Juan Acevedo was a decent Tiger closer for terrible Tiger
team. Juan was born in Mexico. He went to high school in the US and also
college in the US. After college he
played with the Colorado Rockies farm system for a few years before making his
major league debut in 1995 with the Rockies.
That year he was mainly a starter.
He then bounced around to the Mets, Cardinals still as a starter until
2000 when the Brewers used him exclusively as a bull pen man. He returned to Colorado in 2001 but still was
not very successful. He had an ERA of
5.63 and no saves. In fact, in all his
seasons up to this point in his career his best year had been an 8-3 season
with a 2.56 ERA. Most of his other years
he did not have a winning record and often above 4 or even 5. So in August of 2001 the Rockies traded him
again but this time to the Florida Marlins.
He immediately dropped his ERA to 2.54 playing in Miami. But at the end of the season the Marlins did
not resign Juan and let him sign with the Tigers to a one year minor league
contract. He was a non roster invitee to
spring training in 2002 and made the team.
On opening day Juan took the loss to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Matt Miller had blown the save opportunity
and Juan took over and pitched 2.1 innings of relief of a tie game and was not
stellar giving up 3 runs in those 2.1 innings.
The Tigers were a bad team in 2002.
They would lose 100 games. They
did not get save until May 1. That save
went to Juan. He was then the closer for
Tigers for the rest of the season. He
would get 28 of the Tigers 33 saves that season and put up an ERA of 2.65. But at the end of the season the Tigers did
not resign the 32 year old rightie.
Instead he signed with the Yankees for 2003. But he lost his form in New York and after 6
saves in 26 games and a 7.71 ERA he was cut by the Yankees and signed with
Toronto. That was the end of his major
league career. After that Juan went back
to Mexico and pitched in the Mexican Leagues for another 10 years before ending
his career in 2013.
Ramon Pena
Dave Gumpert
Don Buddin
Henri Rondeau
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