Mariners News: Furbush Out, Weber In As M’s Shake-Up Roster

The Mariners made November 2nd their busiest day of this off-season so far. In total, the team made six moves (five subtractions and one addition). Headlining all the commotion was the departure of RHP Charlie Furbush (whose contract was out-righted) and the acquiring of Ryan Weber off waivers from the Atlanta Braves.

General Manager Jerry Dipoto has hinted that he won’t be quiet this off-season. With the Texas Rangers as likely favorites to win the AL West again next year and the Wild Card up for grabs by at least a half dozen teams, the roster the Mariners put out in 2016 just won’t cut it.

Dipoto’s moves show that he his trying to create space on the forty-man roster in order for the Mariners to move up in the world.

Aside from the Furbush and Weber moves, the Mariners also out-righted the shameful reject, Steve Clevenger and and the RHP and more respected, Ryan Cook. The M’s also lost the young and talented RHP, Adrian Sampson on waivers to the Texas Rangers.

Furbush was one of the most tenured Mariners in the bullpen. He had been with the club for the last five and a half years, but missed all of 2016 due to shoulder issues.

Unfortunately his health was too much of an issue for the Mariners going forward. However, when he was healthy In 2015, it seemed that the M’s were seeing the best of Furbush. His 2.08 ERA was his lowest of his career. He also allowed runs in just four of his thirty-three appearances that year.

As for the addition of Weber, we have seen this young man struggle in his first two years in the league, all while being part of one of the worst teams in the league.

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Weber has limited experience with the Braves -only pitching in twenty-one games over two seasons- but it’s a large enough sample size to expose an issue he has: giving up home runs. In 2015 he only allowed a very respectable three long bombs in 28.1 innings. In 2016 that number shot up to seven despite pitching just eight more innings.

While those numbers may not seem too terrible. When you look at how that stacks up with the Mariners roster last year, giving up a home run one out of every five innings would put him in the middle to lower part of the pack for HR/9 innings.

Weber has had some great starts though. In 2015, two of his last three outings were quality starts. He gave up just one run in each of those games and pitch seven innings both times. In his final appearance in 2015 he even struck out ten batters, setting a new personal-best.

Next: Mr. November’s Greatest Game Against The Mariners

It would be a great pleasure to see Weber excel in Safeco Field, which is known to be a pitchers park. And, it would also be a relief to see Furbush struggle down in Texas.

These two moves highlighted November 2nd, but it surly won’t be the last moves made in the first full month of the off-season.