Marlins - Signed a Bunch

Florida Marlins - Signed P Kerry Ligtenberg to a minor-league contract; signed P Joe Borowski, SS Pokey Reese, 3B Wes Helms, and C Miguel Olivo to 1-year contracts.

Larry Beinfest must have notified Jeff Loria that they still have to field a team for 162 games.  This is a pretty mixed bag.  Joe Borowski’s probably the best one here - I think he’s got pretty good odds at being better than Todd Jones in 2006.  Pokey Reese is probably the second baseman and the emergency option at short as the organization doesn’t have a lot of ready depth there.  Olivo is insurance as the Marlins decide to keep trying to see if Josh Willingham can catch.  Wes Helms is probably the worst of these signings - he doesn’t really hit to play 1st and he’s a terrible 3rd baseman; if the Marlins really needed that, they shouldn’t have let Joe Dillon go to Japan.

2006 ZiPS Projections
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Player         W   L   G  GS   IP    H   ER  HR  BB  SO   ERA
——————————————————————————————-

Borowski       3   2  48   0   48   45   22   5  16  40  4.13

Ligtenberg     4   3  53   0   60   57   26   7  16  55  3.90

2006 ZiPS Projections  
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Player        AB   R    H  2B 3B  HR RBI  BB  SO  SB    BA   OBP   SLG 
———————————————————————————————————

Helms        335  31   88  16  1  10  46  32  86   0  .263  .337  .406

Olivo        299  37   69  14  2   9  37  17  80   8  .231  .280  .381

Reese        288  24   63  11  1   3  25  29  70   6  .219  .291  .295