Wilson Betemit is only 28 years old, yet he's been in professional baseball for more than half of his life.

Five years later, as a 19-year old, he made his Major League debut in 8 games for the Braves. During his cup of coffee, he went 0 for 3, with 2 walks, a stolen base, and a run scored. Betemit had to wait another three years to wear a Major League uniform. This time, he played 22 games and hit a disappointing .170/.231/.170 (Just 8 hits in 47 AB's, all singles).
He finally saw extended action and produced very good results as a 23-year-old in 2005. He played 115 games, received 274 plate appearances, and hit .305/.359/.435. It was around this time that he opened our eyes, and we thought he could be good. He seemed to hit the ball with authority.
The Braves deemed Wilson Betemit expendable immediately before the 2006 trade deadline, as they sent him to the Dodgers for Willy Aybar, Danys Baez, and cash. Betemit hit much better for the Braves than the Dodgers that season (113 OPS+ in Atl; 87 OPS+ in LA).

He played at under replacement lever for the Yankees, but they got the best return on him by trading for Swisher. The Braves, Dodgers, and White Sox do not have anything that good to show for ever employing Betemit.

He was a free agent for just over a month before he decided to sign with the Kansas City Royals.
As fascinating as that decision may be, if you're choosing between the Royals and any other team, you're probably choosing the Royals for the opportunity at playing time, steak & bar-b-que, or there really wasn't another team to choose.
The reason we're talking about Wilson Betemit today is because I happened to notice that he's starting for the Royals today and batting .336. I was about to tweet "It's 2010, Wilson Betemit is on the last place Royals, he's hitting .336 and OBP'ing .410 #Wha?", when I decided this should be a quick post on the ol' blog.
Even though he has mostly disappointed, we still like Betemit. We're glad he's doing well, especially with a nonthreatening team like the Royals. We even like the Royals a bit because of everything we read from Joe Posnanski (recommended!), Rany Jazayerly, Rob Neyer and others who we read, but not as often like Bob Dutton, Jason Whitlock, and Dick Kaegel.

That being said, the 14-year old who inspired the Braves organization to invest in him is in his prime season of 28-years old. As Melvin Udall famously said to the other patients in his psychiatrist's waiting room, "What if this is as good as it gets?" For our good friend, Wilson Betemit, this afternoon's stat line could possibly be his zenith.
No comments:
Post a Comment