, especially when it should be focused on taking its best shot at a division title."
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08-01-2008, 10:03 AM
and Manny, but Jr did have 2 hits and ribbies last night...Maybe it will be the trade that everyone questioned, but turned out good?
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