Phillies Sign Lannan to One-Year Deal
Posted by Pat Gallen, Sat, December 15, 2012 11:08 AM | Comments: 25
Analysis, News, Opinion, Posts
MLB.com
Shortly after signing reliever Mike Adams the Phillies struck quickly on the free agent starting pitching market, inking former Washington National John Lannan to a one-year deal, according to Jim Salisbury of CSNPhilly.com.
Lannan, 28, will get $2.5 million guaranteed with performance bonuses that could push the total figure to $5 million, according to Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com.
On Phillies Nation TV, Lannan made our list as one of the most hated rivals of the Phillies for all the times he plunked Chase Utley and Ryan Howard. Now, he joins them on a cheap contract. Just a few days ago, Ruben Amaro said he wanted a low-risk, high-reward type of starting pitcher after losing Vance Worley to the Twins in the Ben Revere trade. This certainly constitutes as such a move.
Lannan is by no means a great pitcher, but has the ability to adequately fill out a rotation. Throughout his career, he’s had a penchant for walks and doesn’t strike many guys out. His 1.39 K/BB ratio is pretty bad, however, as our own Ryan Dinger pointed out on twitter, his ERA+ (103) is better than both Joe Blanton (96) and Kyle Kendrick (97). They’ll look for Lannan to be an innings eater as a fifth-starter.
Posts: 0 Double Trouble Del
No problem with this one.
Posted: 11:28 AM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Corey
Not bad. Go Hamels Halladay Lee Kendrick Lannan. Nice L R L R L rotation. I like it. Horst/Stutes or Cloyd will be long men, Bastardo, Aumont, Defratus, Adams, Paps round out the bullpen. Or if only an 11 man, then no cloyd/stutes. I like it
Posted: 11:40 AM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 CS
Not a bad deal, someone I’m sure our people were very familiar with and kept an eye on.
Posted: 11:59 AM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 1078 EricL
I laughed at the part where you said John Lannan is a “high-reward” type guy.
Posted: 12:06 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 1429 Pat Gallen
Not saying he’ll be Cy Young, but he can be highly rewarding at the price. Come on.
Posted: 01:03 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 1078 EricL
Dude, he’s a 5th/6th starter. His upside is like 1.5 WAR.
When I think high-risk, high-reward, I think of a guy like Fransisco Liriano, for example, who’s actually had a few really good years but comes with a lot of injury/crappy performance risk (although Liriano’s worst seasons are still about as good as Lannan’s best)
Posted: 01:47 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Betasigmadeltashag
He is only 28 and as a 5th starter not a bad guy to have. He was a opening day starter for a major league club all be it the nationals yeo years ago. For the money I think this is a good deal. It gives the young arms another year in the minors to step up. I think he is an upgrade slightly over Worley as a number 5 guy.
Posted: 12:20 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Scruff
Ew… John Lannan.
Posted: 12:46 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Bob in Bucks
A solid deal. If it does not work it is only 2.5.
Posted: 12:56 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 1st in W.A.R.
Hey! Quit digging around our dumpster!
Seriously though, you’ll be getting a decent starter in Lannan. He may put a lot of guys on base, but he’s a smart junk-ball tosser that induces ground balls, works himself out of jams, and forces double plays. He’ll be a good 5th starter in this rotation. Not good enough to crack the Nats rotation or anything, but good nonetheless. Best of luck in ’13.
Posted: 01:02 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 3476 Lefty
Thanks man, same to you.
Posted: 01:24 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 schmenkman
Lefty, off topic, but did you see that Carlton was voted the 26th best player of all time in ESPN’s Hall of 100?
Schmidt was #16.
http://espn.go.com/mlb/feature/video/_/id/8652210/espn-hall-100-ranking-all-time-greatest-mlb-players
Posted: 01:39 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 3476 Lefty
Yes I saw that. That makes him the seventh best pitcher on the list, I think that’s about right. And IMO- As long as Schmidt is the number one 3B, it doesn’t matter where he’s ranked. If you don’t care about steroids its a pretty good list. I can find 6-10 guys I think should be higher/lower but that’s what these lists are for right?
Posted: 02:01 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Ken Bland
hmm, 7th best pitcher on the list.
let’s ee, going back to the time I started following the game, see where, or if I’d rate him in the top 7.
Koufax….better
Pedro….probably give him the edge
Maddux….I’d rate him higher. Greg had a Lefty 72 year 1 season, and during oprime years didn’t have the offseason Lefty did I think twice.
Unit…I might give the edge to Carlton there.
Ryan…Lefty, although it’s taken a while, or did for people to look back on Ryan’s career with justified appreciation.
I believe Lefty would be in the top 4 then. Edge to him over Clemens even if his latter years were roid aided. So 7 of all time might be reasonable.
I’d be curious to see how Carlton would have matched up with Lefty Grove in say 10 games.
I wouldn’t be terribly offended if someone ranked Seaver ahead of Carlton. Those were fun matchups.
Prime to prime years, I doubt the numbers would say Catfish (guess), but games between Lefty and Catfish Hunter would grab your attention.
Warren Spahn would be a good matchup. Peak years well ahead of my time.
Lefty was awesome, wherever you put him.
Posted: 02:15 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Ken Bland
Jim Palmer at 89 seems a little low. Just an impression.
Posted: 04:05 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Ken Bland
The real risk here, if it winds up being one, is this would seem to cement Kendrick as the 4th starter, assuring that in a full season, he gets 35 starts. The 5 guy probably gets 25ish. Not that there were any indications that the Phils were going for another bona fide, proven low risk starter, but if they had less confidence in KK, they might have, and used Kendrick in the 5 spiot.
Kendrick has been on the peripheral most all of his time here. From the start, when he magically turned in a good first year W-L, to last year’s 2nd half performance when he put together about 6 weeks of really top notch results (but did back off toward season’s end), the guy keeps hanging around. He’s been a good story at times, and almost looks like a complete steal when he got a multiple year deal out of Rube setting him up for this year. Now, hes locked into a chance to really prove himself as a solid rotation guy.
Will he do it? I think the Phils view is more think than hope. Lannan, as a 5 gets a chance to prove what Mike Rizzo didn’t seem to think, and get a longer ceal out of his stop here. He’s fine as a 5. But to me, the story is more committing to KK as the 4. His meeting the challenge might be as important as Doc being Doc again, scaled down perhaps by another year on the calendar.
Posted: 01:15 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Scruff
In all reality, I don’t think this is a bad deal at all. It’s just that it’s John Lannan… I don’t know if I can cheer for him. Pretty much the same idea if Cody Ross were to sign with us. If Lannan comes up big in a few spots, this will change I’m sure… But until then… Ew, John Lannan.
Posted: 01:42 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 phil
I’m fine with lannan as the 5th starter at his price. I would have rather had someone better but next years free agent crop of pitchers is much more enticing so a 1 year deal on lannan is fine. 5th starters are usually replacement level pitchers anyway. If he gives us a win or 2 in war at that price I’ll take it. Now use the remaining salary to go get swisher!
Posted: 01:56 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 George
John Lannan plunked Howard and Utley. I say “Big deal, it happens.”
He never did pitch well against the Phils, which may be part of the reason he hit more Phils than he hit Braves or Mets; he may have been trying to hit the corners more.
At any rate, if you erased all his starts against the Phils, he’d have much better stats.
$2.5M for a guy who consistently goes 170 innings per year is a pretty good deal. Even if he sucks and has to be replaced with Cloyd or Pettibone, the money isn’t a great loss. Last year, Joe Blanton made way more for being just as bad or worse, and even this year, he’ll be making way more. Lannan will also be paid less than Baez got for being way worse than useless, and it’s about the same as what Contreras made for blowing his arm out.
People may have wanted someone like Annabelle Sanchez, but I think with a decent ‘pen, the Phils will be fine with Kendrick and Lannan at the back end of the rotation.
Posted: 02:13 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Ken Bland
“Lannan will also be paid less than Baez got for being way worse than useless”
Baez’s record speaks for itself, and your characterization of him is unfortunately faie, and while I jokingly make fun oif players sometimes for ineptitude, or blunders, just as a point of mention, Baez was actually considered a pretty decent pitcher at 1 time, and gutted it out with arm trouble the last hoiwever many years of his career.
People are nice to Brad Lidge because he kneeled at the mound in ’08. Tend to overlook all the bad outings the last couple years that were grinding it out when not healthy, and perhaps explained by the bad health.
Baez pissed me off at times, and I took my shots at him, but I figured I’d add to your inarguable statement by giving him some also deserved props. Ruben took a chance on him, no doubt realzing the health risks. Didn’t work. Chad Qualls, I guess he just blew it.
Posted: 02:26 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 0 Ted Bell
They’ll get more out of Lannan at $2.5 million than they did from Blanton at $8.5 million. A no-brainer.
Posted: 03:46 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 442 Bruce
Lannan? Is he the pitcher that broke Utley’s hand? :-)
I noticed that last season, Lannan lost his job in rotation and spent most of the season in Nats’ AAA farm team. He was called up in late July and later fill the rotation when Strasburg reached his maximum number of pitches ending his season.
I won’t do any “backflips” either with this aquisition. I can only keep my fingers crossed that he won’t be another Adam Eaton (former Phillies pitcher). ;-)
Personally, I wish Amaro would spend more on someone like Brett Myers. At least the Phillies know what the 32 year old righthander has to offer.. the option of 8th inning set up reliever or starter in rotation. I would not worry about the cost since I am fine with our internal options for the OF positions and certainly would not go after someone like Ross. .
Posted: 05:08 PM on December 15, 2012
Posts: 28 landshark
Maybe Ruben has something else up his sleeve. Maybe he signed him for a long middle reliever or something, like Kendrick was a few years ago. Someone to come in and eat some innings. I just cannot see him being our 5th guy in the rotation! Ruben ”HAS” to come up with something better than this move here!! I say we leave our OF the way it is, and push for better pitching!!
Posted: 01:48 AM on December 16, 2012
Posts: 52 LCMRSalazar85
Where’s KK in this discussion? There’s no difference in my mind between the 2 pitchers other than KK’s got tenure here. Lannan won’t last the season, much like he flamed out in DC.
Posted: 09:45 PM on December 16, 2012
Posts: 0 Joe K
Lannan sucks ballls! He was under 500 in the minors last year! We should have signed him to throw in AA.
Posted: 11:45 PM on December 23, 2012