DECEMBER 12: Locke will earn $3.025MM, Heyman tweets.
DECEMBER 7, 10:05am: Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald tweets that it’s a one-year deal, and FanRag’s Jon Heyman tweets that Locke will be guaranteed about $3MM on the deal.
9:52am: The Marlins have agreed to terms with free agent left-hander Jeff Locke, who was recently non-tendered by the Pirates, according to Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports (on Twitter). The ACES client’s deal is pending a physical. MLB.com’s Joe Frisaro tweets that it’s a Major League contract for Locke.
[Related: Updated Miami Marlins Depth Chart]
Locke, 29, joins Edinson Volquez as the second former Pirate that the Marlins have added to their rotation mix this offseason. Former Pirates special assistant Jim Benedict, renowned for his work with starting pitchers, moved to the Miami front office last winter, and he’ll now be reunited with a pair of pitchers with whom he is greatly familiar.
Locke spent the better part of four years in the Pittsburgh rotation, making an even 100 starts (plus 11 relief appearances) for the Pirates from 2013-16. In that time, he logged a solid 4.29 ERA with 6.3 K/9 against 3.5 BB/9 with a 50.6 percent ground-ball rate in 593 1/3 innings. However, Locke’s performance began to decline in 2015 and cratered in 2016; over the past two years, he’s turned in a 4.90 ERA, including a 5.44 mark in 127 1/3 innings this past season. The 2016 season saw both Locke’s strikeout rate and ground-ball rate hit career lows, though his average fastball velocity held strong at 91.5 mph.
That performance led the Pirates to designate Locke for assignment (effectively non-tendering him). MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz had projected Locke to receive a $4.2MM deal in arbitration, so he’ll come up a bit shy of that mark with his new organization. However, Locke will benefit from remaining in a pitcher-friendly setting, and the move to Miami figures to promise him a greater opportunity to accumulate innings. Locke should slot into the back of a rotation that also includes Volquez, Adam Conley, Wei-Yin Chen and Tom Koehler.
I like it I would of preferred wood but Locke still has some potential and he’s young.
I agree you know what your getting from Travis Wood but I believe Locke has potential to be a league average starter that gives he Marlins 180 innings maybe more and that has a ton a value and worth the 3mill investment
‘Would’ve’ not ‘would of’…..aarrgghh!
Contractions are not formal they are not supposed to be in formal writing. Not saying this is necessarily formal writing but I just do not use them all together.
Then you should probably say “would have” and not “would of”.
Settle down
Lock is a young guy that knows how to pitch without having a power arm. Would’ve been a great pickup for any team that needs someone to slot at the end of a rotation.
Pirates fans would disagree about him knowing how to pitch. He will give you one brilliant start every 6-7 outings to give you hope that he has figured everything out and then dash that hope the next time out.
Locke has glimmers of ability but then proceeds to implode on himself. If you happen to have the means to bring AJ Burnett into your organization, you should, as he was one of the only players I saw that could get the “best” out of Locke.
not sure you watched the same Locke I did.. locke was ~50/50 for the pirates.. but with each pitch it was a crap shoot, one thing going the wrong way for locke and it was game over…. and his manager always left him in 10 pitches too long…. everyone knew when locke was done except the person that made the decision to keep him in the game.
It is my firm belief it isn’t the pitching that is the problem with locke.. its mentality.. his stuff is decent.
Locke has a fair chance to become a mid rotation guy in the right environment.
… but also watching locke all these years he could also go the way of J-Mac and be out of the league in two.
Anyway Good luck Jeff.
If Locke is unable to nibble on the corners it is going to be painful viewing. Many Pirate fans had long grown weary of the Jeff Locke experiment. Remember this question when you ask it. Would we be talking about Jeff Locke if he were a right handed pitcher
Locke has always shown flashes of what he could be, but inconsistency was the hallmark of his tenure with PIT. Like I always say – if Ray Searage can’t get the most out of a pitcher, I doubt anyone else will. Good luck with Locke, MIA
Nice lowkey signing
Low being the key word. Won’t be surprised if he’s a bullpen pitcher by mid season.
Locke is an awful pitcher. Good luck with that.,
Good pickup by the fish. He can throw great games.
He can throw great games if you are willing to endure the 3-4 bad ones in between. Best of luck to him though,
make sure he starts home games
Waste of 3 million
For 3 million it isn’t horrible. If you let him, he will throw 180 innings. 140-150 of those will be hard to watch, but he can eat innings as a 5th starter. And 3 million for that looks better IMO than 10 million for who knows what out of Andrew Cashner
Waste of a comment
Nice… Especially at 3 million. He’s shown he can be healthy and capable of pitching 160 plus innings. If he can go out, give the Marlins 25-30 starts, and pitch 5-6 solid innings a game for most of his starts, that’s all we need. If they get the bullpen they’re hoping for. If not, maybe use him in the bullpen.
My dentist’s brother
If you need an arm to pitch some innings, Locke is fine.
If you want to win the games, that’s a dart throw. Every time.
Stephen Brault appears to be an upgrade as a back of the rotation lefty.
Brault appears to have the ability to be better than a back end guy. Solid mid guy. Jeff was a solid #5 guy for the Pirates. Half of the league would love to have a 5 guy who is capable of what Jeff offers. 6 innings most nights out and most nights keep things reasonable and a chance to win. He was 9-8 with a down year ERA if .44 for the Bucs. Liriano was 6-11 with a 5.46 ERA with the Bucs. Locke’s ERA may not have been nearly so bad but a few of the games that he gave up a huge number of runs he normally would have been pulled earlyly but unfortunately for Jeff, his bad start came after Cole and Liriano also imploded and the bullpen was used heavily in the games before. He also started the game in Colorado the afternoon after the Mets extra inning game where the Pirates ran out of relievers. Hope Jeff does well. A change of scenery will do wonders for him.
Rotation is Volquez, Chen, Conley, Locke, Koehler and they want to give $80 million to a closer?
This is why I love the Marlins. They keep making dumb decisions. This signing is ok, but the need better pitching to compliment the good hitting they have
Well, the best pitcher on the team died in September, so they’re left to pick up the scraps off of the free agent heap. It sets the franchise back for years.
As for trying to sign a top closer, they’re trying to shorten the game like the Cubs and Indians were able to do. All you need is six innings out of Chen, Conley, etc., then turn it over to Barraclough, Ramos, and Chapman/Jansen.
There’s no need to sign a top SP if they feel they can shorten the game with a strong bullpen.
The Cubs and Indians both have really good rotations. Really bad comparison. If you want to talk about Baltimore’s rotation over the last few years, that makes a little more sense, but they still had a better rotation than the Marlins currently do. Look, I’m not saying we should have magically got a TOR arm, b/c that was clearly not possible this offseason, but the Marlins needed at least someone that can pitch somewhere in the 3-5 spots in the rotation, and they failed to do that with Locke, who isnt good enough to be a #5. There are names out there that would fit what the Marlins need. Its not the greatest FA class, but adding a useful arm was possible, at an affordable rate, and they pull something like this, as usual
Good luck Jim. Ray’s magic wand is broken.
This is a great deal for the Marlins. Locke is an upgrade and solid number 2 guy! Like what they’re doing so far Steady Eddie and now Locke heck I’m forgetting that young scrub what was his number? Was it 16?
i wish Locke the best, but if you’re counting on him to be a major contributor in your rotation, you may be disappointed.
he’ll have great games, but he’ll bookend those games with some awful performances.
in any case, $3M guaranteed for a Jeff Locke-type guy in this market is nothing, so not much risk.
Jeff Locke shouldnt have even got a Major League deal from ANYONE. Honestly, the Marlins should just leave DC…in fact, they shouldnt even report to ST. In what universe does this move make ANY sense?! Is it another “Oh, we have Jim Benedict, so we should just sign all of the pirates bad arms b/c he’ll just magically make them good.” I’ve never heard of a dumber thought process. No command, soft tossing lefty, super hittable, not good peripherals…He is another lefty which isnt necessary, and honestly, he is too similar to Nicolino, who is at least much cheaper. This literally does ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to improve the ballclub. If anything, the Marlins are worse than they were last night. They have better internal rotation options. Really a disgusting signing.
Calm yourself. Long time Pirates fan. Have watched Locke pitch a lot over the last several years. He is a decent #5 guy for a rotation. If the Marlins signed him to be the #2 or #3 guy then you are correct. Not a great signing. A decent lefty for $3 million that will go out and give you a decent 2 trips through the line up on most nights is what you want out of a #5 guy. A guy you know will go out and tough out a game for you when you need it. He got a lot of ground balls and depended on how the defense was positioned sometimes. He would get the ground ball but somehow squeak through. Does walk batters. If he is not getting calls on the corners, he is in for a long night. If the umpire behind the plate is consistent and calls strikes that are strikes, Jeff is pretty good. If the umpire is inconsistent or decides the pitcher has to throw the ball more over the plate instead of just hitting a corner, he will get hit. He does not have the strength to blow the ball by hitters a lot. This is not a bad signing. Well, unless the Marlins have in slotted as a #2 or #3 guy in the rotation. That would mean that the back end guys of the rotation are really horrible!
Locke isnt good enough to be a #5, even on the Marlins, which is saying something. Also, the Pirates have been good on defense, so the reasoning that they let GBs get through makes no sense.
Seriously this is a waste of money and roster space.