About 16 months after he signed Joe Blanton to a two-year $15 million deal, Jerry Dipoto cut his – and the Angels’ – losses.
The Angels general manager released the embattled right-hander Wednesday morning, a quick and somewhat predictable end to his tenure with the club.
“It’s regrettable,” Dipoto said. “It’s a mistake on my part. There is no one else to blame. I made the call on signing Joe Blanton and bringing him in. Obviously, this isn’t the way he wanted it to work out. It’s not the way I wanted it to work out.”
Blanton went 2-14 with a 6.04 ERA in 2013, the worst season of his nine-year career. Despite better conditioning and numerous changes to his delivery, Blanton had a 7.08 ERA this spring.
“Coming to spring training, we just wanted to see some adjustment, some type of move forward, an improvement in performance that led us to believe something better was coming,” Dipoto said. “We just didn’t see that.”
The Angels delivered the news to Blanton on the day of their final Cactus League game, and he was gone from the clubhouse before the Angels announced the transaction. Blanton did not immediately reply to messages.
Manager Mike Scioscia said Blanton “understands” why it came to this.
“We’ve all been in this together with Joe the last year,” Scioscia said. “We all shared the frustration. There is not a guy in that clubhouse that works harder than Joe in trying to improve and keeping himself in shape. It’s unfortunate that the results of his hard work didn’t translate last year into production.”
Dipoto also had some emphathy for the criticism that Blanton endured.
“Joe didn’t come in here and try to pitch poorly,” Dipoto said. “He came in here and did what he can do. He worked hard. He was in the weight room all the time. I have not met the player in my life that goes out with the intention of not performing well. It just didn’t work out here for Joe. That’s the way it goes.”
The Angels will eat the remaining $8.5 million of Blanton’s deal, which includes a $1 million buyout of a 2015 option. If another team signs Blanton and he pitches in the majors, that team will assume a pro-rated portion of the major league minimum salary of $500,000.
Considering the need for pitching in the majors, it is likely Blanton will get at least a minor league deal and a chance to earn his way back to the majors.
“It’s definitely for his benefit if he gets a look to go somewhere else right now,” Scioscia said.
This resolution of Blanton’s situation seemed to be a distinct possibility as far back as December, when the Angels acquired Hector Santiago and Tyler Skaggs. They were plugged into a rotation including returnees Jered Weaver, C.J. Wilson and Garrett Richards.
The Angels kept Blanton on the roster in case Skaggs, 22, proved to need more seasoning or one of the starters got hurt. The Angels also hoped that if Blanton had a good spring he could be traded, just as Vernon Wells was in 2013.
Blanton, 33, arrived in camp in the best shape of his career – a cliché, but in this case clearly true – and with some mechanical adjustments he’d made since losing his rotation spot last summer. Midway through camp he made the drastic change of going to the third base side of the rubber for the first time in his career.
He provided some glimmer of hope when he threw five scoreless innings against the Texas Rangers in his first game from the third base side of the rubber, but he gave up seven runs in his next two games.
“He came to spring training and we gave him every opportunity to show us improvement and that we were a better team with him,” Dipoto said. “Today’s decision is suggesting that we don’t feel that’s the case.”
NOTES
Sean Burnett is continuing to throw despite disappointing results in his latest bullpen session Tuesday. Burnett, who had elbow surgery last summer, threw all of his pitches but didn’t feel as good as he or the Angels had hoped.
“That last 5 percent of rehab is the toughest and that’s where Sean is now,” Scioscia said. “What he’s experiencing is totally different than what he had last year, but he still has to work through some stuff.” …
Dane De La Rosa is scheduled to pitch in a minor league game Thursday, his first competitive outing since suffering a strained forearm March 6. De La Rosa is not expected to be ready by opening day Monday, but he could be shortly after. He could be activated from the disabled list as soon as April 5. …
Blanton had been scheduled to start Friday’s Freeway Series game at Dodger Stadium, which would allow Richards and Skaggs to have less extra rest before their first start of the regular season. Now, Richards will start Friday and Skaggs on Saturday, and each pitcher will have seven days before his first regular season start.
