Van Slyke, who spent the majority of 13 seasons in the major leagues with the Cardinals and Giants, also implied Clayton Kershaw wants Yasiel Puig off the Dodgers.
Advertisement
On today’s show, Frank Cusumano of CBS Sports 920AM asked Van Slyke for his thoughts on Puig. Van Slyke’s son, Scott, plays for the Dodgers, who apparently has shared this with his father.
When the host first suggested it was an “Adrian Gonzalez quote”, Slyke quickly corrected him, saying, “He’s not the highest-paid player”.
“He was just the most bad player I’ve ever seen”, Van Slyke continued before blasting the Mariners bulllpen and former closer Fernando Rodney for “blowing up” and being “horrible”.
You can listen to the audio-Segment 3, at roughly two minutes in-here. When he brought up Kershaw’s name, Van Slyke simply said, “I didn’t say his name”. More than anything, Van Slyke felt Cano’s performance was uninspired.
The Seattle Mariners made Robinson Cano a very, very rich man. On the field, though, Cano’s play hasn’t really reflected his price tag. Hitting coach Howard Johnson, a former Met, was reassigned in June.
“He couldn’t get a hit when it mattered”, Van Slyke continued and later called Astros outfielder Colby Rasmus dumb.
It’s understandable that Van Slyke might be angry over losing his coaching postion because of the disappointing season, although to blame Cano alone for it might be a stretch considering Cano is just one of 25 guys and Seattle overall as a group didn’t play well.
Any conflict between Seattle Mariners second baseman Robinson Cano and former Mariners first base coach Andy Van Slyke may not have been known during the season, but Van Slyke had plenty of negative things to say about Cano on Thursday. That’s how much impact he has on the organization.
Advertisement
Andy Van Slyke was an excellent Major League Baseball player in his day for the Pittsburgh Pirates, but he’s never been good at biting his tongue. “He was the worst player and it cost people their jobs in the process”. 300 for six straight seasons, Cano had a slash line of.287/.334/.446 in his second year with the Mariners after leaving the Yankees to accept a 10-year, $240 million contract from the Mariners in 2014.
