*Photo from Forbes*
In the midst of an ongoing lockout, a former big leaguer gave us some news. Former first baseman Adrian Gonzalez announced on Saturday that he will retire from major league baseball, as per a post on Gonzalez's Instagram page.
The news of Gonzalez's retirement is not shocking news, as he had not played in the majors since a stint with the New York Mets in 2018. He retires with 5 all star game appearances under his belt, no world series titles, and 15 seasons manning first base at the major league level, a good decade and a half of work for the man known as A-Gon.
While playing for the Mets, Gonzalez finished the 2018 season with a .237 batting average and .672 OPS, slugging .373 while hitting 6 home runs, posting 26 RBI's in 54 games for the Mets, who were the 5th team Gonzalez had played for in his career, after making his MLB debut with the Texas Rangers.
Across his 15 seasons in the majors, Gonzalez retires with a .287 batting average and .843 OPS, mashing 317 home runs to go with 1,202 RBI's in 1,929 regular season games. In 34 career playoff games, Gonzalez has a .266 batting average and .329 OBP, with 7 home runs and 21 RBI's in 5 seasons of playoff baseball.
Gonzalez saw his career take flight when he was traded to his hometown San Diego Padres, being a native of San Diego. In 5 seasons with the Padres, he made 3 all star game appearances and hit 161 home runs, ranking in the top 10 in Padres history in home runs, batting average, hits, RBI's, and runs scored. He was traded to the Boston Red Sox in the 2010 offseason, with Anthony Rizzo being part of the return package for the Padres.
Before he played a single game for the Red Sox, Gonzalez signed a 7 year, $154 million extension with the team, but didn't last even two years, partly due to the chicken and beer saga and the September 2011 collapse of the Red Sox. He was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers along with Josh Beckett and Carl Crawford in a massive salary dump for the Red Sox.
After landing with the Dodgers, Gonzalez stayed there until the end of the 2017 season, helping to kickstart the re-emergence of the Dodgers, being a part of the 2017 World Series team, which lost to the Houston Astros in 7 games.
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