At first glance it appears that the trade that brought veteran right-hander Joel Peralta and minor league left-hander Adam Liberatore to the Dodgers in exchange for hard-throwing right-hander Jose Dominguez and minor league right-hander Greg Harris to the Tampa Bay Rays is pretty much an even swap, with one glaring exception – age. The Rays got 24-year-old Dominguez and 20-year-old Harris, while the Dodgers got 27-year-old Liberatore and Peralta who is… well… let’s just say he’ll be 39 years old on opening day. But when you get past this rather significant age disparity it appears that the Dodgers may have drawn the longer straw in the deal.

Jose Dominguez has battled injuries and control issues in his short time in the major leagues.
(Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

Despite his age, Peralta put up decent numbers with the Rays in 2014. He appeared in 69 games (this following his American League-leading 80 games in 2013) and posted a 3-4 record with a mediocre 4.41 ERA. But what really jumps out at you are his strikeouts per nine innings (K/9), which is a Kershaw-like 10.5. In his 63.1 innings of work in 2014 Peralta struck out 75 while walking only 15 for an excellent K/BB ratio of 4.93 – that’s almost five strikeouts for every walk he allowed. He also posted a very impressive 1.184 WHIP last season.

Joel Peralta leads all of baseball with his 296 relief appearances between 2011 and 2014.
(Photo credit – Greg Fiume)

As for Liberatore, he posted an excellent 6-1 record and 1.66 ERA with the Triple-A Durham Bulls in 2014. He appeared in 54 games (all in relief) and pitched 65 innings striking out 86 while walking 15 for a K/9 of 8.9 and a K/BB ratio of 5.73. If one had to guess, it appears that the 27-year-old Bellflower, CA native may have been Dodgers President of Baseball Operations Andrew Friedman’s real target in this trade.

Harris, a 17th-round draft pick by the Dodgers in 2013 out of Los Alamitos High School in Southern California, went 7-6 with a 4.45 ERA with the Dodgers Low-Single-A Great Lakes Loons in 2014. He appeared in 22 games with the Loons having started 16 of them. He struck out 92 and walked 28 in his 121 innings of work. Needless to say, he is quite a workhorse – especially at only 20 years of age. As with Liberatore, Harris could very well have been new Rays general manager Matthew Silverman’s focus of this deal, although Low-A is a very long way from the big leagues. (Note: It was Silverman who replaced Friedman as the Rays GM when Friedman left to become the Dodgers top baseball ops executive. They are also very good friends).

This brings us to Jose Dominguez – the 24-year-old fireballer who many Dodger fans thought might be the next Guillermo Mota. Plagued by injuries, Dominguez appeared in only 14 games with the Dodgers over the 2013 and 2014 seasons. And though he never figured in a decision, he had a rather dismal 6.14 ERA and 1.636 WHIP in his 71 total innings of work. No one will argue that his ability to consistently hit 100-MPH with his fastball is impressive, but it is much like Mota’s fastball – flat with little movement and is very hittable.

This is an actual photograph of the Dodger Stadium radar gun taken during Dominguez’s MLB debut on June 30, 2013. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

Unfortunately, Dominguez has something else in common with Guillermo Mota, they were both suspended for using performance enhancing drugs twice – Mota in the big leagues and Dominguez in the minors. To his credit, Dominguez overcame his PED issues and eventually made his way to the big leagues, but one has to suspect that his indiscretions were never completely forgotten by several current and former Dodger executives.

Ironically, Dominguez has something in common with yet another former Dodger – this in a good way, a very good way.

“When I first saw [Dominguez] I thought ‘There’s my little Pedro [Martinez],'” said Dodgers bullpen coach Chuck Crim of Dominguez. “Their body types are similar and their deliveries are similar.”

Prior to his promotion as the Dodgers bullpen coach in 2013, Crim was the pitching coach for the Dodgers Double-A affiliate Chattanooga Lookouts when Dominguez came through the Dodgers farm system, so Crim was able to spend quite a bit of time working with the young San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic native. But the similarities between Pedro Martinez and “Little Pedro” pretty much end with their physical appearance. Martinez, a soon-to-be first-ballot Hall of Famer, spent his entire career as a starter whereas Dominguez has been used almost exclusively as a reliever throughout his professional career; not to mention the huge difference in their fastballs. Jose may have more velocity than Pedro did, but Pedro’s fastball had so much movement on it that it was almost like a slider – a 95+ MPH slider, that is.

The physical similarities between Pedro Martinez and Jose Dominguez are amazing. Their pitching – not so much.

Dominguez appeared in only five games for the Dodgers in 2014 in which he allowed eight runs on seven hits while striking out eight and walking three in 6.1 innings pitched. His ERA was a horrific 11.37 and his WHIP 1.579. In his final appearance on May 2 against the Marlins in Miami, Dominguez gave up two runs on three hits with a strikeout and a walk. Two days later he was optioned back to Triple-A Albuquerque to make room on the Dodgers 25-man roster for spot-starter Stephen Fife. Although no one knew it at the time, that May 2 appearance in Miami would be Dominguez’s last in a Dodger uniform.

Upon his return to Albuquerque Dominguez appeared in 31 games for the Isotopes posting a 1-2 record with an impressive 3.24 ERA. He struck out 39 and walked 18 while recording 10 saves. By all appearances, Dominguez was poised to return to the big leagues – and then disaster struck. On July 25 Dominguez was placed on the disabled list with right shoulder inflammation. After spending six weeks recovering at Camelback Ranch in Arizona, Dominguez attempted two rehab appearances with the Dodgers Rookie League Ogden Raptors which did not go well.

As the 2014 season was winding down, Dodgers manager Don Mattingly was asked if Dominguez might make it back to the Dodgers in time to be included on the playoff roster.

“I guess he would be sort of on the radar,” said Mattingly. “A week ago he wasn’t pitching, all of a sudden now he’s been throwing. So I would say he’s on our [40-man] roster, he’s a guy who’s been here before, he’s ready to roll. It depends on how he’s throwing [in Ogden] I guess, and if he’s able to bounce back and things like that I would think he would be on our radar, it’s a possibility.”

But Dominguez didn’t bounce back. He didn’t return to the Dodgers and wasn’t included on the playoff roster; and on Thursday evening, November 20, his career with the Dodgers ended when he was traded to the Tampa Bay Rays.

Although we won’t know for sure who actually got the better end of this deal until after spring training and into the 2015 season, it appears that Andrew Friedman’s first transaction with the Dodgers may have been a good one.

…at least for now.