Alfonso Soriano doesn’t get as much credit as he should

Alfonso Soriano played in 16 seasons overall and finished with a .270 average, a .500 slugging percentage, a .319 slugging percentage, 412 homers, 481 doubles, 289 steals, 1,159 RBI. He was an All-Star seven times and in seven consecutive seasons from 2002 through 2008.

His stats are not Hall of Fame caliber, but he was in the top 25 best players in baseball between 2001 through 2013 when considering offense and not defense. He does not get enough credit for his elite combination of speed and power that he displayed throughout many seasons during his career.

Soriano, who is from the Dominican Republic and went to high school there, had nine seasons when he stole at least 18 bases and five seasons when he stole at least 30 bases. He also had 10 seasons when he had at least 25 homers and that included seven seasons with at least 32 round trippers.

In 1996 and 1997, Soriano played in Japan playing in their minor leagues in 1996 and was promoted to the Hiroshima Toyo Carp in 1997. He would sign with the Yankees in 1998 and was a third baseman in the minors and some in 2000, and then a second baseman in each of his three full seasons with the Yankees. He did not play the outfield until 2005.

He was named MVP of the All-Star Futures Game in 1999, which is for the best prospects in all of minor league baseball.

He was a Yankee in the first five seasons of his career (1999–2003) as well in parts of his last two seasons (some of 2013 and 2014). In his rookie season in 2001, after playing in 31 MLB games combined the previous two seasons, he finished third in Rookie of the Year voting (he only trailed CC Sabathia and Ichiro Suzuki) with 18 homers, 34 doubles, 73 RBI, 43 steals and a .268 average.

In his second full seasons in 2002, he established himself as a star in the league. The 6–1, 195 pound slugger had a .300 average with 39 homers, 51 doubles, 41 steals and 102 RBI. He only needed one more homer to become the 4th member for the 40–40 club. In 2002, he finished 3rd in MVP voting only trailing Alex Rodriguez and Miguel Tejada.

He would come close once again in 2003 during his last season of his first stint with the Yankees. Soriano was an All-Star once again and finished 20th in MVP voting after finishing with 38 homers, 36 doubles, 35 steals, 91 RBI and a .290 average in 156 games.

In 2003, Soriano set the record for most homers to lead off a game with 13 and also finished in the top five in the league in hits, doubles, home runs and steals.

In 2004 and 2005, Soriano played with the Texas Rangers after the Yankees traded him with minor leaguer Joaquin Arias for A-Rod and the $67 million of the $179 million left on his contract. He had 28 homers and 91 RBI in 2004 and then in 2005 he had 36 homers, 104 RBI and 30 steals. This was his third of four 30–30 seasons. He played very well while playing his home games in the scorching Texas heat.

In December of 2005, Soriano was traded to the Washington Nationals in exchange for Brad Wilkerson, Termel Sledge and minor leaguer Armando Galarraga. (Galarraga played in six MLB seasons with middling success and by far his highlight and claim to fame was when he pitched 8.2 perfect innings on June 2, 2010, but lost the perfect game because the umpire, Jim Joyce, incorrectly ruled that the potential last batter of the game was safe at first.) He would receive $10 million in arbitration, which was a record at the time.

Soriano made history during the 2005 season as he finally achieved the 40–40 plateau.

He was an All-Star, finished 6th in MVP voting, and won a Silver Slugger award after finishing with a 46 homers, 41 steals, 41 doubles and 95 RBI. He played left field for the first time this season after exclusively playing the infield, and became only the third player to start All-Star games in both leagues at two different positions. On August 25, he became the fastest player in baseball history to reach 200 homers and 200 steals.

On September 16, he stole his second base of the first inning, to become the 4th and most recent player to join the 40–40 club. He is the only one to do it clean without having the benefit of steroids. The other three to achieve the feat were Jose Canseco, Barry Bonds and A-Rod.

Canseco hit 42 homers and stole 40 bases in 1988 with the Oakland Athletics, Bonds hit 42 homers and stole 40 bases in 1996 with the San Francisco Giants and A-Rod 42 homers and stole 46 bases in 1998 with the Seattle Mariners.

On September 22, Soriano become the only player to hit 40 homers, 40 doubles and steal 40 bases in one season.

Due to declining the 5-year, $50 million contract the Nationals offered him and signing a one-year contract, Soriano signed a 8-year contract worth $136 million before the 2007 season. This was the most expensive contract in Cubs franchise history.

He was an All-Star his last two times in 2007 and 2008 and in those seasons he had 19 steals in both seasons and 33 homers in 2007 and then 29 homers in 2008.

His stats took a bit of a dip the next three seasons (he did have 40 doubles in 2010) but in 2012, in his last full season with the Cubs, he had 32 homers, 32 doubles and 108 RBI, which was a career-high that he set at 36 years old.

The Cubs traded Soriano to the Yankees on July 26, 2013, a few days before the trade deadline, in an effort to offload his albatross of a contract. Soriano recorded his 2,000th hit on August 11, 2013, off of future Hall of Famer Justin Verlander. He would finish with 2,095 hits.

In 151 games combined between the Yankees and Cubs, Soriano had 34 homers, 101 RBI and 18 steals, which is very impressive for a 37-year-old.

He played 67 games for the Yankees in 2014 and was released by the team on July 14, 2014, after not having much success. He retired in November of that year. The 2014 season was the first time the team had missed the postseason in two consecutive seasons since missing the playoffs in 1992 and 1993 (this was in the middle of a stretch when they didn’t make the playoffs in any season from 1982 through 1993, they didn’t make the playoffs in 1994 but that doesn’t count since that was the year the season ended in August because of the strike.)

Soriano was seventh among active players in homers at the time that he retired in 2014.

“I’ve lost the love and passion to play the game,” Soriano said in a radio interview in the Dominican Republic. “Right now, my family is the most important thing. Although I consider myself in great shape, my mind is not focused on baseball.”

He was a 7-time All-Star, a 4-time Silver Slugger winner, an All-Star Game MVP in 2004 and led the AL in stolen bases in 2002 with 41. His major highlight of his career was his 40–40 season. This is such a rarely seen feat that Jay-Z owns a club with this name.

The one major weakness in his game was his fielding as he led all MLB second baseman in errors every year from 2001 through 2005. He was also very much a free swinger, which kept his on-base percentage down throughout his career.

Soriano and his wife Carmen Eusebia have three sons whose names begin with the letter A and three daughters whose names all begin with the letter A as well. One would have to guess that all his kids are named after him.

On June 23, 2014, he donated $2.6 million to kids in his home country of the Dominican Republic who were striving to become professional baseball players.