Darren Oliver deal official

But if we planned to use him like that I doubt we sign him at all. Why would we when hes proven capable as more?

His highest total in 4 healthy years of relief is 63.

You have to admit, there’s not much left to say.

I TRY and find a few positives here. After all, the Yankees pay $26 million in luxury taxes. Meanwhile, I have to be ridiculed daily for pleading my 17 reasons I want to want Darren Oliver on my 2010 roster.

was the year the Rangers drafted Darren Oliver.

Damn Mike Henneman never trust someone from Oklahoma St.

“Ugh. I called this:

http://www.halosheaven.com/2009/12/1/1181570/lackey-and-figgins-only-angels#26431189

Others averred that Oliver would retire if he couldn’t re-sign with the Angels, but the man lives in Texas, and began his career with the Rangers. Doesn’t take a genius to figure he’d sign with them if the Halos didn’t bite.

Word is that Texas is Vlad’s likely destination as well.

If someone on this board said that in the upcoming offseason, Lackey would sign with the Red Sox, Figgins with Seattle, and Oliver and Vladdy with Texas — plus the Angels would fail to offer Oliver arbitration and to possibly deprive Texas of their #22 pick — plus Halliday would be dealt (not to the Angels), and the Mariners would net Cliff Lee for three so-so prospects they weren’t building around — had someone said all that in October, they would have been met with cackling derision, and taunts of bad faith and poor fanmanship.

Welcome to the bad faith future. It looks a little like the hard luck past. People can try to softpedal it all they like, or raise their rhetorical eyebrows at the prospect of Oliver making $4M next season, but here’s the gist of it:

The weakest aspect of last season’s team was its bullpen. Nothing was more responsible for this team losing the ALCS than the weakness of our bullpen. Yet we just let our best reliever for two years running (both in the regular season and the postseason) skip off to our toughest competitor, and got nothing for it. That’s dumbass shit."

by Turks Teeth on Dec 20, 2009 7:44 PM PST reply actions 2 recs

http://www.halosheaven.com/2009/12/20/1210243/oli-to-the-rangers

by a lot.

That’s a lot of money for Fernando Rodney who was sporting a 4.9 W/9 to his 7.3 K/9 last year.

let him start out the season in the rotation. Use Moscoso or Ray or someone else. Put the guy who loses his spot in OKC waitng for an injury or performance melt-down. I really don’t want to see Feliz in the pen-He is still young, and fear Wash will use and abuse him.

Yeah, at some point these minor leaguers need to have some scouts/coaches/managers/execs advocating for them to be acquired/promoted/signed etc. I think a knuckleballer is never going to really have anyone willing to put their neck on the line for them, and they are never going to have sexy stats, so the deck is stacked against them ever getting a shot at MLB.

I wonder if anyone has ever done a study about how a knuckleballer in a ML rotation affects the rest of the rotation? You hear about how facing a knuckler can throw a hitter’s timing off for days afterward. I wonder if that is measurable in some way, and if so, how much benefit does the next day(s) starter get from having a knuckler pitch in front of him?

because of the risk of getting smacked around in the 1st, 2nd inning if you don’t have it and burning up your bullpen is costly. But I guess I would expect more veterans who are losing their stuff would adopt a kuckler and try to use it sparingly at first and then gradually making it their primary pitch. This way they could add on another 3-5 years to their career.

Millwood is an example I’m thinking of. He tires at the end of the year, so learning a knuckle would help his arm. Plus if he can team that up with a high 80’s even 90 fastball, it would be tough to hit. It just makes sense financially and makes sense if you want to stay in the majors longer.

I guess most major leauge pitchers think the knuckleball is a trick pitch used only by guys who don’t have real good stuff. I compare it to using layups in basketball over being able to dunk. It’s hard to argue with that thinking I guess since only Wakefield has truely been able to use it efficiently lately (other than Canseco and Wade Boggs)

I just think watching Wakefield rake year after year all that money, more MLB vets would go to the kuckle to try and keep that paycheck coming.

But I think you can in this case.

you can.

The Rangers could have trumped both of those trades with their prospects but how do you sugest they go about paying for them once they traded for them? This is not JD’s or Nolan’s fault this is on Hicks.