As part of a broader overview of the Guardians’ 40-man roster, Zack Meisel of the Athletic suggests southpaw Logan Allen could be a possible trade candidate. Allen, not to be confused with a Double-A pitching prospect of the same name, is out of minor league option years. Cleveland therefore needs to carry the 24-year-old on the active roster or make him available to other clubs. The Guardians are currently projected to open the year with a starting five of Shane Bieber, Aaron Civale, Zach Plesac, Cal Quantrill and Triston McKenzie.
It’s possible Allen lands a spot in a bullpen that could also include Sam Hentges and Anthony Gose as left-handed options. Allen has worked primarily as a starter throughout his professional career, though. He’s yet to find much big league success, posting a 5.89 ERA/5.19 SIERA across 88 2/3 career innings, but he appeared on top 100 prospect lists at Baseball America and MLB Pipeline heading into 2019 and has excellent numbers up through Double-A.
Meisel also looks at the position player group in a piece that’ll be of interest to Cleveland fans. Notably, he points out that the club will likely have to add a catcher to the roster before the start of the season, with only Austin Hedges and prospect Bryan Lavastida (who has scant Triple-A experience) currently on the 40-man. The Guardians brought in veteran Sandy León on a minor league deal in November. He currently seems the favorite for the #2 job behind Hedges, but he’d have to be formally selected to the 40-man roster once the team breaks camp.
More notes from around the league:
- After missing nearly two full seasons on account of a February 2020 Tommy John surgery, Luis Severino returned to the Yankees late last season. He made four regular season appearances in relief, tallying a combined six innings, before working 1 1/3 frames during the Wild Card game loss to the Red Sox. Severino told Andy Martino of SNY this week (Twitter link) that he’s been throwing bullpen sessions and remains on track to return to the starting rotation in 2022, as expected. It’s not clear how many innings New York can bank on from Severino, who also only logged twelve frames in 2019 due to shoulder issues. They’ll no doubt be cautious with the 27-year-old righty’s workload, but Severino would be a highly valuable piece of the Yankees pitching staff if he’s able to return at peak form on a rate basis. In his last two healthy seasons (2017-18), he posted a 3.18 ERA with an excellent 28.8% strikeout rate.
- The 2021 campaign was a massive struggle for Keston Hiura. The former ninth overall pick struck out in an untenable 39.1% of his plate appearances, and the Brewers accordingly optioned him to Triple-A Nashville on multiple occasions. It marked the second straight year of struggles for Hiura, who burst onto the MLB scene with a .303/.368/.570 showing in 348 plate appearances as a rookie in 2019. Will Sammon of the Athletic wrote this week that the right-handed hitter is working with a longtime personal coach to simplify his mechanics and tone down his leg kick in an effort to improve his contact rate. With Kolten Wong and Rowdy Tellez in place at second and first base, respectively, the Brewers aren’t likely to rely on Hiura as an everyday option out of the gate. Last fall, president of baseball operations David Stearns suggested he could see some time in the outfield to offer manager Craig Counsell more flexibility in working him into the lineup at multiple positions.
I’d be more inclined at this point to consider using Sevy as a power reliever rather than a starting pitcher. Pick up a decent starter and plug Sevy in the bullpen. He’d be an incredible asset there, imo, and wouldn’t need to worry about extending innings as with a SP. Plus, it takes care of the Britton/Chapman challenges that presented last year.
I could see Severino being lights out as a reliever but you’re losing a lot of potential value long term by moving him off starter. Righetti could have had a much better career had they left him as a starter, then of course, Chamberlain was the opposite. Severino would make a great late inning guy though.
Yeah, very true Cosmo. I could see it going both ways too, just thinking it’s definitely a win-win for the immediate season or two post-TJS. Who knows, though?
Disagree, Sevy has always been a starter, and he has picked up a good change-up. I do think his innings will be monitored this year, maybe 120 innings, but many Tommy John guys come back stronger than ever!
Slider32, yeah, I could see that, but maybe down the road from what I was thinking. His personality (kind of like a pit bull) is attacking hitters, flame-throwing, and really good strikeout percentage. But, the biggest reason…the injuries. Man, Sevy is sooo lights-out when he’s there. But you bring up a great point about contemporary TJS guys coming back strong.
He was a two pitch pitcher fastball and slider, this guy threw max effort on almost every pitch he thrown, he tried the use of a change it’s not that good for his arm which lead to those surgeries he had. Look at degrom he was already good when he came up but every year after he started to throw harder it started to shown the injuries. You can’t max effort everything location is key and control.
There seems to be a bias towards Latin pitchers who throw hard to be pushed to the bullpen far more rapidly (whether it be due to injury or command issues) than American pitchers.
This is just something I’ve noticed over time and is not an indictment of racism on anyone in particular. I’m curious if others have perceived this trend as well. It’s an interesting phenomenon.
I did a little research and my suspicion seems to be correct. 32% of all MLB pitchers are Latino (including Puerto Rico) while only 20% of starting pitchers are Latino. So they are only about 60% as likely to stick in the rotation as their American counterparts.
Well, I wonder if you expand the correlation to the percentage of pitchers that makeup the hardest throwers in MLB, and also the ones with control v control issues, how that would change the perception? It may have more to do with style of pitching rather than origin. Hardest throwers are more prone to injury & control issues, generally speaking.
For example, Yankees have a fairly stacked system developed from the international pool of pitchers, starting pitchers. But several these flamethrowers are discussed as having to mow to the BP because of persistent control issues. Others tend to struggle with mapping out their game and throttling back, which the ‘pen assignment rectifies too.
Year-long, I wonder if one factor for that correlation has to do with the development clock ticking and running out of runway to make it as a starter. The international guys are signed much younger than even high school picks and are rule 5 eligible at a pretty young age. From a scouting and acquisition perspective, you’re signing pretty raw talent compared to drafting a college pitcher who has already developed starter routines, workloads, secondary pitches etc. A college pitcher who already has a decent amount of development at his back as a starter has four years to rule 5 eligibility plus 3 years of options. Teams have until their late twenties to play it out as a starter. I also think the college class offers more opportunity for acquiring high floor starters whose stuff might not play up in a bullpen role whereas there’s nothing high floor about a 16 year old and you are taking the arm.
Not to dismiss your query. I find it highly plausible that a sport with fairly conservative roots might have some systemic race issues populating its ranks, but I wonder if there are other contributing factors at play for the correlation you have found. If you take your same inquiry and instead of sorting by race, look at the data based on the class (international, HS, college), or simply age at original signing, do the results reveal any other patterns?
That’s a very interesting point. I’ll look to see if I can find anything based on American pitchers coming out of high school versus college. Again, I highly doubt racism is the cause of the outcome as sports is one of the few places where at the end of the day, no one cares who you are as long as you produce.
Developmental time does seem to make the most sense. I know Latin players don’t play a lot of organized baseball prior to being signed. A lot of those kids never play an official game until they are professionals in the DSL. Compare that to even an 18 year old American who has played little league, middle school, high school, travel ball, where he had to learn situational pitching is going to be years ahead of someone who hasn’t. Combine this with the stuff being good enough to get guys out before those teachings can get implemented and teams are incentivized to push Latin pitchers to the bullpen quicker to get that production at the MLB Level.
Guys that can only throw one or two pitches with success will get pushed to the bullpen while pitchers with more weapons will remain as starters. Perhaps the Latino pitchers coming from abroad are not developing more pitches in their repertoire and just grow up throwing mainly fastball/curveball.
Britton was pitching hurt, & we won’t be seeing him next year. Chapman has had midseason meltdowns before. But, that was the Olden Days when we had a real manager who took him out of the closer spot. Anyway, I’m not concerned about him. In fact, I have no real concerns with the pen at all. It’s a good one, Clip.
So.
I stay with Sevy as a starter. A return to form would be enormous. & – not to be overly cold blooded – but this is the last guaranteed year of his extension. Time for him Sevy to earn his ducats. Which he can do as a starter.
Ya know, that’s an incredible oversight on my part; I forgot this was his walk year. It does make a difference. I just view it from the perspective of knowing what he’s being used for rather than trying to have Boone manage his innings as a starter. It backfired with Kluber (my opinion) and I don’t think Boone has the wits to know when to pull him – ya know, with his feelings being all jumbled up and such?
I don’t normally view players like that.
But Sevy has been paid quite a bit for practically nothing, Clip. I would like to see some kind of return on investment.
Side note; looks like he took his rehab seriously. The kid is all kinds of jacked now.
Of course he would take his rehab seriously….its his walk year and he’s pitching for his next contract.
So young, yet so cynical, @Rocky.
I hear ya though. But he looked like a skinny kid when he first came up. Those days are over. Sevy got swole.
Could it have to do with the No drug testing? Nah….
“Push that needle kid!”
{sigh}
Another one so young & jaded.
Severino has thrown just 18 regular season innings over the last 3 years. Is there even precedent for 50 innings after a stretch like that? I’m thinking no. One inning at a time might be the prudent way to go for his arm and career.
I think you and Clipper makes sense that Severino should be in the pen this year.
I’d like to see Seattle trade for keston
He’s like Ty France but not as good.
If anyone has Gose in their bullpen next year, they aren’t looking to compete. But those 6 innings last year look nice if you ignore everything except his velocity. Not hard to to have a 10+k/9 when you give 5+bb/9
bullpens have, like, half a dozen dudes in them. you really think he’s that much of a liability that every contender has 6+ better options?
I realize that, thanks. I really think there are numerous pitchers that would be better than Gose. What do you actually like about him besides velocity? Terrible control and too much hard contact.
Toss a pebble in any minor league org and you’ll hit a dude that throws gas and has just as terrible k/bb. He’s a “maybe” that is long past his chance to excel at any position. Maybe he chose the wrong path initially and could have been a quality pitcher from the start
I doubt that they’re going to be handing Gose the reigns for high-leverage, late inning situations, at least to start the year. He still has a lot to prove on the mound. As MLBTR noted when he was selected, Gose had an improved 11.5% walk rate from the time he returned from the Olympics to the time he was promoted to the MLB again. So he was showing improvement as the season went on. Plus the Indians know how to develop pitching. They’re one of, if not the only team who can develop quality arms at a rate that rivals the Tampa Bay Rays. Now that’s not to say that Anthony Gose is going to be a shutdown lefty who will be delivering the 9th inning to Clase. Though he does have more in his favor than not, imo.
That’s a huge generalization. The Cleveland Baseball Team only compete by trying these kind of pitchers. The point about command is valid, but it’s Cleveland. They know how to develop pitching. They just don’t know how to develop good outfielders…..or sign them……or trade for them.
What does Cleveland know about developing and evaluating pitching, right?…
Tribe needs to do everything possible to trade Allen. Dude has been an absolute disaster.
agreed. He had about 4 innings where he looked promising, but that’s about it. I wonder if they got this guy, realized it wasn’t really the Logan Allen they wanted, and then we’re stuck with him.
His minor league numbers with San Diego were really good, but when he came to Cleveland and they kept him in the majors he bombed. They should’ve sent him down sooner to work on some mechanics, but didn’t, and now his psyche might be shot as well. He needs a change of scenery, but being out of options isn’t going to help.
If your not aiming at 25 starts, 5-6 innings and healthy for September/October then you are doing it wrong. After Cole and Monte you’re going to need at least 5 other SP’s to get farther than the WC. If it does pan out with Sevi in the pen I would rather have him be a 2-3 inning option than a 1 inning fireman. We’ve plenty of options for that.
If the offense regresses back to the mean at all a run at the pennant is feasible.
Geez, I’m old enough to remember when starting pitchers aimed for 30 starts, 9 innings. Starters today are way too babied.
Sevy needs to be counted on as a starter. If not the Yankees will have more problems. The Yankees biggest problem has been drafting and developing starting pitchers. Whose to blame Cashman or the overpaid scouts who need to be let go and replaced?
So? I am too and it was brutal, with guys getting injured all the time and the ones who gutted it out losing velocity and break as the season wore on.
They aren’t being babied. The teams are now medically intelligent and are protecting their multi-million dollar investments like they should.
Expecting starters to go 6 every time out and pitch 300 innings every year is psychopathic and bad for the game (especially for those who appreciate good pitching more than hitting and want to see them all at peak performance).
The sadistic days of sports are over and the world is better for it.
When they started keeping track of “quality starts” then it went to he ))
That is a big part of it, as the bare minimum for a quality start is the very definition of mediocre to poor (4.5 ERA is not high quality to me).
But when Freddy Peralta goes 4 2/3s and gives up 1 or 0 runs it should be considered quality. It’s dominant.
A quality start should only require 4 innings, but the ERA aspect of it should be more like 3.00 than 4.50
Severino should be a starter. Depth was never an issue. He averaged about 6 IPs/GS.in his two big years.
Why did MIL think they could convert Keston Hiura from a mediocre OF to a 2B or a 1B?
He was actually a bad 2B that they converted to 1B, where he was not good–but getting better–and are trying in the OF just to get him ABs.