Angels Make A Pair Of Very Minor Moves As Free Agency Opens

The Los Angeles Angels made a couple of small moves at the opening of free agency, as they’ve outrighted catcher Sebastian Rivero and reliever Sammy Peralta to Triple-A Salt Lake, per a report from Steve Adams of MLBTradeRumors.com that included an update that had Peralta electing free agency.

The Peralta move isn’t surprising. He was one of a pot pourri of pot-luck Angels relievers, and it was close to a coin flip whether he’d be able to get outs during a given appearance. 

Peralta’s numbers also reflect the ultimate bad baseball experience, as he spent the season with the Angels and Colorado Rockies. The 28-year old lefty pitched a total of 23 innings with a 6.65 ERA, per Adams, although he did have a strikeout rate of just over 20 percnt to go with an eight percent walk rate. 

The reliever did give up home runs, however, and he hit four hitters in 112 at-bats and gave up a batting average of .417 on balls in play. That’s a whole bowlful of bad for a reliever who throws just under 90 mph, and Peralta’s career ERA now sits at 5.64 over 68-2/3 innings in parts of four seasons. 

The Rivero move was a little more suprising. The 27-year old backstop only had 57 plate appearances for the Halos, but he did show some offensive potential before he got hurt, as he posted a slash line of .245/.286/.283, which isn’t bad for a defense-first catcher. 

That should get him a look in free agency assuming he formally decides to go that route, and it might have been worthwhile for the Angels to keep him around given the dreadful state of their catching right now.  

But the Angels appear to be clearing the decks as much as possible for the new ownership group of Stan Kroenke to formally take over on Jan. 1. It’s starting to look like the Halos won’t have formal representation at the GM meetings next week, although that could change this week if some kind of update or announcement happens. 

There are serious ramifications if the Angels do decide to wait until after the lockout to make moves, however. They’ll be behind the rest of MLB, although this won’t exactly be front page news. It could also indicate that the Angels are preparing for another tough season until they have a complete executive group in place, which would be disappointing but not at all unexpected given the mess they're inheriting.