Outlaws land Albers from St. Louis
During a hastily thrown together press conference at the BDBL owners meetings in Minneapolis, The Flagstaff Outlaws announced a surprising move, sending SS prospect Andres Gimenez to the St. Louis Apostles in exchange for relievers Matt Albers and high schooler Hunter Barco.
“It hasn’t been a secret that we were looking to add a reliever before the Trade Deadline. We also figured Gimenez would be one of the likely names moving. But we never thought we’d be doing this sort of a deal with St. Louis.”
While murmurs went through the assembled media, Newgard nodded in agreement.
“We know. We were in talks with another Eck League team for a reliever at the time. The reliever we were targeting wasn’t as good as Albers, but we thought could also be a great addition to our 2019 rotation. That owner was understandably on the fence.
“We had seen that the Apostles were being active at the deadline, picking up Lucas Duda among others, but evidently they had put themselves into a little bit of a roster crunch and starting reaching out to turn their quality surplus into a something more useful elsewhere on their roster.”
“When they reached out expressing interest in moving Albers, the whole office took a step back. Why would another playoff team send a stud reliever to a potential matchup?
“But in comparing the two relievers we were thinking about, we decided to go with the better one for this, pushing our bet on this season and try to give us the best players to succeed.”
After the murmur died down, question turned to the farm players involved.
“Gimenez was a tough sell, being the best bet in a depleted system, Newgard explained. “But again, we knew the cost for any add would probably start there. We’re happy with the pitching side, but we certainly are in a bit unbalanced there.
“We don’t know much about Barco outside of scouting reports we dug up. Looks to be a kid with good pitching skills and a projectable frame and can also play a good 1B. We were looking to cut a farm spot or two, so we’ve got some flexibility to take the flyer there.”
When asked about how Albers would fit into the bullpen, Newgard shrugged.
“Blake Parker has consistently performed as the closer, so I don’t know if we’ll shake the boat there. But Albers could slide into the 8th inning when Jake McGee and Kirby Yates have been matching up. We could also envision saving Albers for any high leverage situations that occur, regardless of the inning. It’s a great problem to have and we’ll figure out how to fold him in.”
When asked if the Outlaws were done trading, Newgard was non-committal.
“We’d be happy if this is the roster end the season with. But a lefty bench bat would stil be a nice addition. We’ve got a few days to talk and see if something makes sense but we aren’t in a must-trade mode.”