MVN - Most Valuable Network

Should the M’s Have Grabbed Frank Thomas?

When the Blue Jays released disgruntled DH Frank Thomas, there was some brief discussion that the Mariners should have snapped him up and replaced Jose Vidro. After all, it is reasoned, Vidro is not a great DH–no power, for certain–basically a middle infielder who can’t play the infield anymore. Thomas is a future Hall of Famer who suddenly became available and could provide some much needed power to the offense. It seems like a no-brainer.

And if we did, it would be.

Frank Thomas was released for a reason. Or actually, for a couple of them. Frank Thomas was a great player in the 1990’s and early 2000’s. His time is past, and now he is a behemoth with a slow bat and a huge ego. As a DH, he would be no better, and probably worse, than Carl Everett or Glenallen Hill–more power and walks, but a lower average and less speed (and neither of them had any).

As a DH, Vidro is not good. True. But he is not so bad that we need make panic poor decisions. We have other options–one of which I mentioned in my previous post–allowing Kenji Johjima and Jeff Clement to split time between catcher and DH.

The other option is the Rotating DH. The only manager I have ever seen use this consistently is Sparky Anderson. His great 1984 team, one of the best of all time, no DH to speak of. He never used a regular DH until Cecil Fielder came along, and then Cecil was the DH only because you didn’t dare put him elsewhere. DH was a way of giving his regulars a day off while keeping them in the lineup and keeping his bench sharp. Are you listening, McLaren?

As I mentioned in “McLaren Challenge #2″, I would like to see McLaren use his bench more to keep them sharp. One way to do this is the rotating DH. We reduce Vidro’s playing time a bit (though I would not cut it entirely–he still hits OK), maybe even have him play some second and/or first to keep him sharp. Meanwhile, Sexson, Johjima, Ibanez, Beltre, Ichiro–all the guys who hit decently enough to keep in the lineup everyday–give them about 2 games a month at DH while someone like Bloomquist, Vidro, Norton, Cairo, or Burke plays the field.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 27th, 2008 at 12:40 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.