The Nationals have designated righty A.J. Cole for assignment, per a club announcement. He’ll be replaced on the active roster by veteran reliever Carlos Torres, whose contract was selected.
It has long been evident that this was a make-or-break season for Cole, who the organization long felt would be a major-league contributor. He was given a shot at a rotation spot out of camp but lasted only two starts and two relief appearances before the team was forced to make a move.
Cole’s once bright star had already ebbed over recent seasons, as he continued to spend more of his time at Triple-A than in the majors. He reached the highest level of the minors in 2014 and cracked the bigs in the following campaign, but has thrown only 110 total MLB frames.
A major factor in Cole’s lack of chances was the fact that the competing Nationals couldn’t simply give him innings without concern for how they went. Perhaps the leash would’ve been longer this year, though, were it not for the fact that the Nats have endured a tepid opening few weeks that have left them looking up at three teams.
With a need for fresh relievers, there just wasn’t more time to let Cole work through his early struggles. Make no mistake, they were pronounced. He paces the N.L. with a whopping six home runs allowed in just 10 1/3 innings and has coughed up 15 earned runs.
Torres, meanwhile, is a sturdy veteran pen arm who is capable of pitching multiple innings. The 35-year-old, who joined the Nats organization on a minors deal just before the start of the season, has thrown more than fifty MLB innings in every season since the 2012 campaign and has a 3.73 ERA in 449 total innings in that span. He has thrown five scoreless and hitless innings at Triple-A thus far in 2018.
Finally. Took them long enough.
“{My team} should give him a chance!”
You beat me to it.
Padres, Royals, Marlins, Rays, White Sox. All teams that suck and have sucky pitching thag could make a move for a sucky, but still young, pitcher.
Exactly right.
Exactly, if he performs then he’s part of the future. If not, doesn’t hurt any of those teams.
I’d be totally fine with KC signing him. Worst case scenario he’s just as bad as the rest of our bullpen and we cut him in three weeks. He’s a 26 y/o with some pedigree and six years of team control, it won’t be difficult for him to find someone to take a change-of-scenery flyer.
There is no question that Torres is a much better option for the Nationals. He can actually get major league hitters out. In a Nationals aside, you can get Max Scherzer at +130 tonight. This could be the first time he has been an underdog in a game, at least in the last five years.
“{Your team} should give him a chance”……..
Torres is garbage
Better than Cole
+1 from a Brewers fan that had to watch him the last 2 years!
As with Romero, i see the Pirates trying to give him a chance.
The Pirates have enough young pitchers who cannot always find the strike zone I saw Glasnow last night and it was interesting that Hurdle went with him for 3 2/3 innings with intermittent times of wildness.It was a blowout game with Arrieta throwing strikes so it was smart managing.They also do not have room at this point on their roster.
I think he would be better than some of Miami’s starters.
Cole back to A’s. Plenty of chances there…
They were talking about Cole to Baltimore on MASN. He’s at least as good as Mike Wright so if they wanna swap them I’d have no complaints. At least I haven’t seen A.J. Cole get peppered all the time.