Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports
When your first move as GM of the Philadelphia Phillies is to pluck a guy off waivers, the expectation is that the wow factor will have to come in subsequent moves.
Signing reliever Dan Otero off waivers from the Oakland Athletics could be it for Matt Klentak as his signature move of the offseason. That’s because the Phillies just will not make any big moves for a number of reasons, the chief one being is that it would not matter anyway. The Phillies are just going to be a bad team and signing a whole group of over-the-hill free agents will not help this team contend.
The team is at least three years away from .500, so adding a big-name pitcher who will not be around when they do compete simply does not make sense right now. They have a number of young arms in the system and they need to find space at the Triple-A level to give them a first shot. Those who impress at that level will quickly move up the ladder. That’s where the Phils are with their pitching right now and Otero represents the kind of low-risk, high-reward move they need to make now. The best the Phillies can hope for with Otero is that can be a long reliever. Bad teams always need a few people to do that.
Otero is only 30 and he will be around when the Phillies get good again. He was only available because he is coming off a season with a bloated 6.75 ERA. He had three pretty decent years before that, so Klentak is playing the percentages.
Phillies fans expecting any big-ticket signings should know now that any future moves will be mid level ones like this Otero signing.
Mike Gibson is a MLB Featured Writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @papreps , “Like” him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google.
