The Not So Hot Corner
(Tony Gustafsen calls off Ricardo Guzman)
When Ricardo Guzman entered the clubhouse this recently, there was a peculiar object in his locker. It was brown, made of leather and had laces on it. Yes that's right it was a baseball mitt. Something Guzman has only used sparingly throughout his 11 year BBA career. Though he has actually and quite perplexingly played every position on the diamond except pitcher(hmm) throughout his professional career, Guzman is the prototypical all bat, no glove DH. In fact, outside of his outfield errors and arm, he might be the biggest defensive slug in the league. So when the veteran saw a glove in his locker, he ran straight to manager Tomás Valdéz.
"Yo skip, we need to talk... WTF IS THIS?!" Guzman slams the mitt down on Valdez's desk so hard, it's sure to leave a Rawlings imprint.
"Well, you know Ricardo. I only manage the players in the locker room. What had happened was.. our lunatic GM went out and traded for a DH even though we had a well enough platoon of you and António Valentín. It wasn't my idea, but I wanted to keep your bat in the lineup. So that's why I had you play the corner outfield one week. I figure if a team had a lot of lefty bats, I'd play you in left and if they had righty bats, I'd play you in right. Tried to hide your deficiencies like a good sabermetric manager should."
"Yeah, I got that. But this is an infield glove. Third base I think, I don't even know the difference. You know I can't field a lick in the infield. I've made $41 million dollars in this league without playing the field. Heck I barely even swing the bat except for the occasional homerun. You can't find anyone else to play third base? What about Corey Jackson. He is looking for his shot as a hitter. At least he has an 8 arm. Me, I gotta roll the ball to first like a f'n bowling ball to get it there.
"For starters, Cojack is no longer with us. He was painstakingly released as we had to get under the salary cap for roster expansion. Now, if I could continue... After our crazy GM brought in Fernando Cruz to DH, he brought in Alfredo Salazar to play left field. So I thought to myself... self, maybe our GM doesn't like Ricardo Guzman. Maybe if I play him at 3B he will trade for Carlton Winson so I don't have to play Earl "The Earl of Errors" Jackson anymore. Which by the way, you probably won't be much of a defensive downgrade from."
"umm, Thanks?"
"You're welcome. While that was original thought, I dug deeper in the strategical sandstorm. That's when I realized that I have a couple of extreme flyball/strikeout pitchers on our staff. While most managers despise the extreme fly ballers, I like their quirkiness. It lets me stretch out my "over managing" legs. So from here on out, you're going to be our starting 3B when Juan Hernández starts and possibly when Ken Bates starts. Bates is a lefty so there may be more right handed hitters in the lineup that day. Don't worry though. Come the 6-7th inning, we have a whole squad of defensive replacements all over the diamond."
When a BBA team starts to play guys with 1/1/1/1 fielding ratings at a position they have absolutely zero experience at, it usually screams tanking. But believe it or not, the Brooklyn Robins went on to win 4 out of 6 games this week. And no, it was not the two games Guzman started at 3B that they had lost, both were won by a combined score of 29-4. As far as Ricardo's defensive prowess... he had 0 assists, 0 putouts, and zero total chances. The plan had worked to perfection. The only ball hit into his zone was a pop fly to short left field that rangy shortstop Tony Gustafsen vehemently called him off on, making the defensively challenged team leader crack a smile that brought laughter to his team mates in the blowout victory over the team with the best record in the entire league.
