Jay Gibbons signed in a minor league contract with the Milwaukee Brewers and is on his way to their Double A affililate in Nashville.
If all goes well, he'll be moved up to Triple A in a couple of weeks and then, if he produces, could end up sitting on the bench for the Milwaukee Brewers and waiting for a turn to pinch hit.
At least I assume he'll pinch hit. Maybe the Brewers plan to pull a reverse Rick Ankiel/Adam Loewen and turn Gibbons into a middle reliever.
God knows they can't allow him to play the outfield or first base. I mean they could, but that would only be the DUMBEST MOVE IN THE HISTORY OF BASEBALL!
I'm glad some of us are getting all misty thinking about Gibbons getting a much deserved second chance in MLB. Because "gee, after all he did apologize for that little HGH incident and he's a really nice guy who did SO much for the community when he was here in Baltimore. Just a kind hearted soul caught up with the wrong crowd".
Plus he's willing to donate his minor league salary to charity.
Great! I don't care if that miscreant donated both kidneys, his liver, his lungs, his batting eye (of course he really doesn't need THAT, does he?), and his spleen. There is NO WAY JAY GIBBONS SHOULD BE IN BASEBALL WHILE BARRY BONDS WAITS FOR A CHANCE!
None. Zero. It's insane...
I said it last night on our show and I'll say it again- Jay Gibbons (and guys like him) have done more damage to baseball than Barry Bonds ever did.
Gibbons is still getting paid 8 million dollars a year (gee, haven't heard him talk about donating that) by the Orioles. His use of performance enhancing drugs led to inflated numbers and locked up money which could've been used for much better purposes by the organization- like maybe a shortstop. Who knows?
Sure, Flanagan and the rest of the O's front office have to take some of the blame for forking over that kind of dough to a guy who has less fielding skills than Carmen Elektra displayed in the MTV celebrity all-star softball game and whose track record as a power hitter wasn't exactly proven. But Gibbons is the poster child for the steroid era. More so than Bonds.
Let's say Barry Bonds DID use steroids. Or HGH... Or iguana bile. Without the additives, he'd still be the best player of his generation and STILL command one of the highest contracts in the league.
Bonds use of performancing enhancing drugs turned the best player in all of a baseball into, um, the best player in all of baseball. He went from superstar to super human.
Gibbons, on the other hand, went from a marginal player to a decent one and then, after the drugs wore off, a less than marginal player. A lot of players did the same thing- many of them named in the Mitchell Report. If you want to know why run production went up and team home run numbers exploded, look to the Gibbons' of the world and not the Bonds'.
Last year- post steroids- while Jay Gibbons watched more fly balls bounce off his head than go over the fence, Bonds hit 28 home runs in 340 at bats and finished the season with a .565 slugging percentage.
Yet, Jay Gibbons gets the second chance.
The only way Jay Gibbons should be allowed back onto a Major League field is ten years from now when the Orioles do a "Idiots Who Stunk" night at Camden Yards.
The greatest home run hitter of all time is willing to play for the league minimum and no team will touch him? Hmm.
But there's no collusion, right?
And we're sure there's no racism, right?
I'm not so sure.