McGuiness, a former 13th round pick by the Boston Red Sox, is left handed power oriented first baseman who primarily played in AAA last season. He hit only .246 with 11 HR but has a very strong K to BB ratio (4 BB per 5 K). He is expected to be the Pirates left handed option in a 1B platoon.
Miles Mikolas is a right handed relief pitcher who possesses a 98 mph fastball and an average curveball. The main knock against him is that although his fastball is hard, it is also generally flat and does not have much movement. Mikolas debuted in 2012 and posted a respectable 3.62 ERA in the pen but his K/9 ratio was very underwhelming (6.4) and his BB rate was high (4.2 per 9 innings.) Mikolas spent most of 2013 in AAA Tucson as the closer and converted 26 saves.
(This takes 1 of the last remaining suitors for Ike Davis out of the equation. While McGuiness is not comparable to Davis' upside, the fact that the Texas Rangers only received a guy whose ceiling is a middle reliever and could end up being a AAAA player is going to kill the possible return Sandy can get. This could possibly be the nail in the coffin that keeps Ike in New York for 2014.)
8 comments:
That trade will have no impact on the Davis trade to pittsburgh.
This is more a product of Sandy Alderson's demand for a high return for Ike Davis... which is fine with me.
My heart still wants Davis to get another chance
One thing u can say about Alderson, love him or hate him he seems to wait out the other teams and he eventually seems to get a good return.
One thing u can say about Alderson, love him or hate him he seems to wait out the other teams and he eventually seems to get a good return.
This does not take pitt out of the Davis sweepstakes. Mcguiness a 25 yr old 246 hitter in the minors to a 26 yr old majorleaguer who hit 30 homers in 2011 you can not compare the two players
@Anon
All the Pirates were looking for was a left handed platoon partner. McGuiness provides that as his numbers against right handers are much better than lefties.
Plus Davis is hardly a sweepstakes. In addition the Pirates have already added him to the 40 man roster so yea...I believe this takes Pittsburgh out of the running.
Christopher - I believe you are wrong on this. Chris McGuiness is not a platoon partner for Sanchez. He is a spare part, a player that Pittsburgh acquired for depth rather than to platoon with Gaby, as stated in MLBTradeRumors today. I doubt that he will even be on Pittsburgh's 25 man roster come opening day.
I don't have his career minor league splits, but his AAA splits against RHP last year were a horrible .231/.348/.388 with 7 HR in 268 ABs. And remember the LHB gets the lion's share of ABs in a platoon since the majority of pitchers are righties.
If Neil Huntington is trying to send a message to Sandy Alderson, it is a rather weak message indeed. Sandy should say to Neil "Great, I look forward to watching McGuiness 3 of every 4 games you play. And I can't wait until you visit Citifield on May 26, 27 & 28." The bottom line is that Pittsburgh still needs a platoon partner for Sanchez, and will be in the hunt for Davis.
Christopher - I still don't have McGuiness' career splits, but I was able to get his last 3 years. Those numbers actually indicate that he does not hit better against righties. Those numbers are:
- - - - PA -AB- AVG-OBP-SLG-HR
v LHP -317-263-.259/.379/.445-10
v RHP -880-753-.247/.352/.417-27
You know minor league stats rarely improve when a player reaches the majors. If this is the guy Neil Huntington want as a platoon partner for Gaby Sanchez, I say more power to him, and then I ask my secretary "What is Milwaukee's area code?"
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