Facts of the matter are that the Indians at the time were in rebuilding mode. Paying Thome what the Phillies were offering would have put a serious hurt on the payroll. Jim also felt alot of pressure from the players Union to take the Phillies offer. Players back then just didn't reject offers like that when the home team was offering alot less. Did Jim WANT to leave? I highly doubt it. Jim was always a humble man who played the game the right way. He is one of the greatest Indians, EVER. Well deserved honor, just like Omar being put in the Indians HOF.
I've heard this a lot and I'm not just buying it. If Jim Thome wanted to stay, Jim Thome wanted to stay. He didn't. He didn't want to be a part of a rebuild. He wanted to go somewhere where he could possibly contend for a World Series title. He also had his wife pushing him to a bigger media market.
As a free agent, he had the right to leave, as he should. In July of his final season here, the Indians asked him what he wanted to do - get traded to a contender, where he could compete for a World Series title, or stay. He said he wanted to stay. He pronounced his strong desire to be an Indian for life, uttering the famous "they'll have to tear the jersey off of my back" line around that time.
In November of 2002, the Indians offered Jim Thome a fair deal, believed to be in the neighborhood of $12 M per year. The offer also included a guaranteed front office job when he retired, several local baseball fields to be constructed in his name, and a statue.
Thome said no.
These are my problems with it:
1) When the Indians approached Thome in July, it would have been a good time to sit down with his wife and consider the future. Surely he knew another team would offer more than the Indians could. If he wanted to move on, he could have agreed to waive his no-trade clause to allow the Indians to trade him to a contender, getting him a shot at a championship and the Indians a nice haul of prospects to accelerate the rebuild. He didn't, which set the organization back a bit.
2) As another person pointed out, statues are usually reserved for guys like Michael Jordan, Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, and Jackie Robinson. Jim Thome is a Hall of Famer and one of the best Indians of all-time. I'd be OK with his number being retired. But a statue? That's for a guy so special, so unique, so important to his sport that simply retired a jersey number isn't enough.
3) Larry Doby.
Larry Doby was not only a great player, he changed the game of baseball as we know it. Jackie Robinson gets all of the accolades for breaking the color barrier, but people outside of Cleveland often forget that Larry Doby went through the exact same adversity Jackie did. Doby debuted for the Indians 11 weeks after Robinson played his first game for the Dodgers - 11 weeks. He was shut out of hotels and restaurants his white teammates stayed in, he was berated with awful, degrading harassment by fans, and he was shunned by some teammates and opposing players. He went through the exact same thing as Jackie Robinson a pretty much the exact same time as Jackie Robinson.
In the end, Larry Doby played 10 seasons with the Cleveland Indians. He was the first black player to integrate the American League, first to go directly from the Negro Leagues to MLB, first black player to win a World Series, second black manager, a seven-time all-star, and helped lead the Indians to two World Series appearances, winning in 1948. He also served in the United States Navy during World War II.
Larry Doby changed the game of baseball. So did Michael, Babe, and Jackie. Those are the types of guys of get statues, not guys like Jim Thome.
