The inevitable on Juickson Profar’s lost season appears to have been confirmed.
Just weeks after the Rangers and team doctors suggested he would be out for the rest of the year, the infield phenom himself recently stated it looks like he won’t play at all after re-aggravating his injured shoulder.
Thus the young kid who was supposed to immediately show how much more awesome he was than stupid ol’ Ian Kinsler (the fans and media’s words, not his or mine) won’t play a game in 2014. With Both Profar and the man the Rangers got for Kinsler, Prince Fielder, both gone, that pretty much has to be declared a failure of a trade all around.
So what do they do now?
Profar’s injury forced the Rangers to call up their other can’t miss infield prospect, Rougned Odor, much sooner than they wanted. The good news is that Odor has actually risen to the opportunity, batting .281, and while his production (6 runs and 11 RBI in 22 games) has dropped off, it still shows more than the other infield prospect called up, Luis Sardinas.
But that leads to another problem. Even if the Rangers sign the likes of Kendrys Morales to give Odor some time off and hopefully avoid the rookie wall, there is pretty much no way they can send Odor back to the minors if he keeps this up.
Which is why the subject has to be approached. Jurickson Profar, by this time, may have become an expendable piece that the team simply can no longer hang on to and is probably better as trade bait.
Odor for now seems to have won the spot as the Rangers’ second baseman of the future. So what could they possibly do with Profar now? Convert him to a third baseman and drag him out for another two years until Beltre’s contract is up?
Of course, that’s not the option that so many on the social media seem to want. They see another person as expendable.
Yes, their solution – is too trade Elvis Andrus.
Because continuing to dump the players that were part of those trips to the World Series has been working so well, right? CJ Wilson, Josh Hamilton, Mike Napoli, Nelson Cruz, Kinsler…. one by one the Rangers have listened to the knee-jerk fans who cry that since that team didn’t get the job done (because of ONE fly ball), every single player from there is worthless and needs to be replaced.
The result has been that they have constantly lost players with the experience of playing on the biggest stage and are now having to wait for younger guys to learn while the rest of the division gets better.
And now Andrus? He’s somehow done as a player that can contribute? Even though he has more runs scored and only three fewer RBI than Shin-Soo Choo?
Please.
If you are giving me a choice between a veteran that has already established himself on this team and a kid that had been extremely over-hyped, I’ll take the veteran.
In Profar, I haven’t seen a Rangers prospect so excessively hyped since Ruben Mateo. And that one didn’t work out too well.
This isn’t just the fact that Profar won’t play at all this season. For one resin or another, Ron Washington didn’t want him in the lineup these past two years. Maybe he sees something that other people don’t.
The Rangers won’t get anything for Profar when the July deadline comes. But if they can convince other teams that he has completely recovered by season’s end, an off-season deal for a catcher or power hitting outfielder could be possible.
It’s time to start looking past the hype and realize that Profar might not have a future here and others have passed him by. I’ve heard people say time and time again that we need to “move on” from all the players the Rangers cast off, even as they succeed elsewhere. But we have to stick with Profar just because people say he’s GUARANTEED to be a star? Nothing’s guaranteed.
It’s time to move on from Jurickson Profar.
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