The Phillies have agreed to terms on a minor league deal with infielder Ronald Torreyes, Jon Heyman of MLB Network tweets.
A former Dodger, Yankee and Twin, Torreyes signed a minors pact with the Phillies last offseason. He only totaled seven plate appearances with the team last season, though.
If Torreyes does make the Phillies’ roster at any point next year, it will be his fourth season under manager Joe Girardi, who previously led the Yankees. The 28-year-old Torreyes hasn’t had much major league success of late, but he was a useful bench piece for the Yankees from 2016-18. Torreyes posted a .281/.308/.374 line across 606 plate appearances in New York.
I hope he gets major league playing time, he was good with the Yankees and brought so much life into the game
Same here. Solid glove
Didi can hold him up again when their teammate hits a homerun like Judge.
Remember the day Judge and Toe wore each other’s jersey’s ? Hysterical = )
With that move Ceasers Palace in Las Vegas has changed the odds the Phillies winning the WS from 200-1 to 400-1.
So much fun to have on a team and can be clutch – why not
Preach
He definitely had some fans when he played with the Yanks.
Dunno, though. He’s not very good with the glove, doesn’t have near enough arm for SS, & is a remarkably poor base runner.
Folks’ll point out that BA, though. He’s a pretty good example of the term “empty batting average”. He’s the type of player that could have possibly even made an All Star team or two if he’d played in the 70’s. But just not very valuable in today’s game.
Ya know?
In ’17 he hit .292. Along with a sub .700 OPS. That’s pretty much his ceiling. Decent depth player but that’s really about it, man.
He also didn’t K much, he put the bat on the ball…
Yeah, there’s certainly that stuff, too.
In truthfulness, I may actually prefer him to Tyler Wade. Although, Wade was a fringe top 100 prospect at one time which hints at some untapped potential.
Either way, he’s that caliber of player.
Like I said, good depth.
*Especially* on a minor league deal, man.
Ducky, you and mlb1225 post some really good material. I enjoy reading your posts. That said, I did like Torreyes’ contributions to the Yankees and he brought precisely what was missing for the Yankees in the postseason- with exception of DJ.
Plus, his intangibles, like the consistent effort he displays, his passion for the game, and his attitude are strong influences when combined with others on his team. Good minor league pickup.
Yea, 2017-2018 Torreyes was a empty batting average guy. 93 of his 120 hits were only singles. Only had an 81 OPS+ but you’re totally right that he would have been an all star in the 60’s and 70’s. Maury Willis had an OPS+ below 90 five different times with a significant amount of PA’s and made the all star game 2 of those times.
Proof that “new age” stats skew reality. Maury Wills was a star on the great Dodgers teams of the early and mid ‘60s. A game changer and borderline Hall of Famer. He was an intimidating player, someone who helped his teams win.
New age stats don’t skew reality. They give it context. 87.4% of Wills hits were singles. In the two years he made the all-star game, his overall OPS was sub-.700. While he was a good defender at shortstop and essentially attempted to steal every time he got on base, Wills is not close to a Hall Of Fame player once you look more into it. He got caught over 25% of the time he tried to steal. He got on base to a workable rate, but wasn’t anywhere near elite or even above average.
He was successful a hair over 70% of the time. From what I have read a success rate in the low 72-4 range is the minimum to be considered an acceptable risk of an out. So he is actually not quite there.
As I posted below, Henderson was over 82%.
Which at that volume is bonkers.
I kinda felt like @Ctyank when I read this, @mlb1225. It seemed perhaps a bit blasphemous, uh. Though Maury Wills was a bit before my time I was certainly aware of who he was.
Then I went ahead & looked at Wills’ career stats.
A few things I discovered:
– in 7588 AB’s he hit 20 home runs (I’m not sure I couldn’t equal that particular stat)
– he had a career OBP of .330 (acceptable)
– he had a career SLG% of .331 (barely playable)
– he stole 586 bags…but was caught a whopping 208(!) times*
– he did have a nose for the plate…but I wasn’t overwhelmed by his 1067 runs… thought it’d be higher, man
Wills certainly makes the Hall of Very Good on the strength of his 100+ SB seasons & compiling 2K+ hits. But he really was a sub par hitter. Though he swiped a lot of bases he also cost his team a *lot* of needless outs. Good player, but not near the impact I’d assumed he had.
So.
* For reference: Henderson stole 1406 bags & was caught 335 times. Really efficient. Remarkably so. That would play in today’s game even with the devaluation of steals.
Hey, @Clipper. Just got back from some duck hunting. I’ll eat well, tonight. 😉
Thanks for the kind words.
I hear what you are getting at in regards to Toe & how he may have helped. I don’t buy into the thought that TTO offense doesn’t work in the postseason. Home runs actually increase in the playoffs. And it’s really hard to string rallies together against bona fide aces.
That all being acknowledged, I would like to see some offensive diversity in the Yankees. That’s why I’ve been kinda fixated on Wong & – as of yesterday lol – Nishikawa as players I’m hoping the Yanks are interested in. OBP, speed, contact hitting.
Non power hitters *can* be useful players. They just need to be pretty good at other stuff like OBP, base running, contact hitting, & fielding. (Again, reasons why I like the aforementioned players.)
Torreyes really isn’t very good at those things thus limiting his value.
I loved that 2017 Yankee squad, man. Little Toe was a Big Part of that club. That absolutely *does* have value.
I’m with you in general, though. Good minor league pickup.