O's acquire Steve Pearce for Jonah Heim

[crawjo]

I think this is an excellent move. Pearce is more than a bench bat. I suspect he will end up playing more often than not, pushing Trumbo to DH on some days and costing Kim playing time as well. He's a better defender than both, also.

[El Gordo]

Make that 13 man staff.

Then your bench is Caleb, Flash, and Pearce. No one can cover CF. It's really a 12 man staff plus Ubaldo. Hire some guys to rough him up in a dark alley, enough that he has to go on the DL

[pastorfan]

If he hits .300 he will be better than mediocre, but not a long term answer. Does this relegate Kim to 4th outfielder status?

I would think that against righties Pearce, Kim, and Trumbo would play a lot due to OBP.

[larrytt]

Anyone know how I can get Steve Pearce's combined stats for the last four years? The stat sites at orioles.com/mlb, baseball-reference, and ESPN give year by year, so to get the last four combined I'd have to work it all out on paper with a calculator.

[OFFNY]

Anyone know how I can get Steve Pearce's combined stats for the last four years? The stat sites at orioles.com/mlb, baseball-reference, and ESPN give year by year, so to get the last four combined I'd have to work it all out on paper with a calculator.

I cropped it on baseballreference.com:

STEVE PEARCE: 2013-2016

50 HR

131 RBI

57 Doubles

2 Triples

133 Runs Scored

7 Stolen Bases

4 Caught Stealing

955 At Bats

1,078 Plate Appearances

.269 BA

.350 OBP

.840 OPS

[pastorfan]

Then your bench is Caleb, Flash, and Pearce. No one can cover CF. It's really a 12 man staff plus Ubaldo. Hire some guys to rough him up in a dark alley, enough that he has to go on the DL

That actually is the best idea I have heard yet! Accidents happen all the time...

[larrytt]

I cropped it on baseballreference.com:

STEVE PEARCE: 2013-2016

50 HR

131 RBI

57 Doubles

2 Triples

133 Runs Scored

7 Stolen Bases

4 Caught Stealing

955 At Bats

1,078 Plate Appearances

.269 BA

.350 OBP

.840 OPS

Hard to believe he's not a starter, considering he's also good defensively.

How do you get baseball-reference to compile the stats for these years?

[OFFNY]

Hard to believe he's not a starter, considering he's also good defensively.

How do you get baseball-reference to compile the stats for these years?

You click on the years that you want to crop.

For example, if you want Frank Robinson's combined number for the 10 years that he played with the Reds, you would click on his 1956 statistics, then click on his 1965 statistics, and then wait a few seconds for baseball reference to load the combined numbers for you.

Follow the same steps for Robinson's 1966 and 1971 seasons if you want his combined statistics for the 6 seasons in which he played for the Orioles.

[SteveA]

Just want to reiterate that a 13-man pitching staff is stupid. They played a 12 inning game yesterday and the starter went 5 and two-thirds and the Orioles still had 3 relievers they didn't use.

I am on team 4-man bench.

Agree, especially since we got Miley who is less likely than some of the guys we have been pitching to have a super short outing (Ubaldo and Wright due to lack of talent, Bundy due to pitch count limitations, and both Bundy and Worley not being fully stretched out after being relievers all year).

[backwardsk]

Won't someone need to be DFA'd to make room for Pearce on the 40 man?

No. Because Borbon was DFA'd when Ubaldo came back from paternity.

We were at 39. Now we are at 40 with Miley+Pearce-Miranda.

[PaulFolk]

We were getting Fowler. With Fowler, Kim , Jones, Trumbo and

Rickard there was really no place for Pearce.

Pearce signed with the Rays Jan. 28, almost a month before the Orioles' agreement (and subsequent non-agreement) with Fowler. Fowler isn't the reason the O's didn't pursue Pearce.

[TINSTAAPP]

Pearce signed with the Rays Jan. 28, almost a month before the Orioles' agreement (and subsequent non-agreement) with Fowler. Fowler isn't the reason the O's didn't pursue Pearce.

Pearce would have been a perfect platoon partner with Kim. He also would have been a great insurance policy in case Kim didn't work out. As an added bonus, there would have been no need for Nolan Reimold to be on the 25 man roster. The Orioles really mismanaged their roster in the off-season when you consider the tendering of Matusz, only signing one starting pitcher after losing your best starting pitcher to another team, not signing another left-handed bullpen arm, not re-signing Pearce, etc....

[gfrank]

I've got a feeling the Rays are ultimately going to be happy with this trade. It sounded like it was between us, the Indians and the Mets going after Pearce, with the Mets falling out after they grabbed Bruce, and the Indians losing interest after getting Guyer. At that point, they were actually lucky to get anything for Pearce, and he'd probably still be a Ray had it not been for the fact that the GM that acquired Pearce three different times in the past(four now) was looking for a bat.

Regardless, I think people are a little too dismissive of the bump in Heim's stats this year. There actually was one. For a guy that was labeled a glove-only catcher, there was a pretty pronounced jump in his power and walk rate this year. That gets a little washed away statistically when you look at his terrible batting average, but I think some of that can be attributed to his pretty unlucky .241 BABIP and the fact that he was trying to(and succeeding) in expanding on the sort of hitter he was. The guy's walk to strikeout rate was 33 to 51, which is precisely what you want to see out of guys like that, guys not striking out at too gaudy of a clip and drawing a fair amount of walks. And that came with the sudden appearance of double-digit power, which was something scouts seemed to talk about, but never actually existed in reality. The guy's still an incredibly long way away, but I think the Rays were pretty savvy getting Heim. He's only 21, and I think there's a lot more meat on the bones there than I think anybody is really acknowledging. I liked him as a prospect and was kinda sad to see him go. I wasn't going to sell the farm over the guy, but I think he was a legitimately interesting prospect.

HOWEVER. The guy is still potentially the third or fourth catcher on our minor league prospect depth chart, and we managed to pick up a proven impact player that led a playoff team in WAR two years ago. That isn't supposed to happen, you aren't supposed to be able to nonchalantly trade away your easily forgotten surplus for guys that have done that. Over the past four years, Pearce has put up an OPS of .840 and averages 28 home runs per 162 games played. This includes that down year and the first year he was here. Baseball reference has him at a 5.5 WAR per 650 plate appearances during that span, which is just stupidly productive. This might be an uncomfortable truth, but this is higher than Chris Davis during that span; a span that included two 50 home run seasons.

This might all amount to nothing. Heim's peripheral statistical improvements might not ultimately mean anything, and Pearce may get injured again(something he's prone to) or fall into a slump like the brutal one he had in April/May of last season. But there's real, honest upside here and we didn't need to give away anything especially noteworthy to get it, during the time of year when you ALWAYS need to give up something noteworthy to get something noteworthy. Would have been nice getting a more impressive starting pitcher, but we needed a bat to wake up this offense, and we got about as good of a deal as you can get.

I hope I'm preaching to the choir here. Steve Pearce rocks and is easily one of the most underrated players in baseball. If you're an Oriole fan and don't already know this, I have genuine pity for you.

[webbrick2010]

Pearce has 1 HR and 2 RBI over his last month

He is streaky and often injured

For all the talk of where Heim is on the depth chart, I keep hearing that he is the only guy

with the defensive chops to be guaranteed to be able to stay at C in the majors

I do not like the trade

[bobmc]

Pearce has 1 HR and 2 RBI over his last month

He is streaky and often injured

For all the talk of where Heim is on the depth chart, I keep hearing that he is the only guy

with the defensive chops to be guaranteed to be able to stay at C in the majors

I do not like the trade

And when Jonah hits homers from both sides of the plate in one game, we will hear about it here....