A shimmy for a curve: Mariners send Eric Filia to Boston to complete the Roenis Elías trade

If you’re not a big prospect follower, like myself, you probably breathe a sigh of relief any time the team acquires a living, breathing body for a player to be named later (PTBNL). More often than not you’ll forget about that IOU and go on with your life, until a few weeks/months/years later when the Mariners announce that they’ve sent Miscellaneous Youth Ballplayer #4 to another team to complete the aforementioned trade.

It was, therefore, somewhat surprising to get this little news nugget on an otherwise peaceful Tuesday afternoon:

Filia, as you may recall, started the whole Mariners-getting-suspended trend back in January, when he was suspended 50 games for smoking weed during his time off. He was a high-ranking prospect (haha high, get it?), but also a 25-year-old in AA due to a lil bit of plagiarism, a detour at the Playboy Mansion, and a whole lot of Life Happens. He was also notoriously beloved on this site for his charming pre-batter’s box shimmy, dedication to his family (per Art Warren on the LL Podcast he turned down a promotion last season to stay near his twin baby boys), and, yes, his baseball hitting acumen.

Per Ryan Divish, the Red Sox opted to take Filia over a cash option. He (Filia, not Divish - never leave us, you cantankerous Grizzly) was apparently the agreed-upon return when the trade initially went down, but they waited until he came back from his suspension to make it official. It’s tough to imagine a more impressive return than Filia’s .426/.508/.537 in the first 13 games back, but it’s also tough to picture where Filia slots into the future of the Red Sox roster.

Additionally, because you went to the effort of clicking on this post, here’s a fun fact about Dave Winfield from the PTBNL Wikipedia page: