The name is Pond, Simon Pond. There once was a big fish in a small pond, and his name is Simon Pond. He was a teenage baseball star in his Canadian region and was drafted by the Montreal Expos in 1994. After 10 years of persevering in the Minors, Pond got an invite to the Toronto Blue Jays big league camp in 2004 as a non-roster invitee, and after a very good Spring Training where Pond batted .338 with 4 HRs and a team best 23 hits, he was the talk of camp. As Spring Training finished, Blue Jays general manager J.P. Ricciardi traded a promising youngster named Jayson Werth to the Dodgers for Jason Frasor on March 29, 2004 to make room for Pond on the Blue Jays Opening Day roster. All congratulations to Pond for doing what he needed to do to make the roster. He worked hard when many players would have quit years earlier. For Jayson Werth, it was a painful reminder of going from top-prospect to a player who was nearing a crossroads in his career.
“I knew something was happening,” said Jayson Werth about the trade. “There were some trade rumors and people would call from home and say they read stuff on the internet.”
Making the Opening Day roster, Pond was cautiously optimistic with his words back in 2004 as he said, “I’m real happy about it, but I still have a lot to do. I don’t know how to say it properly. It’s a rung on the ladder, a step along the way.”
Unfortunately for Pond, his Major League career would span only 16 games in just that 2004 season. Pond floundered in his brief time in the Majors as he batted .163. Pond’s one big highlight was his only career HR which came off of a Boston Red Sox pitcher named Bronson Arroyo. That is coincidental as we fast forward twelve years later, and that is the same Bronson Arroyo in Nationals’ camp here in Viera, Florida as he is trying to secure a roster spot for Opening Day 2016.
The cautionary tale is that relying on Spring Training stats for players is a “slippery slope” for talent evaluators and fans, and it works both ways for great stats and poor stats. Pond had a very good Spring Training in 2004, and Werth had a poor Spring Training in 2004. Werth went on to have a very good 2004 Major League season with the Dodgers tallying a .825 OPS, and Pond ended up with a .515 OPS.
“Offensive consistency was the big difference between Pond and Werth,” said Toronto manager Carlos Tosca after the trade in 2004.
They say hindsight is 20/20. Did we mention Jayson Werth had two 20/20 seasons in his career, and Pond didn’t even reach 20 games played in his entire MLB career. What if? This is not a knock on Pond as he persevered and legitimately made it to the Major Leagues, but Werth went on to being a star player.
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