Steven Wright released
- Thread starter DeadlySplitter
- Start date
Count me as surprised, I figured they'd at least see how arbitration went and see if he still "had it". $1.5 million isn't so much money for a guy with as high a ceiling as Wright had.
If they were going to release him because of the DV case, I think they'd have done so by now.
Of course on the other hand you have different fingers
If they were going to release him because of the DV case, I think they'd have done so by now.
Of course on the other hand you have different fingers
Time's run out - unfortunate as we really could have used more punch injected into the fifth rotation spot.
And that completes this round of Steven Wright Allusion Bingo.
And that completes this round of Steven Wright Allusion Bingo.
He's 35, and only had one season where he was a considerable contributor (WAR of >0.2) out of 7 he's played in. They probably don't feel his ceiling is as high as you do.
Evidently. Still think he was a cheap lottery ticket.
If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something
If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something
Even lottery tickets aren't unlimited in baseball. There are only so many 40 man roster spots. It would be great to keep everyone and see if they work out, but we all know they can't. They have to think someone they're going to need to protect has a higher chance of contributing.
Steven Wright is junk and washed up. One of the easiest decisions the red Sox can make right now.
Thanks again, Manager John!
Is this the beginning of the end of the knuckleball? Does anyone still throw one at the Big League level? It seems like it's a pitch that has been in decline for a long time and Wright was one of the last that I knew of who threw one.
I could see him beating that 1.5 on the open market. I'm glad he's gone though. Less garbage human beings on the team the better.
Ryan Feierabend threw a few innings, ineffectively, last season, for the Blue Jays. (He spent most of his time in AAA ball, giving up 47 runs in 68.1 innings.)
I would say the best chance for an MLB knuckleballer next year is Mickey Jannis, who had a great season at AA (but two awful starts at AAA) for the Mets. (He is featured in the Ringer article.) Jannis at AA gave up 48 runs in 119 innings, with 31 BBs and 103 Ks. One note of caution is that he gave up only 2 HRs in those innings; that is surely unsustainable.
I’ve been an MLB fan for nearly 40 years, and I don’t recall a time when I couldn’t count the active knuckleballers on one hand. I believe Wakefield was the only one for a number of years.
I’m a little surprised that no one signed R.A. Dickey last season, so maybe you’re right that GMs aren’t as willing to roll the dice on knuckleballers as they once were.
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And as the article above mentioned, they're all failed prospects, so they tend to come out of nowhere. At least on the national stage.
I think that has always been true. Players today routinely come back from injuries that were career-ending 40 years ago, so the top of the proverbial funnel isn’t as wide as it once was. Which might mean we’ll never again see two knuckleballers in The Show simultaneously as good as Phil Niekro and Charlie Hough were, and probably does mean there will be times when there are no active knuckleballers in the majors, but doesn’t necessarily mean the knuckleball will become extinct.
He turns 45 in a couple of weeks, the Niekro brothers are still out there too.
I think the problem with knuckleballers is they usually need special catchers, and that can get tricky in the era of a 3-4 man bench.
Someone please help me out -- what does it mean to be "released" now, rather than just non-tended at the end of the season?
Someone only can be "non-tendered" if they're in a situation where they can be tendered or non-tendered, and non-tendering would mean they don't get paid.
Being released means he still gets paid.
I don't think this applies to this situation, Wright could have been tendered, he was under club control for another year, but was released. If it was midseason, I think he would still get the remainder of his salary, but at this point of the year, I don't think BOS owes him anything and I don't think there is any real difference between being released and being non-tendered, just maybe that the non-tender decisions tend to happen a few weeks from now. It opens up a 40 man spot immediately, not sure if that matters here or not or if BOS just wanted to move on ASAP from him.
I believe there's a early December deadline by which a pre-arb player must be tendered a contract or they basically become free agents. A player not tendered a contract at that time would be considered "non-tendered". The only difference here is that Wright was released earlier in the offseason.
And Farrell had nothing to do with Wright's knee disintegrating, or his turf toe that ended this past season.
And Farrell had nothing to do with Wright's knee disintegrating, or his turf toe that ended this past season.
This is another point, sometimes guys get released around now and then re-signed to a minor league deal so as to not clog a 40 man spot until they are needed the following season.
he needs TJ too, you won't see him in 2020 and who knows where in 2021.
https://weei.radio.com/blogs/rob-bradford/recently-released-steven-wright-undergo-tommy-john
https://weei.radio.com/blogs/rob-bradford/recently-released-steven-wright-undergo-tommy-john
Well, that explains everything. They aren’t in a position to pay someone not to pitch.
Before the elbow was the knee. Before the knee was the shoulder, before the shoulder was the ad infinitum. He never had a healthy season.
I followed him after picking up an autographed hat at a PawSox Gwinnett game silent auction in '13. He had a few tantalizingly sick outings in his career that hinted at the upside that never came about. Making the All Star squad was his high point. At his best, he could reliably throw 75% of his knuckleballs for strikes. But even after cracking the starting rotation, the fact that he couldn't grip the knuckleball in the rain made his regular use problematic.
I followed him after picking up an autographed hat at a PawSox Gwinnett game silent auction in '13. He had a few tantalizingly sick outings in his career that hinted at the upside that never came about. Making the All Star squad was his high point. At his best, he could reliably throw 75% of his knuckleballs for strikes. But even after cracking the starting rotation, the fact that he couldn't grip the knuckleball in the rain made his regular use problematic.
So he'd be a good signing for Dbacks, Dodgers, or Angels? Especially the first 2, so he can use his premier base-running skills.
He has potential, but his floor isn't high enough to take a chance, given the injury and off the field concerns at his salary.
If I'm a team looking for pitching, I would rather take on a chance on an AAAA-type pitcher leaving a pitching-rich organization.
After the Angels pick up Wright and he has a few good outings, everyone will hail Joe Maddon as a genius yet again.
I'd say "except for the domestic violence stuff," but Aroldis Chapman and the Yankees seem fine, so apparently that doesn't matter much as long as you can throw a ball well.
Teams will overlook DV charges for an elite talent like Chapman, but I think it matters for a fringe guy like Wright. I’ll be surprised if Wright throws another inning in The Show.
Wright has an argument with his wife in which she became frightened and tried to call the cops, but he prevented her from doing so
“The couple released a statement saying Steven didn’t raise a hand at Ashley and that the incident was purely emotional”
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.mlb.com/amp/news/steven-wright-on-domestic-violence-incident-c266435966.html
Part of the trick here is the public will never know what actually happened. Maybe Wright never did get physical with her. Maybe she covered for him in their public statement. Regardless, we’ll almost certainly never know.