The Marlins have agreed to terms with veteran right-handed reliever Luis Ayala, who cleared waivers on Thursday after being designated for assignment last week by the Minnesota Twins. Ayala's agent, Joe Longo, said the pitcher would report to New Orleans and join the Triple A club in Omaha.
"He hasn't pitched in over two weeks, so he'll go down there for maybe three or four outings to make sure everything is working right," Longo said.
Ayala, 31, has pitched for the Expos, Nationals, Mets and Twins during his six major-league seasons. He had appeared in 28 games for the Twins this season, going 1-2 with a 4.18 ERA.
"He knows (Marlins general manager) Michael Hill and he's played for years with (Jorge) Cantu and (Alfredo) Amezaga for Mexico," Longo said. "I think he's got some familiarity with the (NL East) division, so I think it's a place where he's comfortable. We had interest from a handful of teams, but he wanted to go back to the NL East as much as possible. Once the Marlins called, we just started focusing on much."
Ayala was earning $1.3 million this season. But the Marlins will only be required to pay him the pro-rated amount of the major league minimum, or less than $200,000.
is a good reliver but why the marlins they dont want to pay to improbe the team
Posted by: rafy | July 02, 2009 at 08:01 PM
A good move by the Marlins -- interesting to see how has to suffer from Ayala being added.
Posted by: FireFrediCutAmezaga | July 02, 2009 at 08:34 PM
I like this move a lot. Simply because its a very low risk move which will still help out the club. He's not exactly the last piece to the puzzle but he definately patches the bullpen up till Calero and Lindstrom come back or until the front office pulls the trigger on something big. He didn't exactly do great in Minnesota but lets remember what he did for the Mets last year, he was they're emergency closer for the latter part of the year and he went 9 for 11 in save opportunities. A good signing and it shows the management is at the least attempting to do something. I'm looking forward to this postseason run and I'm really looking to see what the management is going to do at the trade deadline. This is the first deadline after the "assurance" of the stadium so lets see if management keeps its promise and starts using some money
Posted by: danny305mia | July 02, 2009 at 11:26 PM