Phil Plantier
by Bill Barnwell

 

If one were to choose an occupation within baseball, being a left-handed hitter in Fenway Park wouldn't be a bad choice. 302 feet from home plate sits one of the shortest porches in the Major Leagues, waiting with the promise of cheap home runs, RBIs, singles turned into ground-rule doubles...things that make an arbitration lawyer coo. In the early nineties, the Red Sox developed three left-handed hitters who spent significant time in the major leagues. One of them was hyped by no less of an authority than Bill James as the man who would hit the most home runs in the major leagues in the 1990s. The other two were Mo Vaughn and Scott "I Was An All-Star" Cooper.

The player who was getting pimped by the then-not-so-curmudgeonly-beard was a local boy made good, a guy whose power was legendary - not Butch Huskey dislocate-my-own-shoulder-on-a-swing legendary, but good enough. He made the majors at 20, and at 21, put up a .331/.420/.615 line in 148 ABs, launching a race by card collectors to snap up every one of his rookie cards on the market. Now, you can find his rookie card as penny filler below the Brien Taylor rookie that was held in much the same regard. It is there, now, that you can find Phil Plantier.

His minor league numbers aren't on the Internet, sadly, so I don't have access to them - and considering I was six when he debuted, I don't know them. But, even at that young age, I remember hearing about how the Red Sox had this new mammoth slugger who might even match the power of Cecil Fielder. It turns out they did...it was just the wrong dude.

What befell Phil Plantier? Holes in his swing, probably. Someone on the net attributes it to his inability to hit change-ups, which is possible, but I figure he probably had trouble with some breaking stuff. He had a decent year for the Padres after they acquired him for the first time, slugging .509. He also got included in the first mammoth Padres-Astros trade which is very much a fantasy league trade and should've been vetoed on the grounds that it was too silly. Since I don't really know too much about Phil Plantier, let's take a look at that trade in hindsight:

The Padres gave up Derek Bell (who I miss dearly), Doug Brocail, Ricky Guiterrez, the wrong Pedro Martinez, Craig Shipley, and our boy Phil. In return, they got Ken Caminiti, Andujar Cedeno, Steve Finley, Roberto Petagine and Brian Williams. This is what might be known as getting owned. While the Astros got the ugliest man in baseball, a useful reliever, and two decent utility infielders, the Padres got the three best players in the deal. Sure, they didn't know what to do with one of them, but anytime Randy Smith fleeces someone, you have to take what you can get. Even if it is his father.

Plantier retired a Norfolk Tide in 1998 even though he probably could've been useful to someone as a guy off the bench who could slug .550 against righties. Jack Cust, this is your life.

Someone whines about how Phil Plantier ruined their card collection
Buy 20 assorted Phil Plantier cards for $8