Shaughnessy Misses on Damon Reaction

While it seems like every blogger takes a shot at the mainstream media from time to time, I try to stay away from such behavior.  Granted, I’ve been guilty of it on multiple occasions, but I try to appreciate that these people are professionals and I simply may disagree with them, which is to no fault of their own.  Columnists are paid to dispense their opinions and obviously there are two sides of every coin.  And maybe that’s the point of these guys: to create the starting point of “water cooler talk” so that fans can have greater reactions to what they see on television or in stadiums/arenas.

With that said, I feel I must call out Dan Shaughnessy, who wrote about Johnny Damon on SI.com today (or at least I saw it today).  Comparing Damon’s imminent departure from the Yankees to when he left Boston, Shaughnessy basically begs Yankee fans not to boo Damon when he returns to Yankee Stadium next season wearing a visitor’s uniform.  He claims that it makes no sense that Boston fans would boo Damon after he returned to Fenway Park wearing the Yankees’ pinstripes because baseball is a business and fans must appreciate that players are going to come and go.  While I do agree with Shaughnessy that fans must understand that their favorite players will most likely not play their entire careers in one place, Shaughnessy misses the biggest point of disdain that the Fenway Faithful have for Damon: it’s not that he left…it’s that he left to join the New York Yankees.

Had Damon left to go anywhere else, he would have been lauded and praised every time he returned to Fenway, much like Kevin Millar, Brandon Bronson Arroyo and Derek Lowe were.  But Damon did not just go anywhere else…he went to the Bronx, which to Red Socks fans was simply an inexcusable offense.

With regards to Damon now leaving New York, after completing a four-year, $52 million contract, Shaughnessy is asking supporters of the Bronx Bombers not to heckle Damon because he recognizes that baseball is a business and he went elsewhere after the Yankees wouldn’t pay him, presumably, what he’s worth.  Shaughnessy references Damon’s double steal in the World Series and how he was “an ideal No. 2 batter, hitting behind Derek Jeter.”  What is left out is that Damon spent three of his four seasons in pinstripes batting leadoff and never stole more than 29 bases.  What is ignored is that Damon never played 150 games in a season and was so bad defensively in center field, the position he was signed to play, that he ultimately had to move to left field so that Melky Cabrera and Brett Gardner could fight it out for the heralded spot that Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle once held.  That’s right, the Yankees didn’t bring in Ken Griffey, Jr. or Carlos Beltran or Grady Sizemore or Torii Hunter or Matt Kemp to play center, which forced Damon to left.  Damon was so inefficient at the position that they looked at two young prospects, neither of which were heralded in the Yankees’ farm system, to take over and fill the void until a legitimate outfielder could take over.

Whether he goes off to play in Los Angeles or Seattle or San Francisco or wherever, Yankee fans will not boo Johnny Damon.  Heck, he could even go back to Boston and they wouldn’t boo.  While there are plenty of Damon fans still in New York, the fans understand that it’s time to go in a new direction.  World Series MVP Hideki Matsui is now playing in Los Angeles of Anaheim and while it’s disappointing to see him go (this coming from a guy who has a Yankees’ pinstripe jersey with “Gozilla 55″ on the back), we understand that the team is moving in a direction to get younger and better.  The Yankees could certainly still bring Damon back, but it’s not going to be for the four years that he wants.  Two maybe, although my guess is that the team really only wants him for one.

The team now has a legitimate center fielder in newly acquired Curtis Granderson.  And don’t look now, but Granderson just might be the center fielder the Yankees thought they were getting when Damon signed four years ago.

I wish Johnny Damon the best of luck and I promise not to boo; not that that is a tough promise to keep.