Posted by It’s May, we’re a month into the baseball season, and the great Ken Griffey Jr. experiment has failed. There are no bad dogs, but it’s time to move on and place Griffey squarely on the bench (or, frankly, release him).
The plan was to have Griffey in a platoon at DH, where he’d play everyday against right handed pitching. We now have enough data to make a call (1/6 of the season), and Griffey has been nothing short of a disaster. He has no extra base hits. He’s batting .228.
Griffey’s production has been declining steadily over the past several years. This year it has fallen off a cliff. Here’s his OPS by year (On Base % + Slugging %, not a perfect measure, but good enough)…
Even Griffey’s performance versus rightys has fallen precipitously…
It’s time to look for a replacement. In the longer-term, the Mariners will probably need to obtain another bat via trade, but in the short term, virtually anyone off the bench would be better versus right handers. Even right handers face RHP better than Griffey this year. Even the catchers…
There’s no more time to waste on this experiment. Jack Zduriencik and Don Wakamatsu, I implore you to make a change. Griffey, it’s been a good run.