The Red Sox acquired catcher Mike McKenry from the Rockies for righty reliever Daniel Turpen, the teams announced. The Red Sox will have to make a 40-man roster move for McKenry, tweets Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe.
McKenry, 26, hit .265/.328/.424 in 384 plate appearances at Triple-A Colorado Springs last year, catching 94 games. He's thrown out 37% of attempted thieves in his minor league career and is said to have good intangibles as a catcher. A year ago Baseball America ranked him 13th among Rockies prospects, saying, "his best role may be as a high-energy backup."
Turpen, 24, spent the spring in Yankees camp as a Rule 5 pick but was returned to the Red Sox. The Sox had acquired him from the Giants in August for reliever Ramon Ramirez. Turpen posted a 4.30 ERA, 7.8 K/9, 3.7 BB/9, and 0.5 HR/9 in 69 Double-A relief innings last year.
Joel Sherman of the New York Post first reported the trade, which the Red Sox initially denied.
now this is news
Comments like that are so lame. You know that MLBTR reports EVERY SINGLE minor league deal.
And that is why I come here. All the rumors all the time.
top 10 prospect in the rockies system prior to 2010. i accept
can anyone confirm this?
McHenry is a very nice back-up catcher. He is a pitching coach on the field. Very nice player to have. We (Colorado) have two very top notch catching prospects that would take away playing time from Mike. He is a very good guy.
yesh
7. Michael McKenry, C, Double-A
Just 5’10”, McKenry generates surprising pop thanks to his squat build. He also historically hits for a pretty solid average and gets on base. Overall in ’09, he hit .279/.376/.455 in 358 double-A at-bats. He did see a decline in power last season as his ISO rate dropped from .210 in ’08 to .176. However, his walk rate remained strong at 12.9% and his strikeout rate dropped 6% to 19.3%. McKenry is a notoriously slow starter and his numbers could improve if he can find a way to get the bat going in April and May. Defensively, he’s a born leader who does a nice job of throwing out base runners (33% in ’09). He has the potential to be a solid big league regular, and he should have a nice MLB career even if he doesn’t hit as well as he did in the minors.
A bit overrated on that front. His offense just isn’t going to warrant anything more than a back-up catcher
show your work
He had a .223 wOBA on the road at age 25 in AAA with no homers?
i liek ur sample
do they really need another catcher? They’re starting to look like horders
quantity over quality. trust that they’d prefer it the other way around
Thirty-nine lashes for besmirching the good name of Jarrod Saltalalalamac…zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
thought you’d slipped into a rendition of brown eyed girl for a second there
That made me laugh so hard. Respect.
How so? McHenry is our only catching depth that has Major League experience..
AND NOW the Sox are World Series favorites.
Wow! It took five whole posts for some tired reprobate to finally say this? MLBTR is improving (slightly).
Rox were probably going to release him anyway. I know no one cares about the side of this trade going away from the Sox, but how about a little bit of info on the other guy?
Hadn’t been with the Sox system too long. Basically a middling AA reliever. Nothing too special that I know of.
Nothing to report. No one has ever heard of him.
Are we sure he exists? This is probably what Scott Boras is going to try next. Make up a random player and see how long it is until the Nationals offer him a long-term contract.
From Sox prospects: “Big sidearm reliever with a 93-94 mph fastball, complemented by an above-average changeup and an above-average slider. Induces a lot of groundballs. Works in the zone.” He has a good K/BB, usually 2.00 or higher, due more to walking almost no one than to striking a ton of guys out (8.15 K/9 last year which was high for him). His WHIP has been less than impressive but that could be in-part because he is a groundball pitcher with minor league defense behind him.
Quiet you! No one cares about any team outside the east coast.
Ohhh, it’s because your name is East Coast Bi…. Ahhh, I get it now.
hey east coast bias, look around a little, they play pretty good ball in those thar hills. lol but i think you are really gonna like this kid, real hard work guy who calls a great game and has a nice arm too. Bats a little slow but the way he works it could come around. And you didnt have to give up much since everyone knew, including the sox, that they had to clear a spot on the 40-man roster for Giambi. We were lucky to get anything for him since he would have been exposed on waivers in a couple days anyway.
They got him from the Giants for Ramon Ramirez, uhhh other than that, he maybe likes nachos.
Can he catch?
-T. Epstein
Ah, yes, ol’ T. Epstien, Theo’s dyslexic evil twin.
Dammit! It was is “I” before “E” twin.
“It was is ‘I’ before ‘E’ twin.”
Your grammar is going from bad to worse.
Probably because I’m suffering from either mono, the flu, or strep. Doctors aren’t sure yet. Excuse my blunders for the next few days.
I had mono in fifth grade. I hated having it. It lasted like 3 months so you should probably be praying for the flu.
Kevin, you are climbing the ranks on my leaderboard of most entertaining posters! Although, it’s mostly due to your multitude of “d’oh!” moments lol
oh joy….
or maybe you’re really dyslexic?
No!
This was awesome, only other thing that could be even more funny is Can he play SS?
We have two above league average shortstops on the 25 man and a high upside shortstop in the mid minors…
Are you refering to Jed Lawrie and Marco Scuataro as you “above average” shortstops, because they are the definition of average. If they are above average then that means that Troy Tulowitzki is God.
Marco Scutaro ranked eleventh out of twenty-two qualifying shortstops in WAR last year while suffering from a shoulder injury which affected both his fielding AND hitting. In other words, just above average WITH an injury. Without the injury, he probably would’ve put up numbers roughly the equivalent of Jose Reyes. He was actually the second or third best hitting SS (Depending on whether you want to count Alex Gonzalez’s half a season) in the AL last year.
Jed Lowrie put up a 1.8 WAR (Good for thirteenth in the MLB) in only 55 games. If he kept that pace up, that’d peg him at around 5 WAR. Realistically speaking, Lowrie was playing at a level around Alexei Ramirez last year.
So, yes, two above league average shortstops. I think you don’t quite understand how bad the shortstop position is overall right now.
Eleven is half of twenty-two meaning that he was THE average. And I’m not sure you know how WAR works. You don’t multiply that number by how many games he missed. Miguel Cabrera was a 5.9 WAR last year. Are you telling me that Jed Lowrie is nearly as good as the man who came in second in the AL MVP voting? Come on, dude. If you want to tell me that I don’t understand something, make sure you understand what you are saying.
Uhhh…did you actually read my post?
I never said you should extrapolate Lowrie’s WAR, neutral to position, out over a year. I simply said that he posted a better WAR than ten starting shortstops in just over a third of a season (Including the well regarded Elvis Andrus). If I really thought he’d have put up three times that WAR over a season, I’d have compared him to Hanley Ramirez (Who only put up 4.4 last year) instead of Alexei Ramirez.
And let’s look at basic math again: you can’t get a direct middle average out of an even number, because there is no exact middle digit.
Marco Scutaro had a better WAR than eleven other shortstops. There were ten shortstops with better WAR numbers, meaning there were more MLB shortstops who were worse than Scutaro than better. That pegs him just above where the average would be.
All this to get back to my main point of: the Sox aren’t exactly awash with great shortstops on their 25 man, but they’re better off than a large percentage of the league.
“Jed Lowrie put up a 1.8 WAR (Good for thirteenth in the MLB) in only 55 games. If he kept that pace up, that’d peg him at around 5 WAR.”
That is exactly what you said. And in this case you would consider the two medians of the shortstops as average to compromise the fact that you cannot get a whole number as a single median. If you are saying that this is not the case, the you are saying that there is no average short stop. Don’t try to make me sound like I don’t know how math works.
That’s just what the Sox needed, an energy guy off the bench! Who is he, Nate Robinson?
Hopefully not. I’d like to see him get an assist once in a while.
It is kind of funny to think of a catcher playing baseball like Nate plays basketball. Throwing the ball down to second when no one is stealing would be like Nate’s 3 point shots with 22 still on the shot clock with a transition offense.
Yes!….. except he can actually play defense >_<
Now the Sox fans will get to hear, “thighs like tree trucks” or similar, everytime he is mentioned. LOL
That rating above is a bit kind though. He is not near regular material, but he is a suitable backup for a game a week.
What’s a tree truck?
something your biological dad drives for a living…just kidding. LOL
A truck that lumberjacks use to move trees…..duh!
he was a top 10 prospect in the rox system as of 2010 according to fangraphs, minor league ball, and BI. BP had him at #11
he had a disappointing 2010 and his age counts against him, but backup appears to be his consensus worst-case scenario
It’s the logging chains he wears that are most impressive.
Quick glance and I thought it was Daniel Bard
I already had the noose ready and everything.
So basically the sox got a younger….Kevin Cash?
No, it sounds like this can can hit above .200.
His nickname is “Quadzilla.” I have a comical video of him chasing a young Dominican pitcher in a game of Duck Duck Goose from spring training last season
Andrew, where’s the video?
On my camera still. I’m a year behind in downloading video of it unfortunately.
As a Field-No Hit player McKenry is solid. If he didn’t have to bat, his fielding/throwing/catching would be MLB level or better. It’s the bat, that’s the issue.
Biggest part of this: Rockies freed up a spot on the 40 man roster AND got something in return!
Yep. As mentioned at insidetherockies, he clears room on the 40 for Giambi. Not sure who will move off the 25. Considering the way Giambi is playing this spring he was a lock to make the team, so McKenry may have been waived otherwise, so definately glad the Rox got something.
Looks like Cook could be heading to the 60 day DL to free up that spot for Giambi, so I’ve heard.
Good trade for both sides. Rockies clear a spot on the 40-man roster and the Red Sox get more catching depth for someone who had no future with the big club.
The deal is probably waiting while Theo tries to trade someone off the 40-man roster, rather than just releasing them. Look for more action soon.
[edit] In a separate deal, I mean.
Whatever happen to Richie Lentz?
who’s gonna claim nava? washington?
That’s what I’m thinking too. I just can’t wait to see McKenry’s “intangibles”.
so much for that. i guess wagner makes some sense, given that they’d have had 5 catchers on the 40 man
but really, if any team is going to carry 5 catchers, shouldn’t it be the one that’s starting jarrod saltalamaccia and jason varitek
Yeah, I wondered about Wagner when I first looked at who exactly was on the 40 man, but he looked like he could be a decent backup catcher and with all of the guys presumably ahead of Nava on the depth chart I figured he made more sense. And like you say, I could see them needing their catching depth. Oh well.
Yeah Wagner was designated for assignment.
You can only see his intangibles if he is wearing short, tight shorts.
That’s just wrong. Wrong, wrong , wrong.
I bet we see him get some PT, simply because of his arm. Teams are going to run wild on Salty and Varitek, both are even worse than Victor Martinez if Boston fans thought he was bad.
Saltaamacchia is not worse that Vic throwing guys out. Salty actually has a very strong arm, its his accuracy that isnt all there, which victor had none of. ive never seen a worse throwing catcher than victor, maybe posada but thats about it. Salty is better even Tek isnt as bad as victor.