| Michael was acquired by the Cubs
(from Oakland) in December 2003, just one day after the A's acquired
him from Montreal for a player to be named later ... prior to
the trade, he had spent his entire career with Montreal ... the
backstop was one of four National League catchers to hit at least
10 homers during each of the 2002-05 seasons, joining Jason LaRue,
Mike Lieberthal and Mike Piazza ... during his eight-year career,
pitchers have a 4.26 ERA when he is behind the plate ... has a
21.6-percent caught stealing average ... in addition to catching
651 career games (608 starts), he has seen action in 124 games
at third base (114 starts), 6 games at first base (2 starts) and
2 games at shortstop ... was originally drafted by Montreal as
a shortstop, but was converted to a catcher at the end of the
1995 Instructional League campaign ... is a 1995 graduate of Pace
Academy in Atlanta ... as a senior, he was the Gatorade state
player of the year and was selected to the all-USA high school
baseball team ... played for the USA Baseball junior national
team in 1994 ... his cousin, Scott Fletcher, spent parts of 15
seasons playing for the Cubs, the White Sox, Texas, Milwaukee,
Boston and Detroit ... focuses his charitable efforts on children,
working with the Make-A-Wish Foundation and with local children's
hospitals.
2006 Highlights:
Barrett made a run for the batting title, but was unable to total
enough plate appearances to qualify. He was sidelined in early
September by a serious injury (intrascrotal hematoma), and finished
the season on the disabled list. His 107 games played was a personal
low, but he did match his season best with 16 home runs. Barrett
also missed time when he served a 10-game suspension in June for
punching White Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski.
2005 Highlights:
Michael won his first career Silver Slugger Award in a season
in which he batted .276 with 32 doubles, 16 home runs and 61 RBI
... his 16 homers ranked second among National League catchers,
as only New York's Mike Piazza hit more (19). © tied his
career mark in homers and appeared in the second-highest number
of games in his career (133) ... fell 1 double shy and 4 RBI shy
of his career mark in those categories ... finished fourth on
the club with 22 two-out RBI ... batted .286 with 8 RBI when he
came to bat with the bases loaded ... hit better than .300 in
May, July and August ... his best month of the season was May,
when he hit .348 with 11 RBI in 21 games ... recorded a .320 average
off left-handed pitchers, going 40-for-125 with 13 doubles, 7
homers and 24 RBI ... had a season-best nine-game hitting streak
from May 7-May 18 ... batted .387 with 2 doubles, a homer and
6 RBI ... recorded his third career 2-homer game June 7 against
Toronto, hitting a pair of solo roundtrippers ... drove in a season-high
4 runs June 14 in a 14-0 defeat of Florida, hitting a sacrifice
fly in the sixth inning and a 3-run homer in the eighth inning
... tied his career mark in homers on the final day of the season,
hitting a solo homer off Houston's Roy Oswalt in a 6-4 loss to
the Astros. |
