A Marlin out of water
Second baseman Dee Gordon not quite at home yet in Mariners’ outfield.
“It’s embarrassing. I don’t want to bash anyone, but what’s happened is not good.” Dee Gordon, former Marlins second baseman who was traded to the Mariners
KISSIMMEE — Dee Gordon is the starting center fielder for the Seattle Mariners.
No, the former Marlins second baseman isn’t used to that new reality either. His training so far includes fielding a few flies (most spit out of a machine) last week and a visit from Mariners outfield coach Chris Prieto this week, plus those times he goofed around in the outfield during batting practice.
“I go stand out there next to [David] Phelps and [Dustin] McGowan, take their glove and go, ‘I’m going to make a diving catch!’ ” Gordon said. “And probably miss it. That’s about it. That’s the extent of my outfield expertise.”
Gordon laughed at the memory, which is all that is now after his transcontinental trade from the Marlins to the Mariners earlier this month. He sat in the deserted backfields of the Braves’ spring training complex, his offseason workout base, one recent afternoon while crushing his regular Chipotle order — double steak bowl, chips on the side — and reflecting on his past three years in South Florida and the past three weeks in which the Marlins’ core has been broken up. He wore a New Orleans Baby Cakes hat, leftover from last spring.
Like some of his former teammates, Gordon is unhappy about the Marlins’ direction under new ownership, led by CEO Derek Jeter and chairman Bruce Sherman. And, immensely grateful for his time as a Marlin, he wishes it wasn’t over. “I didn’t ask for this,” Gordon said. Gordon was the first Marlin to be moved this offseason, to Seattle for prospects, as the Marlins dumped his salary. Then came Giancarlo Stanton to the Yankees and Marcell Ozuna to the Cardinals.
The potentially connected fates of Christian Yelich and J.T. Realmuto remain uncertain.
“It’s terrible,” Gordon said. “It’s almost — I’m not even going to say almost. It’s embarrassing. It’s embarrassing. I don’t want to bash anyone, but what’s happened is not good.”
Gordon spoke slowly and chose his words carefully, not wanting to cause a stir quite like Stanton did during his introduction as a Yankee but wanting to express his bubbling feelings.
“No disrespect to anybody, but those are your best three players. You let them go,” Gordon said. “Not because they underperformed. But because of something you [new ownership] can’t take care of.”
That’s a reference to the money.
After a franchise record $115 million Opening Day payroll in 2017, the Marlins are reportedly targeting a payroll in the $90 million neighborhood in the first year of their Jeter era. The club is bleeding tens of millions of dollars annually, and Jeter has acknowledged a deep need to change the way the Marlins operate financially.
So far, that includes trading the best team’s best players as they start to lay the prospect foundation for a rebuild. Jeter and president of baseball operations Michael Hill have preached patience, sustainability and the importance of player development and scouting.
Jeter, Sherman and their group of investors just plunked down $1.2 billion to buy the team. It takes less than the pointtwo to keep the team together another year. To Gordon and others, that logic seems so obvious that they couldn’t quite believe that the new owners were
really going to come in and trade guys.
“At first it was like, ha ha ha, they bought the team and they’re going to trade us,” Gordon said. “We were like, there’s no way you can buy a team for $1 billion and have to trade everybody.”
But it did happen, and now Gordon is an outfielder in the Pacific Northwest instead of an infielder in South Florida.
Gordon paints his Marlins tenure as a time of professional and personal growth. He was one piece in a seven-player December 2014 trade between Los Angeles and Miami, a move that happened in part “because [the Dodgers] thought I reached my potential.” This time, he was the major piece in a four-player deal. Happy to prove the Dodgers wrong, Gordon made another AllStar Game and won a batting title, two stolen base titles, a Gold Glove and a Silver Slugger.
He also signed a $50 million contract, served an 80-game PED suspension and took up philanthropic endeavors abroad and at home. The latter continues Saturday, when Gordon — the Marlins’ Roberto Clemente Award nominee last season — hosts his annual basketball tournament in his hometown Avon Park to benefit the local Boys & Girls Club.
“[The Marlins] let me play, they let me be myself, they let me carry out my dreams off the field with charity work and things like that,” Gordon said. “They let me do anything I needed to do to become a better man, not just a better baseball player.”
He also grew close with his now-former teammates. They endured several losing seasons and the death of Jose Fernandez — “When we lost Jose, that was pretty much it,” Gordon said of this group’s chance to win — together. Trades won’t break those bonds, Gordon said.
During Gordon’s recent trip to the Dominican Republic, Ozuna and Jose Urena picked up Gordon and his girlfriend and took them to dinner. And he stayed in regular communication with many of the Marlins — most of them unhappy — as trades went down and more rumors swirled.
What does he think the Marlins should do with Yelich?
“I think you have to let the dude go win,” Gordon said. “That’s what you did for the rest of us, let us have a chance to win. Let him go win.
“I feel bad for Yeli, because he’s my brother. I feel bad for J.T. I feel bad for [Justin Bour]. I feel bad for [Martin] Prado. I feel bad for those guys.”
Another testament from Gordon to the group’s closeness: When the Mariners were close to acquiring him and wanted his thoughts on the position change, he cold called Phelps, the reliever traded by the Marlins to the Mariners last season. He wanted to know: What kind of team is Seattle? What kind of clubhouse? The type worth making this sacrifice for?
Phelps helped sell him on the idea.
“First reaction was ‘no,’ ” Gordon said. “Not ‘What the heck?’ Just straight up, ‘No.’ Then it was, I gotta do it.”
And now Gordon is enthused about being in Seattle, where he’ll play with second baseman Robinson Cano — who Gordon first met in 2005 as a 17-year-old hanging around his father, retired pitcher Tom Gordon, and the Yankees when Cano was a 22-year-old rookie.
Gordon is also working with Mariners legend Ken Griffey Jr., a Hall of Famer, 10-time Gold Glover and one of the best center fielders in major league history. Gordon has long considered Griffey a mentor. Not a bad person to learn from, or live mere minutes from in Central Florida.
Consider that a convenient coincidence in the early days of Gordon’s new life as the Mariners’ starting center fielder.
“We’re going to make it work,” Gordon said. “The way I work, I’m going to make sure it works.”