The Reds announced they’ve claimed right-hander Carson Fulmer off waivers from the Pirates. Pittsburgh designated Fulmer for assignment last week to create 40-man roster space after acquiring Duane Underwood Jr.
Fulmer has pitched parts of five seasons at the major league level and has yet to find much success. Over 105 career innings, he has just a 6.34 ERA/5.41 SIERA. Fulmer has posted worse than average strikeout (18.9%), walk (13.9%) and groundball (37.5%) rates.
In spite of the poor results, the 27-year-old has continued to attract interest around the league. Within the past eight months, the former eighth overall pick has been claimed off waivers by the Tigers, Pirates (twice) and Orioles. In each situation, the claiming team had been near the top of the league by waiver priority. Fulmer fell a little farther down the waiver order this time around, but he’ll find another landing spot nonetheless.
It’s hardly a surprise to see the Reds put in a claim for Fulmer. The Cincinnati organization has been rather open about their affinity for pitchers with high spin rates, and Fulmer certainly qualifies. The 27-year-old sat in the 91st percentile in fastball spin and 88th percentile in curveball spin last season, per Statcast. While that has yet to translate to MLB performance, there’s no harm for the Reds in taking a flier. Fulmer is out of minor league options, so he’ll need to either break camp with the big league club or else again be offered to rival teams.
Teams playing hot potato with fulmer. As soon as they get him they realize he is broken
More like they see the potential but they can’t get him down to the minors to work with him without another team seeing the same potential and claiming him.
Numbers aren’t good in minors either.
Who cares about his numbers in the minors. I seen him pitch this spring. I would take a wild guess and say the the reds did as well. He made some mechanical changes and looks improved. Reds must feel they can improve him some more. I doubt they are worried about past minor league results. Probably took his improved breaking and tunneling over his minor league stats would be my guess.
Those crazy bug eye goggles don’t help. Get lasik young man
won’t last a week
Thank you, agree…
Wait? What? The Pirates waived Fulmer again? How many does that make…16?
2021 World Champion Cincinnati Reds
Yankee 75- 1975 was a good year for the Reds, beating the Redsox in a classic WS. 1976 was also a good Reds year, sweeping some team from the Bronx to win it all.
As for your snarkiness, most teams churn the bottom of their roster – yawn …
How bad do you have to be to get waived by the Pirates?
Or to claim a player waived by the Pirates.
Oh, yeah! Well the jerk store called, they’re running out of you.
Is that supposed to be funny?
Yes.
Astick burn
It is funny to those in the know :)
Pirates are one of the hardest teams to make it as a player. 3 major quantity trades in a month puts a major hurt on the 40 man roster.
The Reds, the Pirates, the Orioles prior to that and the Tigers before that. Started with the pre-rebuild White Sox. So, yeah, if your team wants Fulmer, it’s a second-division team.
Reds may hit like crap but they know pitching.
That’s only because second division has first opportunity. It means Fulmer is a wanted commodity. If he had no value, he would make it to first division teams or clear waivers. Hasn’t happened yet.
@ Frank d
You don’t have to be bad to be waived, just unproven and out of options. Rebuilding teams value options.
As bad as the Reds I guess.
Great pick up. I wished he would clear waivers but never thought he would. He looked good this spring and can still be improved. I would have dropped Poppen instead. Both would have to been dropped anyways to make room for Frazier.
I see he played college ball at Vanderbilt, was DJ his pitching coach there? Anyone know? Would make a ton of sense then…
Carson Fulmer just missed out pitching for Derek Johnson at Vanderbilt. Johnson left following the 2012 season to take a minor league job with the Cubs. Fulmer was a freshmen in 2013 along with Walker Buehler and each became first round picks in the 2015 MLB June Amateur Draft. Scott Brown took over as the Vanderbilt pitching coach in 2013 and is still there producing top pitchers just as Johnson did before him as the coach of David Price and Sonny Gray among others.
Here’s a list of notable names from the Vanderbilt pitching ‘factory’ under both Johnson and Brown:
Tyler Beede (years at Vanderbilt 2012-14), San Francisco Giants
Walker Buehler (years at Vanderbilt 2013-15), Los Angeles Dodgers
Carson Fulmer (years at Vanderbilt 2013-15), Chicago White Sox
Sonny Gray (years at Vanderbilt 2009-11), New York Yankees
Mike Minor (years at Vanderbilt 2007-09), Texas Rangers
David Price (years at Vanderbilt 2005-07), Boston Red Sox
Drew VerHagen (years at Vanderbilt 2012), Detroit Tigers
Kyle Wright (years at Vanderbilt 2015-17), Atlanta Braves
They’re hardly done either. Kumar Rocker is widely considered to be the likely first overall pick in the 2021 MLB Draft.
Too much information
I, for one, appreciate the effort.. even if it looks like a copypasta. Normally I’d be spouting static about a waiver claim like this but I like the fit right now
Don’t forget about Jack Leiter. He may take over the #1 spot in the draft ahead of Rocker. They’re both very likely to be gone within the top 2-3 picks.
There are a couple of prep shortstops who could go in the top-5 but it’s a solid bet that Vanderbilt RHP’s Kumar Rocker and Jack Leiter will be the top-2 college players taken this July. Back in 2015 Walker Buehler (#24) would have gone higher up in the first round if not for his late UCL injury. Both he and Carson Fulmer (#8) would have likely been top-10 selections joining #1 overall pick SS Dansby Swanson from Vanderbilt. I don’t recall two pitchers from the same school ever going in the top-10 let alone the top-5 before. It’s possible Rocker and Leiter could actually go 1-2 in this year’s MLB Draft.
He can’t throw a strike, but at least he has a great spin rate.
But can anyone in Chicago throw a strike?
Giolito did a pretty good job throwing strikes. Lynn’s not too shabby either.
Neither is Kuechel for that matter
Pretty much the whole staff. Sorry piratesfan. Back to 81 and disco
Old guy problems. I initially read it as “…Carson Palmer.”
Now that’s funny. He was Cincinnati too.
Next stop, Cardinals
I believe it was the Raiders, but I see what you’re saying, because there are no BASEBALL Raiders..
The guy who hosted a show on MTV?
Still don’t know why they DFA’d him before a few other less-interesting arms still on the 40-man. Oh well, he’ll probably be available a few more times in the near future.
He’s a good pickup for a lot of teams, problem is he needs to be in the minors or a bit more instructions and to buy him some time to work on some issues. He’s still young enough where he can do that. I think he’s a solid enough bullpen arm, but he’s got issues to work out or at least try to work out.
The rich get richer
So the team that’s gonna be the worst in baseball history as per MLBTR contributors so far this off-season, has put a player on waivers that the Reds picked up?
Shame on you Cincy for dumpster diving at the homeless shelter :-)
Team number 6 for Fulmer – 24 to go…
Not a bad claim, was a stud at Vanderbilt under current Reds Pitching Coach, Derek Johnson. Maybe they’ll catch lightning in a bottle
Actually he was under Scott Brown, per our friend’s highly informative post above. Still love the fit though, being around DJ and Sonny Gray might reignite the philosophy that made him a beast in college
They just bought the pennant! He was given pretty good opportunity to make it with the Sox and still couldn’t do it in their really thin days. Maybe there is a special tip that will unlock the first round pick talent. If the Reds find it more power to them.
Do not understand why people keep claiming him.
He was bad in the minors. Bad as a starter. Bad as a reliever.
People keep seeing potential because of where he was drafted, abd because he manages to put together two good outings per year.
But the numbers don’t lie. There is nothing to salvage here.
Agreed. Had high hopes for Fulmer when he was with the White Sox, but he never had any success. There is nothing to salvage here.
The official Bill James phrase is “he pitches just well enough on occasion to fool you into pitching him more.”
Epic Draft Bust
Wasn’t this the dude the Yankees tried to get at one time, but the WSox wanted too much for him? They were pretty high on him because of his stuff.
I think this was a similar situation where Yankee fans were said to have been delusional because he was so great. Poor guy can’t even pack a suitcase before moving to another city now.
Great spin rate. His pitches hit the Rita’s Italian Ice stand on the main concourse, but…great spin rate.
Find someone who can get his arm moving towards the plate and you’re home free.
I lol’d at this ^^
He’s terrible. He can’t throw strikes consistently, and his stuff is no longer good enough to get guys out when he does. Cleaning up his mechanics got rid of the one thing he had going for him – deception. Major bust.
I see that everyone forgot that the founder of driveline now works for the reds. Fulmer went to driveline to get help, and while he improved it still wasn’t enough to make a major league roster. I would think this is Fulmers last shot on a 40man. Kyle Boddy wants another shot at fixing Fulmer
Even in just seeing the picture here, there’s about four breakdowns/flaws in his form….
they must be hemoraging money at their newspapers and 7 springs to let this guy go
Cardinals trading carlos martinez,andrew knizer and Harrison Bader for Carlson Fulmer