Chien-Ming Wang: Starting Pitcher for the Seattle Mariners? It Almost Happened

In 2000, the Yankees’ signing of the un-drafted Taiwanese pitcher Chien-Ming Wang was a seemingly insignificant move that didn’t make a blip on the average baseball fan’s radar screen. Today, Wang is undoubtedly the ace of the Yankees staff and the value of this move can not be measured; but just how close did it come to Wang signing elsewhere?

 Via Albert Chen of SI-

"Just as Wang was about to sign with Seattle, with him and his family sitting at home in Tainan wearing Mariners caps, New York swooped in with a $1.9 million offer."

Who could have projected Wang to have the value he currently possesses as the best sinkerball pitcher? Nearly no one:

More from Albert Chen of SI-

"The adopted son of workers in a metal utensil manufacturing company, Wang played Little League but was never regarded as a standout while growing up in Tainan. 'In high school, he was kind of terrible,' says Louis Yu, a sportswriter who covered Wang then. 'He was tall and very, very skinny. His delivery wasn't smooth, and his fastball was not impressive'."

Regardless, Wang’s sinkerball has developed into one of the best in the league and he had 19 wins in each of the last two seasons. In theory, how might it look if it was the Mariners, and not the Yankees, who signed Wang? Well, their rotation may look something like this:

Erik Bedard

Chien-Ming Wang

Felix Hernandez

Jarrod Washburn

Carlos Silva

Of course, this is all theoretical. Wang’s development could have been markedly different and his success may have never been fully realized in Seattle.

 Also, signing Wang could have changed other plans for the Mariners, which could subsequently lead to an alternate core of pitchers; but if it didn’t, could you imagine that rotation?  

Further, could you imagine what Wang, coupled with Ichiro, would do for the Asian market in Seattle? It is possible that the added appeal of the Mariners to Asian players making the move to the majors would lead Daisuke to come to Seattle instead of Boston or New York-- if that happened, then the Mariners probably wouldn’t have traded for Bedard.

And what about the Yankees? Would they have traded for Santana? The world will never know, but I’m sure neither GM thought that this transaction would have such an enormous effect on the direction of his franchise.