Mullens: If I Could Go Back, I Would’ve Transfered From Ohio State
January 20, 2012Box Score: Chicago Bulls 114, Cleveland Cavaliers 75
January 20, 2012According to Jon Morosi of Fox Sports, the Indians have acquired Starting Pitcher Kevin Slowey from the Colorado Rockies for Reliever Zach Putnam. Tribe fans should be familiar with Slowey from his days with the Minnesota Twins. The right-hander spent the last four plus years with the Twins and was solid until a horrific 2011 campaign where he went 0-8 with a 6.67 ERA and battled injuries the entire season.
He won double figure games in the previous three seasons, including a 13-6/4.45 ERA/1.29 WHIP 2010 season where he made 28 starts.
The acquisition of Slowey tells me two things:
1. The Indians have serious concerns that Fausto Carmona/Roberto Hernandez Heredia will pitch for them this season.
2. They have less faith in Jeanmar Gomez and David Huff than I thought they had.
Nevertheless, the Tribe has brought in another Major League veteran starter for the fifth starter role. Slowey is only 28 years old and has shown to be a dependable back of the rotation arm in previous years. I think it was a shot worth taking.
Leaving Cleveland will be Putnam, who has risen through the Indians organization after being drafted by the club in 2008 out of the University of Michigan. He was 6-3 with a 3.65 ERA and 1.22 WHIP in Columbus last season before getting a September callup with the Tribe where Putnam had an ERA of 6.14 in eight appearances. The Indians were dealing from a position of depth, so I don’t think they will miss Putnam in the long or short term.
16 Comments
The Cleveland Rockies? Wha?
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore
I guess this was that huge trade that “nobody would get in 50 guesses”
Where’s the trade for the big bat?!?! 2012 will not include a post-season for the Tribe unless they pick up a big, middle of the order, right-handed bat.
They have SP prospects like Gomez, Huff and McCallister, depth in the bullpen like Joe Smith, Tony Sipp or Raffy(if he signs) along with a closer that will never be valued as high as he is right now, all to offer in a trade for a bat. This is not even mentioning young bats like LaPorta, Phelps, Chiz, Marson, Carrerra, and Sizemore.
Take all of those pieces and tell me that you can’t make a four player proposal to a team like Boston or the Mets to get a David Wright or Kevin Youkilis? It’s time to step up and make a big deal like the Ubaldo trade.
But yeah, I like the Slowey deal. Putnam for a 4th-5th starter is a good deal
Career strikeout to walk ratio of 4.7. He was awful a year ago but this could turn out to be a very good trade. When healthy Slowey is a lot like Josh Tomlin except that he strikes more people out.
His numbers (K, BB rates; FB%; HR rates) read a whole lot like Josh Tomlin’s.
I like it quite a bit. Assuming that ’11 was just a statistical fluke and not indicative of some major mechanical or physical issue, this might end up being a really great, sly move.
I like it too, Slowey could be an upgrade over “Fausto” if healthy.
Food for thought: the Indians took on $2.75M with Slowey. Which, as any Indians fan may know, is a sizeable sum for us at this juncture.
Carlos Pena signed a one year deal for $7.25M.
Assuming the Slowey deal was fallout from the Fausto debacle, this means that for about $5M more the Indians could have outbid the Rays on Pena.
Which means either we can’t afford $5M on our payroll this year or we never were truly interested in Pena in any realistic way. I’ll also go out on a limb and say that we are not particularly interested in the other FA 1B candidates. Call it a hunch….
And since I’m making random assumptions – I’ll officially predict that Carlos Lee ends up here when all is said and done, maybe as an early mid-season move.
Bad trade.
The Indians aren’t really that deep at reliever anymore. They’ve lost Josh Judy, Marty Popham, Corey Burns, Adam Miller and Chris Jones from the AA and AAA levels. They’ve also lost Durbin and Germano. That’s why they’ve signed a slieu of minor league free agent relievers (Chris Ray, Jeremy Accardo, Robinson Tejada, Willy LeBron, Chris Seddon).
The place they are deep? Starter. I’m really not convinced that Slowey is going to be an improvement over Jeanmar Gomez, who was one of 6 starters who are at AAA who are on the 40 man roster (the others being Barnes, Rondon, McAllister, Kluber and Huff… but Rondon figures to miss all of this year). There was really no need for another starter, and certainly not at the expense of one of the few relievers that you can actually count as major league depth right now. After this trade, the only reliever in AAA on the 40 man will be Kelvin De La Cruz (assuming Hagadone makes the team out of Spring Training).
Apparently the Indians made a serious run at Pena
https://twitter.com/#!/JonHeymanCBS/status/160412252900564992
I hope we swing a deal for El Caballo at this point. Maybe they can void Carmona’s contract and use some of that cash to pay Lee.
Good to know.
Then I rescind that portion of my post and ammend the other part to – “I find think this $2.75M on Slowey means we will not get one of the remaining 1B FA candidates, barring some serious salary dump from our roster”.
pretty sure Gomez or Slowey would be better than Durbin at long relief. Whichever SPs don’t make the starting5 could be put in the bullpen.
The Rockies are also reportedly paying $1.25 million of that salary in the deal.
Plus Slowey has a minor league option left.
Yep – as TD wrote here: Pena to the Rays: So Now What, Tribe Fans?
Say you’re Boston, and expecting to contend right now. The Indians come knocking, offering four players who probably top out as, other than Chisenhall, average players, What are you willing to give up? One of your best bats? Really? Maybe the Mets are willing to give up David Wright for cheap, but if you can’t pay 7 million for an average player (Willingham) I have a tough time seeing how you can pay 15 million for one.
Or, heaven forbid, Pena was never interested in Cleveland.
Chad Durbin…addition by subtraction.