Interesting reading in The Post today about Lastings Milledge.
I found two comments particularly telling. One, the AAA manager says he's not a leadoff hitter. I agree. I think everybody agrees. But didn't the major-league manager say he was (or am I misremembering)?
Also, it says Milledge has lost faith in the coaching staff. He's probably not the only one but with him, it's out there now.
When he was sent down, I didn't think there was any question Milledge would be back in Washington. After reading this, I'm not so sure.
Anyone think we may have seen the last of Milledge in D.C.? Will he be packaged with someone (Johnson? Willingham?) for a pitcher?
4 comments:
"But didn't the major-league manager say he was (or am I misremembering)?"
The major league manager installed Milledge as the lead-off hitter and gave him about a month (only a week of which was in games that counted) to show that he could be one. In essence, the major league manager had the idea that Milledge might solve the team's lead-off woes, and gave it a shot. Unfortunately it didn't work out, but really how would anyone know it wouldn't possibly have without giving it a try?
A couple of years ago a major league GM had the idea that a certain second baseman could play left field, and forced him to do that, initially against the player's will. That one worked out, didn't it? But really, isn't it the same kind of thing as what they tried to do with Milledge - except that the Soriano experiment worked and the Milledge one didn't? Oftentimes you don't really know if something is a good idea or not until you give it a shot, and you can't really blame a manager if everything he tries doesn't work. Now if they were still stubbornly trotting Milledge out there now, then sure you could start pointing fingers at management. But they're not doing that. They gave him a week of actual games, realized it wasn't working, and moved on. Now they know that the ultimate solution at leadoff and in CF needs to be someone other than Milledge. They didn't know that before they tried him there.
The leadoff point I'll give you.
The CF point not so much! He was out there all last year.
True, Milledge was in CF all last year. But really, who else was there? Bernadina? He was okay in the field, but not at the plate. Now he's hurt. Dukes? Many seemed to think he was the man for CF, but now that he's there people are already backing off on him as the long-term solution. Sure, he's better than Milledge, but how much better? I think the thing is that if they were committed to having Milledge in the lineup every day to lead off, he needed to play somewhere in the field. And given the mix of outfielders they were working with, none of whom is really a centerfielder, they could put him there every day and let the other guys compete for the corner spots. I agree that wasn't the ideal approach to take to sorting out the outfield logjam Bowden left behind. But if you think about it, was there really any other approach they could have taken that would have been markedly better? It was a mess, and ironically it turned out to be Milledge's failure that helped to straighten things out in the outfield (although it's still kind of a mess). But imagine how ugly it would be out there if Milledge had been a success!
Who could we get, pitching wise, for a package of Milledge and, say, Willingham?
I'm not so keen on getting rid of Johnson. Yet.
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