Abrupt retirements

didn't he decide to retire before the trade? I seem to recall that the trade was basically about the Bucs 'selling' a draft pick to Denver. Essentially retired players have to pay back roster bonuses to their teams, though not necessarily to the team that paid them, to the team whose roster they were on at the time. So Denver pays Plummer a roster bonus, trades him to Tampa for a pick, Plummer retires, Plummer has to repay the roster bonus to Tampa. Basically Tampa sold Denver a draft pick for whatever Plummer's roster bonus was.

 

Lee Roy Selmon?

Never heard of him. Was he any good?

 

Eric Crouch.

 

I'd always heard they traded Palmeiro to make room for Mark Grace.

 

Grace was already on the team and Palmeiro was playing left field.

 

As I recall Plummer was going to retire but Tampa thought he wasn't serious, and they definitely wanted him to play. Gruden and the GM flew to Idaho to meet with him. Plummer said at one point he saw the two high-five because they thought they had him convinced, when in reality Plummer had no interest in playing for them and was basically being polite in hearing them out.

 

Man, if you could project a lineup with Brian McRae, Dave Martinez, Mark Grace, Sammy Sosa and Rafael Palmeiro leading the order in 1996 or so, that Cubs team might have had the best offense in the National League. The rotation still would've been garbage, though.

 

Whatever did happen with the first Mrs. Sandberg? Did she marry one of her alleged mister-esses? (Come to think of it, how come there's no parallel term for mistress that relates to the male in an out-of-wedlock thing?)

 

He was just ready to emulate Michael Jordan and embark on that lucrative handball career.

 

Houston Rockets had a guy in the early 1980s named Robert Reid who did the same thing. Stayed away for a year and had the famous quote "I didn't know how good I had it until I was working and making $250 per week". He came back and played several more years and was on their 1986 NBA Finals team.