The Red Sox signed reliever Alan Embree to a minor league deal that could pay the lefty about $1.1MM if he makes the major league roster and reaches his incentives for games pitched. Embree will earn $500K for making the big league club, and he'll have the chance to opt out of his contract on April 15th to reassess his situation. This marks Embree's second stint with the team, as he joined the Red Sox in a 2002 trade and pitched for them until his '05 release.
Amalie Benjamin of the Boston Globe added the opt-out details; Alex Speier of WEEI.com added the salary Embree will earn if he's on the major league roster and Gordon Edes of ESPNBoston added specifics about the incentives (Twitter links).
Embree, 40, posted a 5.84 ERA, 4.4 K/9, and 4.4 BB/9 in 24.6 innings for the Rockies last year. His season ended in July when a line drive fractured his tibia. Checking Embree's FanGraphs splits, his recent work against lefties has been spotty.
The Sox already have lefty relievers Hideki Okajima and Fabio Castro on the 40-man roster and Brian Shouse in camp on a non-roster invite.
Hahaha. Fastball Al!
Awww, COME ON!!!
Is this another Nomah retirement party for Embre? They can’t seriously be considering him for the major league team…can they?
the signings of Joe Nelson, Brian Shouse, and Alan Embree just make the Red Sox seem more “Red Sox like” if you know what I mean.
no,just spit it out.
Haha, I love Embree. I just hope he gets minimal to no major league time. 😛
If he did make the squad, at least he’d bring the mean-looking level of their pen up a few notches.
Just does not make an awful lot of sense. Embree has only had success at SD since Boston released him early in 2005 and that was in SD, where most pitchers can have success at home. Bring Bill Lee out of retirement and stop barnstorming for a season and he could probably be effective there as a situational lefty even.
Just hope that Shouse/Embree don’t wind up on the roster at the start of the season, when somebody like Bonser who can pitch a few innings of garbage time middle relief would seem to be of far more use and Bonser is out of options, sure fire to get claimed on waivers or given away in a trade like Boston got him from the Twins.
This move is all about having some more LHP bullpen options in the upper minors, I don’t think Embree has a shot of making the pen right out camp. The Sox we’re hoping to add another lefty arm in the pen to go with Okie but Richardson got hurt and Shouse hasn’t been good enough so the final pen spots will go to Boof and Atchinson and if they need to replace one of them with a lefty they have a few options in AAA.
He likely won’t last half the season in AAA let alone stumble onto the ML roster.
Just think, this time last year this move would have been heralded as ‘adding more depth to an already ridiculously deep team’. Funny how storylines affect analysis.
nostalgia signing all the way. Thank god it’s just a minor league contract. I love what he’s been able to do in the past, but really, he was done in 05 when his fastball went from 95-97 to 91-92.