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Brewers, Rockies acquire bullpen help

In a couple of trades that have come down in the last twenty fours, the Milwaukee Brewers and Colorado Rockies have acquired righthanded relief help

By Adam J. Morris
Texas Rangers v Minnesota Twins Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images

The Colorado Rockies and the Milwaukee Brewers have each made a trade for a righthanded reliever with Ranger ties in the past twenty four hours, with each team giving up a former first rounder as part of the deal. The Rockies acquired Seunghwan Oh, who had agreed to a deal with the Rangers this offseason only to see it nixed due to concerns that arose during his physical, while the Brewers landed former Ranger (and current ChiSox) reliever Joakim Soria.

The Oh deal has the Toronto Blue Jays sending him to Colorado in exchange for former first rounder Forrest Wall, 2017 draft pick Chad Spanberger, and a player to be named later or cash. Wall was the rare prep second baseman to go in the first round of the MLB draft, with his bat thought to play well enough to make him worth a premium pick, but he’s struggled as a pro, and reportedly is seen more as a bench player or organizational depth guy now. Spanberger, a 6th round pick out of the University of Arkansas in 2017, is mashing in low-A (.315/.363/.579), but he’s a first base-only guy whose home park is very lefty-hitter-friendly, resulting in fairly extreme splits. This isn’t as significant a return as you’d expect for a reliever under control through 2019 with a 2.68 ERA and a 3.03 FIP.

Joakim Soria was part of a July deal in 2014, when the Rangers sent him to Detroit for Jake Thompson and Corey Knebel — and coincidentally, Soria will be joining Knebel (who went to Milwaukee in the Yovani Gallardo trade) in the Brewers pen. The ChiSox, who acquired Soria in a salary dump this offseason from the Royals, are getting Kodi Medeiros, a 22 year old lefty pitcher who was the #12 overall pick in the 2014 draft, but whose command issues and delivery have him viewed as a likely reliever, as well as 20 year old Wilber Perez, a RHP in the Dominican League.

Each team appears to have taken advantage of a glut of relief pitchers available on the trade market — Oh and Soria are nice bullpen options, and neither cost much in the way of prospects.