Trade Rumors Now Big Part of Joyner’s Life as an Angel

Wally Joyner could have been a non-contender.

He could have been a Houston Astro.

He could have been a St. Louis Cardinal.

Some five-year plan, this Angel career of Joyner’s. From the 1986 All-Star Game to the 1991 trading block, from big deal to make-us-a-deal, from Wally World to the Joyner Home Shopping Network.

Can you believe it?

Joyner can. He checks out the newspapers. He checks in on the talk shows. He doesn’t believe everything he reads or hears, but he has seen and heard his name often enough this off-season to realize that if there’s no rhyme to the rumors, there must be a reason.

“Obviously, somebody in the front office has the idea to play somebody else at first base in the future,” Joyner says by phone from his home in Yorba Linda. “Obviously, I’m on the trading block.

“Now, I wouldn’t be the first person ever traded from the team he had played on for all of his career. There aren’t very many players who go their entire careers without being traded. But I wouldn’t be honest if I said (the trade talk) doesn’t bother me, because it does.

“For the past two or three weeks, it’s become apparent, in my opinion, that the Angels have other plans for me. It’s only normal for me to put up my defenses, to start thinking that, eventually, I might not be playing here.

“What I heard the last few days about Houston, along with the rumors of me going to St. Louis--I didn’t know if they were true or not. But when you, as a player, do not get a phone call or any reconfirmation from the ballclub, you start to think, ‘Hey, it could be true.’ And, obviously, it was true with the Houston Astros.”

The Angels and the Astros were talking. Joyner for Glenn Davis. Fortunately for Joyner, the Astros were also talking with the Baltimore Orioles, and in a priceless twist of irony, Joyner was ultimately saved by his salary.

He makes too much money.

At $1.75 million, Joyner couldn’t give the Astros what the Baltimore offer could: cheap labor. In Houston, the Salary Dump-a-Thon continues--owner John McMullen has already reached his goal of slicing an $18-million annual payroll in half--and Baltimore’s package of Steve Finley ($125,000), Pete Harnisch ($120,00) and Curt Schilling ($103,000) had the numbers McMullen really wanted.

So Joyner stays, but for how long? The contract that kept him in Anaheim last week could send him elsewhere the next. Joyner fought long and hard for that contract--holdout threatened in 1987, holdout realized in 1988, arbitration waged and won in 1990.

Perhaps too hard, Joyner acknowledges.

“I guess that other teams must be thinking that somewhere in the past history of my contract negotiations with the Angels, something happened to make me want to go somewhere else,” he says. “They know I’m entering my free-agent year and that I’m not under contract right now. I think it’s just easy for them to say, ‘Hey, he might be available for a trade. He’s not signed, he’s had tough negotiations in the past, he’s not happy with the Angels, the Angels are not happy with him.’

“You take all that and put it in the computer, and it comes out: ‘He’s on the trading block.’ ”

So you hear ludicrous rumors: Lee Smith and Rex Hudler for Joyner and Bryan Harvey. Or merely outlandish ones: Smith and Pedro Guerrero for Joyner and Kirk McCaskill.

Or, if the Angels don’t trade Joyner in 1991, he will abandon them in 1992 for a free-agent homecoming in Atlanta.

When will they ever cease?

If you ask Joyner, how about yesterday?

“As far as I’m concerned,” Joyner says, “I have never, ever wanted to leave the Angels. In fact, my intentions for the past two years have been to sign a multi-year contract with the Angels. Unfortunately, that hasn’t gotten off the ground. . . .

“I don’t think I ever stated I wanted to go to Atlanta. That’s where I’m from, and people have assumed I’d want to play there. But I’ve never taken any position like, ‘I can’t wait for free agency because I’m outta here.’

“It’s like going skiing. I have never gone skiing, and a lot of people tell me, ‘You gotta try it, it’s great.’ But I don’t know what I’m missing because I’ve never done it, and I’m happy not to try it. Same with free agency. Why worry about it if you’re not really interested?

“I have no problems with the ballclub. Player-wise, coaching-wise, I enjoy playing here. The fans have been great. It’s like they say, ‘If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.’ ”

With Joyner, only a kneecap has been broken. The injury was enough to limit him to 83 games, eight home runs and 41 RBIs in 1990--all career lows. Can that be fixed? If the Angels are unsure, that could be one reason they are now making Joyner available.

One more: The Angels need help in a major way, and without breaking up their starting rotation, Joyner is the one player they could trade for a major return.

These theories are mentioned to Joyner. He concurs with the first but disputes the second.

“What must concern them is that prior to last year, I had one of my lesser years (16 home runs and 79 RBIs in 1989), and then this year, I was injured,” Joyner says. “The way I look at it, I had a great year in 1986, a better year in ’87 and after ‘87, two good years. Unfortunately, when the club looks at ’87 (34 home runs, 117 RBIs) and compares it to ‘88-89, there’s been an obvious dropoff in home runs.

“Maybe that concerns them.”

But Joyner doesn’t buy the best-athlete-available-for-trade reasoning, noting, for example, that the market demand for proven major league shortstops never goes out of style.

“Nobody talked about trading for Dick Schofield,” Joyner says, “because he’s under contract. He’s already signed for the next few years. I’m not under contract, and I’m entering my free agent year. That’s why people are talking about me.”

For the record, Joyner says his knee “feels great. I’ve been working out every day. I’m ready to go.” He also says he likes what the Angels have done this winter--at least until they got to the Js on their list of tradable commodities.

“I think they’ve improved the ballclub from last year,” he says. “I’ve seen Junior Felix play the last couple of years, and he’s a tremendous ballplayer. I haven’t seen Luis Sojo, but from what he’s done in the minors, he deserves to move up to the majors.

“A sleeper (addition) might be Floyd Bannister. I don’t know if he’s 100% healthy, but I know him to be a tremendous competitor. And it’s always good to have another left-hander on the ballclub.

“I think they’ve filled some of the holes. I don’t know what their plans are for the future, but it looks like they’re doing things to help the ballclub.”

That future might or might not include Wally Joyner. Joyner knows what happens to one-time untouchables in Anaheim. Look at Devon White.