A former 8th round pick, Berger has been used as both a starter and a reliever in his 6 year minor league career and has bounced between AA and AAA in each of the past three seasons. Equipped with a terrific mustache and a low 90s fastball, he's probably best suited to be a lefty specialist, and he posted some really strong numbers as a reliever in AA back in 2011 (2.53 ERA in 57 innings with 67 strikeouts). He hasn't yet found success at the AAA level which is probably why most people haven't heard of him. Ultimately, he looks like a guy who will give us some depth, but not much else.
So what'd we have to give up to get this pitching depth? Catching prospect Chris Wallace. For the first time in a while, the Astros organization seems to have some depth at catcher, so Wallace became expendable. Limited to just 3 at bats in AAA this season, Wallace hadn't actually caught a game this year stuck behind the likes of Cody Clark and Jason Jaramillo. Add Max Stassi and Carlos Perez into the mix and Wallace ends up being the odd man out. He has some decent pop as evidenced by his 20 homers back in 2011, but those numbers dropped off quite a bit in 2012 as he managed only 5 and his slugging percentage dropped over 100 points. He strikes out a lot and isn't anything special defensively.
Overall, it looks like we didn't give up much, and we didn't get much in return. Despite that, I like the move because Wallace was stagnating on the bench in AAA, and you can never have too much pitching. Even if Berger only turns out to be a situational lefty it's a good move. Considering our bullpen woes early on this season, we really shouldn't look past giving anyone a shot. Anyhow, best of luck to Wallace in Cleveland and welcome aboard Mr. Berger.
No comments:
Post a Comment