Sunday, February 17, 2008

What to do With Jeter?

So we can now add a new Wharton statistcal measure of fielding prowess to the hordes of measures rating Derek Jeter as a below average fielding short stop. Let's assume for a moment that they are correct - Jeet is among the worst SS in all of MLB; my question is - what then?

As our Captain, face of the franchise and clubhouse leader, Jeter is not about to get embarrassed by the Yanks. Additionaly, even if the Yanks wanted to tell him to move, where would we move him to?

Second base - taken for the next 10 years
Third base - we're not gonna swap DJ and Arod for 2 reasons...first, that would be a huge slap to Jeet, and second, Arod has become a very good 3B
First base - after 2008, Texiera will be there for 5 or 6 years
Left field - possibly, but both Damon and Hmat are signed thru 2009

I guess Jeter could start the 2010 season in LF; what if both Ajax and Tabata are ready though? The point is that even if Jeter is the worst SS in the league (which I subjectively do not believe), he ain't going anywhere.

Moving Jeter off short is like moving Mantle out of center, or putting Whitey Ford in the 'pen. For better or worse, I think we're going to see #2 manning SS until he's ready to hang up his spikes.


BallHype: hype it up!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Everyone has known he is a below average SS and should have moved to 3B when AR showed up.

But he is captain intangible, isn't he?

Search This Blog