(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by Henk Seppen)
   Didi Gregorius released by Philiadelphia Phillies
Nederlands
 PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (USA) -
Didi Gregorius has been released by Philadelphia Phillies, the Major League-club announced on Thursday-afternoon (August 4).
The 32-year old Gregorius played for the club since 2020 after having played five seasons for New York Yankees.
...Didi Gregorius during the 2017 World Baseball Classic...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
Gregorius was born in Amsterdam (Netherlands), where he grew up, as his father Didi Gregorius Sr. played there in the Dutch big league for Amsterdam Pirates.
During several games, Gregorius Junior was a bat-boy, as was his brother Johnny.
At age six, the Gregorius-family returned to Curaçao, where the two brothers then grew up.
Didi Gregorius turned professional and made his Major League-debut in 2012, playing in eight games for Cincinnati Reds.
After the 2012 season, the short stop was traded by Cincinnati to Arizona Diamondbacks.
There, he became a regular player and appeared in 103 games during the 2013 season.
In 2014, Gregorius played in 80 games for the D-Backs and then was traded to New York Yankees in the off-season.
At New York Yankees, Gregorius was the successor of famous short stop Derek Jeter, who retired in 2014 after having played 20 seasons for the Yankees.
After a slow start in 2015, Gregorius did great as short stop for New York, both defensively and offensively.
With his bat, he did things no other short stop had done in Yankee-history.
He became a popular player with the fans of the Yankees and also within the team.
In his first season with the Yankees, Gregorius played in 155 games and batted .265 with 56 runs batted in and nine homeruns.
In the following three seasons, his performances became better and better, setting personal highs each season.
He batted .276, .287 and .268 in 2016, 2017 and 2018.
His run-production in these seasons increased from 68 to 73 to 89.
In these three seasons, his RBI-totals were 70, 87 and 86, while his homerun-total grew from 20 to 25 to 27.
During these seasons, Gregorius set several records for short stops in the rich Yankees-history.
In 2018, he hit two grand slams to give him three while playing for the Yankees.
With three grand slams, Gregorius tied the club-record for most grand slams by a short stop.
The only other Yankees short stop to do so was legendary Frankie Crosetti, who played for the team in 1932-1948.
Gregorius became the first Yankees short stop to hit two grand slams in one season.
...Didi Gregorius after hitting a homerun...
...during the 2017 World Baseball Classic...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
In April 2018, Gregorius led the Major League in homeruns (10), runs batted in (30) and slugging average (.735) and was named American League Player of the Month.
The ten homeruns in the first month of the season were the most by a Yankees short stop since 1908.
Gregorius was only the fourth short stop since then in history to hit ten homeruns in the first 27 games of a player's team.
Gregorius also became only the third player in the history of the Yankees to hit eight or more homeruns and has 27 or more RBI's in the first 22 games of the season.
The others were legendary Babe Ruth (1921) and Alex Rodriguez (2007).
In 2017, by hitting 25 homeruns, Gregorius broke Jeter's team-record for most homeruns by a short stop.
He also is the Yankees recordholder for short stops with three consecutive seasons with 20 or more homeruns.
In the 2018 season, he had the best Fielding Average of all Major League short stops with .987.
In Game 2 of the 2019 American League Division Series, Gregorius became the first Yankees short stop to hit a grand slam homerun in the postseason.
After the 2018 season, Gregorius underwent Tommy John-surgery.
He missed Spring Training and returned to the line-up in June 2019.
The lefthanded hitting Gregorius played in 82 games, struggled and batted only .238, but he hit 16 homeruns and batted in 61 runs.
Although Gregorius had three productive seasons (2016-2018) with the Yankees before his injury, the club did not extend a $ 17.8 million Qualifying Offer after his contract expired after the season.
And with that, the infielder became a Free Agent after this season.
In December 2019, Gregorius signed an one-year contract with Philadelphia Phillies.
There, he was reunited with Manager Joe Girardi, who led the Yankees in 2008-2017.
Gregorius was then re-signed in February 2021.
The short stop signed a 2-year contract, worth 28 million dollar.
Of that contract, the Phillies owe him more than 5 million dollar.
In his first season (2020) with Philadelphia (which was abbreviated due to the COVID-pandemic), Gregorius batted .284 with ten homeruns and 40 runs batted, playing in 60 games.
Last year, he batted .209 with 13 homeruns in 103 games, missing part of the season due to an elbow-injury.
This season, Gregorius batted .210, but hit only homerun (he had 45 basehits, including nine doubles and four triples).
He batted in 19 runs and played in 63 games.
Again, he missed part of the season, this time because of a knee-injury.
...Philadelphia Philies thanked Didi Gregorius...
...on its Twitter-account... |
On June 22, Philadelphia Phillies fired Manager Joe Girardi after the team had started the season with a disappointing 22-29 record.
Girardi was succeeded by Interim Manager Rob Thomson, who was Philadelphia's Bench Coach since 2018 when Gabe Kapler was the Manager.
Thomson remained Girardi's Bench Coach when he became the Manager in 2020.
Since Thomson took over, Philadephia won 35 of the 54 games played.
Thomson also worked for New York Yankees, where he was Girardi's Bench Coach after having the 3B Coach in six seasons.
On the 26-man roster of Philadelphia, Gregorius was replaced by second baseman Jean Segura, who had been injured.
Rookie Bryson Stott now will be the daily short stop of the Phillies.
During a press-meeting before Thursday's home-game against Washington Nationals, Manager Rob Thomson said:
,,It's a difficult decision, but I think the right decision.
We’ve had a long history, going back to the Yankees.
A lot of really good times.
Ups and downs.
I have a lot of respect for him.
He’s been a really good player for a long time.
Unfortunately, at this point, with Segura coming back, Stott is going to be the shortstop.
So, Didi was really kind of the odd man out.
That doesn’t mean he’s a bad player.
Because he’s played very well at shortstop for us.
He just didn’t hit the way that he normally hits''.
In his 11-year Major League-career, Gregorius has played in 1,077 games so far and has a .257 batting average.
He collected 999 basehits, including 134 homeruns, scored 503 runs and batted in 530.
Gregorius needs one basehit to reach the 1,000 milestone.
However, he will collect that basehit in another uniform, as it is expected that Gregorius will continue his career somewhere else.
In 2011, Didi Gregorius was a member of the successful Netherlands National Baseball Team, which in that year captured the title at the World Championship in Panama, beating Cuba in the Final.
For that accomplishment, all team-members were knighted and received a Royal Decoration.
Gregorius also played for the Orange Team during the 2009 World Championship.
He also played for the Netherlands Team during the 2017 World Baseball Classic and the 2010 Intercontinental Cup in Taiwan.
(August 4)
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