Hooray! Soriano Decides to Play Baseball!

Mike Popelka

Man, if only the full blown confrontation had come.

Alfonso Soriano backed down from his refusal to play left field last week, ending an entertaining stand-off between an all-star player and his team's management. Management wanted him to play left but Soriano refused, claiming he was a second baseman. There were only two problems with this plan: Jose Vidro, a classy veteran, already owned the position and Soriano is a terrible second baseman.

No one denies the incredible bat that Soriano brings to a ballclub; he has been a 30/30 man three times and was one home run shy of being a 40/40 player in 2002. The weakness in his game is his fielding. Compared with Vidro, Soriano has made 41 more errors in two fewer seasons. Which guy would pitchers rather have behind them? Being a mediocre pitcher in a hardball league for washed up high school ball players, I can attest to the fact that pitchers want to know their fielders can handle the hops and turn the double play. Soriano doesn't warrant this confidence. As the Cubs did with Glenallen Hill and the Red Sox do with Manny Ramirez, sticking your defensive liabilities in left field is always the best option if you need their bat badly enough.

One thing that doesn't sit well with me is the idea that, being in the last year of his contract, Soriano wants to play second because his power makes him an extremely desireable commodity in next year's free agent market. Unfortunately, booting routine grounders is never a quality managers look for in a second baseman. Soriano will still be a prime free agent regardless of where he plays. He'll have less opportunity to look bad in the field playing left, and he'll still be a 30/30 or even 40/40 man. How many guys can compete with that? Alex Rodriguez and Jason Bay were the only other players who even came close to a 30/30 season last year. Alfonso would still be a blessing for any team looking to upgrade its offense, and I'm sure plenty of teams will still be willing to pay an ungodly sum for his services next year.

I am dissapointed that the Nationals didn't end up having to put Soriano on the disqualified list. The stand-off between team vs. player could have had larger repercussions in the league. If put on the disqualified list, Soriano wouldn't have collected his salary, wouldn't have been given service time, and would have still been the property of the Washington Nationals until he completed his contractual obligations with them. If this scenario had played out the owners would come out looking "in the right", while Soriano and the players would come out looking like whiners. In short, the owners would have gotten the fans on their side, perhaps causing a shift in labor agreements next time the players' union and the owners negotiate a plan. But, this was all shot to hell when Alfonso Soriano came to his senses.

"You know it makes one feel rather good deciding not to be a bitch." --Lady Brett Ashley to Jake Barnes in Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises.