The Era of Good Feeling Continues

Soriano returns to camp; refuses to take the field with his teammates.

Memo to Jim Bowden: Fix it. No second or third chances.

"We told him if we get to Thursday, and he refuses to play left field, we told him at that point we will request that the commissioner's office place him on the disqualified list, at that time -- no pay, no service time." (Jim Bowden, via AP/ESPN.com, 3/20/2006)

"If he's going to play here he's going to be out in left field." (Frank Robinson, via Washington Post 3/21/2006)

"I just hope they can fix that situation. I think everybody's a grown-enough man here. I just hope for the best for the team and those guys can fix the situation. Let's let Jim and Soriano and his agent fix the situation." (Jose Guillen, via Washington Times, 3/21/2006)

So this week begins with the not-surprising news that Soriano refused to join his teammates on the field after being penciled into the lineup as the starting left fielder for last night's game against LA. Bowden claims that the team will give him another chance on Wednesday;  we say trade him now, even if it's for ten cents on the dollar - he's gonna walk at the end of the year anyway. Get him out of here. (Is it too late to flip-flop and say that we don't like the Soriano for Wilkerson/Sledge/Galarraga deal?)

Just last Wednesday, Tom Boswell was all giddy with rah-rah-rah about how suddenly everything was looking up for the Nationals.  Thanks Boz, you jinxed it. Since then, while the Nationals have continued to play like the Bad News Bears, Guzman officially joined the Torn Labrum Club (no matter how bad he stunk it up last year, its not good news), and then the clincher: the irreplaceable Luis Ayala became the inevitable WBC casualty (every team in the majors was holding their breath, because it was inevitable that someone, somewhere, was going to go down), done for the year. And now, the Soriano soap opera continues...

Comments

[SomeGuy]

Here's what I want Frank to do:

Start Soriano in the OF, when he won't sack up and actually play out there, Frank then has the team play the first defensive half inning without Soriano so he can point out for all the world to see that Soriano is putting himself visibly ahead of the team and his teammates.

Somehow Bowden needs to work up enough interest in an obviously devalued commodity so we can play a few teams off each other when Soriano gets traded.

The key might actually be to wait it out, let things settle down and attempt to trade Soriano for two plugged nickels instead of the one we can get on Thursday.