It's official! Gillies dealt to Phillies

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor
Tyson Gillies was looking forward to having his head hit the pillow Wednesday night.
“It’s all done,” the outfielder from Kamloops said yesterday, referring to the monster Major League trade in which he found himself moving from the Seattle Mariners to the Philadelphia Phillies. “I’m relieved because it was going for such a while. I just wanted to turn my phone off. I haven’t had a good night’s rest in the last couple of nights.”
The trade became official for Gillies when Jack Zduriencik, the Mariners’ executive vice-president and general manager of baseball operations, called him about 11:30 a.m.
“We had a talk about how these things work,” Gillies, 21, said. “He said there were several teams wanting me in trades that he (rejected) but that it’s too hard to say no to a Cy Young pitcher like Cliff Lee who will be in the rotation with Felix Herandez.”
The Mariners acquired the left-handed Lee from the Phillies for Gillies, right-hander Phillippe Aumont of Gatineau, Que., and Nicaraguan right-hander Juan Ramirez.
The Phillies were able to trade Lee because they acquired right-hander Roy Halladay, like Lee a former Cy Young Award winner, from Toronto, with the Blue Jays getting right-hander Kyle Drabek, considered one of the best prospects in all of baseball and son of former pitcher Doug Drabek, catcher Travis d’Arnaud and outfielder Michael Taylor. The Blue Jays then shipped Taylor to the Oakland A’s for Brett Wallace, who can play first or third base.
Drabek, 22, was the Phillies’ first-round pick in the 2006 draft. Last season, he was a combined 12-3 with a 3.19 ERA at Class A Clearwater and Double-A Reading.
The Blue Jays also gave US$6 million to the Phillies. Halladay then signed a US$60-million, three-year extension through 2013.
Gillies, Ramirez and Aumont, who is Gillies’ best friend and offseason roomate in Arizona, began last season with the High Desert Mavericks of the High Class A California League. Aumont finished the season in Double-A and is being groomed for short relief.
“I wouldn’t choose anyone else to come with me,” a laughing Gillies said of Aumont. “Last year, Phillippe and I were standing there and the farm director walked by. I was supposed to go to low A Clinton (Lumberkings, in Iowa).
“Phillippe told him, ‘He’s coming to High A with me.’
“Then, while this trade was going on, Phillippe told (Zduriencik), ‘If they’re taking me to the Phillies, Tyson’s coming with me.’ An hour and a half later, that’s what’s going on.”
The 6-foot-7 Aumont, who pitched for Canada in the 2009 World Baseball Classic, was a combined 2-6 with 16 saves and a 3.88 ERA for High Desert and Double-A West Tennessee last season. He was Seattle’s first-round pick, 11th overall, in the 2007 draft.
Gillies, 21, hit .341 last season and led the California League with 44 stolen bases. He scored 104 runs and had a .430 on-base percentage.
Gillies said Zduriencik told him, “We had a good run and it’s tough the way these things work, but . . .”
Early last evening, Gillies heard from the Phillies, including general manager Ruben Amaro Jr., and Steve Noworyta, the director of minor league operations.
“It was exciting,” Gillies said.
Had he remained with Seattle, Gillies would have been going to spring training with the Mariners. That being the case, chances are that he will go to main camp with the Phillies.
If he ends up in Double-A, it’ll be with the Reading Phillies of Eastern League; if it’s Triple-A, it’ll be the Lehigh Valley IronPigs of the International League. Both teams are located in Pennsylvania.
Gillies already is thinking about the climate change he will face, going from Arizona and California to the East Coast.
“It’s going to be a pretty sweaty experience, that’s for sure,” he said.
But the one thing he won’t do is change his game.
“I’m going to a new organization and I’m just going to stick within my game and do exactly what I’ve been doing,” Gillies said. “I’m not going to change anything.”
At the same time, he admitted to being sad at leaving the Seattle organization.
“I’ve built such a strong realtionship with all the coaches and my teammates,” he said. “Guys from my team are calling me, sayin, ‘Sad to see you go.’
“It isn’t that I’m just going to Arizona. I’m going to Florida, the East Coast . . . I won’t see those guys for a long time.”
And, of course, there was some humour involved in the goodbyes.
“A lot of them were sad but we joked around about the guys who play the same position being sad to see you go but happy to see you leave, you know?,” Gillies said with a chuckle.
gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
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