The Astros have had one of the better collective bullpens in all of baseball this season, but GM Jeff Luhnow tells Evan Drellich of the Houston Chronicle that he’ll still be on the lookout for a hard-throwing bullpen arm this month. “I think you can always use another good arm,” said Luhnow. “You look at the arms we have in the bullpen: we’ve got a sinker baller, a slider guy, different looks. Neshek is a funky guy. The one guy we’re probably missing is the flamethrower guy. …but those guys are hard to find. Certainly we’re going to keep our eyes open.”
Houston has received an excellent return on its offseason investment in Luke Gregerson, Pat Neshek and Joe Thatcher. The trio of veteran relievers have combined to deliver a 2.96 ERA in 82 innings of relief this year, and they’ve been complemented nicely by waiver claim Will Harris (0.93 ERA), left-hander Tony Sipp (3.19) and right-hander Josh Fields (2.57).
Given the success of the current group, it’s not all that surprising to see Luhnow categorize the addition of a hard-throwing reliever to be more of a luxury than a necessity. As Drellich notes, the answer could come from within as well. Both Lance McCullers and Vincent Velasquez average about 94.5 mph on their fastball and will have their innings monitored. The Astros plan to find a way to keep a way to keep McCullers available for a potential playoff push, Drellich writes, and Velasquez could also fit into the bullpen picture as well.
The first name that comes to mind when discussing hard-throwing trade candidates among relievers would be Aroldis Chapman, though the tone of Luhnow’s comments doesn’t seem to indicate that the team is gunning for a reliever of that caliber. Additional relief arms that are among the league-leaders in velocity (via Fangraphs’ leaderboards) and happen to be on non-contending clubs include Jake Diekman and Ken Giles of the Phillies, Bryan Morris and Sam Dyson of the Marlins, and Jeremy Jeffress of the Brewers.
Jake Diekman and Ken Giles won’t exactly be cheap. They’d probably cost more than Papelbon would, Giles significantly more than Paps.
Papelbon and 10M for L.J Hoes?
It’s not a bad trade, but I think neither team would pull the trigger on it. Phillies want more, Astros just want a decent hard thrower.
“Flamethrower” = Chapman, who’s also a guy who makes them officially dangerous. If they are serious about contending, he’s definitely the puzzle piece they need.
A one inning pitcher no matter how dominant will never be the difference maker between a playoff team and a non contender..
Yes, that’s what I was getting at? The Astros are contenders but are by no means a dominant force, Chapman makes them officially dangerous.
They are “officially dangerous” without Chapman. Gregerson is fine enough at closer. Chapman puts guys on base at an extremely dangerous rate. Gregerson does not. You don’t have to be a flame thrower to effectively close out games, just ask Trevor Hoffman. Gregerson has 4 straight seasons with a sub 3 ERA, and has a career line of 1.07 WHIP, 2.79 ERA, and averages 8.8K/9 with a 3.2:1 K:BB ratio… I’m more than happy to see him as the closer for Houston.
The point is, strikeouts or fastball velocity don’t matter as much as how many (or how few) guys you allow to cross the plate. Overpaying for a guy like Chapman is insane, because he will cost too much to get and too much to keep.
The bigger concern is the hitting. Leading the league in strike outs and homers is concerning. I’d be more happy to see Chris Carter and/or Evan Gattis move on in favor of more consistent hitting. I’d like to see Adam Lind in Houston, personally. Solid left handed bat that could hit .280-.290 with ~25 HR, approximately. Keep the lineup from being quite so boom or bust…
He may not be the “flame thrower” Lunhow is looking for but how about
John Niese, Bobby Parnell and Hansel Robles for
Jed Lowrie and Colby Rasmus?
No disrespect at all, but I cant see this deal happening.
That’s a trade that doesn’t help either team, and both sides have better pieces to acquire better quality help. Its almost all rental players, you don’t see that happen at all.
While the Mets have a crowded bullpen (just had to send Logan Verrett down to make room for Mejia, despite Verrett pitching well), I don’t really see it.
How about Brett Phillips straight up for Ken Giles?
Phillips, Singleton & Musgrove for Giles, Ruiz and Howard and RAJ won’t hang up. You gotta remember RAJ is acting insane right now, he wont give up anyone unless its a massive overpay – you could say thats the worst way to rebuild and get no argument from me.
You have Amaro nailed perfectly.. I don’t understand why he is making things so difficult.. Had he made the trades necessary last year the Phillies would already have their rebuild underway.. Instead they have wasted a year and Amaro has put his job in jeopardy.. I know Seattle made him look foolish in the Cliff Lee trade but he needs to get over it.. Grab a few good prospects and get the rebuild going.. Getting rid of Hamels/Papelbon/Giles/Howard/Revere will make sure the Phillies get top 3 draft picks for the next few years. Then Amaro can get his own prospects.. An argument can be made that had he unloaded them last year the Phillies would have picked a lot higher than 10th in this years draft.. Which would have resulted in him picking higher in later rounds.. Amaro is one of those people that can’t see the forest through the trees..
There is no need to trade Giles. Hes a young, controllable, cheap elite reliever who if not for Papelbon, would be an allstar reliever this year. His stats are right up there with the elite BP arms in the game. Don’t dare trade Giles unless you’re getting a Craig Kimbrel-type haul for him.
There’s no point for the worst team in baseball to have great bullpen arms when theres next-to-no-offense to have leads to hold.
It’s just that great bullpen arms might not command even the equal value in arms back. I completely understand the absurdity… but Giles has to bring back solid value…they’d need to double his contribution. He’ll still have value down the road. A bullpen is also a great thing to assemble from within…they could bring a few guys along to pair with Giles and in very short order have a strong pen.
Its mind boggling how he hasn’t been fired. Its not hard to have a fire sale, if done correctly a team can even contend while they’re doing it and get real good real quick, but even if the rebuild fails, you just pull an Astros and tank for 3 years then have a great team thats built to contend for years, as they have now.
Philly isn’t a small market…they can rebuild quickly… Once they start developing some players they can also make some signings.
Don’t forget the Pence and Victorino trades.
You’d have to do a bit better then that. Relievers with Giles upside are a rarity. Hes in the same boat as Betances. Imagine the return it would take to pry Betances away from NY.
Last 2 seasons:
Giles: 1.52 ERA, 1.81 FIP, 248 ERA+, 12K/9, 3.0BB/9
Betances: 1.48 ERA, 1.80 FIP, 267 ERA+, 14K/9, 2.8BB/9
Betances has the slight edge is most stats, but its 0.01 FIP, 0.04 ERA, 0.2BB/9 is hardly a difference.
I’m hearing you out and I’m reluctant to trade Giles, but just don’t see his value when the Phils need to build up a core of outfielders that could play defense and put some runs on the board. Dial in a solid starting 9, THEN worry about a closer.
I’m all for trading him, but for the right price. I feel like even Amaro can get a better return for a great reliever. I get that relievers are a dime a dozen, but we’re talking about a guy with 5+ years of control mixed with a 95-99 MPH heater and a filthy slider. I feel like we could do better than Brett Phillips in a return.
Then maybe one of Hader, Feliz, or Velasquez or something like Phillips with Kent Emmanuel…just don’t see them getting a huge haul for a bullpen piece, but hey, yeah the Braves did awesome getting Wisler for Kimbrel pretty much and as a Phils fan was disgusted to see that Andrew Wisler is going to have to be facing the Phillies for many years to come….