On the long list of ways for a big-league ballplayer to jump to the front of other teams’ wish lists, hitting a pair of grand slams in one game ranks pretty high.
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It took Josh Willingham a month to wrestle playing time from a crowded Nationals outfield. It took another few weeks to establish his powerful bat. Now, the 30-year-old might have hit his way off this desert island with two grand slams against Milwaukee on Monday.
Trade talks continue around Major League Baseball as the July 31st deadline fast approaches. Few players would provide more pop than Willingham, who entered play Tuesday with 16 home runs in just 228 at-bats. He also hit a combined 47 homers in 2006 and 2007 before back issues limited him to 15 last season.
But there’s the rub. Willingham spent the first month of 2009 rotating through the bloated outfield former general manager Jim Bowden patched together. He produced all of five hits in April and a .143 batting average. Everything Willingham has accomplished since has been because of steady playing time. Would that same production continue if he went to a contender and was used — again — as a part-time starter and a weapon off the bench?
Nats general manager Mike Rizzo has been adamant about not trading his veteran players for spare parts. The price for Willingham and first baseman Nick Johnson has been set high — to the point where Johnson’s most likely suitors, San Francisco and Boston, made other deals.
But Johnson is a free agent at the end of the year and can go where he wants. Willingham has two more years of arbitration and if he keeps hitting 20 to 30 homers a year will provide excellent production for relatively little money. A middle of the lineup in 2010 of Ryan Zimmerman, Adam Dunn and Willingham would be hard to pass up if the return for Willingham is simply another middle reliever. For all its futility, the biggest thing Washington did right in the offseason was find players with power. Even closing in on 100 losses, can the Nats afford to give some back?
