Derek Jeter Never Played for the Mariners

This may come as a surprise to some people, but shortstop Derek Jeter never played a single inning of his career for the Seattle Mariners. In fact he has only ever played for one team in his career, The New York Yankees. Despite this simple statistic, the Seattle Mariners (along with most of the rest of Major League Baseball) have decided they should spend time and money honoring this man's illustrious playing career. They went so far as to give him a seat from the Kingdome because he played his first major league game there. They have also decided to give him the second base used during this weeks Mariners vs Yankees series. All of this begs the question, why?

Why are the Seattle Mariners, a team that Jeter never once suited up for, going so far to honor this man? The Mariners don't have much to thank Jeter for. They don't owe him anything for all their success because they haven't really had any during Jeter's career (1554-1570 for a .497 win %). During his career Jeter batted .283/.345/.417 against the M's. That is not great, but it is not bad either and definitely not bad enough to have significantly helped the M's win. What it boils down to, like most things in professional sports, is cash.

Derek Jeter is a big name and he plays for one of the most beloved and loathed teams in the world. In fact he has basically been synonymous with the Yankees for the last 15 years. People love to watch Jeter and his Yankees. Attendance at Safeco field spikes when the Bronx Bombers are in town. When attendance spikes, ticket sales spike, and with them profits. People want to see the legends. On top of that, most of these people, much to the chagrin of this hometown fan, are Yankees fans, paying to see their team in person. These fans buy hats and jerseys, which makes the Mariners yet more money.

I supposed I should be glad about all this because anecdotally, if the Mariners make money they are more likely to spend more on good players (hopefully good players, but this post isn't about the talent evaluation skills of the M's so let's leave it at that) which will help my team win. And I would rather have the team spending money on good players then not spending money on good players.  However, I don't feel happy about it. Instead, I feel a sort of weird awkwardness combined with jealousy. 

There is just something not right about seeing another team's great honored so emphatically. Like mentioned before, the Mariners didn't mess around. They made it known that the Yankees shortstop was great and should be honored. They pulled out all the stops. The only thing missing was Ken Griffey Jr parachuting out of a 777, painted in Yankees livery with a big old #2 on it, and personally delivering the keys to Safeco Field to the shortstop. It feels like your parents throwing a party to celebrate your neighbors excellent report card because yours was full of D's. Why do we have to make such a big deal about it? People are going to play to see the Yankees play in Seattle even if every Mariners great doesn't show up to high five the Yankee captain. I wish we could just say good job on the jumbo-tron, give him a round of applause, and move on.



References: Baseball-Reference.com