Seattle Mariners claim RHP Jimmy Cordero from Toronto

Staying on brand, Jerry Dipoto and the Seattle Mariners have acquired another reliever.

This time through waivers, as the M’s claimed 27-year-old right-handed pitcher Jimmy Cordero, who was recently DFA’d by the Toronto Blue Jays. Ironically, Toronto DFA’d Cordero to make room for reliever Zac Rosscup, whom the Mariners had DFA’d last week. Baseball is weird.

Cordero made one appearance for the Blue Jays this year after being claimed off waivers from the Washington Nationals. He allowed one run on two hits in his 1.1 innings worth of work.

Most of Cordero’s playing time in 2019 was spent with the Nationals’ Triple-A affiliate in Fresno, where he threw 15 innings over the course of 12 appearances in total, all in relief. While there, Cordero posted a 6.00 ERA with a 10.20 K/9.

Cordero sports a four-pitch repertoire that consists of a four-seam fastball that sits in the mid-to-upper 90s, a sinker, slider, and a curveball. During his 19 inning stint with the Nationals last season, Cordero saw most of his success come when using the sinker and slider, with opponents hitting just .217 and .154 off the pitches respectively.

The problem for Cordero throughout his professional career has been his inability to throw strikes consistently. This isn’t anything new to the Mariners, who’ve acquired several hard-throwers with command issues this year and have seen some early success with a few of their projects.

For now, Cordero will start out in Triple-A Tacoma. But with the way Seattle has constantly shifted their bullpen all year long, don’t be surprised to see Cordero in the navy and teal at some point in the near future.

To make room for Cordero on the 40-man roster, the Mariners transferred Gerson Bautista from the 10-day Injured List to the 60-day Injured List. This is just a formality and will have no impact on Bautista’s expected return in the coming weeks, meaning the Mariners will have to make a more permanent move in regards to their 40-man roster soon.