The Rangers have claimed left-hander Jesse Biddle off waivers from the Mariners, according to announcements from both clubs. Texas transferred Jeffrey Springs from the 10-day IL to the 60-day IL to open a spot on the 40-man roster.
The 27-year-old Biddle is a former first-round pick who bounced back from injuries to give the Braves a strong season in the bullpen in 2018 (3.11 ERA, 9.5 K/9, 4.4 BB/9, 55.6 percent grounder rate in 63 2/3 innings). The 2019 season, however, has been a nightmare for the hard-throwing southpaw. In 22 2/3 innings between Atlanta and Seattle, Biddle has been pummeled for a 7.54 ERA. His strikeout, walk, home-run, ground-ball and swinging-strike rates have all gone in the wrong direction, with his control being particularly problematic; Biddle has walked 17 batters, hit another, and thrown seven wild pitches thus far in ’19.
That glut of red flags notwithstanding, Biddle is still a 27-year-old lefty who averages better than 94 mph on his heater and has some very recent success on his resume. Hard-throwing lefties who can miss bats and generate grounders in bunches are hard to come by, making Biddle an interesting reclamation project even if this year hasn’t been at all encouraging.
A’s should have been in on this. He can’t be any worse than Butcher.
Yankees would have been all over Biddle if he had got that far in waivers.
Ryan Buchter? Have you compared the stats? Biddle has been MUUUUUUUCH worse. Biddle’s production is right there for you to see. Buchter’s ERA is less than half of Biddle’s.
Can’t be too much worse then the current options in Texas. Surprised the Red Sox didn’t take a flyer on him
Rangers have lowered the bullpen ERA in June to 3.83 from 4.86 in April and 4.85 in May so they are headed in a better direction. Also helps in that they are being asked to pitch fewer inning, 117 in May vs 87 so far in June.
He can still mop up to see if he returns to 2018 version
Haha. I can’t believe the M’s actually traded Swarzak to the Braves to get this guy. Swarzak has been the best reliever the Braves have since they acquired him. Biddle was so bad the M’s already released him. The best part is that the M’s actually took on money to do the deal. Biddle is out of options too. Any team that picks him up has to keep him on the the Major League roster. Tough sell for a guy that refuses to stop walking batters and has an ERA in the 9.80’s.
I enjoyed that trade. I had a feeling he would turn it around. It was funny when that Yankee homer tried to tell me that I’ll be wanting him gone in a week. I don’t think Swarzak is going to keep dominating, but I think it was a good bet that he would pitch better. Biddle has always been a question mark for me. Even in his 2018 season he had quite a bit of luck. His delivery seems to be whatever he wants it to be that day. Sometimes he has a pause in his leg kick, other times he’s rushing it, etc. That’s not to say he could turn it around if he ever gets some kind of consistency.
i have a hard time believing you really thought Swarzak would be this good. he was terrible with Seattle, and has an absurdly inconsistent track record. better then he was to start the year? maybe. a vital cog in Atlanta’s bullpen? yeah right.
I never thought he’d be this good, but I did think he would pitch better. The fact I have to reiterate this is pretty annoying. So far he is a vital cog. He’ll probably regress no doubt, but to say he still won’t be good is silly. Compared to the rest of the relievers they have that for sure was/is an upgrade.
Why did you think he would pitch better?
Because the Braves have a history of turning guys around/getting the most out of dead weight players. They also have a history of winning trades. They’ve lost some, and some big ones at that, but the good far outweighs the bad. The FO obviously saw something in Swarzak to do this deal. Not to mention he’s had good seasons before. Add all that up and there was more than greater chance he would pitch better.
I don’t think anyone thought he was going to be THIS good. “Better than he was in Seattle”is an understatement though. The man has an ERA well below 1.00 since he got here. He has made at least 16 appearances since then. He gave up a solo home run to Howie Kendrick the other day. That is literally the only run he has given up since the trade. I would definitely call that a vital cog. Especially since he has made everyone in the Braves bullpen better. He hasn’t been doing this with no one on base against the bottom third of the order. He has been routinely coming into games with runners on base and nobody out while getting out the 2, 3, & 4 guys. When the Braves acquired Swarzak they had one of the worst bullpen ERA’s in the National League. Since his acquisition we have rebounded all the way back up to one of the best 3 bullpen ERA’s in the National League. Not to mention the fact that in order to receive terriBiddle for Swarzak the M’s we’re willing to pay Vizcaino millions of dollars even though he is out for the season with an injury and he will be a free agent before he ever pitches for them. They are literally paying at least the same amount of money they would have had to pay Swarzak and the only thing they will ever have to show for it is the terrible performance Biddle produced before they released him. Biddle was already worse than Swarzak before the trade. Dumb, dumb, dumb.
Swarzak with Seattle was a 5.27 ERA, 8.17 FIP, and 1.61 WHIP. He may be doing good now but I’d bet a bunch that he starts heading back the other way sooner than later.
Swarzak literally just proved my point again just a few hours after I made it. Came into a 3-2 game to face the heart of the order. He got everyone out without allowing a run to score. I guess I wasn’t precisely correct though. I just said he does it with runners on base. Tonight he did it with the bases loaded. Man… that flyer on Jesse Biddle was sure worth giving up this kind of production. At least the Mariners now get to watch Vizciano take advantage of their state of the art training facilities while he rehabs to get well enough to pitch for some other team next season. That will probably be the most exciting thing to watch during the Mariners season anyway. Unless of course Mariners fans wanna switch the channel to the Braves game. Then they could watch their old player Swarzak mowing down every teams best hitters during high leverage situations. If that’s too depressing the next best thing is definitely watching Vizciano doing stretches with the Mariners paid physical therapist. That way they can hope he doesn’t pitch against them for a divisional opponent when he leaves Seattle to sign with a contender.
The money was even and Swarzak was terrible in Seattle. The idea was to take a shot on a controllable guy while jettisoning a non producing veteran
Sure Swarzak has been good in Atlanta but the trade was junk fir junk and one side got hot. Let’s see where he’s at come September
Hey, Seattle still has Vizciano if he heals up.
He won’t heal up. He had surgery and is out for the season.
Jesse Biddle a.k.a. Ricky “Wild Thing” Vaughn.
Swarzak has had some real good years especially 2016 so that goes to show you guys don’t know what you’re talking about