Several players this year have won jobs (or impressed teams) out of spring training with pretty good March performances. Jeremy Reed has made the Mets squad as a fourth outfielder, Brett Tomko pitched well enough to make the team while Angel Berroa was, until yesterday, was in consideration for the Yankee utility infielder role. Former New York Yankee Nick Green has made the Boston Red Sox team as the utility infielder with a very impressive spring consisting of a .349 BA/.414 OBP/.524 SLG/.938 OPS with five doubles, 2 HR’s and 10 RBI’s. 

What do all these veterans have in common? Basically, they all really stink as major league players and played above their heads during a month of spring training games. What is amazing, though, is that both Yankee veteran players (Tomko and Berroa) were demoted while the Mets and Red Sox kept their veteran over their head guys. Shows that despite sepnding over $400 million this winter, the Yankee hierarchy is moving in a different direction.

Despite their recent spring success, all four of those players are marginal at best as major leaguer players. Reed has been rather pedestrian in his brief five year career with an OPS+ of 83 in 1061 career at bats. He has shown little power (11 HR’s and 98 RBI’s in career) and even less speed (19 SB’s). His best ever seasonal numbers of .269 BA/.322 OBP/.360 SLG/.682 OPS are almost equal to his career averages of .257/.314/.365/.679.

What you see is what you get with Jeremy Reed.

The same is true with the others, too. Berroa, Tomko and especially Green are not good players, as they are below average in most every category. Berroa’s only decent season was his rookie year in 2003 and on defense he usually appears to have a ping pong paddle on his left hand, while Tomko was pedestrian in all but two seasons, both of which he went 11-7. His career best ERA of 3.43 came in his rookie season, but the major league hitters adjusted and Tomko’s other seasonal ERA’s were all over 4.00, with many over 5.00. Only two of Tomko’s ERA years have been above league average.

Not a good pitcher by any means.

And don’t get me started on Nick Green. Please, already! The guy is a terrible baseball player who adds nothing to a team. And despite his spring power surge, for someone who has shown very little power over his career (10 HR’s in 703 AB’s), he has struck out a whopping 192 times! Green is a .240 career hitter with a career OPS+ of 72. And all his defensive metrics are all below league average.

Why is he even in a major league camp, let alone making a 25 man roster?

Football coach Bill Parcells was fond of saying: “Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while.” The baseball equivalent is that even the worst player can have a good month. In this great game everyone gets hot at one time or another and those who get hot in March usually “surprise” some front office people (and scouts) and make a team.

The old baseball axiom is to never believe what you see in spring training or in September, and in these cases of the four above players it is true. With veterans of established track records, teams should go by less what they see now and more what the true history is of the player. While it is true that players can improve and get better, those types of players are usually the younger ones who have worked hard, adjusted to the higher level and gained increased strength as they have matured physically.

All the has-been hangers on are all almost past their prime peak physical conditioned ages.

Guys like Brett Gardner improved their approach and earned the spot with improvement in his game, and Ramiro Pena brings specialization with defensive wizardry.

The Berroa’s, Tomko’s, Reed’s and Green’s of the world will show nothing after a fast spring start and revert back to their mediocre ways. Berroa and Tomko should never being part of the Yankees and Reed and Green will both lose their backup roles when their true colors are revealed.