Orioles sign Miguel Tejada to one-year deal

Posted on January 23, 2010

Miguel Tejada of the Oakland Athletics plays defense at shortstop during a game at the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, California in 2002. (Photo by Brad Mangin)

 

The Baltimore Orioles have made another big move this Winter by signing free-agent infielder Miguel Tejada to a one-year deal worth $6 million this afternoon. The Orioles were looking to improve their corner infield spots, and now they have Tejada to play third with Garrett Atkins, who they also signed this off-season, moving over to play first. The 35-year-old Tejada hit .313 with 14 home runs and 86 RBIs in 158 games last season for the Houston Astros.

I have had the pleasure to photograph Tejada pretty extensively over his career, since he broke into the big leagues with the A’s way back in 1997. In his early days he was always left out of the conversation of the great American League shortstops of the late 1990’s. Derek Jeter, Nomar Garciaparra and Alex Rodriguez got all of the publicity. Tejada did not take long to get mentioned in the same breath as these guys as he began to pile up some huge offensive numbers for the Swingin’ A’s, culminating in his monster MVP season of 2002 that saw him hit .308 with 34 homers and 131 RBI’s while playing in all 162 games.

Tejada was the heart and soul of the great A’s teams of the turn of the century and a real fan-favorite. A’s fans were not happy when the A’s lost Miggy to free agency after the 2003 season when he signed a huge four-year contract with the Orioles. During his days in Baltimore he batted .311 with 102 home runs and 429 RBIs before being traded to the Astros in December 2007 for Mike Costanzo, Matt Albers, Troy Patton, Dennis Sarfate and Luke Scott.

The departure of Tejada was a bitter pill for A’s fans to swallow, especially after they lost slugger Jason Giambi to free agency the year before. Tejada wasted no time in making a good impression with the Orioles and their fans in his first season playing at Camden Yards as he hit .311 with 34 homers and 150 RBIs in 2004. One of the highlights of that season for Tejada was his win in the Home Run Derby at the All-Star Game in Houston. I was photographing the All-Star Game and the festivities surrounding it for USA TODAY and had a chance to document Miggy’s win in the Derby (see above). He put on quite a show.

Tejada is a player I always rooted for when he came up, especially because I first learned of him from my good friend Jose Luis Villegas of the Sacramento Bee. Jose and writer Marcos Breton had met Jose when he was a teenager in his hometown in the Dominican Republic and documented the pursuit of his dream to be a big leaguer for many years. Their efforts resulted in several books highlighting Tejada’s story and the plight of Latin American ballplayers, including “Home Is Everything: The Latino Baseball Story”, and “Away Games: The Life and Times of a Latin Baseball Player”.

Because I watched him grow up as a major leaguer it was sad to hear about the steroid allegations that were made in later years about Tejada, first being implicated in 2005 by Rafael Palmeiro and later by Jose Canseco in his book “Juiced”. Finally, Tejada was named in the Mitchell Report that was released on December 13, 2007. In the report, Tejada is said to have received $1,500 worth of steroids.

I hope Tejada still has some ball left in him for the 2010 season. There were rumors of the Giants going after him to play third base a few months ago before they looked elsewhere. It would have been fun to shoot Miggy in the orange and black. After today’s signing it looks like I will still be able to shoot him in the orange and black, but this time of the American League variety.