Mark Melancon Is a Good Pickup for Boston Red Sox, but Nick Punto Is Not

Yesterday, the Boston Red Sox made some moves, signing Houston Astros reliever Mark Melancon and St. Louis Cardinals utility man Nick Punto.

My first reaction to this…Nick Punto? Who cares? A crappy utility man with a .249 average in 11 major league seasons? How is this guy still even bouncing around the bigs.

I’m over this move. I’m not going to cry over two years and $3 million in spilled milk.

Picking up Mark Melancon was a move that I like, however. I’ll  be the first to admit that I haven’t watched a whole lot of Melancon. It’s generally difficult for me to care about the Astros, or any other 56-win team for that matter. What everybody knows by now is that Melancon converted 20-of-25 saves opportunities for the Astros last season while racking up a 2.78 ERA. I like the ERA, but a 80 percent save conversion rate isn’t so hot.

What I’m more excited about is the fact that we got Melancon, who is at least a solid reliever whether he closes or not, for only Jed Lowrie and Kyle Wieland, neither of whom I get excited about.

The scouting report of Melancon is pretty basic—he’s got a plus-fastball (low to mid-90's) and curveball, and made huge strides with a splitter last year. Last season he threw 68 percent fastballs, 24 percent breaking balls and seven percent changeups. He’s known as being tough and confident—while Daniel Bard has better stuff, Melancon likely has a better head on his shoulders for pressure situations.

At 26 years old he’s young, hungry and you know he’s got to be psyched to land in Boston. He’ll help bring some competition to the closer role, creating competition being a preliminary focus of Bobby Valentine’s. The Red Sox have him locked up for at least the next four seasons, and I’m excited to see what he can bring to the mound at Fenway.

Sorry Ben Cherington, I’m not sold on Punto. But you get a plus-one for the day for the Melancon signing.

Geoff Roberts is the founder and managing editor of howiGit.com, a Boston sports blog.