4:37pm: Milone will indeed step onto the roster to take the start, manager Scott Servais tells Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times (via Twitter).
4:24pm: The Mariners need a starter in what would’ve been righty Erik Swanson’s spot — Swanson was optioned to Triple-A last Friday — and MLB.com’s Greg Johns tweets that southpaw Tommy Milone is with the big league club right now. There’s been no formal announcement from the team, but Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times tweeted today that “all indications” suggested that Milone would start for the Mariners tomorrow. Seattle would need to formally select Milone’s contract and add him to the 40-man roster, which seems quite likely at this point.
Milone, 32, opened the season with the Mariners’ Triple-A affiliate in Tacoma and has pitched to a 3.83 ERA with 7.8 K/9, 2.2 BB/9, 1.28 HR/9 and a 37.7 percent ground-ball rate. Mariners fans would likely prefer to see the upside of top prospect Justus Sheffield rather than the veteran Milone, but manager Scott Servais told Johns and others recently that the team’s preference moving forward is to promote Sheffield only when he’s deemed ready for a long-term audition. It still seems quite likely that’ll come at some point this season, but Sheffield has pitched just 18 2/3 innings with a 4.82 ERA and a 21-to-14 K/BB ratio over his past four starts; it’s not as if he’s kicked in the door to the big leagues with his recent work.
Milone will join Marco Gonzales, Yusei Kikuchi, Wade LeBlanc and Mike Leake in the team’s starting five for now, though the length of his stay will surely be tied to his performance. Seattle does have alternatives in the upper minors, and GM Jerry Dipoto is never shy about adding options from outside the organization.
Sheffield is nothing special. Yankees knew what they were getting rid of. Wasn’t Swanson part of that trade also?
Yes he was. Swanson had a good showing in the minors last year, but that has not carried over
That trade has yet to play out on both sides. If these young prospects were major league ready the yanks would have had them up already. What chat room you copy and paste your comment off of you simple minded screwball?
Yankees did call Sheffield up last year. Only 3 games in relief but they still called him up. The 3rd player the Mariners got Dom Thompson-Williams was only in A+ last year so why would they have called him up. He’s having a solid year at AA this year. As far as the trade working out…Paxton has a 3.11 ERA and 1.19 WHIP. 52 SO in 37.2 innings. Been on the IL for 3 weeks but he always does. It’s expected. Yankees are getting what they wanted from Paxton and Mariners have 3 minor leaguers. Sheffield is struggling but it’s not even 1/3 into the season. I’d say the trade is playing out like both sides expected.
I agree. I think you missed the point of my comment. Time will tell.
Let’s play nice
BigS…..
Beware any pitcher originally drafted by the
Rangers ha ha!
Tommy “bad to the bone” Milone is back baby
I was always partial to his nickname “Home Milone” when he was with the A’s, referring to his lob-sided home/away splits.
Well, he compares well to Wade LeBlanc.
Jerry being Jerry and digging himself a deeper hole.
Such an ignorant statement.
Lol how? This isn’t a win-now season
Oooooh that Mariners starting staff has nothing on the Orioles staff of 1970
Swanson was hilariously bad.
This guy is garbage why do MLB teams keep giving him a job? Lol
Left handed people make about 12% of the population they will always get more chances in baseball