2009 O’s Retrospective: Oscar Salazar
November 22nd, 2009 | by Daniel Moroz |In part twenty-six of my almost 50 part series “Better Know An Oriole” (otherwise known as 2009 Orioles Retrospective), I take a look at Oscar Salazar… THE FIGHTIN’ PROFESSIONAL HITTER!
Salazar is a minor league veteran at the age of 31, and the O’s gave him a cup of coffee at the end of last season – his first action in the majors since 2002. He started 2009 in the minors as well, where he hit .372/.408/.618 with 10 HR in 50 games.
After being called up at the beginning of June, Salazar hit a robust .419/.455/.613 with a couple home runs in 33 PA before being traded to the Padres for Cla Meredith. He wasn’t quite as Ruthian in San Diego, but had a solid .269/.339/.463 line. Despite not having a real position, Salazar’s bat made him a valuable player in his 154 total PA – the .302/.364/.496 line (.370 wOBA) was 6.4 runs above average, which combined with his -3.5 run defense (mostly in the outfield, but also first, second, third, and short) for 0.5 Wins Above Replacement, which over a full season (600 PA) would be about 2 WAR. In any case, it’s nice to see Oscar getting a chance to play somewhere he can more fully contribute.
Photo by Keith Allison and used under the Creative Commons License 2.0.
By Daniel Moroz on Nov 22, 2009
He didn’t really turn in a 2 WAR performance since he didn’t get that much playing time. I only projected it out to show that his production in the time he did play was pretty good. It’s entirely possible – even probable – that Oscar had gotten 600 PA that his production would have been worse (maybe 1-1.5 WAR). Bad on me for not making that clearer.
I didn’t have Cla in the pipe-line coming up soon, but based on your “request” I’ll go ahead and move it up. My intuition is that the Padres have gotten the better end of the deal thus far.
By Andrew @ TLC on Nov 22, 2009
I assume Meredith is coming soon, so we can compare and contrast and see if the trade was worthwhile in the 2009 bubble?
Frankly I’m a little shocked that Salazar turned in a solid 2.0 WAR performance. I never thought he had it in him.
By Andrew @ TLC on Nov 23, 2009
I gotcha. I should have said pro-rated 2 WAR, which I still didn’t really think he could do, even over a 150 plate appearance span, especially once he moved to Petco. Good for him.
By Stacey on Nov 24, 2009
While I know that Salazar isn’t a solution for any of the O’s problems, I thought his trade was a little weird. I guess having a young arm in the pen is a good idea, but I liked the idea of having Oscar’s bat on the bench. Plus he kicked off the June 30th comeback with his 3 run HR. Gotta love that.