The Pittsburgh Pirates found out on Saturday afternoon that minor league relief pitcher Pat Light was claimed off of waivers by the Seattle Mariners. Light was placed on waivers on June 10th when the Pirates called up Edgar Santana, who needed to be added to the 40-man roster.
Light was acquired from the Minnesota Twins back in February. He pitched for Indianapolis this season, where he had a 3.76 ERA in 26.1 innings over 22 appearances. He had a .242 BAA and a high GO/AO ratio, but too many walks led to a 1.44 WHIP. The 26-year-old made 17 appearances in the majors last year, splitting time between the Twins and Boston Red Sox.
+ postsJohn started working at Pirates Prospects in 2009, but his connection to the Pittsburgh Pirates started exactly 100 years earlier when Dots Miller debuted for the 1909 World Series champions. John was born in Kearny, NJ, two blocks from the house where Dots Miller grew up. From that hometown hero connection came a love of Pirates history, as well as the sport of baseball.
When he didn't make it as a lefty pitcher with an 80+ MPH fastball and a slider that needed work, John turned to covering the game, eventually focusing in on the prospects side, where his interest was pushed by the big league team being below .500 for so long. John has covered the minors in some form since the 2002 season, and leads the draft and international coverage on Pirates Prospects. He writes daily on Pittsburgh Baseball History, when he's not covering the entire system daily throughout the entire year on Pirates Prospects.
I don’t know if this is much of a “loss”, to the Pirates, as Light was also let go by Boston – and hasn’t shown much in Indy. But I suspect that there may have been someone else on the 40 man who would have been a better candidate to put on waivers…glancing at what I assume is the current 40 man roster, I would have waived Barbato or Gosselin before Light. Gosselin would have been my first choice to waive – he has very little value to the Pirates, as Indy has 2-3 other players who can do what he does and probably better…but, the Pirates are cheap and stubborn, and will not waive a guy who they traded for in the off season and has a contract.
Like it has been mentioned, these are back filler to the 40, but I would had kept him over lindblom, maybe even bastardo.
Or Watson?
Moves like these make real baseball feel like fantasy baseball, where the last rostered guys are like penny stocks. Certainly no fun for those involved, but roster limits are equalizers in baseball.
Why could we have not sent him to the Yankees for Barbato?
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He was on the 40’man and I’ll assume the Yankees didn’t want him, especially since they would have had to add him
We need a new #30 . Next man up.
Is it Jin de Jhang
Thats the risk of being deep on the depth bench.