You know that it is “NC State Shit” when an article reads — “No one in baseball has been in Turner’s position, now or ever.”
This article highlights ‘The curious case of Trea Turner’…it is such a curious case that the Washington Post is writing about it.
He is here with the Padres even though he has already been traded to the Washington Nationals, the “player to be named later” in the three-team deal that sent outfielder Steven Souza Jr. from Washington to Tampa Bay and outfielder Wil Myers from Tampa Bay to San Diego back in December. Except he won’t be named later. He has been named already. Not officially, because neither club can say as much, but it is one of the worst-kept secrets in the game.
So this is baseball purgatory, playing for one team that’s not really his. But the organization that will be his home? He knows no one.
“It’s out of my control,” Turner said.
Given the way Major League Baseball’s rules are written, this was out of everyone’s control. The only reason Turner is in Peoria, Ariz., rather than Viera, Fla., is because of an obscure mandate that prohibits the trading of draft picks until a year after they sign. A week after he became the 13th pick in the draft – June 13 – he signed for a $2.9-million bonus that has coaches and teammates with the Padres jokingly calling him “Cha-ching.” So it isn’t until June 13 of this season that he can join the Nationals.
Over the course of any baseball season, there will be trades major and minor, each helping shape an organization to varying degrees, each completely exploding the lives of the players involved. They are part of the sport, which is at base a business, and fans pay attention to how each will help or hurt their team now and in the future. They are analyzed as transactions, commodity swapping. The human fallout is a secondary consideration, if a consideration at all.
But when this deal went down Dec. 17, Turner’s agent, Jeff Berry of CAA Sports, expressed his extreme displeasure with the situation on Turner’s behalf. At the time, he told FoxSports.com, “In this case, the plan to ‘trust us’ is not enough when it comes to a player’s well-being and career,” said there would be an “undoubtedly negative impact on Trea Turner,” and added that approving the trade was “unethical.”
That was immediately after the deal went down, back when Turner tweeted, “Well this day got a whole lot more interesting …” By March, with the season ready to unfold, the rhetoric had died down. Berry declined comment on the situation – which remains odd. As Turner spoke to a reporter last week, Padres minor league coaches yelled, in good fun, “Tell him, ‘I’d rather stay with the Padres! I’ve found my home here! Get somebody else in the trade!”
“It’s not my decision,” Turner yelled back. “I’m just doing what I’m told.”
There is a LOT more about Trea and his evolution as a baseball player in the article. Definitely worth a read.
