Veteran left-hander Tommy Milone went unclaimed on outright waivers following this past weekend’s DFA, and the Mariners have assigned him to Triple-A Tacoma, per MLB.com’s transactions log. He has enough Major League service time to reject the assignment if he chooses, though Milone spent a good chunk of the 2022 season in Tacoma as well and re-signed with the Mariners organization over the winter, so he’s clearly comfortable there.
The 36-year-old Milone made a spot start for Seattle this past weekend, holding the visiting Rockies to just one run through 4 2/3 innings. With that start, the well-traveled lefty has now logged time in each Major League season dating back to 2011.
Milone was a regular in the rotation for the A’s and Twins for a few years earlier in his career, making 113 starts with a solid 4.16 ERA from 2012-16 between Oakland and Minnesota. He’s since become more of a journeyman southpaw, donning seven more big league uniforms since 2017 and posting a combined 5.77 ERA in 260 2/3 innings through a series of bullpen stints, spot starts and occasional relief appearances at the MLB level.
All in all, Milone has piled up 949 big league innings for nine different teams, pitching to a collective 4.59 ERA in parts of 13 big league seasons. He’s accrued more than eight years of Major League service time in the process.
Assuming Milone indeed sticks with the Mariners, he’ll provide them some depth both in the rotation and in the bullpen. He’s spent parts of ten seasons in Triple-A and has a lifetime 3.24 ERA in 497 innings there — including a tidy 2.68 ERA in 40 1/3 innings with Tacoma just last year.
MLB’s transactions log also indicates that the Mariners re-signed righty Konner Wade a few days back, and he indeed just started last night’s game in Tacoma. The 31-year-old Wade had a brief MLB look with the 2021 Orioles but has otherwise spent his career grinding through the minor leagues. He spent the 2022 season in Tacoma, making 23 starts and pitching to a 5.60 ERA in 115 2/3 innings there. Wade, a seventh-round pick of the Rockies back in 2013, has a career 4.42 ERA in Triple-A.
I thought Milone was a lefty and the Mariners out him as a righty?
DCartrow, you are now officially entered in the Who Can Be The Stupidist contest for April 20, 2023.
His great start the other day just seems kind of wasted on this disappointing Mariners team.
Dipoto sort of promised a great season, but it is a dud like Musk’s big rocket ship was.
I agree, pretty disappointed with how the season has gone so far, for the Mariners. A few players have been bright spots so far, but overall the whole team has seemed disappointing. The pitching is not the strength that it was last year, the offense is not showing any sort of consistency so far, and the defense has been surprisingly bad to start the year.
But who knows, maybe they will clean up their play and it will get better as the year goes along.
I blame John Stanton at this point. All his comments, coupled with the way Dipoto phrased his during the offseason, read as “we made the playoffs last season… good enough.”
Konner Wade sucks
Pretty expected Milone would clear. He did a nice job of giving himself a chance at being called back up if he chooses to stick in the Seattle system (which I expect he will since they’ve already called his number once).
Milone has around 20 million reasons to go open market if the Mariners don’t pick his contract back up.
If you pick your spots Milone can be a worthy place holder. These two series with the Cubs, and Brewers had just blew the M’s out of the water their torpedo’s were more effective then the M’s trident. There going to need a bigger bat in the lineup.
Speaking on the pen there are some new players who I no nothing about. So what can we expect from them and how is that better than last year?