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Greg Van Voorhis
Sports Editor
So
once again, Seattle fell victim to a trade demand when one of the
greatest baseball players of all time, Seattle Mariners’ Ken Griffey
Jr., asked out of the Emerald City.
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| Ken’s sweet swing. This was his
first home run against the New York Yankees in the 1995 playoffs.
Seattle eventually won the series 3 games to 2, after starting the
series 0 and 2. |
Bring
back any bad memories? Only if you’re one of the Seattle fans.
They’ll
sadly remind you of a certain former Seattle Supersonics star, Shawn
Kemp, who, just one year after leading his team to the NBA Finals,
stated that he would never again play another game in a Seattle uniform.
Until their trade demands, both Griffey and Kemp had played in Seattle
throughout their whole careers, and just as it seemed they were hitting
their strides, they demanded out of the city that had brought them their
fame and fortune. So I ask this one simple question, why?
Well,
let’s see what they had to say for themselves. “When that last game
[against the Houston Rockets in the second round of the 1997 playoffs]
was over, I knew it was my last game in that uniform,” said a
disappointed Shawn Kemp in an interview with ESPN’s David Aldridge.
Shawn felt that he was not being paid what he was worth, and he was
angered at the Sonics who had offered more money to players who were
performing not even half as well as he was.
He
was also angered by the fact that he had been there for eight years, and
these new guys were stepping in and taking what he felt was his money.
“It makes me angry, no doubt about it. It doesn’t make me angry that
guys are making a lot of money. It makes me angry the way things
happened. A lot of things fall on the premier players in the league. If
somebody is getting $100 million, I'm for Charles Barkley and Hakeem
Olajuwon getting that money.” Kemp was referring to the fact that
Seattle went out and spent $35 million on free-agent Jim McIlvaine, who
in his first two years in the league had averaged just 2.2 points per
game. Shawn was making just over $3 million per, and simple math figured
that if 2.2 points per game were worth $5 million per year, then 20
points per game should be worth, say $50 million per season.
So
pay the man, right? Now, of course, Shawn never asked for such an
amount, but he did want a raise, and he was unable to get it. According
to the old collective bargaining agreement, no player could have more
than seven years on his contract, and at the time, Shawn still would
have had six. That meant that the Sonics could have only extended his
deal one more year for $17.5 million. That seems like a lot of money,
but it would not have come until the year 2003. Kemp watched Shaquille
O’Neal get a $124 million over seven year deal, and teammate Gary
Payton receive an extension paying him $87 million over seven years.
Even more irritating to Kemp, he watched new teammate Jim McIlvaine get
that crazy contract, and he felt he was not being treated fairly. “I
never went to the Sonics and asked for more money. I didn’t ask for
another dollar. What I wanted was the right to have a conversation. If
they’re going to start giving out $100 million, let’s start giving
it out to guys who have been good over time, who’ve shown a commitment
to the game and who do things the right way.”
Another
problem for Shawn that season was that there were rumors running rampant
that he had alcohol and sexual abuse problems. For Shawn, the most
painful part about the situation was the fact that these rumors were
somehow leaked to NBA analyst Peter Vescey from someone in the Seattle
organization. “I trust absolutely no one, other than my mom and very
limited friends,” Shawn said. “I don’t have very much contact with
anybody. It makes things easier for me to deal with things. I’m from a
part of Indiana where drugs and alcohol are a big problem. I’m one of
the biggest role models to come out of that area. How could I do those
things? That would be going with everything I’m against. I go back
every year and play with kids on the playgrounds and talk to them about
not using drugs and alcohol. How does it look when it comes out
nationally that I’m doing stuff like that?”
Shawn
started to crumble, arriving late to practices; he even missed a team
flight to a game in Phoenix. The situation and his play got worse, and
Shawn finally got his wish; he was involved in a three team deal that
sent him to Cleveland, a team that many knew would be unsuccessful, even
with Shawn there.
But he was happy; he got his $100 million extension, and a new
start. He obviously felt that holding onto the chance of earning an NBA
championship ring by staying in Seattle was not worth the $100 million
offer from Cleveland. So, off he went to Cleveland, but not before
explaining to the Seattle media and his fans that he felt he had been
made out to be the bad guy. Well, guess what Shawn, you were.
Which
brings me to Griffey’s recent demand. Is he just another disloyal
player who’s searching for the big bucks? Surprisingly not. According
to Griffey, he has decided to leave Seattle so that he could play closer
to his family in Orlando. “While my decision was mainly about family,
this is what led to my final decision,” Griffey was quoted as saying,
remembering Stewart Payne, the golfer who died just a week earlier in a
mysterious plane accident. “Payne missed the cut at Disney (a golf
tournament in Orlando). On Saturday, he went to see his son play
football — his first football game — and he watched him catch a
touchdown pass. On Monday, his wife and daughter kissed him goodbye.
Forty-five minutes later, he’s not there anymore.”
The
loss of Griffey’s close friend, Payne Stewart and of NFL Hall of Famer,
Walter Payton, made him realize that he wanted to play closer to his
family, so that he could be able to see his wife and kids more
frequently. So he demanded the trade. Now this is quite a different
reason from Shawn’s, and Griffey’s decision left a much better taste
in the mouths of the Seattle fans. But it’s not the whole story.
The
truth is that Griffey also wanted to win a World Series and he felt that
there was very little chance of that happening in Seattle. I am not
saying that he was not honest in his reason for demanding the trade, but
I am saying that this also was a factor in his decision. But unlike
Shawn, he made a clean break with the city that brought him up. Both
were just teenagers when the city of Seattle welcomed them with open
arms in 1989. It is a place that both called their home for all of their
adult lives, but only one was courteous enough to be graceful in his
departure. So I guess it’s possible that one city can have two players
be miles apart.
The Hunt
for Mr. October
Greg Van Voorhis
Sports Editor
Okay,
Okay! I know the title of “Mr. October” belongs to former Yankee,
Reggie Jackson, but that’s because Ken Griffey Jr. has only had two
Octobers to play in.
So far, in his ten seasons with the
Seattle Mariners, Ken Griffey Jr. has only made it to the playoffs
twice. His first appearance in 1995 was nothing short of spectacular,
when he brought his team back from a two-game deficit to overtake the
New York Yankees, 3 games to 2, in the American League Semi Finals.
In that series, he hit five home runs,
which tied a record for most home runs in a five-game series. He and the
Mariners went on to play the Cleveland Indians in the American League
Champion-ships, but lost in just six games, but not before adding one
more home-run.
The next year, Seattle played Baltimore
in the playoffs in the Divisional series. They lost, and Ken did not
have a chance to sparkle. That was his last chance... so far.
The baseball world stood still for one
whole minute as it heard Griffey declare that he asked for a trade. And
the very next minute, all 30 other Major League teams were calling
Seattle to try to work out a deal for Griffey. Since he is a 10 and 5
guy, meaning he has played in the big leagues for a minimum of 10 years
and on the same ball-club for a minimum of five, he has the right to
veto any trade the Mariners want to make, meaning that he basically has
the right to play anywhere he wants if Seattle will pull the trigger on
the trade.
Since the recent deaths of Payne
Stewart and Walter Payton, Ken has realized that he would like to play
in a city closer to his family in Orlando, Florida. Griffey has said
that he would like to play not much farther than a 2 hour flight away
from his Florida home, and he would also like to play for a contender,
which cuts the list of teams down to a measly few. So far, four to be
exact: Cincinnati (where
his father coaches), Houston, Atlanta, and the New York Mets. Word has
it that the Mets are most likely to get him.
The “Big Question” is... what will
they have to give up to obtain him, and secondly, is it worth it?
If the Mets are going to get Griffey,
then they will likely have to lose Roger
Cedeno, Edgardo Alfonzo, possibly their most consistent player
last season, Octavio Dotel, and maybe another pitcher or two.
Is it worth it? Yes. When you have the
possibility of having the best player in baseball, you seize that
opportunity and take full advantage of it. If they don’t, they’ll be
sorry. Right, “Mr. October?”
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