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November 14, 2006

Transaction of the Day

Major Moves, November 8-13, 2006

by Christina Kahrl

BALTIMORE ORIOLES Team Audit | Team DT Cards | Team Articles | Team Statistics

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Acquired RHP Jaret Wright and $4 million from the Yankees for RHP Chris Britton. [11/12]

To the credit of Mike Flanagan and Jim Duquette, the Orioles did what bottom feeders need to do to make modest improvements by taking on some measure of salary to see if they can get value. You can also see this is a symptom of the club's perceived trouble wooing free agents. In that sense, getting Wright isn't significantly different than their getting Kris Benson last winter, except that it cost them less, and it comes with the hope that reuniting Wright with Leo Mazzone might re-create the circumstances of Wright's one genuinely good year in the last eight. I say might, because we could have said the same thing of their picking up Russ Ortiz off of the scrapheap last summer (and did), and that didn't really work out. However, Wright does offer some measure of hope, especially in that he did finish up 2006 with a flourish by making four quality starts in his last four, although it's also worth noting that he got at least a week's worth of rest between appearances during that promising "streak." Basically, I don't think he's quite as useful as his Support-Neutral numbers for 2006 suggest, but considering how poorly the Orioles' rotation did, he's still a nice addition.

What Wright offers the Orioles is a veteran placeholder for the rotation who, if healthy, affords them a choice between Adam Loewen and Hayden Penn for the fifth slot in the rotation early on, and who can then get dealt at the deadline to make room for the other of the two. Four or six months of Wright, plus the prospect he might generate in return in a deal or (less likely) in the form of picks as a departing free agent seems more than worth Britton.