Figgins DFA’d, Five Added
Do a happy dance – Chone Figgins is finally gone. The Mariners designated both he and recently claimed Scott Cousins for assignment, clearing them off the 40 man roster so that they could add a total of five players who otherwise would have been eligible for the Rule 5 draft. The five:
SP Brandon Maurer
3B/OF Vinnie Catricala
LHP Bobby LaFromboise
LHP Anthony Fernandez
OF Julio Morban
Left unprotected were LHP Brian Moran and RHP Andrew Carraway, who both could be selected and stashed in a bullpen somewhere next year. But, neither are particularly high upside guys, so even if the organization loses either one, it’s not a particularly huge deal. And, of course, they might not get selected, and if they do, they might very well get returned. So, I wouldn’t lose much sleep over it.
Especially since Figgins has finally, mercifully been DFA’d. Now the team can get back to actually using a 25 man roster again.
I fail to see what harm could possibly arise from competition.
If I live to be 140, I don’t know if I’ll ever figure out what the hell happened to Chone Figgins as a Seattle Mariner.
When the deal was first made, the price tag made me cringe a little…but there was a lot of good writing (not the least of which was from Dave) to explain that it was pretty much the going rate of business.
I never thought of him as a “savior move”, of course…more like a really good piece, and one that had given us all kinds of grief as an Angel.
I never dreamed at the time that he’d be the author of WAY more grief for Mariner fans by wearing the Mariner uniform.
I don’t get it, why it never worked out. It kind of feels like a black mark on Zduriencik’s record as a GM that isn’t deserved. No one in baseball- no one, that I can remember- thought of this move as the impending disaster it would prove to be.
It’s probably less than fruitful if I even try to figure out the answer(s) to it.
All I know is WOW am I glad the team has finally decided to bite the bullet on that, and DFA him.
And I’m surprisingly on board with an idea to try again with a pricey deal in free agency, and bring Nick Swisher to the Northwest.
Also…can someone please tell me why exactly Carlos Peguero occupies a 40-man roster spot?
For us or ANY major-league club?
We have enough data on him, minors AND majors. Age 25 in 2013, and has failed at least two full auditions in the bigs. No contact rates to speak of. Ungodly high amount of whiffs. A disaster defensively in the OF, albeit with slightly better speed than you’d expect from a 250-pounder and a better-than-average arm.
I’m willing to say that what we see is what we get with Peguero. Ever.
I sure hope that when we need the 40-man roster room (and please God, I hope that’s soon), he’s odd man out.
^Maybe out of fear? Though their own coaches and instructors can’t seem to mold him into something useful, maybe they’re worried another team might succeed where they have failed? Paranoia’s probably a better descriptive word for that scenario, though.
The team may be worried if they dump Peguero and he manages to have a decent/lucky 1-2 months at some point , fans will start screaming about how the team gave up too quickly on him. Even if he goes back to sucking full time and eventually gets cut by that other team.
We could call it the Brian LaHair syndrome.
I fail to see what harm could possibly arise from competition.
John Jaso (20 plate appearances in April) and Hisashi Iwakuma (15 IP before June 1) say “Hi, remember how we were used early on based on what Eric Wedge thought about spring training?”
The problem is that spring training stats are complete garbage for assessing players- you have three things working against you: Small Sample Size Theatre, the fact that it’s being done against everything from A ball players to guys who don’t care how the games end up, they’re working on that new pitch, AND it’s at altitude in Arizona (inflates hitting stats). Scouting during spring training makes more sense (you can tell when someone like a Griffey Jr. is ready for his big league job in games), but if you’re Eric Wedge… well, you routinely screw this up, as we saw. It’s pretty common for managers to mess this up, though.
The M´s are in on Napoli. 4 years and 30 millions is my guess.
If that’s so – the team must’ve already told Montero to put away his catcher’s gear.
EC, just because certain talent evaluators on our team are fucking morons doesn’t mean that competition is a bad thing.
^I think that was kind of his point. Bad talent evaluators, like Wedge, get confused/distracted with more competition and smaller sample sizes.
With four of the teams worst players gone, and the undeniable production from Jaso and Iwakuma, let’s hope there’s fewer mistakes this year!
EC, just because certain talent evaluators on our team are fucking morons doesn’t mean that competition is a bad thing.
It depends on what you mean- if you mean “it’s a good thing to have a surplus of talent throughout the roster and minors”, sure, if it means “we’re going to use a short period of time of questionable validity to make our roster decisions”… no, not so much.
Taken to an extreme, let’s say Felix doesn’t do so great in spring training, and we’ve already noted he faded some in September. Is he part of the “competition” for roster spots? The original quote is ” every job is open to competition in spring training”. I submit you’d have to be an idiot to be putting Felix’s job in question, unless it was obvious he was injured (and even then, look at how he looked in April compared to June this year).
Re Competition: Baseball has guaranteed contracts, so Figgins’ bad contract sat on the bench…If the Angels had played Trout from Opening Day last season, they would probably have won a few more games and made the playoffs… e.g. If Zunino, or any of Hultzen – Paxton – Walker – looks really good in spring training, I hope he makes the team, and isn’t “seasoned” in the Minors to protect Super Two contract status. However, if the M’s sign a better option at catcher, or pitcher, or anywhere; as a free agent, or acquire one in a trade, I’ll be happy to have Zunino and the, ‘Big Three’ get some ‘seasoning;… I just want the M’s to start the year with their best 25 so they can win as many games as possible, and not be doomed by a crappy start.
EC, you’re talking about evaluating competition based on the numerical results. I’m not. Despite all our progress in statistical analysis, we still have to rely upon the coaches and scouts to determine whether someone still has “it” or not. Nobody is going to push Felix from the starting rotation if he has a hideous Spring. But if his velocity is way down and his control is erratic, they might get concerned about him.
Obviously if you know your stars they’re not going to get moved off. But, for the guys like Smoak, who have to prove they’re worth their position, having competition to determine which is better going forward isn’t bad. Again, it’s just up to the people doing the talent evaluation to get it right and not rely upon stupid stats like ours did last spring for certain players.
The original post that started this:
Next best announcement would be that every job is open to competition in spring training, ala the Seahawks…
This is just wrong: football is a very different game than baseball, NFL rosters are very different creatures than MLB rosters, the talent acquisition is very different, and so on.
But, for the guys like Smoak, who have to prove they’re worth their position, having competition to determine which is better going forward isn’t bad.
Oh, you mean “having a surplus of talent”? Or “Scouting during spring training makes more sense (you can tell when someone like a Griffey Jr. is ready for his big league job in games)”?
Look, using spring training to evaluate talent on a gross level (“Hmm, that Pineda/Griffey kid looks like he could break camp with us”)? Sure, nobody’s arguing against that. But if the Mariners don’t already know that Smoak doesn’t really deserve a guaranteed MLB job after 1300-some horrible plate appearances, 4 weeks of spring training isn’t going to help them with picking up the clue phone- and in my opinion, if Smoak hits .400 in spring training and 5 jacks, and Carp hits .250 with a homer, it’s nearly useless in the evaluation (based on what I’ve seen so far, neither Smoak nor Carp are very good MLB players; they are fringy, below average starters/bench players with a small chance of a Ibañez-style bust out at the top end of their projections- the M’s should be seeking out other options, not seeing which one of two bad 1B has the hot spring training).
And, again, you’re using a small sample size in a distorted environment, where you’ve got A ball players getting regular time; even scouting only gives you so much. The cliché about competition is just that, a cliché.