Goodbye Eric O’Flaherty
Conor · November 20, 2008 at 3:27 pm · Filed Under Mariners
Today the Mariners added Greg Halman, Stephen Kahn, Gaby Hernandez and Marwin Vega to their 40-man roster, which now has 37 players. Luis Munoz and Tracy Thorpe were outrighted to the minors and Eric O’Flaherty was claimed on waivers by the Braves.
Here’s a link to the official release. I’ve got a Rule 5 post on the way later tonight.
I think the Mariners will regret letting O’Flaherty go. I hope he does well in Atlanta.
interesting that Halman was added. He wasn’t Rule 5 eligible, I don’t think. Is there any chance at all that some club would want to carry Vega or Kahn an entire year?
O’Flaherty must’ve had some value still. I don’t see how he’s a worse pitcher than guys like White and Messenger.
He was. They signed him in 2004 and he played in instructs that year, which meant that even though he didn’t debut until 2005, it was an ’04 contract that he signed.
Vega is a guy other teams were thinking of picking up in the Rule 5 last year, so there’s something there, definitely.
I share your concerns about keeping White and Messenger over O’Flaherty though. I don’t know what the M’s know regarding his medical records, but that just seems silly.
I liked Potatoes. I’m sorry to see him go.
I’m not going to lose any sleep over this move but this is probably a good pickup for Atlanta.
Best of luck to EOF.
This doesn’t really make much sense to me. Good luck to O’Flaherty.
I agree I think that Eric has a lot more to offer to the franchise than Messenger,White, and Thomas.
Hey guys, I’m a new poster but I’ve been an M’s fan since I was 8 years old. Eric had a tough year last year (who didn’t?) but I remember he was pretty effective in ’07. And he was from eastside too… oh well.
Wow.. Good luck Eric. I thought he had a chance to start on the opening day roster.
We might be saying goodbye to JJ too.
Jayson Stark at ESPN
•The same source says he was told that, despite talk that the Mets prefer to fill that role [closer] with a free agent, if Seattle were to put J.J. Putz on the market, he would go to the top of the Mets’ list.
With Putz inked for the next 2 seasons for about 13 million, he’s looking pretty good compared to the 5 years and 75 million K-Rod is asking.
Minaya is probably just looking for a steal.
Ah O’Flaherty, we hardly knew ya. Yeah, this one’s a little surprising, especially since he’s a lefty. They know more than we do, at least the new people installed by Z-man do, so I’ll have to trust their judgment. As far as Putz, I had him penciled in as our closer back when people still were thinking Gurdardo could come back. That reinforces what Derek and Dave have said here: finding a good young closer is not that tough. If we can flip Putz for a couple of prospects, let’s do it. It’s not like he’d be saving wins 91-92-93 this year anyway.
I think holding onto JJ makes more sense. Give him a chance to bounce back and possibly trade him at the deadline when his value would be artificially inflated. Unless, of course, the Mets are desperate and offer us a great deal right now.
From looking at Hernandez and the other new pitcher’s stats in the link, I’m wondering how they made it onto the 40-man. Any better stats than ERA to show how/why they got called up? Anyone seen them pitch?