A source close to Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald tells him that the Marlins have pulled right-hander Dan Straily off revocable waivers after an unnamed team put in a claim on him. Straily will now almost certainly remain with the Marlins through the end of the 2018 season.
Straily, 29, was one of few veteran pieces the Marlins kept this offseason amidst a fire sale of assets that saw Giancarlo Stanton, Marcell Ozuna, Christian Yelich and Dee Gordon all end up in different cities with new teams. Though he’d been a mediocre pitcher for most of his career, Straily managed a league-average performance in 2017 by posting a 4.26 ERA across 181 2/3 innings while boasting 8.42 K/9. That came courtesy of an ability to limit walks and homers, to a reasonable degree. The Marlins didn’t feel as though offers from other clubs were enough to move Straily, so they held onto him throughout the winter.
After an injury delayed his start to the 2018 season, Straily succumbed to a significant regression in pitching ability. Though his 4.35 is nearly in line with last season’s figure, his walk rate has ballooned to 4.19 batters per nine; more than a full run above the 2.97 mark from a year ago. He’s striking out batters at the lowest rate of his entire career, and he’s been incredibly lucky with batted balls (.264 BABIP). FIP pegs him as a pitcher who deserves a 5.33 ERA based on his work this year.
Still, the Marlins evidently see value in his contract. He’s owed about $800K for the remainder of the season, and can be controlled for two additional years via baseball’s arbitration process, so there’s no rush to give him up for nothing. Miami is perhaps holding out hope that he can bounce back in 2019 and return to his 2017 form. The mystery team that claimed him was apparently unable to offer any prospects the Marlins believed to be worth Straily’s departure. He’ll continue to pitch for the Fish amidst their thin rotation for the remainder of the present campaign.
I feel the Marlins could have let him go, Straily only has a 5-6 record and Marlins in a rebuilding state.
My only guess is they weren’t offered enough for him. Teams view him as the player he is right now, and the marlins view him as the player he was in 2016.
His win-loss record is irrelevant
Most meaningless stat in baseball.
Why don’t you want your pitchers to have a lot of wins?
Nobody said that. But a win loss record doesn’t show anything about ability. It’s a terrible stat and shouldn’t be brought up when evaluating a pitcher
I understand his point but when someone enamored of “newer” statistics says that Wins/RBIs/BA are “meaningless” they undermine their argument. Moreover they are saying that being proficient in the accumulation of them has no value. I disagree. Wins come from players scoring runs. BA is the biggest driver of OBP. The vast majority of RS are “batted in”.
Meaningless? I don’t think so.
Yes, but we’re talking about pitcher wins. You have to do something to get an rbi. You have to hit something to move your average. A pitcher could throw the game of his life and not be guaranteed a win. Some old stats are alright, but a win loss record is not one of them.
So you wouldn’t want a #5 SP with 16 wins and a 5.00 ERA?
My point is that much of this talk is dismissive of how some things just shake out. There are 25 guys needed to round out a roster and they are not all going to be SABRmetric darlings.
Btw, I enjoy the discussion JD!
Just look at Jacob deGrom’s record
deGrom is the opposite of what I’m talking about. Everything EXCEPT his W/L is good. Pretty clear that he’s a quality pitcher.
Gonna need 5 to 10 SPs in a season and if 1 of those is a guy that despite his “meh” peripherals racks up W after W, there’s a place for him.
You mean to tell me Jacob deGrom isn’t a mediocre pitcher?!?!
Darn. If only that W-L record was better someone would’ve sold the farm
Could have been a bottom feeder that decided to take a chance on adding an arm for next year. The Padres, Reds and Mets were the first three on waivers orders. It doesn’t always have to be a team trying to add for now.
Straily is going to be fairly affordable through arbitration for the next 2 years. The Padres could use a veteran rotation stabilizer other than Richard who is horrible. The Reds- similar reasons, add now, one less thing to do in the offseason. The Mets figure to lose one of the big two this offseason, via trade. Syndergaard I think is the logical choice to move obviously, but Straily could have replaced some of that blow now.
Mets don’t need Straily ….. they have more starters than they know what to do with:
Lugo, Gsellman, and Conley are All in the pen because there’s NO ROOM IN ROTATION NOW.
Conley is on the Marlins. he’s not in the pen cuz they don’t have room
Whenever you see players pulled back, it’s usually because the claiming team does not want to give up anything at all.
How much you wanna bet it was the Brewers again. And yet again, they fail to offer any value at all, thus whiffing once more in their pursuit of pitching. Surprised they haven’t claimed a 2b where their needs really are.
He was probably going back to A’s…
*he’s been. Not he’d been. I know it’s knit picky, but just thought author would want to know.
*Nit picky, just thought the poster would want to know. @ _ @