Phillies choose Larish to become the next Dobbs

The Phillies once rescued Greg Dobbs from the AL and turned him into a productive NL reservist. Jeff Larish, 28, could be given the same opportunity after signing a minor league deal with the Phils.

Larish, a blocked corner infielder and perennial 25th man candidate with Detroit and most recently with Oakland, hit .179/.267/.313 with two homers in 75 plate appearances between the Tigers and A’s last season. As usual, his minor league totals were much, much stronger, a .284/.375/.533 slash line in 385 plate appearances between Oakland and Detroit’s Triple-A affiliates, including 20 homers, the third time he’s topped 20 in a season. Slowed only by a season-ending wrist injury in '09, he’s been in and out of the majors since '08, producing a not-too terrible .224/.308/.380 career line in 276 plate appearances. Like Dobbs, he’s a left-handed hitter who came up through the chain without a true position and alternated between first and third, which meant that he’s been stuck behind Miguel Cabrera. The Tigers designated him for assignment midway through the season and the Athletics claimed him.

Beerleaguer: No minor signing, people. Look for Larish to make a strong case to fill the final bench spot out of spring training. The Phils need a backup for Placido Polanco and are looking for someone in the mold of Dobbs, circa 2007, to do some damage off the bench. Before the ‘09 season, the year he screwed up his wrist, Baseball America ranked Larish fifth among Tigers prospects, citing his raw power to the pull field, ability to crush a fastball, decent speed and good awareness between the bags. Defensively, he’s average at best, maybe a little below, which is all Dobbs ever was. He sounds like a scrappy student of the game, too.

Expect him to yo-yo between the big club and Triple-A. This is a great opportunity for Larish to thrive in a new league and a way for the Phillies to get slightly younger on the bench. I like the potential here.

Minor re-signings: The Phillies signed minor league deals with pitcher Nate Bump, first baseman/outfielder Tagg Bozied and outfielder Rich Thompson, all holdovers from last season. Bozied, in particular, had a terrific season in Reading, where he challenged for the Triple Crown and hit .315/.401/.631 with 27 homers and 92 RBIs.

Minor notes: The Phillies must protect several players on the 40-man roster by Saturday night or risk losing them to the Rule 5 draft. Reliever Justin De Fratus is expected to be protected, but former first-round pick Joe Savery, who is being converted to a first baseman, first baseman Matt Rizzotti and outfielder D’Arby Myers are candidates to escape.

Comments

[Lake Fred]

We'll see about Larish. I'm not holding my breath on this one.

''Obviously, Felix's numbers are very, very impressive,'' Halladay said earlier this week when asked about the AL Cy Young vote. ''Ultimately, you look at how guys are able to win games. Sometimes, you find a way to win games,'' he said.

I take this to mean that Doc thinks a pitcher needs to do more than pitch quality starts. Poor Felix, being an ALer, could not come to bat and drive in or score runs like Doc does. Doc would've voted for CC.

[donc]

Mickey Morandini to manage Williamsport. Expect Dave Cash to be named Assistant GM any time now.

[bay_area_phan]

Dobbs & Larish are very different kinds of hitters. Dobbs always hit for high average in the minors, but he rarely walked & had only so-so power. Larish has hit for only so-so average, but draws a lot of walks & has pretty good pop. In the abstract, Larish's skill-set is probably the preferable one. The problem is, it's also the skill-set which is much less likely to transfer to the major leagues. If a guy can only hit .260 in the minors, that might well translate to about .224 in the majors -- which is precisely what Lanish has hit in 245 career ABs. He's more likely to be the next Cody Ransom than the next Greg Dobbs.

[Ollie Brown]

With that wrist injury, is there ANY doubt that this kid is not the next Dobbs... but a left handed batting Jayson Werth?

[Joe Cowley]

has Tommy Herr been hired back yet to replace GG?

[MG]

Good thing is that Phils almost never have to worry about the last couple of roster spots on their 40-man roster. No lose if they lose Savery, Rizzotti, or 'toolsy' Myers.

[bay_area_phan]

Considering they only have 36 guys on their 40-man roster, and the roster includes such non-entities as Brian Bocock, Mike Zagurski, and Drew Naylor, I can't think of any sound reason why they wouldn't protect Rizzotti.

[Doc]

Dobbs swing got longer and longer with every year. Hopefully Larish knows how to keep the swing short and use the good eye he apparently has.

[Unikruk]

We loves us some scrappy players!

[RSB]

Dobbs worked out better than anyone could possibly have imagined for the first two seasons, at least offensively. It would be unwise on the part of the Phillies to assume they could grab another under-the-radar guy of a similar ilk and think he's going to step in and become that same type of player. They've become rather good at this in recent years, but they'll still need to have other options in mind. (Of course, I'm kind of going along with the same assumption made in the header...we don't really know that the Phils expect Larish to be the next Dobbs.)

[gobaystars!!1!]

*''Obviously, Felix's numbers are very, very impressive,'' Halladay said earlier this week when asked about the AL Cy Young vote. ''Ultimately, you look at how guys are able to win games. Sometimes, you find a way to win games,'' he said.

I think what Doc is saying is that when a game is 2-1 in the 7th you know that the score is 2-1 and you need to keep it that way. If you are on the level of Halladay, you find a way to stay in the game to give your team the best chance to win. You don't say "it's alright I got a quality start." I'm not arguing against Felix here. I'm just reminding everyone that guys pitch differently in different situations and the situation matters. Wins aren't everything, but they shouldn't be so quickly thrown away. Also, we don't know the context. Was the question "should he have won the AL cy young?" or was there a follow up "Do wins matter?" If a pitcher answers "No wins don't matter it is all about the numbers." He would be rightly murdered by the fans. I really didn't follow much of the AL this year so I can't comment on how good who was.

[clout]

Totally agree with BAP on Larish. Different skill set than Dobbs.

I was shocked to see BA had him 5th in the Tigers organization after 08. Must be a weak farm system. Sickels rated him C+, which is just a hair above fringe prospect.

BA is strongly tools biased and probably loved his raw power, which is real. But Sickels projected him a .240 hitter at best and he lacks range to play 3B.

That said, he could hit 30 HRs if you gave him 500 ABs and played him at 1B, where his glove is at least average. Of course, he'd also hit .235, offset a bit by his ability to draw walks.

He can't play corner OF, which Dobbs could, and he's no better than Dobbs at 3B, so he's really just a LH backup 1B. Which is what we have Gload for.

Unless Gload or Howard get hurt, hard to see him making the team out of ST.

[mm]

In felix's defense, it also wouldn't be hard to argue that there were better blue jay's teams when doc was in Toronto then the 2010 Mariners. Don't buy the finding a way to win argument. This isn't basketball, or even hockey, where one guy can carry the team because you can play offense and defense.

[Ralph]

BL Consensus:

Larish is the next Dewayne Wise

[BowlCut]

Phils non roster st invitees...

Josh Barfield, INF
Eddie Bonine, RHP
Tagg Bozied, INF/OF
Ryan Feierabend, LHP
Erik Kratz, C
Jeff Larish, INF
Dan Meyer, LHP
Matt Miller, OF
Pete Orr, INF
Brandon Moss, OF
Juan Perez, LHP
Dane Sardinha, C

[pb]

clout "That said, he could hit 30 HRs if you gave him 500 ABs"

that's a little much, if that was the case he'd defintely still be in the AL.

[MG]

2nd Tiger they plucked this offseason already . . . wonder who is the scout or sr. guy assigned to keeping tabs on the Tigers.

[clout]

pb: Well, I did say "could" not "would."

As for teams not playing a guy who could give you 30 HRs if you gave him 500 ABs, I have two words: "Jack Cust"

[R.Billingsly]

He sounds like a scrappy student of the game, too.

Be careful. I've learned on BL that calling a white player "scrappy" and/or "student of the game" is inherently racist. Putting them together? Uh oh.

[Marc H]

I think that Brandon Moss was a good pick up; he could be one of those late-bloomer types

[MG]

http://zozone.mlblogs.com/archives/2010/11/phillies_add_five_players_to_4.html

No real surprises here except maybe for C. Hernandez last year at Williamsport. Others were De Fratus, Galvis, Garcia, Rizzotti.

Savery, Myers, and Gosewisch weren't selected.

[Andy]

I like Cesar Hernandez. He looks, um, como se dice "scrappy?"

[Bedrosian's Beard]

My wife enjoys the blind items and passed this one along:

4. "This professional athlete, who is based on the coast, is having an affair. What makes this interesting is that the athlete is supposedly very happy in his marriage. And he is cheating on his wife with someone they both know. His teammate. Yes, a man. We actually didn't know that the athlete had any interest in batting for the other team, so this is totally coming out of left field." [Blind Gossip]

[Andy]

BB - Ibanez and Werth linked again?

[Bedrosian's Beard]

http://larrybrownsports.com/everything-else/pat-burrell-supposedly-was-the-machine-in-brian-wilsons-video-interview/36779

[out of my league]

Ah, Jack Cust, source of many derisive comments from A's fans.

I'm not so sure he'd have hit 30 jacks this season even if he had gotten 500 AB's. His power was down some this season but his contact hitting was up.

In a hitters park (which the Coliseum isn't) Cust might bring more power, but he's not someone you want prowling the OF everyday or even every other day.

[Meyer]

Phillies signed another Scott Boras client?

[aksmith]

Andy LaRoche designated for assignment along with Zach Duke by the Pirates. I'm just sayin'.

Wonder if Duke wants to become a LOOGY?

[EastFallowfield]

Yo, new thread