Weird. I remember D'Acquisto well from the Giants but have no recollection of him being on the A's even though he was a Giant when I was far too young to have known anything about it, so my memories of him as a Giant are fabricated strictly from baseball cards. I'm a nutter.

Also, can't blame his wife for not wanting to go to New York in 1980 if she watched movies at all. Hollywood made NYC out to be the worst place on earth then with the exception of Woody Allen. Hell, even The Facts of Life piled on--Tootie wasn't alone in New York for 10 minutes before a pimp tried to put her on the street. What the hell, man, leave Tootie alone!

“I don’t want to go to New York,” my wife said, a half-empty glass of Cabernet accentuating her words, “I don’t care how much the Yankees will pay us.”

That's a hell of a woman right there.

“I don’t want to go to New York,” my wife said, a half-empty glass of Cabernet accentuating her words, “I don’t care how much the Yankees will pay us.”

My kind of woman!

I know it's all a business and everything, but I wonder how many players retain their childhood likes and dislikes for teams and if that carries over into not taking any of the Steinbrenners' evil money, no matter what.

[quote“I don’t want to go to New York,” my wife said, a half-empty glass of Cabernet accentuating her words, “I don’t care how much the Yankees will pay us.”]

Don't. Stay in San Diego. And they won't be paying us, they'll be paying me.

should have gone to the Yankees and dumped the wife.

I know it's all a business and everything, but I wonder how many players retain their childhood likes and dislikes for teams and if that carries over into not taking any of the Steinbrenners' evil money, no matter what.

It was heavily rumored that Ken Griffey Jr. despised the Yankees and would never have gone there because Billy Martin yelled at him or something in the clubhouse when he was a kid. But my guess is once you're drafted fandom is no longer a real consideration.

But my guess is once you're drafted fandom is no longer a real consideration.

Maybe not for the athlete, but I've already told young Cormac, the only baseballing Unacceptable, that if he someday played for the Yanks, I'd root for him to do well in low-leverage situations, but I couldn't promise anything more than that.

The rest of the family thinks I'm joking.

But my guess is once you're drafted fandom is no longer a real consideration.

Phil Hughes gave up his Red Sox fandom pretty quickly after being drafted. I'm sure Yankee fans have similarly become Red Sox fans after being drafted by Boston.

After signing this contract, over 1981 and 1982, he averaged a walk per inning (and only about 5 K/9) -- in AAA!

Somehow I don't think everything would have been lollipops and sunshine if he had signed with New York. I doubt he would have been around to celebrate their 1981 playoff victories too.