Ahh, Snelling
DMZ · February 22, 2005 at 10:20 am · Filed Under Mariners
Many people have asked us what happened to Chris Snelling this off-season. He went home for the first time in years to spend time with his family and friends. So on a whim he and his brother he spent two months adventuring in the Outback (the real one, not the steakhouse) and all over the place.
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43 Responses to “Ahh, Snelling”
The rumor that, when handed the new baby, Willie dropped her on the transfer from glove hand to throwing hand happily proved unfounded.
By the time the two-month journey ended, Snelling had a beard, long hair and a better appreciation for a completely different lifestyle than a professional baseball player enjoys.
“I would suggest everyone do it once in their lifetime, whether in the United States or a different country,” he said. “It makes you appreciate the things you have a lot more.”
I’m always really jealous when I run into people on multiple-month hikes when I’m backpacking. Work and school limit me to one or two weeks max, and grad school is going to limit that even further over the next couple years. A friend in environmental science *cough* just spent six months biking around New Zealand and loved it. Jerk.
#1– hmm, surprisingly close…. “Willie Bloomquist was on hand when wife Lisa delivered daughter Natalie. “I was there waiting to make the catch and turn two,†Bloomquist said. “I handed her off to Lisa.—
Ah, Snelling… getting injured playing baseball isn’t enough for you, hm? Gotta go try to get bit by a croc while on walkabout. That’s a real man’s injury.
Considering Australia has more species of poisonous animals than all the other continents combined, the thought of a man with Snelling’s luck leaving the house makes me want to call Lloyd’s of London.
OT, Felix at #3 and Reed at #10 on BP’s prospect list. No other Mariners listed, or even in honorable mention.
Speaking of Snelling: Can any of the crew here (perhaps Dave) comment on what Snelling’s likely to be doing in April if his health stays on track? Starting LF in Tacoma, I’m guessing?
Do any of y’all have anything to say regarding Mr. Snelling? I’ve lost track of what to expect from him and what the team’s plans for him are. It’s impossible not to love the guy, and root for him to become some semblance of the player he was supposed to be.
Is there still some chance he becomes a star? Or has that gone the way of his luck and health? Is he still in the team’s plans for the future, or are they holding on to him for sentimental reasons, a la Ryan Anderson?
Snelling’s probably never going to have the speed he once did, so his future as a CF is likely dead.
But he could produce as a corner outfielder. He’s still young – he turned 23 in December.
And I’m with Jeff on the poisonous animal thing. When the world’s third most venomous snake is something the Aussies call the “common brown snake”, be afraid. Not to mention the spiders and crocodiles.
I’d just like to point out that while I think Snelling could contribute at some point there’s a huge crime being committed by the Mariners right now concerning Bucky Jacobsen. Today in the PI Hargrove was saying that Bucky is a long shot to even make the team due to the bad knee. Even though the man can hit, is recovering and can run (just not really stop) they’re already dismissing him. If you read between the lines this has been coming all off season, but the front office just doesn’t have the guts to tell us that they don’t care about what the fans want, or what Bucky could do if given a season to hit. This is driving me CRAZY!
just a thought… but if a guy can’t STOP he can’t play baseball at the major league level unless he only hits home runs or singles and gets pinch run for.
maybe he needs to rehab at AAA until healthy… i suggest a wait and see approach.
He will be able to stop and all that good stuff in another couple of weeks. The point is he’ll be healthy well before the season starts and they’re already writing him off even though he was the only interesting thing to watch for a large portion of last year, not to mention he could hit 30+ homers for us in a full season.
#11-You know, I’m not sure what Bucky can do over the course of a full season. Sure he was fun to watch last year but he did have a hard time hitting breaking pitches, frankly I am not so sure he would be very productive as the full-time DH. I’m not a huge Ibanez fine either but I would bet money that he would make a better DH.
I bet Chris Snelling would like to leave Dave Myers in the middle of the Outback without any beans, he would never say it though.
I’m surprised the caption on that article didn’t read something to the effect of:
“Chris Snelling and teammate Jamal Strong argue over which player will become injured first in 2005.”
Any chance Snelling had of playing CF in the majors went away with the knee injury. He’s strictly an LF now.
Snelling really just needs to go to Tacoma and play. He’s lost so much development time the past few years that he just needs at-bats. I don’t think it will matter if he hits .500 in spring training, as the team doesn’t want him sitting on the bench if he’s healthy. He’s not a legitimate contender for a roster spot out of spring training.
From all reports, though, the whip-like bat speed is still there, so if he gets some experience against high level pitchers, he could be ready for a role with the club next year.
Dave,
Re. #17, great info on Snelling. Any chance of getting a couple of paragraphs for each of the future forty? or maybe only the top 10?
I dunno that it the Outback trip was such a big risk, as long as it wasn’t Dave Myers who arranged the trip.
I did a more extensive writeup of the top ten last year, and I may do something like that again this year. A few paragraphs on everyone in the Future Forty would be a pretty long post that I’m not sure I have time to write. If there’s specific folks you have questions about, you can ask and I’ll do my best to get to them.
“he did have a hard time hitting breaking pitches”
I keep hearing people say this, but I sure didn’t see it in the games I saw. I saw Bucky homer on a breaking pitch and a number of times I saw him wait on a breaking ball and line easy singles on them.
If this was true, I’d expect his K rate to have gone up as word got around. Instead, his K rate went DOWN and his batting average went UP. It seemed to me that it was Bucky who made the adjustment over time, not the pitchers he faced. He stopped overswinging at breaking pitches and started waiting on them.
At least that was my observation.
It would be silly to stick Snelling on the major league bench when we have no idea if he can play a 140-150 game, 600-650 PA season without ending up on the DL, after 6 pro seasons (his career high in games is 114…in 2001. And he STILL went on the DL that year).
And since we’re on the inveitable Bucky tangent (Bucky is apparently the new Ryan Howard, able to consume threads at will), if Bucky spends the year in the minors, wouldn’t he be eligible to get his release as a minor league free agent, since he’s been stuck there so long?
Oh and “he can’t hit the breaking pitch” is, generally speaking, baseball-ese for “We don’t believe minor league stats are as relevant to major league performance as tool and scouting reports are.”
It’s the kind of attitude that the Beanes of the world will take advantage of repeatedly, while people wonder “Gee, how come they lost Hudson/Mulder/Tejada/Giambi and the A’s still don’t suck?”…
#22 “if Bucky spends the year in the minors, wouldn’t he be eligible to get his release as a minor league free agent, since he’s been stuck there so long?”
No, he wouldn’t be eligible to be a free agent unless Seattle tried to take him off the 40 man roster. As long as he stays on the 40 man roster (even if he’s in the minors), he’ll need to either run out of options (sent back to the minors in 3 different years) or have 6 years of major league service time to become a free agent …
RE: #10 And then there those dreaded drop bears! ‘shiver’ Horrible creatures! I wish Snelling all the best too. He was a Dave Myers victim, halfway to home plate when the former third base coach throws up the hold sign. As a runner myself, I winced as I watched Snelling try to put on the brakes, ripping out his hamstring. I’m sad to hear he won’t have centerfield speed anymore. I have Snelling/Strong penciled in on my bench. Let’s hope.
#23 “Gee, how come they lost Hudson/Mulder/Tejada/Giambi and the A’s still don’t suck?”…
Actually the A’s haven’t played even one game since losing Hudson and Mulder and I for one, am expecting them to suck (at least this year). I know I’m in the minority, but you don’t just trade pitchers of that caliber and insert rookies into their slots in the rotation and not expect a huge dropout in the team’s performance (especially since they’re already a team that doesn’t have much depth due to their payroll restraints).
Dave, love the write-up of the top 10 from last year! It would be terrific to see something similar for this years top 10 (or at least those who weren’t in last years).
RE Bucky: I thought the team basically told him in August last year, “You’ve made the team, go get that knee surgery.” So he got the surgery in August instead of October. Has something changed regarding him making the team? Is it because Hargrove now is in charge and not Melvin?
Willie is a dad now? Great, we can’t DFA a new father. Willie keeps finding ways to stick around.
In any case, I’d definitely like to see Snelling get his chance this season.
As long as he stays on the 40 man roster (even if he’s in the minors), he’ll need to either run out of options (sent back to the minors in 3 different years) or have 6 years of major league service time to become a free agent …
Bucky’s never been on a 40 man roster and optioned back to the minors before this?
I wonder- if he has another monster year in Tacoma and doesn’t crack the lineup if we’d give him his release. Bavasi seems decent enough to do that (he did something similar for Terry Mulholland last year).
I doubt it – even if we send him to Triple-A, Bucky still has value to this team (especially if Sexson goes down). Mulholland, not so much.
#28-“RE Bucky: I thought the team basically told him in August last year, “You’ve made the team, go get that knee surgery.†So he got the surgery in August instead of October. Has something changed regarding him making the team? Is it because Hargrove now is in charge and not Melvin?”
apparently, no decision has been made yet; after all, Hargrove hasn’t seen Jacobsen do anything really but take BP:
2/13 Times: “Bavasi hinted at Jacobsen’s situation when he said, “He just started running, and you want to be careful with him. You’d like to go wire to wire without injuries, but you don’t, so you need depth in the majors or minors.” The makeup of the five-man bench will be settled in camp.”
2/22 PI: “The wild card is Bucky Jacobsen. A big-swinging right-hander with plenty of power, Jacobsen ended 2004 with the expectation that he’d have a great shot at being the next DH. But he underwent knee surgery and isn’t fully recovered. Jacobsen can swing and can run in a straight line, but he can’t start and stop on the run. When Cactus League games begin in two weeks, he probably won’t be ready to play. A couple of weeks later, he might be.
Much of the competition will take place in the battles to land the backup roles, starting with Jacobsen, whose health may not give him a real chance to make the team. “Not being healthy is going to hurt,” Hargrove said. “I think he’d have a great chance to make the team if he was healthy.”
Yeah, you read that and you see it’s another step in them getting the fans to accept the fact that they just used Bucky last year and are going to discard him like so much Charles Gipson.
If Bucky’s healthy he needs to be with the big club, and he needs to be the full-time DH. Let Ibanez find at-bats elsewhere.
In other news, MLB.com is auctioning off a “Barry Bonds Singed Game-Issued Road Jersey”. Smokin’.
“Yeah, you read that and you see it’s another step in them getting the fans to accept the fact that they just used Bucky last year and are going to discard him like so much Charles Gipson. “–Comment by Change
Gipson G R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO BA OBP SLG
7 Seasons 354 76 74 14 7 0 29 29 68 .239 .313 .329
Gipson’s numbers the past 2 seasons — including AAA — have done nothing to suggest the M’s were wrong to discard him.
Bucky, on the other hand….
BLOOMIN’ ONION!!!! NOW! NOW!
Anyway, Snelling is better off in Tacoma until we trade Ibanez.
Bucky Jacobsen isn’t Ken Phelps, he’s Kevin Maas. C’mon, people. He hit 9 home runs and 28 RBI in 160 at bats. That’s, well, a good quarter season. He’s going to turn thirty this year. Sure it would be nice, sentimentally at least, to see him given a whole season. But it’s hardly a baseball crime or a moronic decision if it doesn’t happen. Do you really think that he’s going to hit 36 home runs over a full season, and slug .500? Those 9 home runs, by the way: 5 in 49 at bats in July, 4 in 111 at bats the rest of the year.
Bucky should at least get a shot at being the power bat off the bench and if hes anything like he was last year it will be hard for hargrove to not give him AB’s at the DH position. I have the feeling hargrove might want to see bucky earn it in ST, which might not happen.
Who cares if he’s 30? If he can hit, which he can, he should play.
Bucky Jacobsen isn’t Ken Phelps, he’s Kevin Maas. C’mon, people. He hit 9 home runs and 28 RBI in 160 at bats.
And his minor league numbers that led to his callup are what, garbage?
This was EXACTLY the same kjind of crap Phelps had to deal with in getting his career started- injuries, unlucky signings, and so on.
Do I think he’s an All-Star? No. But I think he’ll have a useful career in the major leagues…like Ken Phelps.
One month of good hitting, which is what he did, doe not mean he is going to hit at that level. The point of him being 30 is that he has very likely already reached his peak, and if he were going to be good we would probably already know it by know. If he were 25, I would understand the outrage at the Mariners blocking his way. But there’s not much reason that I can see to believe that he has a future as more than a spare part. He was a good story last year. I wouldn’t mind seeing him given more of a shot. All I’m saying is that it’s not moronic for the Mariners to feel otherwise. They can’t afford to be governed so much by sentiment, especially since they’re already slathering so much sentiment on Dan Wilson.
The point of him being 30 is that he has very likely already reached his peak, and if he were going to be good we would probably already know it by know.
You mean like having a career minor league OPS in the 900’s? Hey, what do you know…