Astros Snag Veteran Lefty Reliever Oliver Perez
It’s the Houston Astros and you never know what will happen!
Although we’re well past the trade deadline, there will still be deals that will be made but nowhere near the level of what we saw last week.
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I’d have to admit that it was the most active and aggressive that I’ve seen the Astros be before the deadline in quite some time.
And you know what?
It was just a frenzied event in general as all teams except the Arizona Diamondbacks made a trade in some way or fashion.
Until now…
According to the Houston Chronicle’s Evan Drellich, in a late-night seemingly back-room deal, the Astros have traded for veteran left-handed pitcher Oliver Perez in exchange for minor prospect Junior Garcia of the Short-Season Class A Tri-City ValleyCats:
Astros make it official: Junior Garcia from Tri-City goes to Arizona. Deduno goes to 60 day DL
— Evan Drellich (@EvanDrellich) August 8, 2015
However, Drellich does gives us a caveat that Perez won’t be ready to go until tomorrow:
Oliver Perez isn’t going to join the Astros until Sunday.
— Evan Drellich (@EvanDrellich) August 8, 2015
Garcia, 19, earned a 0.96 ERA with 26 strikeouts in 37.1 IP between the ValleyCats and Greeneville Astros.
You can never have enough arms in the bullpen and that’s where Perez will be headed.
If you think about it, the only active lefty that we have in the bullpen is Tony Sipp and his performance has gotten better despite a rough patch he hit last month.
Sipp has struck out seven, has allowed four hits and has held onto a 0.60 WHIP over the past 30 games.
This pick up of Perez not only helps diversify the Astros bullpen but gives them more options to go with in games.
He’ll certainly fit that bill as soon as he joins the team.
His strongest suit is his ability to shut down left-handed batters as his stats against them are .183/.234/.267 with 22 strikeouts and three walks on the season.
But he has faced his fair share of right-handed batters as well but they’ve done a bit better against him, cranking out numbers of .297/.397/.365.
Perez has been around the league for quite some time, participating in his 13th season in the majors.
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He’s currently playing on the back-end of a two-year, $4.25 million deal that he signed with the D-Backs going into last season.
Although his best years of baseball are likely behind him when he was featured with the Pittsburgh Pirates and New York Mets, he still has plenty left in the tank to help out this team.
We’ll have to see how it goes but I think there’s something there or else the Astros wouldn’t have traded for him.
They gave up little for him so this is certainly a move that’s low-risk.
Perez, 33, has gone 2-1, posting a 3.10 ERA, with 37 strikeouts in 48 games and 29.0 IP.
His 2.99 FIP and 1.241 WHIP are quite impressive and I’m sure that’s why Jeff Luhnow and David Stearns gave the green light on this move.
I like the move — let’s go ‘Stros!