The Mariners have claimed right-hander Dominic Leone off waivers from the Angels, reports Ryan Divish of The Seattle Times. The reliever was one of a handful of players waived by Los Angeles in a salary dump.
It’s the fourth organization of the season for Leone, who originally broke into the majors with Seattle nine years ago. He began on a minor league deal with Texas but didn’t crack the Rangers’ MLB roster. Leone moved to the Mets via free agency and turned in 30 2/3 innings of 4.40 ERA ball. He struggled with homers in Queens but posted better than average strikeout and walk marks.
The Halos acquired Leone just before the August 1 trade deadline. As was the case for the bulk of the roster over the last few weeks, he struggled in Orange County. Leone was tagged for eight runs in 13 frames as an Angel. He walked nine while striking out 11. For the season, the 31-year-old now carries a 4.74 ERA across 43 2/3 frames. He’s striking hitters out at a league average 23.4% clip but has now walked just under 11% of batters faced.
It’s not the most dominant performance, but Leone has shown an intriguing arsenal on a pitch-for-pitch basis. He’s averaging just under 96 MPH on his heater and has gotten swinging strikes on a massive 15.7% of his offerings between the two clubs. He’ll add a power arm to the middle innings, furthering deepening a very good Seattle relief corps.
The combination of power stuff but inconsistent results explains both why the M’s rolled the dice on Leone and why so many other teams did not. Seattle had the #26 waiver priority, meaning everyone aside from the Rays, Orioles, Dodgers and Braves certainly passed.
Seattle will need to clear a spot on the 40-man roster once they officially announce the claim. Leone can take the extra spot on the active roster during tomorrow’s expansion. It’s a low-cost roll of the dice, as Seattle will take on roughly $258K in remaining salary on Leone’s $1.5MM contract. He’ll be a free agent at season’s end.
Lol. Didn’t learn much from both mets and angels?
“Dominic Leone wasn’t spectacular, but he was actually pretty good for us at times” – Met’s television analyst Ron Darling.
mlb fan, that is right.
Evidently, Dipoto and staff now want Leone as a reliever down the stretch.
If they think he is better than someone else, I say go for it.
Nothing is changed, really. The Mariners are the favorite to win the AL West, with 28 games left. And they know Leone is “solid”. End of story.
Go Mariners!
He was decent enough for the Mets as an end of bullpen guy for 1.5 million. Not our fault the Angels thought he was anything more than that.
If you view Leone as a medium to low leverage, 5th best reliever type, you’ll like him. If you view him as high leverage, you’ll most likely be very disappointed.
It’s the Mariners, and he’s a reliever. The Mets and Angels should watch us and learn!
The one thing seattle has done very well, is develop bullpen arms and use them to their ability
Dipoto is the pitching “Whisperer”. I remember years ago when he was in Anaheim, can’t remember the year, the Angels had a terrible bullpen in the first half and he changed out 4 of them. By the second half the Angels had a top 5 MLB bullpen. He’s very good with SP too obviously.
@sourhaze- Mets fans said the same about Sewald, the M’s turned him into a beast. Brewers fans said the same about Topa, now he’s our most reliable reliever. Royals fans said the same about Speier, but he’s been very good for us. Jays fans said the same about Thornton and he’s put up a 1.84 ERA as a Mariner in 14 2/3 IP. I could continue, but hopefully you get my point now.
At least he won’t be blowing games for the Angels any longer.
Thanks to poor management by Arte Moreno, the Angels won’t have to worry about protecting leads for the next half decade or so. By then, maybe they’ll actually build a farm system and switch to a more sustainable, less top-heavy business model.
Yep no leads to blow..
That’s why the Mets dealt Robertson.
Call me crazy, I don’t blame Arte. AL West weirdly strong this season. Stros, Mariners, Rangers all solid. Plenty of injuries for our Halos. Weren’t gonna get much for Ohtani so decided to try and make some moves and sneak into the playoffs. Perry seems like kind of a strange cat. Do not care about a single prospect the Angels traded this season. Watch our Halos keep Ohtani and sign Cody B. Heard it here first. Get rid of Rendon at all cost. Go Halos.
I won’t call you crazy, I’ll call you delusional! You didn’t think your “Halos” would’ve gotten much for Ohtani? You ARE delusional! The deadline was before his known UCL injury. It is pretty commonly believed that had dumb Arte and his stupid management trades Ohtani, the “Halos” could’ve gotten multiple prospects and rebuild the dismal Anaheim minor league system. Instead, dumb Arte and his stupid management kept Ohtani….and dealt 2 of the “Halos” 5 best minor leaguers (plus more) for a handful of guys they ended up dumping less than a month later. That’s malpractice. What a trash organization. You honestly believe after being in the trash organization that is Anaheim since 2018, Ohtani is really thinking about resigning with a team who hasn’t sniffed the playoffs in the 5 years he’s been there?
All indicators are Ohtani wants to win. He has spent his last 2 winters in Seattle. Hell, if he really wanted to stay in So Cal he could go up the 5 freeway and play for a team that wins the division every year. But you really believe he’d stay with a loser, trash minor leagues, no pitching, Trout gets hurt every year, incompetent owner, a perennial loser? You heard it here first, pal…..Ohtani is gone.
Also…if you think Bellinger would leave Chicago for a trash heap team like Anaheim…you heard it here first, pal….Bellinger isn’t coming to Anaheim! Keep dreaming. Anaheim will be awful the next 5-10 years.
Big talk from a fan of a team that has wasted many careers and zero rings.
Live in the past, or deal with today. Which organization would you rather be today?
I’m sure he’ll have better success now that he’s been pardoned out of the trash organization in Anaheim
How’s Leone doing with the trash M’s organization?
@orange- Instead he’ll be racking up holds for the Mariners when we inevitably fix him.
How many holds has he racked up for so far for Seattle?
He’s made 2 appearances lol relax
Comes full circle. Hopefully the M’s get the 2014 version.
Mariners do well with fixing relievers.
That 2014 bullpen had a historical season and Dominic was a big part of it. They won 87 games that season and missed the playoffs on the final day. The fans gave the team a standing ovation during their final game. Lloyd should have won Manager of the Year because he did an outstanding job.
Nice pick-up for them and a great environment for a reliever. They turned Trent Thornton into a good reliever.
Surprised he made it all the way to Seattle
Never doubt the Ms with pitching moves. Name the last one that didn’t work?
Rafael Montero, Diego Castillo, Yohan Ramirez, Matt Koch, Ryan Borucki. We just move on from our mistakes/problems very quickly. Don’t get me wrong, results have been good more than bad… but don’t pretend that we are perfect.
Diego Castillo worked for a long stretch. I wouldn’t say that failed. He was a big part of the pen last season. If he counts as a failure, so does Steckenrider. I also don’t think Borucki was that bad, he was just replaceable. Koch shouldn’t count; he got 4 fill-in games and was never intended to be a piece. Montero sucked, but that was just regression. They weren’t trying to fix him. Yohan Ramirez was a rule 5 flier and really only got bumped because we had so many options at the time. He was a SSS DFA.
I’d argue that Castillo was more than serviceable after the trade and the next year. But whatever reason lost it this season and has been terrible in AAA to. 40/30 so:bb ratio.
It’s similar to Steckenrider a couple of years ago. Was great for the first year, but then fell apart the next and was never heard from again.
But as you said, they identify mistakes and move on very quickly.
Arte Moreno Please sell the team you’re the clown of baseball how embarrassing when we needed starting pitching three years ago the free agency market what do you do sign Anthony Rendón? You hand-picked him do us Angels fans, a favor adios don’t forget your sombrero
You gotta believe that bozo will sell the team. His biggest draw is gonna leave. He didn’t trade him so he’ll walk for nothing. Anaheim has an awful farm system. Nothing’s coming. They’re pitching is lousy. Trout breaks down every year. It’s a joke of an organization.