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MINNEAPOLIS — It is not difficult to figure out which locker might belong to Josh Phelps. If there's a book store bag in the locker, or in front of the locker, there is a good chance that it is his locker.
Phelps is an avid reader. His critiques are sound, his recommendations are worthy of a follow-up, like Steve Kluger's Last Days of Summer.
"This one's a Wyoming writer, C.J. Box," Phelps said pointing to the book bag at his locker in the visitors' clubhouse at the Metrodome this week when the New York Yankees were playing the Minnesota Twins.
Phelps's presence with the Yankees is one for the books in itself. After signing a minor-league contract with the Baltimore Orioles, he was plucked in last December's Rule 5 draft by the wealthy Yankees who don't often need to go bargain hunting.
Related Information
- New York Yankees
- Tampa Bay Devil Rays
- Carlos Delgado
- Jason Giambi
- Doug Mientkiewicz
- Josh Phelps
- Andy Phillips
- Johan Santana
- Jason Smith
Phelps had a solid spring training and opened the season with the Yankees as the platoon first baseman. The right-handed hitter starts when the opposing starter is a left-hander. Doug Mientkiewicz starts against right-handers.
Like the Toronto Blue Jays' Jason Smith, he's not the typical Rule 5 draft. Both have major-league experience and are in their late 20s. Often players taken in the Rule 5 draft are younger prospects. The Twins double Cy Young Award winner Johan Santana went through the Rule 5 draft when he was still a prospect. Some prospect.
Phelps, not long ago a top Blue Jays prospect, was not surprised that he was taken in the Rule 5 draft in which a player must be retained on the 25-man major-league roster or be offered back to the team that lost him for half of the $50,000 claiming price and must clear waivers. He was surprised that it was by the Yankees.
"We've joked about it, some of the guys I've played with, a 28-year-old Rule 5, with three years in the big leagues," Phelps said. "It's just not typical. Usually a Rule 5 is a younger player who has never played in the big leagues, or very little, that a team didn't want to protect on its roster. That's how that works. It's definitely different."
Phelps, who was 2-for-8 with two walks in four games for the season when the Yankees left Minnesota, said that he felt there was a possibility that he could be taken in the Rule 5 draft after he signed with the Orioles.
"That's why we signed the contract early enough," Phelps said. "But the Yankees aren't the team that you'd ever expect (to make) a Rule 5 selection. Usually when they want a player, they go get him. They sign him before anything else can happen. That definitely was the surprise part of it."
It was the Yankees first selection in the Rule 5 draft since 1995 when they took catcher Marc Ronan from the Milwaukee Brewers.
Yankees general manager Brian Cashman told Phelps when he was drafted that the team wanted to create some competition for the job at first base with Jason Giambi likely to be limited to the designated hitter role.
"(Cashman) said to come in to camp and not try to do too much and see what happens," Phelps said.
Phelps batted .395 with four home runs and 11 runs batted in during spring training to beat out Andy Phillips for a job.
"I had a good spring at the right time," Phelps said.
He said he had similar results last year at the Detroit Tigers spring training camp but there was not the same opportunity there. He batted .308 with 24 home runs and 90 RBIs in 126 games for Triple A Toledo but was not called up, even for the expanded roster period in September.
"The only difference between this spring and last spring with the Tigers is that this spring I did it with a genuine opportunity," he said.
He said he also understood why he wasn't called up by the Tigers who won the American League wild card and lost to the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series.
"You look at the team that they had in Detroit last year and they didn't need any help," he said. "When you sign a minor-league contract you got there and hope for the best and hope for an opportunity and that one just didn't materialize. I did everything I could on my end."
Phelps had a resounding beginning to his Blue Jays career, batting .309 with 15 home runs and 58 RBIs in 74 games after being called up in 2002.
The next year he hit .268 with 20 homers and 66 RBIs in 119 games.
He had three knee surgeries between 2002 and 2003.
In 2004, he was batting .237 with 12 homers and a team-leading 51 RBIs after 79 games when he was traded to the Cleveland Indians for Eric Crozier, a first baseman who supposed to replace soon-to-be-free-agent Carlos Delgado. Crozier played last season in Double A and in an independent league.
In 2005, Phelps played for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays for part of a season.
He said he might be a little more selective as a hitter than he was but is still aggressive. As for the decline of his fortunes in Toronto, he said, "I can't go back and put my finger on any one thing."
