Pineiro to the Red Sox for 1y, $4m
DMZ · January 3, 2007 at 1:50 pm · Filed Under General baseball
Free-agent pitcher Joel Pineiro is closing in on a one-year deal with the Boston Red Sox, two baseball sources told ESPN.com. The deal is believed to be worth a guaranteed $4 million plus incentives, and is conditional on Pineiro passing a physical exam.
Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwow. And they’re a pretty smart organization. I have no idea what they’re thinking.
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Well, $4M is cheap for a slopball pitcher in this market. And they’ve taken gambles like this before (e.g. Wade Miller).
But still, better them than the M’s.
This just made my day. I hate the Red Sox Nation with a burning passion, and their suffering brings me great pleasure.
It’s hard to say a one-year deal is ever a big mistake. If Jo-El sucks, then the Red Sox are out $4 million. It’s not like they’ll carry him and waste the roster spot if he can’t pitch.
The article says “Pineiro will apparently pitch in a relief role for the Red Sox.” I assume this means he’ll pitch whenever the Red Sox want to provide relief to their opponent.
I’m with Evan on this. I can’t see this as a major mistake.
Perhaps pitchers can have this “grit” as well?
He will fill the “Brandon Arroyo bad bleach job” role.
interesting– he’d take a 1-year relief role vs a potential multi-year starting deal with the Pirates …. the Bucs talked with him, and pulled out because they ‘didn’t like the asking price’ — so when did the price come down? When it was the BoSox?
Isn’t this the worst move Pineiro could have made? He’s going to the hardest division with intense pressure from fans and management. I bet he cracks within the first two weeks. At 1 year, 4 mil in this market, I’m sure he could have gone to a low-profile NL team and been good.
Branson Arroyo, not Brandon Arroyo.
Bronson Arroyo, not Branson Arroyo
I’m with Evan on this. I can’t see this as a major mistake.
Same here. When you’re talking about a one-year deal, spending money to fill a roster spot is way cheaper than spending talent to fill it, especially when you have a payroll like the Red Sox.
The Sox were at about $120M at the beginning of last season, seem to be in the mood to add payroll, so say they’re up to something like $140M at the beginning of this season. At about $350K/player, each team has to spend about $9M minimum in salary considerations to field a team. So Pineiro is only going to take up about 2.8% of their marginal expenditure on opening day. Considering you only have 25 guys on the active roster, I don’t see that as a problem at all.
Now, say the A’s did this with about a $65M payroll. Then Pineiro would be taking up about 6.5% of their marginal expenditure. The same contract is more expensive in some sense to the A’s because they have less money to throw around than the Red Sox do.
Worst case scenario is if they keep Pineiro around even if he sucks. Assuming that your manager/pitching coach are able to tell you if Pineiro is terrible and not worth a roster spot at the end of spring training, the worst case scenario is that you’re out $4M. I don’t think Theo Epstein will lose any sleep over that.
Bronson Arroyo.
In this market, not so bad at all. Sure beats moving Soriano for Ramirez.
In this market? In this market this is still retarded when they could get a guy from AAA or by other easy means to do the same thing Pineiro would do but for 1/8th the money.
…I’m sure he could have gone to a low-profile NL team and been good.
Good at baseball? Sure, the NL is the weaker league, but they’re not little leaguers over there.
Pineiro doesn’t suck because the pressure gets to him, he sucks because he throws an 88 mph fastball with terrible location.
hello, Jeff Suppan
interesting Rotoworld comment:
Pineiro wasn’t that bad in relief for the M’s last year, and certainly not as bad as he was starting. But he still wasn’t good, and $4m/year is what you pay good middle relievers, not someone who’s just seen their career collapse. As a gamble, I might even take it, but not at that price.
Oh man, Pineiro as your closer. That’s frightening.
Burroughs is offical
I was going to make a post joking that Pineiro could be the Red Sox new closer. Truth is…
But he still wasn’t good, and $4m/year is what you pay good middle relievers, not someone who’s just seen their career collapse.
Given Boston’s payroll and placement in the standings, it seems like they’re in a position to spend about $4M/win. About 86 different relievers were worth more than a win last year, so that doesn’t seem like a terribly high bar to set for Pineiro. (Brad Halsey, for instance, had a WXRL over 1 last season with pretty unspectacular peripherals.)
I have to think that the Red Sox are assuming they can “fix” Pineiro, like the White Sox “fixed” Matt Thornton, but even if they don’t, I’m not sure this is a terrible waste. Unless you’re really certain you can do something with him, you could probably find something better to do with the money, but there don’t seem to be many earth-shattering moves left out on the table.
If I was a Red Sox fan, I’d be neither terribly concerned or terribly happy with this move, though I would be a tad surprised.
I’m definitely on the side of this being a not-dumb move. I just don’t understand why anyone would see this as being inherently bad. As others have rightly pointed out, the value of a player’s and his salary is relative to the overall salary of the team. A while ago, I tried coming up with a metric for this that I call the affordability index. There is no such thing as a flat, inherent value for a player. Instead, the value is relative to the payroll.
Pineiro was not horrible in relief. Boston can afford to pay for potential upside and in a one-year deal, 4-mil deal if that upside never happens then it’s a very small relative cost. There’s also a lot to be said for a change of scenery for the player. Baseball, more than perhaps any other sports besides golf, is such a mental game that one can’t completely deny that moving cities will have some impact.
FWIW, one of the Fox booth guys (Mccarver?) used to call him Brandon Arroyo.
A lefthander on the right side of 30 who throws hard and has missed a lot of development time to injury, but seems to be healthy now, may have some upside if you pick him up for essentially nothing (Thornton to the White Sox).
It’s hard for me to put Pineiro in that kind of category, given (1) the salary, and (2) his loss of velocity since he was actually good.
It’s a good year to be a pitcher.
It certainly looks like he is being brought in to close games and not just in a middle relief role.
What can you tell me about Joel? I’ll summarize your comments (good, bad, and indifferent and sarcastic) in tomorrow’s column on the site.
Tim
Red Sox Times
I guess I completely blew my not very funny Bronson Arroyo bleached hair joke had by blocking on his name not once but twice. Would it help if I referred to him as Jose Pineiro?
Can a team really win the WS with Joel Pineiro as its closer?
As others have rightly pointed out, the value of a player’s and his salary is relative to the overall salary of the team. A while ago, I tried coming up with a metric for this that I call the affordability index. There is no such thing as a flat, inherent value for a player. Instead, the value is relative to the payroll.
I’m not sure I understand this. Just because the Red Sox won’t be crippled financially if Pineiro doesn’t perform doesn’t mean this isn’t a bad move. Couldn’t they have found someone who did just as good a job (and younger, with more upside) for the league minimum, and spent 3.5 million on player development?
Having a higher payroll should mean you are able to take fewer gambles like this, because you can afford the ‘sure thing’.
27 – His name is pronounced Jo-El. He has interesting hair. And he sucks.
ENJOY!
#27: Let’s just say, it would probably be prudent to add a “Tums & Alka-Seltzer” stand somewhere in Fenway.
One of his best games of the year came in Boston last year. Maybe someone in the organization saw something they liked? $4M is a hell of an expensive flyer, though.
I was a HUGE Pineiro fan…3 years ago. He was young, had a decent fast ball with a sharp curve. He was going to be part of the M’s rotation for many years! Something happened along the path to Mariner Famedom. Lost mph. Lost control. Lost bite on the curve. Seems to indicate an injury…but nothing was ever confirmed. Also, doesn’t really make sense to have him close since he’s never had the experience to do it.
If I was a manager looking to pick up cheap pitching, I would offer him a cheap guaranteed two year contract and make him go under the knife for exploratory surgery.
#27-
As a young pitcher first up from AAA, he struck people out and was tough on RH. As his fastball crept from 94 down to about 88, he stopped striking people out, and folks started to tee off. There was some whisper of elbow problems about a year and a half ago, at which time he took a sharp turn for the worse. His command in the zone suuuuucks – lots of middle-in belt high hit-me fast balls. Good luck with him.
Good news is that he’s a nice guy, and the girls like him.
Oh…and don’t let me forget…you should make him shave that fuzz off the chin and stop bleaching the hair. MLB should make that kind of stuff reserved for good pitchers!
you mean when in July 2004 he was put on the DL for the rest of the season for a strained flexor bundle?
oh, and FWIW, he also started 2005 on the DL with shoulder stiffness…
#34: Something happened along the path to Mariner Famedom. Lost mph. Lost control. Lost bite on the curve. Seems to indicate an injury…but nothing was ever confirmed.
Maybe this is what happened.
#37 – at first, the reports were TJ surgery, but then it was changed to strained flexor bundle. But you’ll note that his command and control have been off ever since, often indicative of an elbow problem.
#27
Pineiro’s become a drastically different pitcher in the last two seasons. He’s lost a ton of velocity, and I don’t think his breaking pitches are very effective as a result. He’s still got a decent change, but he’s lost his margin for error within the strike zone due to his loss of velocity, and tends to get hit really hard when he’s off (check out his line drive % from last year). His game is predicated on his control at this point, and he’s still not totally awful as long as he doesn’t walk anyone. If there’s one good trend to his pitching style, it’s that he’s started producing more ground balls the last two seasons, which is probably a good thing if he’s pitching in Fenway. I guess best case scenario would be he increases his GB% again next year, while reducing his walks. That would make him an average to slightly above average pitcher, but I still wouldn’t want him occupying an important role in the bullpen, due to his inability to strike anyone out, which doesn’t bode well for high-leverage situations. Maybe pitching out of the bullpen will help his velocity though, and pitchers do improve when moved from the rotation to the bullpen. The more I think about this deal, the less awful it sounds. I wouldn’t make it personally, but it’s not terrible if you have the money.
Of course, on the bright side, you Red Sox fans, Pineiro has been better pretty much his entire career than $21M man Jason Marquis. In a market where the going rate for a fourth starter is $20+M or a top-notch relief pitcher, maybe this contract is a big bargain.
Tim – Jo-El is what Ryan Franklin would be if scouts liked him more.
I dunno. Pineiro’s last outing for the Mariners (if I remember it correctly — the batters were shaking him and playing with him like a pack of Orcas with a seal pup) marked me as badly as if my mother had been tossed into a den of snakes while she was pregnant with me.
But you Boston folks have fun.
I’d say by mid-season Red Sox Nation will have him driving through the Big Dig daily hoping a panel will fall.
My observations are that he used to be a young hard thrower with a good curve, then something happened to him and now he throws a meatball for his heater and gets knocked around a lot.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sports/2003508103_webpineiro03.html
Uh, player option? Closer?
Ok, NOW this looks like a stupid deal, unless Joel’s shown them a 94 MPH fastball.
#23. Exactly right. I’m a Red Sox fan and that’s a good summary of how I feel. Except that this has been rumored for about 4 or 5 days now.
#41. Fenway’s actually a good park for flyball pitchers. Check the numbers. It plays about even for homers by righties and severely limits homers by lefties, about 75% as many in Sox road games. The downside is that it’s a very good doubles park. But the bottom line is that if you can keep righties from pulling the ball all the time it’s not a bad park for flyball pitchers.
Someone on line posted numbers showing that Piniero had much much better numbers through the first 30 pitches he threw.
I’m still not optimistic about him but I have a question for the folks here. Pineiro threw much harder in 2001 and 2002. What significant injuries has he suffered?
Maybe throwing 1-2 innings at a time can give him a few extra MPH.
Still, hahahahahahaha.
Surprised they just didn’t go after Gagne harder.
Let’s see.. Sore shoulder put him on the DL, then it was the strained flexor bundle.. He was never the same after that.
How many guys have tanked as a starter after early success, and then moved to the closer role and thrived? I can’t think of any off the top of my head.
Gagne? Eckersley?
Nathan, Foulke, Isringhausen
I guess Hoffman didn’t really have any success as a starter….
I look at Burroughs and Pineiro the same basically… They definately overpaid Pineiro he should of been paid the same as Burroughs
I have to say the shrewd moves the Red Sox have made have made me depressed as a Jays fan this offseason. However, I think the are flubbing it with their pen. They also got Mike TImlin and JC Romero, and now Piniero. The only good guy they brought in was Donnelly, who I like. The player option on this, when it comes out, could officially make this a bad deal. I can only hope…
My memories of Joel (and I haven’t looked back to see if this is actually true statistically) is that often his first couple of innings were disasters, and then he settled down and threw 3 or 4 more innings of pretty-to-very good ball — but by then the team was operating out of a hole because of the runs scored in those first two innings. At least, that was why my “Hey, what if they made Joel a reliever” thoughts never went very far (even after they had actually done that).
The player option vests if Pineiro finishes 35+ games. If he does that, he’ll have earned the option.
Dave Righetti. Oooh oooh! Roy Face almost counts.
Rick Aguilera.
Early success as a starter, struggled, did well as a closer.
Lindy McDaniel. Stu Miller, if you’re allowed to struggle for a while. Tom Gordon, though… not so much with the brief initial success then struggle.
Jeff Russell! 83, success, 84-85 increasing suckiness as a starter, then off to success in the bullpen (with, uh, that 1988 return to starting) and a long career as a late-inning reliever.
Hrm. Not sure at all what to think about this….
But if the Sox CAN get some use out of Pineiro, I think we can say that the Ms have little aptitude for talent recognition and just as little aptitude for maximizing the talent they do have….
But if the Sox CAN get some use out of Pineiro, I think we can say that the Ms have little aptitude for talent recognition and just as little aptitude for maximizing the talent they do have….
Or, the blind squirrel finally found a nut.
Derek Lowe did it in reverse.
well, I don’t think you can say the Ms gave up on Joel too fast….
62: Miguel Batista did it, and then switched back. Eric Gagne as well.
I think Tom Gordon counts.
I love, re-reading this thread, that you can see where I get distracted and then totally start researching some bizarre question about where closers come from and end up spending a lot of time looking at people who racked up saves in the 1950s.
This is why I don’t get articles done.
Uh, Corco, I don’t think the Rangers are planning on 200 IP from Gagne. Plus, I don’t think Batista has actually “thrived” as a starter or closer.
I wish I was a horrible pitcher. I could use $4 million.
Yea, it was real tough suffering through that World Series championship. Hard times to be sure, clown.
Mm. It’s really not an awful move, but I have to agree with Bender in #15; I don’t think that Pineiro does anything for Boston that a 29 year old career AAA starter couldn’t do for an order of magnitude less money. And a random AAA starter has more breakout potential.
I have to figure that Boston thinks there’s something specific to ‘fix’ about Pineiro and are willing to take a chance on being right about that. I have my doubts.
#69: What you said.
Also I’m sure the suffering was just awful in Boston when, down 0 games to 3, they won 4 in a row against NY, with NY taking a lead into the 8th inning of the first 2 games with The Greatest Closer In The History Of The Game on the hill, and then winning the final 2 in The House That Ruth Built.
We’re talking about wailing and gnashing of teeth.
But enough about that.
Here is Curt Schilling’s analysis of the Joel deal: I’m still pissed we didn’t sign Rollie Fingers….Oh wait, he’s not available. Market was sickeningly think [sic] for the top shelf stopper this winter, I think we’ll find someone to save 42 out of 52 chances this year. We do that and I like our chances.
“Someone to say 42 out of 52.” Yep, “someone.” You heard it here first.
Meche says “Ha-ha!”
Waay to late but how about Branston Arroyo, a pitcher who’s frequently in a pickle?
http://www.britishdelights.com/branston.htm
If he can regain velocity in the bullpen, he could be useful. This is a BIG if however.
67: I didn’t mean to imply they were planning on starting Gagne, rather he is an example of a mediocre starter turned sweet closer.. It does read like that, however.
My question is how the BAWSTON fans will butcher the pronunciation of his name. My guess is PENAYHRUH.
I guess they see some value in his short relief, 89 mph fastball and 0 pitch arsenal.
But those 30 pitches only got him through 1 inning.
#76: Most New Englanders think you talk funny too.
#44 Very funny indeed.
I didn’t mean to evoke the wrath of lurking Boston fans. Sorry about that.
Good job with 2004.
Your accents are beautiful.
Hope you enjoy Pineiro.
hmm. apparently BP thinks he might have had closer stuff:
Sure, he won 16 games, but he lost 11 (making him look flaky), plus that was his career high in innings pitched (and it only happened because that was the season with only 5 starters).
Except that Pineiro has a bit more power and Burroughs has a better fastball.
Love Schilling’s analysis of the deal. If Pineiro gets 42 saves I’ll eat my hat.
Funny, I was just wondering how my New England neighbors would pronounce Pinata.
#84: Easy: peen-YAH-ter.