Pirates Sign Francisco Liriano Part II

[burgh_fan66]

From Pirates Prospects

According to Ken Rosenthal, the Pittsburgh Pirates have finalized their two-year deal with Francisco Liriano. Rosenthal has the details below:

Ken Rosenthal✔
@Ken_Rosenthal

Sources: #Pirates, Liriano have adjusted and finalized 2-year agreement. Liriano will assume risk due to injury to right (non-throwing) arm.

Ken Rosenthal✔
@Ken_Rosenthal

If Liriano misses no time due to specific right arm injury, he still gets original $12.75M. First-year salary would reduce if he misses time

I’m guessing that the first year salary would include performance bonuses for either playing time, or days on the active roster. That’s the only way I could see a team being able to work a deal like that.

With the recent addition of Jeff Karstens, the Pirates don’t have a huge need for Liriano on Opening Day. They could go with Karstens and one of Kyle McPherson or Jeff Locke to round out the rotation, then bring Liriano in when he’s healthy. Obviously you want him back as soon as possible, since he’s got the potential for more upside than any one of those pitchers.

So it looks like there are probably performance bonuses that can push Liriano's deal back up the orginal sum but that he will need to be healthy in order to get what I'm guessing is a fairly sizeable chunk of his contract. Looks like a good deal to me and gives the Pirates some much needed rotation depth and some high upside.

[burgh_fan66]

Also I see a lot of complaining about this move on other sites. Isn't this the exact move fans have been wanting to see the Pirates make in free agency for like forever? They signed a starting pitcher in his his prime (29 years old!) who has already posted two seasons with a WAR of great than 4.0. Only 18 pitchers in all of baseball posted a WAR that high last year. And one of those 4.0+ WAR seasons was greater than 6.0 (only two pitchers, Justin Verlander and Felix Hernandez did that last season). When this guy is on he is an ace and at his best he rates as one of the best pitchers in the game.

Now those days very well may be gone but at only 29 years old they can't be completely dismissed. This is an in his prime free agent that has big time success in the major leagues. This is exactly what people have been asking for.

[Tomahawk27]

Really like it, especially that it isn't as much guaranteed. So what's the rotation then?:

Burnett
Rodriguez
McDonald
Liriano
Karstens

Or does Karstens assume the long relief position and Locke/McPherson battle for the #5 spot?

[burgh_fan66]

My preference would be for Karstens to take the LR job and for Locke to take the 5th job (McPherson only has 3 AAA starts, he needs more polish) but I have a feeling Karstens will take the 5th spot.

[burgh_fan66]

With Morton still ineligible to go on the 60 day DL (to my knowledge at least) I have to think this is the end of Gomez or Mazzaro on the 40 man roster. Anyway I'm really liking our pitching depth this season.

Burnett, Rodriguez, McDonald, Liriano, Karstens, Locke, McPherson, Wilson, Oliver, Cole, Morton, Irwin

That is 12 players with major league or AAA experience who all look like they could be solid major league starters. I think there are a lot of teams that would like our depth. Now of course our top end is very weak compared to the rest of the league but at least its a start. Before we had no depth and no top end guys at least now we depth and some potential top end guys.

[Tomahawk27]

Yeah, Burnett and Rodriguez aren't going to scare anyone but at least there isn't a huge drop off after those guys, we have some consistency in our rotation skill wise. The past few years you could always pick out the weak link but this year it seems like we could have 5 legitimate starters

[JNev]

Im all aboard for this move. Can't wait to see him in action

[sep11ie]

I don't see what's not to like about it. I follow the White Sox too and he had some rather nice games last year after they got him.

[burgh_fan66]

Well its been about another week and once again the deal still isn't official. This is just a weird situation that hopefully is resolved soon.

[JNev]

Since when is it not official?

[burgh_fan66]

Since when is it not official?

It hasn't been official. It was announced they agreed to a new deal but Liriano still hasn't been added to the roster.

[JNev]

Seems like semantics to me

[burgh_fan66]

You are probably right. It could be they are just trying to figure out the best way to clear a roster spot for him or something along those lines. If they manage to stretch it out another 3 weeks or so they can just put Morton on the 60 day DL.

[Tomahawk27]

It wouldn't surprise me at this point

[burgh_fan66]

From Pirates Prospects the saga continues.

The Sports Xchange, a news wire service that provides news to various outlets, has an update on Liriano. I’ve seen the exact same story in several newspapers in search results, but first noticed it today in Yahoo. The latest holdup, according to the report, is on that minor league deal.

The holdup now appears to be that the Pirates want to sign Liriano to a minor league deal with an invitation to major league spring training and a legitimate chance to make the rotation. However, Liriano is said to at least want one guaranteed year with an option for 2014.

This is a very unique situation, and because of that, it’s very messy. If Liriano agreed to a minor league deal, that would make it possible to reduce his pay based on time he missed from the injury. However, I’m not sure that you can do a two-year minor league deal, and a minor league deal definitely doesn’t guarantee any salary.

Looks like if they do sign him I will need to create a part III