The Angels announced they’ve selected the contract of reliever Jose Marte. Fellow bullpen arm Aaron Slegers was optioned to Triple-A Salt Lake in a corresponding move. Los Angeles already had an opening on the 40-man roster, so no additional transaction was necessary.
Marte is in line to make his big league debut. The right-hander signed with the Giants as an amateur from the Dominican Republic during the 2015-16 offseason. He’s spent the bulk of his career in the San Francisco system, where he’s entered each of the past three seasons in the back half of the Giants’ top 30 prospects list at Baseball America.
Entering 2021, BA ranked Marte #30 among San Francisco minor leaguers, writing that his high-90’s fastball and low-90’s slider could make him an effective bullpen piece. That said, Marte also has some rather notable issues with his control that led San Francisco to leave him exposed in last winter’s Rule 5 draft, where he went unselected.
The Angels acquired Marte just before the trade deadline as part of a three-player return for reliever Tony Watson. He’d have again been Rule 5 eligible this offseason if not selected to the 40-man roster, so there’s little harm for the Angels in getting him a look at the big league level down the stretch. Marte has spent the majority of this season at Double-A, posting a 3.16 ERA over 25 2/3 innings with a massive 36.3% strikeout percentage but an elevated 15% walk rate.
Even if he pitches underhand, he will be better than Slegers.
An ERA over 10 in AAA.
The Angels: he’s better than what we have now on the MLB roster.
True, but in what was formerly the Pacific Coast League, that’s MLB equivalent ERA of 0.15
Agree that Slegers is bad, but Guerra is the worst pitcher on the Angels. I don’t know how that guy has not been dfa’d. I would take Eaton coming in to pitch again over Guerra (I know Eaton was dfa’d, but you get my point). Maybe they should have kept Eaton and given him Guerra’s spot in the bullpen.
Sam Selman would like a word
This team could compete for a WC spot if they had a competent bullpen. There’s some promise with guys like Warren and Quijada, but If the pen isn’t the first thing addressed by Perry this offseason, we riot
I still shed tears over the halos not re-signing Yusmeiro Petit some years ago. That guy is exactly what they need, a quality middle innings guy that helps, not hurts you.
He was a huge loss and signed for relatively little this last off season.
Major fail this off season. Every non closer RP the Angels signed this off-season has been terrible.
Yep. That the white flag over the Angels dugout when he comes in the game.
That’s
Oh look another pitcher who has control issues. Seems to be happening with a lot of these younger signed talent. I guess mph is more important that where it goes. Lol
Throwing an 85 mph strike doesn’t get you off the island
Time after time and year after year, how many times we, the Angels fans, have yelled/screamed/begged for quality pitching help!! I mean, it’s not a rocket science. Like literally everyone knows the Angels needs good pitching except for Arte, maybe.
I really hope we can sign some great pitchers this offseason we won’t waste another year of Trout and Ohtani.
How long until Ohtani leaves?
Ohtani’s not going anywhere.
For the past several years, the Angels, much to the chagrin of their fan base, have signed inexpensive RP to build their BP. And with little success… very little success.
I believe this off-season, the Angels BP construction will evolve from signing low ceiling, low cost options to promoting internal options currently in their system.
The Angels have drafted dozens of arms the last several years and added five more at the deadline. I’m guessing the Angels will continue to give them opportunities the remainder of this year and call up additional arms next year. Other than one closer/high leverage type guy, I don’t anticipate the Angels will be in the market for many RP this off-season.
Looks like he pitched well in his debut tonight in yet another loss. Help.
Marte actually looked good in his debut. 98-99mph with movement with most everything on the edge of the strikezone, Good to see. We seen 2/3rds of the Watson trade now in Selman and Marte. I am sure we will see Elvis Peguero, one of the players from the Heaney trade, soon.
Angels should have called Cleveland at the deadline. This is the last year these two teams could have made a deal without affected players being called “Guardian-Angels.”