Comments on: Marte DFA’d

By: CJ

CJ — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 17:52:39 +0000

Marte’s Total Zone stats in the minor leagues are exceptionally good at third base. He has been up and down in the majors (plus sometimes, negative others), according to UZR, with a career number around -2….but given the sample sizes each year, I don’t know how much confidence you can put in that for predictive purposes. My question is: for people who have seen Marte in the field, how good is he, defensively, at 3d base? The Total Zone stats from the minors would seem to indicate he is a very good defensive player at 3d base. If he has the potential to be a plus defensive third baseman, that could give him some life in the majors, even if his bat isn’t as good as once expected.

By: WillClark4HOF

WillClark4HOF — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:29:16 +0000

The Orioles have had good luck with (slightly older) former Indians prospects, too…

http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=2072&position=P

By: Ron

Ron — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 13:41:12 +0000

Word is, Dayton Moore has just traded Joakim Soria, straight up for Marte, and immediately signed him to a contract extension for 3yrs/$15 mil.

When asked why, Moore replied, “As I’ve said all along, good relievers can be found anywhere, and we really need another guy with a below .300 OPS to take us over the top, and all the way to the World Series. He’s a great clubhouse presence.”

In other news, in November 2009, Joakim Soria, who had been moved to the starting rotation by the Indians, will only finish 5th in the Cy Young voiting, in his spite of his 37-1 record, with a .78 ERA.

Experts sight his lack of hardware as proof that sabermatricians have finally convinced the BBWAA that a pitchers W/L record and ERA are no indicaiton of how good he is. The winner, David Price, finished with a 8-14 record and 4.32 ERA, but his graphs looked absolutely fabulous.

By: JH

JH — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 08:00:18 +0000

2005 was the last year he was really considered a top prospect. He started his slow fade in 2006 to end up as a DFA.

Why you’d ever judge a 19-21 year old on his MLEs is beyond me.

By: Brian Cartwright

Brian Cartwright — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 05:27:35 +0000

He’s entering his 9th pro season, and he’s on the major league 40 man roster.

Once on the 40, you can only be sent to the minors in 3 different seasons, within I believe four years of the date of your mlb debut. Those are used up.

He doesn’t get mlb free agency until he has six years service time on the 25 man roster.

A team claiming him on waivers must carry him on their 25, or waive him again (can’t be assigned to minors). However, if no one claims him after 10 days, then he is released, and can sign with anyone. But, that can be to a minor league contract.

By: scstrato

scstrato — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 04:58:36 +0000

I’m curious, does Marte not have enough service time to elect free agency if no one claims him? This may be a moot point if Cleveland intends to outright release him under this scenario, but i’m curious if this will have a role in where he ends up.

By: Bermanator

Bermanator — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 04:02:05 +0000

I wonder how many teams will call Cleveland to kick the tires on this guy within the next 10 days, and what the Indians wind up taking for him.

By: Brian Cartwright

Brian Cartwright — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 00:57:58 +0000

Marte was just never as good as a lot of people thought. The Braves realized this and got what they could for him.

Unregressed single season MLEs
2002 18 ATL A 252 300 408 308
2003 19 ATL A+ 278 344 482 355
2004 20 ATL AA 259 335 496 356
2005 21 ATL MLB 242 324 449 334
2006 22 CLE MLB 235 290 418 306
2007 23 CLE MLB 239 273 409 293
2008 24 CLE MLB 220 267 314 260

Now clearly he has gone backward every season since Cleveland acquired him, but at the point where they got him from Atlanta, he had three straight years with a MLE wOBA above avg for a 3b, but still a guy who was going to hit 240-250 with about 20 HRs. Really no better than Jose Bautista. Once you throw in Marcel and regression, my highest projection was a 333 wOBA, barely above avg for a MLB 3b.

Declining BABIPs could come from loss of speed and hitting more balls in the air.

By: BD

BD — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 23:58:02 +0000

I’m going to ask a pretty basic question that may be unanswerable: What happened to this guy? Or more generally, when someone is that good, that young, and then utterly craters when the get to the bigs, and there’s no injury you can point to, what’s the reason?

By: Jason T

Jason T — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 23:05:34 +0000

Yeah, that’s my mistake. I always do that with Marte. Sorry!