7:39pm: Saltalamacchia can opt out of his contract if he isn’t on Arizona’s Major League roster by June 1, SB Nation’s Chris Cotillo tweets. The opt-out clause likely won’t be an issue, however, as the catcher is expected to join the D’Backs well before the end of the month.
2:22pm: The Diamondbacks took some strides to address their early catching woes on Thursday when they announced that they’ve signed Jarrod Saltalamacchia to a Minor League contract following the veteran catcher’s release from the Marlins (Twitter link). Saltalamacchia is a client of agent Jim Munsey, who took some time to sit down with MLBTR Podcast host Jeff Todd to discuss his client’s release from the Marlins (in addition to several other issues).
The 30-year-old Saltalamacchia inked a three-year, $21MM pact with the Marlins in the 2013-14 offseason, but the south Florida native’s homecoming didn’t go as planned. Saltalamacchia batted just .220/.320/.362 with the Marlins last season, and he found himself released this year after a 2-for-29 start to the season. The move came as somewhat of a surprise, given the fact that Saltalamacchia had roughly $14.16MM remaining on his contract at the time he was designated for assignment. The Marlins attempted to trade Saltalamacchia, according to several reports, and it was at least somewhat of another surprise that they weren’t able to find a team willing to pay $1-2MM of the remaining commitment to ensure that they were able to sign him.
As it stands, the D-Backs will reap the benefits, as Miami is on the hook for the entirety of Saltalamacchia’s salary, minus the pro-rated portion of the league minimum that the D-Backs will pay him for any time spent on the active roster.
Arizona’s catching situation has been dismal in 2015, with Tuffy Gosewisch and Jordan Pacheco combining to bat .219/.276/.250 — much of which has been fueled by an unsustainable .400 BABIP for Pacheco (as MLBTR’s Jeff Todd noted last night). The move from the spacious Marlins Park to Arizona’s Chase Field should prove to be quite advantageous for Saltalamacchia, who has 15-25 homer pop in the past and boasts an above-average .175 isolated power mark (slugging minus batting average). Saltalamacchia has long been a better hitter against right-handed pitching than left-handed pitching, as evidenced by a career .775 OPS versus righties and a .596 mark versus lefties. That could allow the D-Backs to effectively platoon Saltalamacchia and Gosewisch, and while Gosewisch doesn’t offer much offense against lefties, he’s considered a stronger defender, so a platoon would minimize some of Saltalamacchia’s defensive deficiencies, to an extent.
Saltalamacchia at one point, from 2011-12, graded as an excellent pitch-framer, but his marks in that regard of deteriorated, as he was below-average in 2013 and graded out as one of the worst in the league in 2014. He’s also thrown out just 22 percent of attempted base-stealers in his career, although in 2011 he was decisively above average in that regard as well, catching 31 percent of those who attempted to run against him.
In the end, the move is a no-risk endeavor for the D-Backs, who will hope that Saltalamacchia can help bridge the gap to prospect Peter O’Brien, whom the organization still hopes can handle catching in the Majors. O’Brien has been moved to the outfield in the early stages of the season after developing a concerning issue with throwing the ball back to the mound at the end of Spring Training, and scouts from other organizations have long questioned whether or not the powerful prospect will be an adequate defender behind the plate.
Saltalamacchia will head to Triple-A to get some at-bats before joining the big league club, tweets Jack Magruder of FOX Sports Arizona. Between paternity leave and his DFA period, Saltalamacchia hasn’t appeared in a game since April 23.
The Arizona Republic’s Nick Piecoro was the first to report that the D-Backs were expected to sign Saltalmacchia. MLB.com’s Steve Gilbert reported that the two sides had agreed to a Minor League deal.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Seems like the perfect landing spot; a team without a starting catcher in a good park for hitters. Saltalamacchia has decent on-base skills for a catcher and has hit for a some power in the past. He’s only 30, so he might have something left. Good no-risk move for Arizona, although they had to make it out of necessity. And again, classy move by the Marlins to release him while he was celebrating the birth of his son.
It’s a business, not a cuddle circle.
Even a business should treat its employees with some modicum of respect.
Holding onto Salty just because he recently had a child, would have been disrespectful to the player (employee) that they would have had to hold back because of that.
How would that conversation go? “Sorry kid, we can’t give you that break and cut you a Major League check yet, it’s kind of a sensitive time..”
Salty was being paid $21million to do a job. He was doing a bad job. Now he’s getting paid $21million not to do the job.
Congratulations on the child, and good luck in Arizona. That’s Baseball.
I understand all that, but why not just wait the extra day or two until his paternity leave ended, right? I’m sure I care about it a lot more than he does; he’s getting paid either way and now he gets to play maybe.
He can wipe his Salty tears with the enormous checks the Marlins still owe him.
How are they still deluding themselves into thinking O’Brien can catch?
as opposed to having Tuffy Gosewisch/Salty?
At least Tuffy is above average behind the plate. He just has no power at all and doesn’t take walks. O’Brien legitimately has difficulty throwing the ball back to the pitcher.
Salty is just moving deck chairs. His potential for offensive upside comes at the expense of having any defense at all behind the plate, while asking an unproven crop of fringey pitchers to pitch to a guy with poor game-calling/framing skills.
eh, none of those guys are great options for the Dbacks, unfortunately. Makes the salary dump of Montero a little short-sighted, right?
A combination of pride (not wanting to admit they were wrong from day one and should have never accepted him in the Prado trade) and the fact that they have ZERO other options available, meaning they might as well keep trying.
It was a different crew making the Prado trade, so I suspect pride isn’t a reason. (The new crew has been willing to shake things up and not run things the way Kevin Towers did.) I would suspect they are trying to build his value and perhaps train him enough to play OF. If he hits enough they should play him a bit and ship him off to an AL team in need of a DH. Just as they should do with Trumbo.
TLR was already on board when the Prado deal was made. I agree though, O’Brien probably should stay in the OF. I wouldn’t even mind him directly replacing Trumbo at this point. However, with Tomas hanging around, it’s probably best if both Trumbo and O’Brien are moved.
They have deluded themselves into thinking Salty can catch, so the bar must be low.
Just for the extra cost of all the letters stitched onto the jersey I’m not sure if it’s a good deal. Actually, getting a minor league deal really works well for the DBacks.
I’m ok with this signing of the dbacks getting salty but it wont help them this year because the dodgers padres and giants are fighting for a spot in the wild card even though its early
He sucks. Save the BS