In a 10 minute span – literally – the Cubs announced Brandon Hyde’s promotion, the AFL rosters were released, and the Indians announced that they had claimed Scott Maine off of irrevocable waivers from the Cubs. I elected to write the Maine piece last, which, like, sorry Scott.
Maine, 27, was designated for assignment, and ultimately placed on irrevocable outright waivers (i.e., the kind that allows you to send a guy to the minors after taking him off the 40-man roster), last week to make space for catcher Anthony Recker. It’s tough to lose a lefty with stuff like Maine’s for nothing, but his control issues sealed his fate with this front office. While he always struck out a bunch of guys – including 11.3 per 9 at the big league level this year in 20.2 innings of work – he always walked a bunch of guys – including 5.2 per 9 at the big league level this year. You just can’t have that, especially not on a roster serving at the pleasure of a GM (Jed Hoyer) who has said K/BB ratio is his favorite pitching stat.
At AAA this year, though, Maine’s BB issues seemed to have reached the best level of his career (walking just 3.4 per 9), but it came at the price of his strikeout stuff (he struck out just 7.6 per 9). His WHIP was a nice 0.990, but the Cubs obviously decided he wasn’t going to reach that level of effectiveness, or even close to it, at the big league level next year.
Maine becomes the Indians’ version of all of those guys the Cubs have been picking up off the waiver wire – a lottery ticket with a really low rate of paying off, but a really low price tag. Why not?