After Being Traded From The Dodgers To The White Sox, It's Tough To Find a Professional Athlete Who Looks More Miserable Than Miguel Vargas

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It's pretty hard to get anyone to feel bad for a person making $722,500, but let me try with Miguel Vargas. Just a week ago this man was playing for the first place Dodgers and living in beautiful Los Angeles. Now was he an everyday contributor for them? Not at the moment, but Vargas has had moments for them over his first 2.5 seasons. Welp, the trade deadline rolled around and in the Dodgers' quest to acquire Michael Kopech and Tommy Edman, it involved them sending Miguel Vargas to the lowly Chicago White Sox. 

Last night as the Sox inexplicably dropped their 21st straight game in a row, the cameras caught Vargas slumping over in the dugout, kinda just staring into the void reconsidering everything he's done to get to this point. 

Guy looks like he just buried his dog. That's what playing for a team that White Sox Dave roots for is like. 

Here's his first session with the Chicago media. You can see the pain in this man's eyes. 

That's unfortunately part of the business of being a professional athlete. In a moment's time you can be shipped off to absolute irrelevancy, leaving behind all your friends, family, baby mamas, girlfriends, wives etc. Again, the money these guys are getting paid, even those in the beginning of their team control, is what makes it okay to absorb. He's being paid to play baseball for a living, regardless of the environment. Sure it sucks in the immediate, but you'll live. 

It is nuts to think about in the blink of an eye having your employer ship you off to a different part of the country with you having no say in the matter. Imagine being a teacher in Florida and then all of a sudden you have to pack up your life and move to North Dakota? The whirlwind behind being trade has to fuck with you mentally so hard. Justin Steele talked about it recently on his pod with Mark Leiter Jr. having no clue what to do upon getting sent to another team. 

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There's a positive to Vargas going to a team like the White Sox and it's playing time. Look at that roster. He's going to have every opportunity to play for them and rack up at bats. With The Dodgers he was sparingly used and even saw time in the minor leagues because of their talent level. While he's still got two years of pre-arb left on his deal, that kind of playing time could lead to making himself valuable for a contending team to trade for him down the road and eventually earn himself a nice contract. Easy motivation for sure, but not a small task by any means.