Los Angeles Dodgers

What's next for Yasiel Puig?

Published Nov. 15, 2016 3:09 p.m. ET

Dieter Kurtenbach

Yasiel Puig came into the Major Leagues like a tornado. He was a force of nature that demanded you get out of the way or face the consequences.

He was the real deal — the Cuban Mike Trout on the other side of Southern California — a true five-tool player who could hit for average, power, fly around in the outfield, steal bags, and throw dudes out in spectacular fashion.

When Puig came to the Majors in 2013, rampaging through the National League with 19 homers, a .319 average, and a .925 OPS in his first 104 games, it was impossible to believe those numbers were anything but a baseline. Puig was a revelation. There was no doubt he was going to be in the Dodgers’ outfield for the next decade.

Three years after that spectacular introduction, it’s hard to know exactly where things went wrong.

Those numbers that were presumed to be a baseline turned out to be the high-water mark, and over the last few years, Puig has produced more drama than runs.

We don’t know if this is the end of Puig’s time in Los Angeles, but it’s certainly the ending of chapter one of this story — the Dodgers will reportedly option Puig to the minors on Tuesday.

The Dodgers reportedly tried to move Puig in a trade before Monday’s trade deadline, but they didn’t find anything close to a fair offer. So instead, without a spot for him on the Major League roster, they’ll send him to Oklahoma City, the team’s Triple-A affiliate, where he’ll be asked to sort himself out and earn a call-up to the big leagues.

When Puig entered the game, he represented a new counter culture. Puig was a true unknown, and for an unknown to perform the way he did in a baseball landscape that demanded that everything be predicted made Puig one of the most polarizing figures in the game.

To many, he was everything that was "wrong" with the game.

To others, he was a cult hero.

That latter status, like his stats, faded as his career progressed.

Puig was replaced before the Dodgers acquired Josh Reddick to play right field Monday — the former Oakland A wasn’t Puig’s replacement, he was an upgrade from the platoon the Dodgers had been using.

We know what’s next for Puig — he’ll go to the minors, and he’ll work on his swing and his range in the outfield. What happens after that is anyone’s guess.

The Dodgers could still trade Puig after a short show-me stint at Oklahoma City, but that encounters some complications. Puig, having put in more than three years of MLB service time, will have the right to opt into arbitration in the final two years of his contract — those arbitration-determined salaries that could fall anywhere. Puig could decline to opt into arbitration, in which case, he's owed $17 million over the next two years.

At this point, the Dodgers might be keen to move on from Puig, even at a loss. They could well have deemed him not worth the trouble anymore. Even when he was playing at his best, discipline and attitude made Puig difficult to predict, and if there’s one thing that modern baseball doesn’t care for, it’s enigmas.

The Dodgers could also opt to release Puig and wash their hands of the outfielder, but that would leave them on the hook to pay the remainder of that $17 million and another team the possibility to sign the preternaturally talented outfielder for pennies on the dollar.

That option doesn’t seem likely — after everything they've been through, the Dodgers are going to want some sort of compensation, right? And you don't release a player like Puig, no matter how much has happened. He's still a viable Major League player — he was batting .301 with a .813 OPS in his last 30 games — but that's not good enough for the Dodgers.

So what team wants to give up a mid-level prospect or two for the right to take on Yasiel Puig? The Oakland A’s would make sense — they love to buy low — but they clearly don’t want him, otherwise, he would have been included in the Reddick deal.

The White Sox had reported interest in Puig long before the trading deadline, and they’ve been lacking a viable three-man outfield since Austin Jackson went down with a knee injury in June. Are they willing to take on the monetary risk? Puig is, at the minimum, a $17 million investment. It's hard to see the White Sox pulling that trigger.

At this juncture, the most likely option appears that the Dodgers will stash him in the minors until the time they deem him ready to return to the big leagues. Maybe that's in a few weeks, or maybe Puig has to make the team at Spring Training next year.

No one can say with certainty when Puig will play for LA again.

The undeniable force now has to wait.