The Phillies released righty Chad Gaudin this morning when he failed his physical, reports Matt Gelb of the Philadelphia Inquirer (via Twitter). The 30-year-old swingman signed a minor league deal with a MLB Spring Training invitation back in January, and had been expected to provide a solid pen and rotation depth option. Instead, the Reynolds Sports Management client will return to the open market.
Depending upon the issues that led to the failed physical, Gaudin should still find takers for his services. He put up appealing numbers last year with the Giants. Throwing in his age-30 season, Gaudin put up a 3.06 ERA in 97 innings (including 12 starts). He reached those marks with 8.2 K/9, 3.7 BB/9 and a 38.4 percent ground-ball rate.
Gaudin has extensive experience working from the rotation and the pen: he made 34 starts with the A's in 2007 and has thrown the first pitch in 87 of his 344 career outings. His career 4.44 ERA does not reflect a significant difference in performance between the two roles: he has allowed a 4.56 ERA and .762 OPS as a starter, and a 4.30 ERA and .776 OPS as a reliever.
Phillies GM Ruben Amaro Jr. declined to comment on the details, but told reporters, including Matt Gelb of the Philadelphia Inquirer, that the club was disappointed to have to let Gaudin go. "It hurts," said Amaro. "Obviously the roles he can fill as a long guy, a guy who can sit for 10 days and not pitch and then pitch as a starter, all of those things you like to have a veteran guy to be able to do. We have to find out of that guy is in our camp."
Aw that’s a shame.
I wonder precisely how he failed…Bench test? Running test? X-Rays came back positive for hidden persistent injuries?
You misspelled Orioles.
Haha. I like this
What? This is crazy. I watched Gaudin pitch three gems last year- one being against the Phils. What a shame. The guy had big league stuff and would have been a very solid long reliever.
He had legal problems, and apparently an injury. He would opt out anyways at the end of spring, since hes odds of making the club just dropped from like 75% to 5% when they signed Burnett.
Carpal tunnel is a tough one.
After some are done poking fun at the Orioles, will the same people now give the Phillies garbage over dropping a player because of problems with his physical?
I would think they probably wouldn’t of released him if they haven’t just signed Burnett. He was a depth/longman pick up. Now they will have Pettibone and Gonzalez as there long man choices and AAA depth.
Must call Fox sports, I thought the O’s were the only team to have a player fail a physical .
Yeah, this is really killing Gaudin’s value now…he might have to take a job in Indy Ball now!!!
Probably better to sit on FA and wait than to play in AAA ball.
Yankees…GO!
Possibly more “hurt” than hurt here. The Burnett signing made his chances of making the team pretty slim. They may be just doing him a favor in giving him more time to hook up with another team.
He should have a job in a week or so. It’s a shame that he wont be in Clearwater
Interesting. Maybe the Angels should go for this. It would certainly help since Blanton is still their 6th starter. Probably has a much better chance of making that squad.