According to MLBTR.COM, The Mariners have designated right-handed pitcher Yusmeiro Petit for assignment in order to open up a roster spot for the newly re-signed pitcher, Erik Bedard.
Petit, 25, was claimed off waivers from the Diamondbacks back in November, and his career E.R.A. is 5.57 . He was originally traded by the Mets along with catcher/ First baseman Mark Jacobs for Carlos Delgado.
In other ex Met news, Bobby Kielty who failed to make the Mets out of Spring training last season is trying to convert from being a outfielder to a pitcher ( I thought it was usually the other way around) .
The Colorado Rockies have signed ex Met hitting phenom Alex ” The original F-Mart” Escobar to a minor league contract. He hasn’t played in any professional baseball since ’06.
And Finally the Washington Nationals have signed former Mets pitcher Shawn Estes to a minor League contract. I wonder if his accuracy has improved to the point that he can bean Shane Victorino if he ever faces him.
                                                                                 
                                                      ” Will the Mets take a big chance on Petit?”
19 comments
GravediggerHebner
2/6/2010-3:20pm at 3:20 pm (UTC -4)
I think a MiL contract with spring invite is worth it for a 25 year old former farmhand. If nothing else he’s capable of the occasional Alay Soler moment of brilliance.
wannybackstra
2/6/2010-3:35pm at 3:35 pm (UTC -4)
Petit was another guy we heard about forever and probably fell into the purposely hyped for trade category (he never had the power arm that highly touted prospect pitchers ordinarily do).
stickguy
2/6/2010-3:55pm at 3:55 pm (UTC -4)
the problem isn’tso much hyping up guys, it is doing it to players that aren’t evenold enough to have graduated HS!
Hard tobelieve this kid is just 25. He could just be getting out of the minors now and not be particularly old for a rookie.
wannybackstra
2/6/2010-4:02pm at 4:02 pm (UTC -4)
true. maybe there is still a chance for him.
wannybackstra
2/6/2010-3:33pm at 3:33 pm (UTC -4)
This beauty is from Mattsblog’s Michael Baron
“…i would envision Takahashi as a possible bullpen arm with any team he signs with…he supposedly has a good screwball which, if it’s true, would be beneficial against the big lefties in the Phillies lineup…he also could compliment Pedro Feliciano as a second lefty out of the bullpen…”
This is fine and dandy except for the fact that left handed screwballs (and for some reason righties generally can’t even throw them) tail away from right handed hitters and into left handed hitters and is therefore usually more effective against righties than against lefties.
Nice try at analysis, though.
GravediggerHebner
2/6/2010-3:38pm at 3:38 pm (UTC -4)
LOL. I hadn’t read his piece but it was always my general understanding that as you say the screwball was an effective weapon against the opposite hand batter so therefore a pitch that allowed one to not be an “OOGY” so I’m glad to read reinforcement of my understanding.
GravediggerHebner
2/6/2010-3:47pm at 3:47 pm (UTC -4)
On the topic of the screwball, does it fit into a broader pitch grouping? By that I mean, is it in one of the fastball, cutter, curveball, slider, splitter, knuckleball or changeup “families?”
The reason I ask is it was my understanding that John Franco threw a screwball so I just went to his FanGraphs page and “screwball” is not an option for his pitches thrown, though “unknown” is and accounts for 1.7% of his total pitches thrown for 2003-2005 which is all they list. Otherwise he’s show throwing 63.4% fastball, 11.6% slider, 0.2% curveball, 22.6% changeup and 2.2% split finger which shocked me as I wasn’t aware he threw a split at all.
wannybackstra
2/6/2010-3:54pm at 3:54 pm (UTC -4)
interesting. not sure how it would categorized if it was subsumed within one of the others. my guess is that fangraphs or whomever categorized franco might have categorized them as changeups because of the similarity in the effect (tailing away from righties)
prismo
2/6/2010-4:09pm at 4:09 pm (UTC -4)
“Thrown by a left-handed pitcher, a screwball breaks from right to left, moving down and in on a left-handed batter and down and away from a right-handed batter. Due to this left to right movement of the ball when thrown by a right-handed pitcher, a screwball is used by right-handed pitchers against left-handed batters in the same way that a slider is used by right-handed pitchers against right-handed batters.” -wikipedia
So I’m guessing the 11.6% slider is actually his screwball.
GravediggerHebner
2/6/2010-4:19pm at 4:19 pm (UTC -4)
Yes the pitch moves the same way but if they charted it that way wouldn’t they be willfully ignoring that Franco was left handed?
Totally unrelated to any of this is this link about catcher’s defense. If one is not interested in the article one may scroll down to see their chart of what they explain in the article. For Met fans it shows that by their complex defensive rankings Santos is ranked 21st out of 114 (Mike Napoli of LAA is 114th).
As an interesting aside it was written by “devil fingers” who I believe is Matt Klaasen of FanGraphs, proprietor of “The Contest.”
http://www.drivelinemechanics.com/2009/10/13/1082419/2009-catcher-defense-filling-in
joed1
2/6/2010-5:53pm at 5:53 pm (UTC -4)
That’s weird because John Franco used a screwball a lot more than 1.7%. In fact it was his out pitch against right handed batters. Wonder what it shows for Tug McGraw who also threw a screwball.
Kingman 26
2/6/2010-10:24pm at 10:24 pm (UTC -4)
LOL!!
This guy is clearly the next Heyman.
It is also fine and dandy until one takes a quick look at Takahashi’s stats (or if one watched Met baseball last year) and sees that Takahashi held righty batters to a .156 BA and lefties hit .302 against him!!!
Metsblog–where commenters are sheep and the facts run scared.
Kingman 26
2/7/2010-12:24am at 12:24 am (UTC -4)
Oops, holy cr*p I thought you were talking about our Takahashi from last year!!
My bad!!
Ouch!
stickguy
2/6/2010-7:02pm at 7:02 pm (UTC -4)
all I know is that after shovelling 2 feet plus of snow for the 2nd time this winter, I really, really need a baseball game to go to. the hotter and sweatier I get, the better.
I may go to ST just to get warm. And may not come back.
GravediggerHebner
2/6/2010-7:44pm at 7:44 pm (UTC -4)
Can you pitch?
stickguy
2/6/2010-8:50pm at 8:50 pm (UTC -4)
well, I could throw 3 big buckets of BP balls to my sons babe ruth team and still move my arm afterwords, so I would say yes!
Kingman 26
2/6/2010-10:17pm at 10:17 pm (UTC -4)
I bet he can play a mean second base….
stickguy
2/6/2010-11:39pm at 11:39 pm (UTC -4)
my sons position. if he got drafted, I might not have to pay tuition next year….
Nah, I can still do it. I probably still have as much range as Luis.
royhobbs7
2/6/2010-8:12pm at 8:12 pm (UTC -4)
Franco’s changeup had a right to left rotation and by all intents was his “scroogie”.