I Will Not Allow 1937 To Contradict Me

Last week I wrote about my feelings: The feelings that overwhelmed me as the Padres made good on their promise to build through the draft by signing the vast majority of their 2011 draft choices. My thoughts were all over the board but I'd like to ask for permission to quote myself on this glorious Friday morning? Are we cool? Cool:

 The Padres are not the farm system for the Boston Red Sox.

Nor are they the farm system for the rest of MLB. For that to be the truth then the Padres would have needed to develop an awful lot of players over the last 10 years for it to be a valid argument. They have not. Jake Peavy is not a good example. Jake Peavy was a catastrophic injury away from sinking the organization.

 I stand by that statement. Because I wrote it. And most importantly, I felt it. Feelings count just as much as an 0 for 1 with three walks.*


Having conveyed that sentiment such a short time ago, I could not help but chuckle as I read through David Halberstam's The Teammates last night. One of Halberstam's last books before his untimely death in 2007 tells the tale of four close friends named Ted Williams, Bobby Doerr, Johny Pesky, and Dom DiMaggio; teammates with the Boston Red Sox.

Bobby Doerr and Ted Williams were very close friends, perhaps destined to be so, as Doerr was a patient and kind man who understood Williams, but most importantly, he could deal with Williams' uneven temperament. Bobby Doerr recounts to David Halberstam how Ted Williams almost didn't become his teammate with the Red Sox:

It was Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey who almost blew it. That year's baseball winter meetings were held in December in Chicago, where Collins [Red Sox GM] and Lane [The PCL San Diego Padres owner] were supposed to meet to finalize a deal. But suddenly Yawkey balked. He had lately been paying a lot of money for aging stars like Jimmie Foxx and Lefty Grove, and it was all short-range, so they decided to go another route: to build up their farm system. To Yawkey, who had had a number of drinks that day, the Williams deal suddenly seemed to smack of the old way (paying big money for a star), now officially known as the wrong way. For whatever reason -- perhaps it was the cloud of alcohol -- it was hard for the owner to understand that this was not the same kind of deal, that this was paying far less money, only $25,000 plus a couple of prospects, for what was obviously an immensely talented kid. They were using the Padres as a de facto farm club, and Williams was not a player on his way down, but a wunderkind on his way up-- a kid with a stroke like Joe Dimaggio's.

The Red Sox went on to sign Ted Williams by the deadline imposed by San Diego Padres owner Bill Lane that evening at the winter meetings. Had the deadline not been met the Chicago Cubs were next in line to purchase the services of the young San Diegan, Williams.

All very interesting but it was the reference to the Padres as the de facto farm club for the Red Sox that brought a grin to my face. There was a time and place where this was indeed the truth.

But so we're clear, allow me to reiterate... it is not here... nor is it now.

Enjoy your Friday.


* Write that one down.