And Now It Gets Awkward...

The Los Angeles Dodgers were getting ready to bat against the Washington Nationals in a spring training game on Monday, but there was something holding the game up. There was nobody playing left field for the Nationals. The reason being that Alfonso Soriano was penciled in to play left field, but never went out to the position. Manager Frank Robinson was forced to make an official lineup change with the umpire and put someone else in the position Soriano was supposed to be playing. The reason behind all this is that Alfonso Soriano is technically a second baseman. He has been playing that position for his entire major league career, and he refuses to make a switch to the outfield.

Why not play him at second base? You ask.

The answer is that the Nationals have Jose Vidro at second base, and a content with him. While Soriano has impressive offensive stats (he is consistently a 30 Home Runs and 30 Stolen Bases player), his defensive skills are lacking (he has made nearly twice as many errors as anybody else at the position over the past 5 years, and has led the league in errors at second base each of those five years). The Nationals like Vidro's defensive skills, and he is not bad at the plate either. They figured that Soriano's speed and solid throwing arm would make him into a good outfielder, but Soriano refuses to make the switch.

Speculation has it that one of Soriano's reasons behind not moving positions is that his offensive statistics stack up better against the rest of the second basemen in the league than they do against outfielders, which is a valid point. Soriano is one of the best offensive second basemen, if not the best. But as an outfielder his 30 HR and 30 steals look more average compared to some of the huge power guys that play the outfield (examples being Vladimir Guerrero, Manny Ramirez, Gary Sheffield and Barry Bonds). Also, Soriano's 30/30 seasons don't look as impressive because other outfielders like Bobby Abreu and Jason Bay have done or are near accomplishing the same feat. Since he is a free agent after this season, Soriano would most likely command big bucks as the prized offensive second baseman in baseball, but might lose a few million dollars if he were playing left field. But that is all speculation, the refusal to move could be for various other reasons. His comfort at second base and not having to go through the struggles of learning a new position, especially one that can be as difficult as left field.

Regardless of the reasoning, Soriano is saying he will not move. And sitting out yesterday's spring training game is evidence to me that he is serious. This is where it becomes strange. What do the Nationals do? The Nationals are considering placing Soriano on the disqualified list, which is something I had never heard of until now. What it means is that if Soriano refused to play the outfield the Nationals could place him on this list which means that Soriano will not get paid the 10 million dollars he is owed this season. Also factoring into this move is that Soriano would no longer be a free agent at the end of the season, because he did not serve his service to the Nationals. He would remain the property of the Nationals until he served his contract (which is one year worth 10 million dollars). The other option is to trade either Soriano or Vidro. It is hard to see the Nationals trading Vidro because that would make it look as though they are giving in to Soriano, but it seems at this point they would not be able to get equal value back in a trade for Soriano, which is something Nationals General Manager Jim Bowden said he would not do.

I don't know what is going to happen out in Washington, because it doesn't seem like Soriano is going to budge from his stance, and it doesn't look like the Nationals will be able to make a good trade. That leaves the disqualified list, in which Soriano would sit out until he either decided to play left field, Vidro was injured or traded or until the season ended. I sure hope it doesn't come to the disqualified list, because I have Soriano on a few of my fantasy teams. And that would really throw a monkey wrench into my season.

Publish Date: March 21 in the Missourian.