Ken Griffey Jr. returns to Seattle tonight.
A big deal, and justifiably so, is being made about it in the great Northwest. I thought I’d take this time to reflect on the time when Junior was traded to the Reds.
Word of a Junior to Cincinnati possibility began spreading in the fall of 1999. The Reds had just narrowly missed making the playoffs with a 96-win season — there was a one-game playoff with the New York Mets in Cincinnati to determine which team would win the NL Wild Card. Getting a home game seems like a good deal for the Reds, except they had played in Milwaukee the night before and didn’t finish their game until after midnight. Bud Selig had sent the Mets to Cincinnati to get a good night’s sleep in the event they’d have to play the playoff game.
If you think I’m whining, I am. This was an ahead-of-schedule Reds team that was full of young players, and a few veterans (Barry Larkin and Greg Vaughn in the field and Pete Harnisch and Denny Neagle on the mound). Winning 96 games and not making the playoffs is unheard of. A telling example is the fact last year’s World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals won just 83 games.
It really was an exciting time to be a Reds fan, not to mention it was that fall that the CPA and I started dating. We went to a few games together, including one when Pokey Reese hit an extra inning home run to beat St. Louis. That Milwaukee series was excruciating. All the Reds had to do was win two of three games and the Mets and Astros would’ve been playing in a playoff game with the Reds winning the NL Central. A misplayed fly ball in the first game of the series set up the first loss. They lost Saturday and after rain delays all day Sunday, beat the Brewers to get the playoff game.
Unfortunately they had to fly through the middle of the night, return home at 5 a.m. and play the biggest game of many of their careers with little to no sleep.
No, I’m not bitter!
Junior to the rescue?
Former Reds general manager Jim Bowden was notorious for making the most of a shoestring budget. He had taken Pete Schourek off the scrap heap and watched him win 18 games in 1995. Harnisch was a solid big leaguer before battling an addiction to smokeless tobacco. He came to the Reds and averaged 15 wins for the Reds in ’98 and ’99.
But this would’ve cemented Bowden’s legacy. Bringing Junior home would be the move of the century, possibly the franchise, and after winning the 96 games in ’99, what better way to improve the team than bringing an All-Century player aboard?
Bowden’s problem, however, seemed to be that he didn’t always do the math on what it would take to have a guy like Junior on the team. Even at a prorated level, Junior was going to take up around a fifth of the team’s salary. Add in Barry Larkin’s contract and you’re talking nearly two-fifths of the payroll.
Without saying I was against bringing one of my favorite all time players to my favorite team, I will take credit for feeling that the Reds would never be able to afford enough pitching to make this up and coming team a contender. The other fear was the fact that Reese, Dimitri Young, Aaron Boone, Danny Graves, and a host of other young players, would be nearing arbitration, and thus would be nearing free agency and bigger contracts.
Junior delivered an average season in 2000, his first as a Red. He hit 40 homers and drove in 118 runs, the first time since an injured ’95 season that he didn’t total at least 130 RBI. He played in just 145 games after missing just a total of 10 games the previous three seasons, a precursor of things to come.
People were upset at an 85-win season and second-place finish, but if they could’ve had a crystal ball they may have enjoyed it a little more. Junior’s first season as a Red was the last time the team won more games than it lost. It was the last second-place or better finish, it was the only time to this point Junior hit 40 homers and it was the lone season he topped 100 RBI.
His next six seasons would see him top 100 games just three times, and his 35 homers in ’05 was the only glimpse of greatness he had during that time. Junior injured everything conceivably possible. He hurt a knee, a shoulder, tore the hamstring off his bone, necessitating a revolutionary surgery that actually screwed his hamstring back to his bone — it’s widely believed that surgery saved his career — and this past offseason’s broken wrist that was suffered playing with his kids.
There were more injuries that sent him to the DL, but only that last one was suffered off the field. In fact, most of the other injuries were suffered doing something extraordinary, like diving for a ball in the outfield or trying to make it home at full speed.
Fans actually blamed Junior for being hurt. Many on talk radio wanted him gone because they didn’t feel he was earning his money. Admittedly it’s hard to earn $10 million if you’re out of the lineup, but much like Eric Davis in the late ’80s, the injuries weren’t suffered because of a lack of effort.
In ’05, after it seemed Junior would never play well again, the smile returned as he was not in the spotlight because frankly, not many expected much from him anymore. Adam Dunn was hitting tape measure home runs and the Reds’ lineup had other hitters who could pick up the slack if Junior was injured again. At that point, it was the pitching staff that was to blame for the Reds’ woes.
Now, in ’07, after a rough April that saw him still recovering from his broken wrist, Junior has exploded in May and June, hitting 18 of his 19 homers during that time. Despite an April trip to the DL because of a stomach bug and pleurisy, he’s played in a lot of games, including 35 in a row at one point. Cal Ripken he isn’t, but Junior has proven more durable this year and he’s hitting .285 with 44 RBI to go along with his 19 dingers.
It’s upsetting that Junior isn’t nearing 700 long balls rather than the 600 he’s on the doorstep of. I saw an ESPN stat that said that if he had played the games he missed due to injury during his time in Cincinnati he’d be around 680 homers at this point. That’s not even counting the 20-30 games he appeared only as a pinch hitter during Bob Boone’s reign. Boone was afraid to play Junior because of his injuries. Understandable I suppose, but I’d almost count one-at bat appearances as missing games during a time when he should’ve been on the DL anyway.
I’m extremely excited about Junior’s season. An FSN reporter asked him in April if he ever thinks about what it’d be like to be up around 700 homers, four or so years younger than Barry Bonds. His response summed up what I hope to see nicely. He told the reporter he’s not done yet so who’s to say he won’t get to 700? If he were to get 700 homers, I don’t care how many Bonds ends up with, his career will have been righted and everyone would acknowledge him as one of the all time best. His missed time would still be there and yet he’d still have more long balls than all but two or three guys in the game.
I hope Seattle fans embrace Junior this weekend, but he’s ours now! The Kid is home where he should be, finally enjoying time on the field. Hopefully trade rumors prove to be false and he can play his final three or four seasons as a Red, knocking on the doors of history.