Many teams interested in Manny Delcarmen
by Randy Booth on Mar 30, 2009 12:03 PM EDT
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PrintAccording to ESPN's Peter Gammons, there are a lot of teams interested in potentially trading for Red Sox reliever Manny Delcarmen:
...several Arizona teams have expressed interest in Boston reliever Manny Delcarmen. Boston needs a catcher, and could use another infielder and even another outfielder.
I'm a big fan of Delcarmen, so I'm against this to begin with. Sure, the Sox would like to have another catcher, but do they really need a catcher right now? George Kottaras is holding down the fort as a backup and we obviously are going to be set with Jason Varitek for awhile. Nick Green, a backup infielder, is absolutely smashing the ball and is a good utility player (outfielder as well). Another outfielder? Perhaps, but we're not going to get one good enough that could push out Rocco Baldelli or Mark Kotsay when he's back.
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MDC might be most expendable RP
If Saito retunrs to 2007 from and Okajima has another soild year, Manny will quickly find himself battling Javier Lopez and Ramon Ramirez for mop up duty and meaningless innings during blow outs…
With Bard in AAA and Materson looking sharp, I would be very interested in trading MDC (as much as I hate to see a local boy get traded). But what do we need?
I’d like to see a quality IF, but like Randy said about the OFs… is there anyone better than Nick Green or Julio Lugo (maybe) out here?
Bottom Line: The smart play would be to see how the first half goes and see what injuries sneak up on the Sox. If we stay healthy and MDC is begging for a more serious role… that’s when you trade him to someone in desperate need of an RP.
Saito is old and injury-prone
I’m against trading MDC. He is one of the few Sox relievers who is tough on both lefties and righties. Masterson, J-Lo, and Ramirez are one-sided pitchers, although Masterson might be tougher on lefties if his change improves.
However, if the Sox can bring back a good starting player or potential starter, I’d listen. There’s no way the Sox should trade MDC for bench depth.
I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.
by Drugs Delaney on Mar 30, 2009 1:05 PM EDT up reply actions
Saito a ?
Saito has a lot to prove and this may be his only year in Boston… so I respect the idea of keeping a young MDC. Having young arms like MDC, Masterson, Bard, and Ram Ram for the long haul would be nice.
I suspect we’ll be hearing more trade talk than usual throughout the year as teams try to keep the budgets down…
by bottomlinesox on Mar 30, 2009 1:31 PM EDT up reply actions
Keep MDC
As Drugs said, I’d only trade Delcarmen if he brought back a valuable player. Relievers are often unreliable year to year, but I think Delcarmen is really worth keeping in the bullpen as a young, maturing, cost-controller pitcher.
I might trade Delcarmen in a package for an upgrade to the starting nine, but that would really only be at SS or C. And really, Lowrie at SS isn’t bad compared to what some other teams put up with.
In short, I’m happy with Kottaras as a back-up (he can’t be worse than ol’ Chicken Parm), but he’s not a long-term solution at catcher in my opinion. I’d trade Delcarmen for a 2-way catching prospect.
"You know you're having a bad day when the fifth inning rolls around and they drag the warning track." - Mike Flanagan, Baltimore Orioles pitcher, 1992.
MDC
has not improved in 3 years, so his trade value is probably at its highest. From every report Bard is dealing, add Ramirez, Saito, and Masterson, MDC is the odd man out. Francona uses Masterson and Okie before MDC and they just traded their OF depth for Ramirez, I think its fairly obvious RR will get most of MDC’s innings to start the season.
Most on this site would not give up a prospect for a young catcher but now the 4th guy in the pen is too valuable to deal for a Montero type player. The Sox will have to give up Something of value to fill that position, a 28 year old middle relief arm that really has not reached the level most anticipated seems like a deal.
Truth is the guy that needs to go is J. Lopez. Its not like he can get out lefties either.
THANK YOU.
I hate Lopez. He blows up at the most inopportune times, unlike MDC, who blows up at random. MDC can dominate when he’s on though, and Lopez can, at best, keep the ball down.
MDC for Montero straight up
Other than that, do not trade MDC.
"Hey we got a lot in common here... I'm gonna rape you"
Some people are way too down on MDC.
He started out the season poorly, but was unhittable in the second half with a 1.82 ERA. He pitched more innings out of the bullpen last year than anybody. From 2007 to 2008 he lowered his walk rate, increased his K rate, decreased his HR rate, increased his GB% and lowered his FIP. He was just unlucky at times last year with a BABIP of .266 compared to .224 the previous year. PECOTA, ZiPS, and Chone all project Delcarmen to be better than Masterson this year.
by BTLove on Mar 30, 2009 5:05 PM EDT reply actions 3 recs
+1
And rec’d. Agree completely.
I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.
by Drugs Delaney on Mar 30, 2009 6:17 PM EDT up reply actions
Wouldn't the BABIP suggest he was regressing towards the mean last year?
And that he might further regress this year? .224 is ridiculously fortunate, and .266 is still well below the league average (.290-ish, I think).
Manny ain't the only bad man.
I would expect
non-mop up relief pitchers to have lower BAPIPs than the 290 average. They generally pitch less than 2 innings, so can feature harder stuff. I would imagine that every year there are relief pitchers (Betancourt 07, Balfour/Mariano 08) that have BAPIPs way lower than any starting pitcher. This is pure speculation, however, as I have not even looked. Do you know?
I have no idea.
But your hypothesis makes sense. Though I stand by my argument that it’s somewhat premature to look at 2007 and 2008 to conclude that he was unlucky last year, as opposed to being lucky in 2007.
Manny ain't the only bad man.
I did a brief
check. It is true for balfour/Btancourt in the years I said, but interestingly Mariano’s career BAPIP is 267. Not so low.
You're right. I should have been more specific.
He had a very unlucky first half, which I think is why people are down on him. His ERA was 4.54 but his BABIP was almost .350. And yes, I think in 2007 he was lucky, but he showed improvement in all his peripherals last year (as I said above), but had worse results in terms of ERA, mostly due to that high BABIP in the first half.
Also, I don’t think you necessarily have to compare BABIP to the league average, but to a player’s established norms. Obviously this is hard for a young player like MDC.
agree
aside from the strength against either lefties or righties, he also can take a very heavy work load. He has some of the most nasty stuff on the staff.
True
I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.
by Drugs Delaney on Mar 30, 2009 7:55 PM EDT up reply actions
If we can get good value for him, I'm all for it.
For instance, a catcher-of-the-future deal built around MDC rather than Buch would be sweet. I don’t really see it happening (though Arizona’s bullpen needs help badly), but it’d be sweet.
As an aside, Gamons has really stepped up his ESPN game this spring – it seems like it’s been an article a day for a couple weeks. Worth the pice of the Insider, for sure.
Manny ain't the only bad man.
I would
listen, but there might not be much that makes sense. For example, we have Tek now for 2 more years. Do we make such a trade for Montero, who is not really a good starting catcher, when we are tied in? We also will have time to get a better look at Exposito, etc in that time. And, Papelbon wont be here very long-a good late inning relief pitcher might be of more value to us in 2-3 years than we realize. Just some thoughts, not suggesting that MDC is untouchable…
"Montero, who is not really a good starting catcher"
I’ve mostly heard good things about him. No one touts him as the next Russ Martin, but he’s certainly got the upside to be a decent starting catcher. More upside than Kottaras, at least.
Manny ain't the only bad man.
I agree
better than what we have now. I have not watched him play much. He has a bad defensive rep, but a good rep in handling pitchers. A decent but not special one sided hitter. He looks ok, but a would guess he would be in the bottom half of starting catchers right now. His career OPS+ of 81 isn’t a ringing calling card, especially for a guy whose defense is suspect, but he is young, and might really pick up both offensively and defensively.
Small sample size
especially for a young catcher. His minor league numbers look pretty good.
Manny ain't the only bad man.
I agree
but also remember these are PCL AAA numbers.
I've always been very "meh" on Montero
I don’t think an average-at-best catcher, with an outside shot at a little better is worth a young, improving, cost-controlled reliever.
"You know you're having a bad day when the fifth inning rolls around and they drag the warning track." - Mike Flanagan, Baltimore Orioles pitcher, 1992.
Another Gammons tidbit, from the same article.
In his last Triple-A start, Boston’s Junichi Tazawa threw three balls in three innings.
Junichi might be Bizarro-Dice-K…
Manny ain't the only bad man.
I like Manny Delcarmen
and he’s performed fairly well, going by the numbers. That said, he’s not the sort of guy that I trust in big situations. A lot of that mistrust stems from his failure to produce in the playoffs. Admittedly it’s a small sample size (8.2 innings), but in the last two years he has an 11.42 postseason ERA.
MDC needs to step up to the next stage of his career. He has the stuff – a blazing fastball, a great curve, and a solid changeup. But he hasn’t done enough with it all. Maybe he’ll bloom this season, or later on (for another team), or maybe he’ll always be a middling reliever.
"It's just a tiny little nick, but it hurts when I get champagne in there."
- Jason Bay, on getting spiked scoring the winning run in ALDS Game Four.
You may be right
in the end, but this sort of thing shows the uselessness of ERA+small sample for a relief pitcher. MDC was not good int he 07 playoffs, but he was not used much or in important situations. Last year the story was different. He looked sharp against the Angels. In fact, he looed sharper than Masterson, and people started to question Tito’s reliance on Masterson in that series in part because of MDC. He was the guy on the mound during the infamous “bunt” that essentially ended that series. MDC basically saved that game from the jaws of defeat when Masterson had craped his pants (2 walks, 1 hit and a blown save in 0.2 innings). Against the Rays it was different. He started well, but his last two appearences he gave up 7 runs in 0.2 innings inflating his ERA dramatically. His por pitching in this less than an inning did not change the outcome of either game (luckily in game 5). Overall, it is not clear at all that he “can’t be trusted in big situations;” in fact, if luck breaks differently we might be saying that about Masterson, who wiggled out of a lot of self-made trouble in the playoffs.
Yep
Masterson was lucky in the post-season last year, especially the ALDS.
I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.
by Drugs Delaney on Mar 31, 2009 10:44 AM EDT up reply actions
Agree wholeheartedly about Masterson
I like the kid, but, boy! He makes me nervous sometimes.
"You know you're having a bad day when the fifth inning rolls around and they drag the warning track." - Mike Flanagan, Baltimore Orioles pitcher, 1992.
Maybe several teams that play Spring Training in Arizona? I dunno.
Have the preview/post/cancel buttons always been ovals or is that new?
That's new.
The pic button is still the tree, which is still random.
That makes sense though. I think I got that originally but MatthewRI threw me off.
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