The Blue Jays announced that they've claimed right-hander Liam Hendriks off waivers from the Orioles and designated infielder Brent Morel for assignment to clear a 40-man roster spot.
The 25-year-old Hendriks has been unable to put it together in three Major League stints, as evidenced by his bloated 6.06 ERA in 156 innings. He's averaged 5.8 K/9 and 2.7 BB/9 in those 156 frames to go along with a below-average 40.4 percent ground-ball rate.
However, the Australian hurler was once a well-regarded prospect in the Twins system, ranking sixth and seventh on the Baseball America's Top 10 Twins prospects lists from 2010-11. Hendriks has a 3.61 ERA with 6.2 K/9 and 1.8 BB/9 in 254 career innings at Triple-A and a career 2.99 ERA in the minors as a whole. He's been claimed off waivers by the Cubs and Orioles already this offseason, making the Blue Jays his fourth organization since being designated for assignment by Minnesota.
As for Morel, he too is a former AL Central top prospect. Morel cracked Baseball America's Top 100 list as a White Sox farmhand prior to the 2011 season but has slashed just .229/.276/.333 batting line in 669 Major League plate appearances. A bulging disk in his back has played a large part in the offense decline for the 26-year-old, who in 2010 batted .322/.359/.480 across two minor league levels. He's drawn praise for his glove at third base, though Toronto was reportedly going to use him at second base.
we’re at that point in the offseason where AA starts playing the DFA carousel. I’m psyched!!
He invented that move, and it’s apparently bought him endless adoration.
Yep! That means Opening Day is just around the corner!
New internal option!
Swapping our starting 2 bagger for a #3 starter. I like it.
1 – Morel wasn’t going to crack the majors out of camp.
2 – Hendriks is not a #3 starter. He also won’t break the majors out of camp. Hopefully we won’t see him until September.
You’ve never seen Hendriks pitch, have you?
Funny, just yesterday Morel was tabbed by AA as one of 2 players (Moises Sierra being the other) competing to be the 25th man. How quickly things can change.
It’s the 25th man. Those guys are usually expendable
No doubt, right?
I hope this is the last stop for Hendriks this off-season, one more team and he might win the “Sandy Rosario Award” for being so well-traveled.
It should be the Russ Canzler/Sandy Rosario award. They each moved around as many times last season.
What is the logic here? It’d have been nice to at least see how Morel did in ST games. And in the starting rotation “depth chart” (assuming Hutchinson is the 5th starter), I can see Hendriks filing behind Rogers, Redmond, Stroman, Drabek, and possibly Nolin.
Would like to see the cards put in a claim to push descalso to up his game for the 25th spot or maybe take his spot