Phils sign righthander Qualls
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Phils sign righthander Qualls
Daily News staff
Reliever Chad Qualls had a 3.51 ERA in 74.1 innings pitched in 2011. (Matt Slocum/AP Photo)
The Phillies have signed righthander Chad Qualls to a 1-year, $1.15 million contract, general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. announced today. The contract includes performance and awards bonuses.
Qualls, 33, was 6-8 with a 3.51 ERA in a team-high 77 games for the San Diego Padres last season. In his final 19 appearances, he had a 1.96 earned run average and held batters to a .219 batting average. Qualls made the eighth-most relief appearances among all major league pitchers last year.
Qualls has made more appearances (512) than any other major league pitcher since 2005 and ranks second in relief wins (34), trailing only Jesse Crain (38).
He was a second-round selection by the Houston Astros. His career record is 38-34 with 51 saves and a 3.78 ERA in 537 games for the Astros (2004-07), Arizona Diamondbacks (2008-10), Tampa Bay Rays (2010) and Padres (2011).
Comments (57)
Jose Contreras's real name is Napoleon Bonaparte Rey Salamon Desiderato Arnaz, and he's old enough to go on Social Security if the Phillies release him.— Dave Clemens- s, I posted last year during spring training that the Phils should trade Blanton while he was healthy and pitching well. It's been obvious for quite a while Blanton has been the most expendable of the Phils starting pitchers. If he's healthy and pitching well this spring, the Phils may have deju vu all over ahain and trade him. Funny things happen during spring training and many teams unexpectedly wind up looking for starting pitchers. I have always been a fan of Polanco and consider him one of the most competitive players in baseball. I think his injuries are behind him and he's going to have a great year offensively and defensively. I wouldn't be in any hurry to trade him, but you can never tell what the Phils front office might do. The Phils may very well add another big hitter before the season starts. Unfortunately, of all the infielders, Polanco has the shortest remaining contract, and if healthy, could still have surprising trade value. A competitor who has Gold Gloves at two different positions is the kind of player many teams will still be looking to add this spring. When the dust finally settles, I hope Polanco is still a Phil.— onthebucks
- it don't mean diddily-plop. old relievers come, old relievers go. sometimes they can develop a new pitch and go crazy for a year, or even a few months. last year, as well we know, the cardinals picked up a few cheap veterans who wound up winning them a ws. of course, they had a manager who. we got a manager what.— bubba church & granny hamner
- onthebucks, I agree on Polanco. Presuming he's healthy, 1 more year is fine. And Blanton is by far the worst signing Amaro's done. Not even a close second. Let's review: Three years, $24 million. The first year Blanton gets lucky with run support and goes 12-10, with a godawful 4.81 ERA. The second year, hey, 1-2 with an even-worse 5.01 ERA. But, he's white and overweight, like a lot of us, so poster dump on Howard, Rollins and Ibanez. Blanton's three-year deal was been a total bust. Anyone confident about a comeback 2012 should talk to me about some swampland I own in Jersey.
— eman - Keep up the solid Work RA !!!— john ullman
- is it my imagination or do the phillies now have set up men to set up the set up men to set up the set up men???— tmq
- eman - not everything is about "race" ... Blanton is completely useless and the contract was a waste of $24 million the day it was signed (except for people like so-called "dogbiscuit" who insisted that it was smart and not rube's fault that this terrific no. 5 starter got injured)--but worse then the waste of $24 mill, is that afer signing Blanton and then finding Halladay available the rube decided that he couldn't afford all 3 so he traded away
Lee for peanuts thus costing the Phils CLiff Lee for the 2009 season and a chance to win the 2009 WS and ultimately costing the Phils another 3 prospects that the clueless rube traded to get Oswalt to make up for loss of Lee -- a falling deck of cards whose effects are still being felt because then having to sign Lee as F.A. to try to undo Lee trade, Phils now will be unable to afford Hamels...only thing is that the Phils waste 5 times the Blanton contract numbers on Howard...— warbiscuit - "costing the Phils Lee for the 2010 season and a chance to win the 2010 WS"— warbiscuit
- is it my imagination or do the phillies now have set up men to set up the set up men to set up the set up men to..........?— tmq
- is it my imagination or do the phillies now have set up men to set up the set up men to set up the set up men to..........?— tmq
- eman - Your stats are off a bit. Blanton had a pretty good 2009 which was his first full year here. He went 12-8 and had a 4.05 ERA. A little better than your stats and not at all bad for a #4 or #5 guy in the rotation. It was that year that prompted the big contract. Plus he had gone 5-1 in Phillies post-season games and had several decent years in Oakland before we got him. All that undoubtedly factored into overpaying him. He's not the first one of course. Look at Brett Myers in 2007/2008 where he got 12m/8.5m. Not that this justifies another bad contract but pitchers often end up overpaid, particularly when they land on the DL like Blanton has the past 2 years (with no real injury history before that).
I agree that it's possible he's traded in spring training. I'm just not sure how likely that is since he really didn't pitch at all in 2011. If it happens, the Phillies will almost surely be paying part of his salary.
Here's the other factor: I like giving a young arm a shot in a #5 role as much as anyone. But Worley is a wildcard. Despite his 2011 success we really don't know what we have with him until we're a few months into 2012. With Oswalt gone, having two young guys in the rotation potentially struggling could be a problem. A guy like Blanton can offer more predictability there if he shows his old form and no injuries in spring training. Particularly when no one wants to take on his salary. I'm not endorsing that. Just explaining the logic of why they might keep him. If he really got back to form I think a trade by the trade deadline is more likely than a spring training trade. Kind of like we were hoping for last year and by then Worley would be much more of a known entity.— s - Everybody thinks they should of signed lidge instead. I truly think we didn't need him lodge or d-train. We have good young hard throwing guys ready now, defreatus,shimmer,diekman, and savory. Why do we continue to get older and worse from the previous yr.— phillyboyda1
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