來源:MLBTR
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The Rangers have added some depth to their rotation and bullpen, announcing
the acquisition of right-handed starter Lucas Harrell and left-hander
reliever Dario Alvarez from the Braves in exchange for minor league second
baseman Travis Demeritte. Texas has designated infielder Matt Duffy for
assignment to clear room on the 40-man roster. Both Harrell and Alvarez will
join the big league club right away, per the Rangers’ announcement.
Harrell, 31, signed a minor league contract with the Tigers this offseason
and opened the year pitching with Detroit’s Triple-A affiliate. After
hitting the open market in late May, Harrell inked another minors pact, this
time with the Braves, and worked his way up into Atlanta’s big league
rotation, where he’s posted a 3.38 ERA with 6.4 K/9, 3.7 BB/9 and a 44.2
percent ground-ball rate in 29 1/3 innings spanning five starts.
Harrell broke into the Majors with the 2010 White Sox but didn’t find his
first success until the 2012 season, when he tossed 193 2/3 innings of 3.76
ERA ball and made 32 starts for the Astros. Harrell looked at that point to
have a chance at establishing himself as a long-term option at the back of
the Houston rotation, but he struggled in two subsequent seasons and
ultimately landed with the LG Twins of the Korea Baseball Organization in
2015, where he also struggled over a full season’s workload out of the
rotation. Harrell, though, has pitched well at all of his minor league stops
this season and looked useful enough in the Braves’ rotation to have
reportedly garnered trade interest from a handful of teams.
Alvarez, too, was a midseason addition for the Braves, who claimed him off
waivers from the Mets back on May 25. The 27-year-old hadn’t experienced
much in the way of big league success prior to this season despite a lifetime
2.97 ERA in the minors, but he’s yielded just five earned runs on 11 hits
and five walks with a whopping 28 strikeouts through 15 Major League innings
since being claimed by the Braves. It’s a small sample, to be sure, but
Alvarez’s velocity is up two miles per hour (averaging 93.5 mph) over his
previous stints with the Mets, and he’s doubled the usage of his slider,
which appears to have led to considerably improved results. The Rangers
clearly were impressed by the gains he’s made in 2016, and if they prove to
be sustainable, Texas will have control of Alvarez for another five years
beyond the 2016 season, so there’s some long-term potential here.
That the Braves were able to turn a pair of May additions into Demeritte is a
fairly notable surprise. While the 21-year-old doesn’t rank among the game’
s top 100 prospects or even the top 10 farmhands within the Texas
organization, the former first-round pick entered the season rated 20th among
Rangers prospects per MLB.com and 28th per Baseball America. He struggled
last season and was hit with an 80-game PED suspension but has had a rebound
year with Texas’ Class-A Advanced affiliate, batting .272/.352/.583 with 25
home runs and 13 stolen bases. MLB.com notes that he has more power than a
typical second baseman but has long been far too aggressive at the plate.
That hasn’t changed this year, as Demeritte has whiffed in more than a third
of his plate appearances in Class-A in spite of his power.
The 27-year-old Duffy, not to be confused with the Giants third baseman of
the same name, was claimed off waivers out of the Astros organization last
month. He’s a career .272/.340/.438 hitter in parts of three Triple-A
seasons but has totaled just 12 plate appearances at the Major League level —
all coming with Houston.