The Royals designated left-handed pitcher Dusty Hughes for assignment, tweets Bob Dutton of the Kansas City Star.
The move was made to make space on the 40-man roster for the recently acquired Jeff Francis. In a related transaction, Bruce Chen was officially added to the 40-man roster after his signing in the wake of Gil Meche's retirement, writes Dick Kaegel of MLB.com.
Hughes, 28, appeared in 65 games with the Royals over the past two seasons, 57 of them in 2010 (all in relief). For his career, he has a 6.3 K/9, 4.1 BB/9 and a 4.09 ERA.
Really? He got a lot of late-inning work for the Royals last year, and they didn’t exactly improve their pen.
They’ll look to upgrade from within with some of the prospects…Tim Collins (Atlanta deal), Louis Coleman, Jeffress (Greinke deal), Holland, Hardy. They have plenty of internal options with way more upside than Hughes.
Two problems 1) None of those guys are on the 40-man now. 2) They’re all righties, with the exception of Collins. There are no lefties on the Royals 40-man now.
Hardy and Collins are lefties, but as you stated would need to be added to the 40 man. I think this all but guarantees Collins makes the team barring a terrible spring. Teaford is another option already on the 40 man, but they’d probably rather keep him as a starter. Chen would be an option if he doesn’t win a rotation spot in the spring.
There are plenty of ways to open up a spot on the 40 man starting with Pucetas or Chavez. I will say I’m surprised they didn’t just DFA one of those two right away. Maybe they think Hughes will clear waivers as a lefty that doesn’t do especially well against lefties? I would have gone Chavez, but it’s no major loss if someone takes a chance and claims him.
Gotta say, I don’t understand this. I don’t know why you would DFA your only lefty bullpen option.
… because he’s not their only lefty bullpen option.
He is on the 40-man and that is kind of the point for the team at this juncture of development.
Definitely a mistake. I’ve seen Hughes pitch a handful of times…and the guy throws well, hard and from the left side. As erratic as relievers are, I wouldn’t be shocked if this guy out-performs Brian Fuentes next year, for 1/10 (literally) the price.
I mean, a team like the Red Sox can cut David Aardsma and get away with it. A team like the Royals shouldn’t be cutting Dusty Hughes, IMO.
But I’m sure they’ve got great ideas on how to spend Gil Meche’s donation…maybe a new helipad for David Glass?
Dusty was OK, but he is not really a lefty specialist at all. He was really erratic back of the bullpen material, but probably has a career full of AAA time with occasional calls to the majors ahead of him. He can spot start or eat some middle innings, but he really is not a dependable late inning guy at all.
I would have DFA’d Chavez, but what do I know. They seem to have more (misplaced) hope for him.
Brent, those are pretty much my thoughts, exactly, and I think you summed it up very well. Big loss? No. But he did have some value, and more than Chavez, I thought.
One teams trash can always amount to being a Pittsburgh Pirate treasure. I’d like to see the buccos take a gamble on this guy considering we have zero serviceable lefties in our pen.