In a case of what appears to be “well, it worked out for us before, maybe it will again”, the Braves visited the Seattle waiver wire for their latest acquisition, right-handed reliever Anthony Varvaro.
If you’re scratching your head, I’m alluding to the sucess the Braves have had with their last Seattle waiver pickup, Eric O’Flaherty. The bad news is, it takes some effort to find a lot of other reasons that the Braves used to justify the move.
How so? Well, Varvaro had a 4.02 ERA in 65 innings combined in Double-A and Triple-A in 2010. While he had 72 K’s in 65 innings, he also walked 35 men (wow, can you imagine Bobby Cox living through the walks it looks like the Braves pen could issue in 2011?). While he did pitch in some bad luck last year, Fangraphs still showed him with an FIP (Fielder Independent Pitching, on an ERA scale) of 3.12 at AA and 3.78 (obviously more troubling) at AAA. Plus, he’s already 26 with just 4 innings of major league experience.
While hard, it’s not impossible to find some good things about Varvaro. Throughout his career, he hasn’t been vulnerable to the long ball. He also throws pretty hard (93-95 MPH, generally). And he’s already had his semi-mandatory Tommy John surgery.
In total, I find it hard to get too worked up on this one either way. I guess the most positive way to view this is that the Braves are assembling a good-sized group from which to pick the 13th man on the staff. If this turns out to be a major concern, it will be a good year! Thoughts?
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