Election Night

This is how election night went at our house, Michele in the living room watching results on CNN, me in the kitchen doing Strat-O-Matic team rosters. Extra bench player or reliever? Clare called right around the time I started work on the 2018 Mariners’ pitching rotation. “Carlos Rodon declined his option with the Giants. What would you do?” Try to sign him, but not for six years. “I thought you’d say that. And did you hear about A.J. Pollock?” Do tell. “He turned down his option for next year,” and I all but shouted, Hurray! Pollock disappointed in his only season on the South Side, hitting .245 with fourteen homeruns and fifty-six RBIs. On top of that, he turns thirty-five in under a month, which suggests he’s running out of gas. Pollock gets a $5 million buyout in exchange for passing on a $13 million salary next year. Good luck trying to top that. Of course, it’s entirely possible Pollock didn’t like the atmosphere in the clubhouse and doubted it would improve much next season. In which case, I can’t say that I blame him. Whatever the reason for his departure, this really is addition through subtraction. The leading candidate to take over for Pollock in the outfield is twenty-four year old rookie Oscar Colas, who bats lefthanded. It looks like Eloy Jimenez will primarily DH while Andrew Vaughn will play first in place of free-agent Jose Abreu, who does not look to be coming back. That in turn opens up another spot in the outfield, for Gavin Sheets or someone else. All this good news comes with a qualifier, however. Rick Hahn traded two young players—reliever Codi Heuer and infielder Nick Madrigal—to the Cubs at the 2021 trade deadline in exchange for closer Craig Kimbrell, who couldn’t dislodge Liam Hendriks as closer and certainly couldn’t transition into a setup role. Hahn then traded Kimbrell to the Dodgers for Pollock at the start of this past season. That leaves us with bupkis. Way to go, Rick.