No Barry? How about Richie?
Have you ever driven by someones front yard and notice something they are throwing out and think you could use it?
Now that the Giants trash isn’t the Diamondbacks treasure it’s time for them to focus on another yard. It’s time for them to back the truck up to the Mariners yard and pick up the 6′ 8″ thing they just placed on the trash heap.
That’s right things are so bad that it’s worth getting desperate. It’s worth looking at Richie Sexson.
The D-Backs have seen Sexson up close. In his brief stint in the desert he didn’t show them much, except for a torn labrum.
Sexson didn’t show a lot to Seattle either but he has averaged 27 home runs and 90 RBI a year over his career. That alone makes it worth taking a chance on him if you are Josh Byrnes and the Diamondbacks.
You are probably thinking, “what do the snakes need another putrid sub .230 hitter for?” They need him because their offense has been more painful to watch than a testicular fracture (sorry Chris but you know it’s more painful). They also need him because his .218 average this season is deceiving.
Sexson’s average away from Seattle’s pitcher friendly Safeco Field is over 80 points higher, .260, than his .178 average at home. His OBP is 100 points higher on the road and his SLG is almost double on the road than in the land of rain and Starbucks. Add onto that that he hit 8 of his home runs and 24 of his RBI on the road and you’ve got the makings of a trend.
Could his decline over the last few seasons be due to Safeco Field and not his own diminishing skills? Sure, but it’s probably a combination of both. His low average at home isn’t a fluke however. In his time in Seattle he has batted on average 20 points higher away from Safeco. If you could get a .250 average and 15 to 20 home runs in the second half it could make the difference between a sub .500 record and winning the west.
If signed he could share time at first with Tracy and let Conor Jackson focus a majority of his playing time in left. It would also give Tracy the ability to back up Mark Reynolds when he needs a day off.
It’s not ideal defensively but honestly no one is going to be able to fix this teams defense (unless you get Mark Reynolds a giant novelty glove and paint the correct path to the ball on the grass for Justin Upton).
Plus Richie Sexson owes the Diamondbacks and their fans after he cost them 6 players, a scoreboard and a large amount of wins in 2004. Maybe he could pay them back in a decent performance for a minimum contract.
It’s worth a chance. At the very worst you just put him back out in the yard for the next bargain hunter to pick up.
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Posted by Greg Esposito
Co-founder of AzSportsHub.com. Greg provides the sometimes serious, sometimes sarcastic and always interesting takes on Arizona sports (at least we hope). Whether it’s on In The Zona with Matt or in his column Greg reports, rants and raves about whatever is in the news for Arizona Sports.
http://www.azsportshub.com/author/espo
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