I suppose we all should’ve seen something like this coming after the house-cleaning that the front office did last month, but last night something triggered in Ryan Doumit and caused John Russell to bench him mid-game. Russell is refusing to talk to anyone about it, but from the quotes given he sounds about as pissed as he’s ever been as Pirates’ manager.
Of course, we don’t know all the circumstances here because no one’s talking and I doubt anyone is going to do any talking any time soon, but it seems pretty safe to infer that Doumit is still being mopey about all of the trades that happened last week. I hope that’s not the case, but if it is, it’s really time for him to get over himself. There’s only one team in baseball that would take an injury-prone catcher with a poor defensive reputation and keep him behind the plate for as long as the Pirates have kept Doumit back there. If he’s trying to get traded, he’s almost certainly going to get traded into four-corners/utility role (think Eric Hinske) where he’ll see considerably less playing time than he does here. Is that really what he’s angling for here?
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