Me, Elsewhere: What if the Padres Had Drafted Travis Fryman?

The second installment of my “Reimagining the 1987 draft” series is up at Hardball Times. In our alternate reality, the Padres don’t take Texas right-hander Kevin Garner with the 10th pick overall, choosing instead Florida high schooler Travis Fryman. In this scenario, Fryman would have been the Padres’ third baseman during the Ken Caminiti years (Cammy never gets traded to San Diego because Steve Finley is with the White Sox, not the Astros). In a fun coincidence, Fryman’s most similar player according to Baseball-Reference is… you guessed it, Caminiti. On the not-so-fun side, Caminiti was a much better player during his Padres tenure than Fryman was during that same stretch: Player PA BA OBP SLG OPS+ WAR Fryman 2593 .276 .335 .447 100 12.1 Caminiti 2351 .295 .384 .540 146 18.6 I touch a bit on the Caminiti/Fryman comparison in the article and also marvel at the idea of Fryman and Gary Sheffield on the left side of the infield in ...