Feierabend Out For Season
Dave · February 25, 2009 at 9:18 am · Filed Under Mariners
Per Larry LaRue – Ryan Feierabend is going to have surgery on a ligament in his left elbow and is probably done for the year.
While he’s not a top prospect, this is a bit of a blow to the M’s pitching depth. Zduriencik did a good job of stockpiling LH starters this winter, but with both Bedard and Washburn as potential trade bait this summer, Feierabend was still looking at a possible end-of-season rotation spot if he pitched well in Tacoma. This was probably going to be his best chance to show the team that he could be a decent starter in the majors. With his ’09 season gone, his window is closing very fast. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see him removed from the 40 man roster next winter.
And that’s why you stockpile arms until silly people say you have “too many” young pitchers.
Thank God! Maybe we will finally release the hack. He has performed poorly in every cup of coffee he’s gotten, and never was good in the minors. He always gave up more hits than he pitched innings and has never had good stuff. I hope this means they cut him, he’ll still get paid, and both sides can move on with their lives.
Questions: does he occupy a spot on the 40 man while on the DL? Does this mean that Saunders could be shuffled into the 40 man?
If this means Saunders gets on the 40 man and is protected from poaching next offseason and useable by the big league club, I’m an even happier man.
Feieraben is a waste of a roster spot!
Wow, I wasn’t as negative on Feierabend as the commenter above me. Nevertheless, while I feel bad for him, I think his ceiling was as a swingman — not sure he was ever going to be a solid 4-5 SP.
Congratulations, Micah, you just reminded me why I long for the days when we didn’t have comments.
That’s too bad, I was just learning how to spell his name correctly.
Wow I was hoping he would pull something out. Sad days.
I just read about this on Drayer’s blog, too. This makes me sad. 🙁
News like this always tempers my excitement for the start of baseball. There are always injuries like this that rob a player of playing time or perhaps even a career. I feel bad for Ryan, he’s had to work his ass off to get where he is and something beyond his control jeopardizes all of that. It’s a shame.
Bummer. You say, Dave, that the Mariners will probably remove him from the 40-man roster after the 2009 season. Does he stay on the 40-man roster the whole year if we put him on the 15 or 60-day DL? Does that mean there’s one less valuable guy we can protect from the rule 5 draft? Or do I have this mixed up?
Guys on the 60-day DL don’t count against roster limits.
Yeah, he’s serviceable at best but that hostility seems a bit over the top. It is a bummer as he possibly could have put it all together, who knows? Not to brush him aside so quickly, but now the issue becomes who takes his place on the 40 man roster and/or in the pitching derby (i.e. 17 arms for 11 spots). Does Z go roster-trolling for another random lefty starter?
I’d love for him to be the 5th starter, long reliever, etc., but it’s probably not in the cards…
How about using the roster spot for Marte? We’ve got nothing to lose right?
Every other team has guys they’re going to cut. I’m sure Zduriencik will be keeping his eyes, and the roster spot, wide open.
I would assume that the M’s would use his open spot to move one of their minor league contracts/invites (Sweeney, Fields, Shelton, Tyler Johnson if healthy) to the 40 man.
Unfortunate blow for Fierabend and the M’s.
However, if Bedard and Washburn are both traded, it would seem that Rowland-Smith and Olsen could both step in to the rotation to fill those spots.
However, I do agree 100% that this cuts in to the pitching depth for the backend of the rotation.
My hope is that Bedard has a great year and that the M’s are somewhat in the divisional race and then keep Bedard to try and make a run. Then they dump Washburn at the deadline and RRS and Olsen duke it out for the #5 spot in the rotation.
I hate to be so dark about this, but he never really impressed me on the mound anyhow and there were a lot of times where he looked like Jarrod Washburn 2.0.
So indeed, good thing we’re starting to stockpile.
Washburn 2.0 at almost no cost is valuable. Washburn 1.0 at $10M is an outrage!
True, but even Washburn 1.0 only had a couple pretty good years in Anaheim if I recall. His resume was nothing overly impressive to begin with.
So I don’t see how people think Washburn 2.0 is so much of a better option than 1.0 aside from the fact he costs MUCH less to have.
Who is likely to take his spot on the 40-man?
As a cheap, back-of-the-rotation starter, he was (and probably still would be) valuable. I doubt, though, that Feierabend would have ever become Washburn.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmm. . .Manny Ramirez, maybe?
hahaha, just kidding.
But seriously, any good starting pitchers that could be had for cheap right now on the free market?
I for one feel bad for Ryan Feierabend. I still think the guy has potential, although I’d certainly have to admit he hasn’t shown much in the majors up to this point, other than an alarming tendency to pitch the cookie that the hitter was looking for.
I’ve wished several times for Feierabend to take the best page out of Tom Glavine’s book- the one that says, “know how the hitter’s working you, and don’t give in and throw them exactly what they’re waiting for”.
Glavine’s pure stuff was never that much better than Feierabend’s (though in terms of command, there’s no comparison). It’s basically all between the ears for a guy like Ryan to succeed.
But he’ll only be 23 for the vast majority of this season, he turns 24 in August. If he recovers to 100%, he still has a shot at a future…if perhaps not with us.
If they’re good, why would they be cheap? The market for no-glove outfielders may be a bit depressed, but overall salaries are hardly cratering and it’s not like there’s a glut of starting pitching.
There might be some high-risk guys out there to take a flyer on and hope to get lucky, but that’s about the only way to capture good with cheap.
Tough break for him. It seems they may just let him go since he has been up and down between the show and the minors and hasn’t shown much so far. He did have a few quality starts, but he was still learning how to pitch.
Terrible news for Feier, absolutely terrible. And I hope for your sake Micah that there was a lot of sarcasm in that comment because karma is a bitch (I know her well).
I hope he has successful TJ and bounces back from this well. Who knows, maybe he’ll be one of the fortunate ones who picks up and extra MPH or two out of the deal. Hang in there Feier!
OMG, Niehaus on the radio. Sounding well-rested and fit and full of summer. The monsoon outside my window melts away.
Even the jarring interjections by Rizzs serve only to set Dave’s gem-like voice into sharper relief. I smell kingdogs and ichirolls and the warm salty breath of the Sound on a July eve. Baseball is back!
At the risk of feeding the troll, Micah’s facts about Feierabend’s minor league career are simply wrong (“He always gave up more hits than he pitched innings”). He had fewer hits than innings at Wisconsin at age 18, 156 hits in 154 innings at San Antonio at age 20, and pitched very well in his 13 starts at Tacoma last year (64 hits and 15 walks in 75 innings).
Hits per inning is not how to evaluate minor league pitchers, but it’s the measure Micah chose and he was wrong about that. Hope he recovers well from the surgery.
Ok, I know this is, you know, not about the subject and it’ll get deleted but… [deleted, not about the subject]
I for one feel nothing but bad for Feierabend.
I still think the guy has a lot of potential…so long as his command and game planning improves dramatically.
I would have to agree with anyone who said he hasn’t shown much in the bigs up to this point, except for an alarming (though correctable) tendency to toss hitters a cookie at the exact wrong time.
I have often wanted Ryan to just take out one important page from Tom Glavine’s book- the one that says “Know how the hitter is working you, and don’t give in and throw the exact pitch they’re looking for”….
Really, Glavine’s stuff has never been much better than Feierabend’s. For Ryan to succeed, it’s mostly a matter of between the ears.
And he’s only 23 the vast majority of this year, turning 24 in August. If he can come back 100% physically and a year wiser, it’d be way too early to pronounce the guy’s career dead…although he may well have to resurrect himself somewhere else.
Derek, Dave- My apologies for the double posting on Feierabend…my computer froze, I thought I had to re-type that comment…I should have scrolled up and saw it had gone through, somehow.
Regarding quality pitching pick-ups, would Odalis Perez be interesting to Zduriencik, you guys think?
Logically, though, I think there’s enough lefty options in camp as it is to form a suitable major-league bullpen. My money would be Vargas, Lugo and if Washrag’s not traded, Rowland-Smith.
Speaking of Washburn (and people he could have been traded for), looks like there’s another pitcher out for the season. In Boof Bonser’s case, it’s the shoulder.
I just heard Z tell Niehaus that people are calling him up about deals.
With Bonser out, it couldn’t possibly be the case that the Twins are still interested in The Bus, could it?
No, the Twins have been pretty clear on that, and it’s not like they were looking to Bonser to fill their rotation anyway.
Yeah, somewhat inexplicably, they favored Perkins over Bonser.
Okay, I was wrong about Feierabend concerning how many hits he gives up, to a degree. I’ve been watching him for about 3 years and have never seen anything to make me especially optimistic besides him being a lefty. On the lefty front, though, we seem to have a good number of guys who are just as good as Feierabend in our system now. He has never seemed to have enough stuff or control. He always seemed to have to nibble the corners to get by, and showed an inability to nibble effectively at the big league level. I cringed every time he came up to the majors because it almost never looked like he should be there when he was promoted. Last year was the exception and he bombed worse than other years.
I’m probably overly pessimistic. I also didn’t realize how young he is. He is probably just another victim of overaggressive promotion. Outside of his major league stats last year, he appears to have started to get it going down in AAA.
I guess my dislike was an irrational one. I hope he turns it around, and that his recovery goes well. I never wished him ill will as a person, or a player, but I thought he was older, and beginning to look like a nowhere prospect. I was wrong on both counts. If he was 26 or 27 we would probably all feel different about him. He’s got time. I hope he uses it well.
I’ll try not to react to someone’s unfortunate injury like they tried to eat my baby with my favorite spoon next time.
We all get a little out of control sometimes. I apologize.
And I apologize for calling you a troll…
“Window is closing fast”???? Hey, the guy is only 23, and pitched in the majors at 21. I don’t think they are going to give up on him that fast. This is a pretty good, very young, 6’3″ left hander who was rushed to the majors we are talking about.
I know, I know, listening to KJR rots the mind, but they were saying around 2:30 this afternoon that RF was going to be seen by the team doc later and the decision about Tommy John surgery had not yet been made.
Are they just blowing smoke? Is this really a done deal? I suppose sooner or later they’ll get something right and maybe this is the one!
Zduriencik on the radio with Niehaus during the game unequivocally said “He’s getting Tommy John surgery” — and I’m sure that’s what he said because my only previous information on him was this post, so I hadn’t heard the “TJ” before.