The Philadelphia Phillies announced Monday that they have acquired RHP Yunior Marté in a deal that saw them send LHP Erik Miller back to the San Francisco Giants.
Marté, 27, posted a 5.44 ERA and 4.38 FIP in 39 games for the Giants in 2022, his first Major League action. While those numbers aren’t impressive, he posted a 3.16 ERA in 25 games at Triple-A Sacramento. Oh, and Marté’s average fastball velocity in 2022 was 97.7 mph, and he also has a 96.8 mph sinker and 90.8 mph change-up in his arsenal. Marté also comes to the Phillies with two remaining minor league options.
The trade for Marté represents a continued theme during president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski’s tenure of acquiring relievers with tremendous stuff and trying to harness their power and turn them into quality big league relievers. José Alvarado took a season-and-a-half, but developed into one of the best bullpen arms in baseball during the second half of the 2022 season. Someone like Sam Coonrod, meanwhile, has shown flashes, but ultimately has a 4.91 ERA in 54 games over two seasons with the Phillies. You aren’t going to hit on every chance you take on a hard-throwing bullpen arm, but the more shots you take, your odds improving of finding a diamond in the rough.
Meanwhile, Miller was a fourth-round pick in the 2019 MLB Draft, and checked in at No. 8 on Phillies Nation‘s most recent ranking of the top prospects in the organization. With the offseason additions of Matt Strahm, Gregory Soto and Andrew Vasquez — and the continued organizational presences of Alvarado, Cristopher Sánchez and Michael Plassmeyer, among others — the 24-year-old probably didn’t have a clear path to the majors soon. As hard as it may be to believe, the Phillies may be in a position where they have a surplus of big league bullpen arms
, specifically lefties.