Nice timing there, with Michael having just written about the Cubs’ success building a bullpen this way.
Adding to the cache of waiver-type bullpen arms the Cubs have added this offseason, the team today claimed lefty Edgar Olmos off of waivers from the very-active Mariners. That activity has left the Mariners increasingly needy of 40-man roster space, hence having to shuttle off interesting arms like Olmos.
The 25-year-old lefty originally came from the Marlins’ system last year, was briefly claimed by the Rangers and then returned to the Mariners. He dealt with a shoulder issue early in the year, but broke out at AAA, posting a 23.3% K rate and 8.9% BB rate over 20.0 innings before getting a crack at the big league bullpen late in the year (where he was not especially successful).
Olmos, if he survives on the Cubs’ 40-man roster all winter, will compete for a bullpen job in the Spring, but it’s possible that the Cubs will themselves try to get Olmos through waivers at some point so they can outright him off of the 40-man roster and keep him at Iowa. Olmos appears to be one of those guys: good enough and near-MLB-ready enough that lots of teams want him, but not quite obviously good or ready enough to keep on the 40-man roster for good.
It’s also possible that the Cubs want to see how Olmos looks as a starter, something he did twice in the bigs last year and twice at AAA, but something he hasn’t done regularly since 2012.
We’ll see what the Cubs do. For now, the 40-man stands at 37.