Saturday, January 20, 2007

Taking a page out of Jim Paxson's Manual

Does anyone else see the irony of a team called the Indians having the whitest outfield in baseball?

The newest edition? Trot Nixon.

(I've always hated Nixon for some reason; part of me feels like he's the Red Sox version of Scott Brosius (but better). Is Nixon terrible? No, but he's not really anything that great. If he had been playing in Baltimore or Kansas City the past 8 years, no one would think twice of him. I'm not prepared to root for Trot freaking Nixon just yet. I don't think I'll ever be)

But back to that pasty outfield...

Just look at that list of names: Trot Nixon, Grady Sizemore, Luke Jackson, David Dellucci, Jiri Welsch, Jason Michaels and Casey Blake.

When looking at that list a lot of phrases come to mind; like 'clubhouse guys', 'hustle' and 'gritty'. I'd also like to add 'platoon players', 'crappy' and 'slow'. Somehow 'dynamic signings' and 'let's go buy a lot of tickets' never really entered my mind.

The Indians are pretty close to fielding an all white lineup, it's really not that far off from happening: Ryan Garko 1B, Blake 3B, Joe Inglett SS, Travis Hafner DH, Kelly Shoppach C, Dellucci, Sizemore and Nixon OF. The Indians really blew their chance to complete the white out by trading for Josh Barfield.

Honestly Shapiro, what were you thinking? You could've signed either Adam Kennedy or Mark Lorretta this offseason. Better yet, you could've signed 'em both and had them platoon!

In all seriousness, these signings aren't really terrible. Nixon plays everyday and Dellucci is decent. Wait, no. Dellucci sucks.

But these signings do signal one thing: the Tribe will be a major player in at least one end of season award.

3 comments:

LargeBill said...

I argued with my brother yesterday that if Trot Nixon is the answer then I have no idea what the question is. Sure it is only a one year contract for just 3 million. My problem is he is in a serious decline and coming off injuries (knee?). I don't see him being any better that what is available at Buffalo. If we were going to make a move for a major upgrade (Alex Rios) to the corner OF I'd be all for it. But a slight (or negligible) upgrade isn't worth the bother.

On your other point, Grady is bi-racial, Marte will hold the 3B job, Peralta and Victor are Hispanic. Easy fix to your diversity concerns - dump Nixon and Gutierrez makes roster out of Spring training. No matter what we do we won't be as pale as the old Boston Red Sox.

Ben said...

Oh, I know that those guys won't start, just that it's possible to see that pale ass lineup.

As for Nixon... the signing came out of nowhere (at least to me).

Anonymous said...

I think there might be more capable guys in Buffalo, but I think Shapiro is trying to up the mean age on this ballclub.

Getting younger at this stage really isn't going to accomplish anything, not when you share a division with three teams that have forked over the cash to add impact veterans the past few years.

For my money, the more the clubhouse can lead itself and not have to rely on Eric Wedge for motivation, the better off the team will be.