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White Sox Claim Ryan Noda, Designate Joshua Palacios For Assignment

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The White Sox announced that they have claimed first baseman Ryan Noda off waivers from the Red Sox and optioned him to Triple-A Charlotte. Boston had designated him for assignment a few days ago. Outfielder Joshua Palacios has been designated for assignment to open a 40-man spot. Infielder Brooks Baldwin has been recalled to take the active roster spot of Palacios. There was also a swap on the pitching side, with left-hander Tyler Gilbert reinstated from the injured list and righty Owen White optioned as the corresponding move.

Noda, 29, has an extreme profile. He strikes out a lot but also draws plenty of walks and has some pop. He has done that all throughout his minor league career and then showed it at the big league level in 2023 after the A’s grabbed him from the Dodgers in the Rule 5 draft. He got into 128 games and stepped to the plate 495 times. He struck out in 34.3% of those plate appearances but also walked at a massive 15.6% clip and hit 16 home runs. That all added up to a .229/.364/.406 line and 122 wRC+.

Last year, he got out to a rough start and ended up getting optioned to the minors for most of the year. The A’s put him on waivers at the end of the season, with the Angels putting in a claim. He was designated for assignment about a month ago and got flipped to the Red Sox in a cash deal. Both the Angels and the Red Sox kept him on optional assignment.

His minor league numbers have continued along with Noda’s usual style. Dating back to the start of last year, he has 655 Triple-A plate appearances with 29 homers, a 20.2% walk rate and a 30.4% strikeout rate.

The White Sox came into this year with Andrew Vaughn as their primary first baseman. He struggled badly enough to get optioned to the minors a few weeks back. Earlier today, the Sox flipped him to the Brewers for Aaron Civale and cash. Tim Elko has been getting a lot of the playing time at first lately but is hitting .155/.222/.379. If that continues, perhaps the Sox will make a switch.

Palacios, 29, signed a minor league deal and then was added to the roster in April. He has 145 plate appearances so far this year with a .203/.292/.305 line. That now gives him a career .223/.287/.349 batting line and 75 wRC+.

Since he’s out of options, he can’t be easily sent down to the minors. He’ll now be in DFA limbo, which can last for at most a week. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so the Sox could take five days to try to line up a trade. He cleared waivers back in March and hasn’t done much to improve his stock since then, so the level of interest should be low. If he clears waivers, he will have the right to elect free agency.

Photo courtesy of Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images

Red Sox Acquire Jorge Alcala

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June 12: The trade is now official, with both teams formally announcing the move late last night.

June 11: The Red Sox are acquiring right-hander Jorge Alcala from the Twins, as first reported by Phil Miller of the Star Tribune. Chris Cotillo of MassLive reports that infield/outfield prospect Andy Lugo is headed to Minnesota in return for Alcala’s services. The Athletic’s Dan Hayes reports that no cash is being sent from the Twins to Boston in the deal. Both teams subsequently announced the deal officially, and Boston designated right-hander Brian Van Belle for assignment to create room for Alcala on the 40-man roster.

According to The Athletic’s Aaron Gleeman, the Twins were planning to designate Alcala for assignment in the coming days, and after the club claimed southpaw Joey Wentz off waivers earlier today it’s fairly easy to surmise that the decision to part with Alcala was motivated by a desire to make room for Wentz on the active roster. By trading for Alcala preemptively, the Red Sox were able to bypass the waiver process in order and add the right-hander to their bullpen more directly. Even if the Twins were planning to part ways with Alcala prior to this trade, it’s clear that the Red Sox were very interested in the 29-year-old righty given that they gave up a low-level prospect to acquire him and took on the remainder of Alcala’s $1.5MM salary for this year despite the fact that most trades of DFA candidates wind up being cash deals.

Looking just at Alcala’s surface-level numbers, it may be hard to see why the Red Sox would be enamored with him. Across 22 appearances with Minnesota this year, he’s pitched to an 8.88 ERA with a 5.42 FIP and an elevated 13.2% walk rate. Those numbers are certainly concerning, but Alcala’s 24.6% strikeout rate has remained quite good even in this down season and he entered the year with a career 3.64 ERA and 4.33 FIP. His 2024 campaign was even better, as he posted a 3.24 ERA and 4.14 FIP in 58 1/3 innings of work during a season where his walk rate sat at a much more manageable 8.5%. Alcala’s .369 BABIP allowed and 52.6% strand rate are both certain to improve over a larger sample size, and if the Red Sox can help restore his command it’s not at all difficult to see them making him into a viable option for the middle innings of even a setup role.

That would be a fantastic development for Boston if it were to come to fruition, as they’re without Justin Slaten and Liam Hendriks while both are on the injured list. That’s left them a bit weak from the right side, with Garrett Whitlock and Greg Weissert forced to step into high leverage roles. Zack Kelly is currently in the club’s bullpen despite a 6.61 ERA, and the club has zero full-time relievers who throw from the right-hand side on the 40-man roster in the minors at the moment. The depth Alcala could provide to the bullpen if he manages to get right is considerable, and it was enough of an upgrade that the Red Sox opted to DFA Van Belle just one day after adding him to the roster. The Red Sox will have one week to either trade Van Belle, who has still not yet made his big league debut despite his brief call-up, or put him through waivers.

Heading to Minnesota in return for Alcala’s services is Lugo. The 21-year-old has been in the Red Sox organization since 2022 and is currently hitting .265/.327/.430 across 44 games at the High-A level. He’s split time between first base, third base, and left field throughout his pro career to this point, but is unranked on MLB.com’s Top 30 Red Sox Prospects list. That’s not necessarily a shock given his age and the fact that he’s not yet reached to the Double-A level, but it’s not impossible to imagine him getting called up to Double-A by the end of the year now that he’s in the Twins organization, so long as he can continue hitting fairly well in his new organization.

MLBTR Podcast: White Sox Ownership, Roman Anthony, And The Diamondbacks’ Rotation

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Steve Adams of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

Plus, we answer your questions, including…

  • Do the Mariners need a left-hander in the rotation? (40:45)
  • What will the Braves do with the rest of the season and would they trade Chris Sale? (45:30)
  • With the Mets seemingly having too many young infielders, who stays and who goes? (53:35)

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

Photo courtesy of Kamil Krzaczynski, Imagn Images

Red Sox Outright Robert Stock

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The Red Sox announced today that right-hander Robert Stock cleared waivers and has been outrighted to Triple-A. He was designated for assignment by the club earlier this week.

It’s the second time the 35-year-old has been outrighted to the minors by Boston this year. He previously threw two innings for the club in an appearance earlier this year and was outrighted off the 40-man roster shortly thereafter. It was a similar story this time around, as he spent just two days on the roster and made a single appearance before being cut from the club’s roster.

Drafted by the Cardinals in the second round of the 2009 draft, Stock didn’t make his big league debut until he was with San Diego in 2018. Stock was nothing short of excellent in his first taste of the majors with a 2.50 ERA and 2.71 FIP across 39 2/3 frames. Unfortunately, he’s never come close to that in the majors in the years since. While pitching for the Padres, Red Sox, Cubs, and Mets from 2019 to 2021, he surrendered a 7.36 ERA and 5.50 FIP in 33 innings of work. Following the 2021 season, Stock departed affiliated ball to pitch as a starter for the KBO League’s Doosan Bears throughout the 2022 campaign.

That stop in South Korea went fairly well for Stock, as he posted a 3.60 ERA in 165 innings of work. Even that solid figure pales in comparison to the top imported arms in the KBO league, though, so it wasn’t exactly a shock when he didn’t return to the Bears for 2023. Instead, he wound up pitching for the Atlantic League’s Long Island Ducks and the Mexican League’s Tecolotes de los Dos Laredos (along with a brief stint in the Brewers’ minor league system) in 2023 and ’24 before he settled back in with the Red Sox at Triple-A Worcester this year. He’s posted a 3.09 ERA for the WooSox in 55 1/3 innings of work across 12 appearances last year, nine of which have been starts.

Those strong results at Triple-A obviously haven’t translated to results at the big league level, where Stock has surrendered three runs in 2 2/3 innings of work this year while walking four batters and striking out just one. Lackluster as Stock’s results have been at the big league level, however, there’s always a place for a versatile veteran capable of eating innings out of either the rotation or bullpen as necessary on a club’s minor league depth chart. Given that, it’s hardly shocking that the Red Sox decided to outright the right-hander to the minors and keep him in the fold as an emergency depth option who they can call back up to the majors when they need an extra arm to provide some length out of the bullpen or an emergency starter. Until that happens or the 2025 campaign comes to a close, Stock figures to remain a member of the Triple-A pitching staff who provides non-roster depth for Boston going forward.

Red Sox Promote Roman Anthony

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It’s finally Roman Anthony time. The Red Sox announced that the top prospect in baseball has been selected to the roster. Fellow outfielder Wilyer Abreu has been placed on the 15-day injured list with a left oblique strain. First baseman/outfielder Ryan Noda has been designated for assignment to open a 40-man spot.

Anthony, now 21, has been at or near the top of prospect lists for a while now. The Sox grabbed him with the 79th overall pick in 2022, a compensation pick they received after Eduardo Rodríguez rejected a qualifying offer and signed with the Tigers.

After a brief professional debut in that 2022 season, he took off in 2023. He climbed from Single-A to High-A to Double-A, putting up a combined .272/.403/.466 line and 140 wRC+. That made him a consensus top 25 prospect in the sport coming into 2024. He raised his stock even higher last year, slashing .291/.396/.498 for a 147 wRC+ between Double-A and Triple-A.

In addition to that work at the plate, Anthony tallied double-digit stolen base totals in both 2023 and 2024. He is also considered a strong outfield defender. By the end of 2024, he was already the #1 prospect in the league for some outlets. Some publications bumped him to #2 once Roki Sasaki was signed by the Dodgers, though others kept Anthony in the top spot.

Between Anthony, Kristian Campbell, Marcelo Mayer, and Kyle Teel, the Sox had four tremendous prospects generating excitement this past offseason. The four were often mentioned in trade rumors and Teel was eventually flipped to the White Sox as part of the Garrett Crochet deal, though the other three remained and still provided a lot of optimism about the future.

Coming into 2025, with that hype and already having 35 big league games under his belt, a quick promotion for Anthony seemed possible. However, his time in Triple-A has dragged on, despite murmuring from all corners of the baseball world.

Initially, some of that was justified. He was dealing with some shoulder soreness in April and spent some time where he was only serving as the designated hitter and not playing the field. But that quickly passed and he kept putting up huge numbers at the plate. The question then became one of playing time in Boston. The Sox have spent most of this year with a crowded outfield mix consisting of Abreu, Jarren Duran and Ceddanne Rafaela, with Rob Refsnyder and Campbell also factoring in.

That didn’t leave a clean path for Anthony to get playing time, especially with Rafael Devers taking up the designated hitter spot on an everyday basis. Still, many were calling for the Sox to simply call him up and figure it out.

Those calls grew louder when the Sox lost both of their corner infielders. First, Triston Casas suffered a season-ending knee injury. That led to much speculation about Devers getting plugged in at first in order to open at-bats for Anthony, or perhaps Anthony taking first base himself. Understandably, the Sox didn’t want to mess with Anthony’s development as an outfielder, so they never gave much consideration to that. Devers was unwilling to try his hand at first base. Then third baseman Alex Bregman went on the IL with a quad injury that could keep him out for a couple of months, but the Sox never seemed to really consider the possibility of asking Devers about going back there.

As all that was going on, Anthony continued to put up massive numbers for Worcester. As of today, he has a .288/.423/.491 line and 146 wRC+. He has ten home runs and three steals in 58 games. His 19.2% walk rate is almost as high as his 21.1% strikeout rate. Now, finally, it seems like this Abreu injury will open the door for him to get to the big leagues.

As the season drags along, the playing time puzzle might return. That will depend on Abreu’s injury and how long it will take him to get back. At some point, maybe Masataka Yoshida will finally get healthy and re-enter the equation.

It’s possible things will work out organically. Other injuries may arise before those guys heal up. Anthony might struggle, as even the best prospects can sometimes need a bit of time to get their feet wet in the big leagues. Campbell also followed a hot April with a rough May. If he doesn’t get back on track, perhaps he could get optioned to the minors with Rafaela moving to the infield. But on the other hand, Rafaela is the best defensive center fielder of the bunch. Duran and Anthony can play up the middle but each is considered a better fit for a corner. There’s also the shortstop question, as Trevor Story has been heating up of late but is having a bad season overall. Mayer is up to cover for Bregman at third but hasn’t quite fully clicked in the big leagues yet.

There will also be long-term things to be sorted out. The crowded outfield situation has led to trade rumors surrounding Duran. Bregman could opt out after this season and it’s unclear if the Sox would be willing to return Devers to that spot. Casas is expected back by next year’s spring training but he has also been in trade rumors. Devers isn’t willing to play there now but perhaps he would be more amenable with an offseason to prepare. Campbell has dabbled with some first base drills but hasn’t officially played there yet.

In time, there should be more clarity on the club’s long-term plans. For now, Sox fans can get excited about Anthony’s emergence and hope that it helps turn around a middling season. The Sox are currently 32-35, fourth in the American League East and four games back of a Wild Card spot. Even if they can’t engineer a comeback this year, players like Anthony, Mayer, Campbell, Rafael, Duran, Abreu and others can be affordably controlled for years to come, giving the club an exciting core to build around.

As a consensus top prospect, Anthony is eligible for the prospect promotion incentive. Since the Sox didn’t promote him early enough to get a full service year the traditional way, they won’t be able to earn an extra draft pick based on awards voting this year. Anthony can technically earn himself a full year of service time by finishing in the top two of Rookie of the Year voting, though that will be tough to do. Players like Jacob Wilson, Shane Smith and even Anthony’s teammate Carlos Narváez have a big headstart on him. Even if he performs well, it would be hard to catch up to those guys with more than a third of the season already in the books.

If Anthony manages to pull that off, he would hasten his path to free agency by a year. Otherwise, he would be on pace to hit the open market after 2031 at the earliest, though future optional assignments could also impact that timeline.

Noda, 29, was just acquired from the Angels a few weeks ago in a cash deal. He’s a three true outcomes guy, with lots of homers and walks but also strikeouts. In 606 big league plate appearances, he has a 34.2% strikeout rate, 15% walk rate and 17 homers. That adds up to a .212/.344/.369 line and 107 wRC+. Dating back to the start of 2022, he has 574 minor league plate appearances with 25 home runs, a 16% walk rate and 28.2% strikeout rate. That leads to a .259/.395/.474 line and 125 wRC+.

The Sox grabbed him for extra first base depth with the Casas injury but now risk losing him. DFA limbo can last as long as a week but the waiver process takes 48 hours, so Boston could take five days to explore trade interest. He is still optionable for the rest of this year and one additional season. If he were to pass through waivers unclaimed, he would stick with the Sox as non-roster depth.

Christopher Smith of MassLive first reported that Anthony was being promoted. A few minutes earlier, Chris Cotillo of MassLive reported that a promotion was possible. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic first noted that Abreu was going on the IL, though Alex Speier of The Boston Globe had previously suggested that an IL stint for Abreu was likely.

Photos courtesy of Ashley Green, Imagn Images

Red Sox Designate Robert Stock For Assignment, Select Brian Van Belle

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The Red Sox announced that they have selected the contract of right-hander Brian Van Belle. He will take the roster spot of fellow righty Robert Stock, who has been designated for assignment.

Stock, 35, was just added to the roster a couple of days ago. Facing the Yankees on Friday, starter Walker Buehler only lasted two innings, in a game that finished in a 9-6 loss. Zack Kelly and Brennan Bernardino came in after Buehler before Cooper Criswell mopped up the final three frames.

Criswell likely wasn’t going to be available for a few days, so the Sox optioned him down and brought up Stock to give the bullpen a fresh arm. In last night’s 11-7 victory over the Yanks, the Sox used eight pitchers to get the necessary 27 outs, leaving them in a somewhat taxed position going into tonight’s contest against the Rays.

Stock was one of those eight pitchers and he wasn’t terribly efficient. He was put into the game in the bottom of the ninth with an 11-5 lead. He faced six batters, only retiring two of them, while throwing 30 pitches. Closer Aroldis Chapman had to come in and get the final out.

That’ll get Stock bumped off the roster for the second time this year. He signed a minor league deal with the Sox in the winter and was also called up in April, under somewhat similar circumstances. Boston had just played a doubleheader and wanted a fresh arm. Stock made one appearance and was designated for assignment right after. He cleared waivers and stuck with the club, which allowed him to come back up in recent days. It’s possible that the same sequence of events plays out in the coming days. Stock has a 10.13 earned run average in those two big league outings this year but a solid 3.09 ERA in Triple-A.

Van Belle, 28, has never been a huge name among prospect evaluators but is having a good season. An undrafted free agent in 2020, he has climbed the minor league ladder and been in Triple-A since 2023. This year, he has logged 51 innings over eight starts and four relief appearances with a 2.29 ERA. His 20% strikeout rate isn’t strong but his 3.4% walk rate is tiny and he’s been getting ground balls on 51.7% of balls in play.

As mentioned, the pitching staff got a lot of work yesterday. Van Belle will replace Stock and give the club a fresh arm capable of tossing multiple innings. He’ll be making his major league debut as soon as he gets into a game.

Photo courtesy of David Butler II, Imagn Images

Red Sox Select Robert Stock, Place Josh Winckowski On 60-Day IL

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The Red Sox announced this afternoon that they’ve selected the contract of Robert Stock. Right-hander Cooper Criswell was optioned to the minors to make room on the active roster, as was previously reported by Ian Browne of MLB.com. Making room for Stock on the 40-man roster is right-hander Josh Winckowski, who was recalled to the majors and placed on the 60-day injured list with a flexor strain in his right elbow.

Stock, 35, joins the Red Sox bullpen for the second time this year. He previously threw two innings for the club in an appearance earlier this year but was outrighted off the 40-man roster shortly thereafter. A second-round pick by the Cardinals all the way back in 2009, Stock didn’t debut in the majors until 2018 as a member of the Padres. He turned in a dominant showing during his first year in the majors, with a 2.50 ERA and 2.71 FIP across 39 2/3 innings of work, but has never reached those heights since. He bounced between San Diego, Boston, Chicago, and Queens over the next three seasons but didn’t get much in the way of results with a 7.36 ERA (5.50 FIP) in 33 frames between 2019 and 2021.

Following the 2021 season, Stock departed affiliated ball to pitch as a starter for the KBO League’s Doosan Bears in 2022. He posted a 3.60 ERA in 165 innings of work but did not remain in Asia beyond that season, instead returning to North America to pitch for the Atlantic League’s Long Island Ducks and the Mexican League’s Tecolotes de los Dos Laredos. Stock finally returned to affiliated ball with the Red Sox on a minor league deal this year, where he’s pitched to a 3.09 ERA in 55 1/3 innings of work at Triple-A in addition to his brief stint in the majors. Now he’ll once again be tasked with helping fill the gaps in the Red Sox pitching staff, and perhaps can provide some length for the club out of the bullpen.

Making room for Stock on the active roster is Criswell, a right-hander with a similar ability to pitch in a variety of roles. After spending parts of three seasons with the Angels and Rays early in his career, Stock arrived in Boston last year settled into a swing role with the big league club that saw him pitch to a solid 4.08 ERA (104 ERA+) with a 4.15 FIP in 99 1/3 innings last year. Those frames were split between the bullpen and rotation, with 18 of his 26 MLB appearances last year being starts. Things haven’t gone as well for Criswell this year, however as he’s struggled badly in six innings with eight runs (five earned) allowed and as many walks (two) as he has strikeouts. He’ll head to Triple-A where the Red Sox will try to help him get right so he can contribute to the pitching staff later in the season.

Meanwhile, Stock will take the 40-man roster spot of Winckowski. The right-hander debuted with the Red Sox back in 2022 as a back-end starter but since then has been a very effective multi-inning reliever, with a 3.51 ERA and 4.10 FIP in 172 innings since the start of the 2023 campaign. That includes a 3.86 ERA in six outings for the big league club earlier this year, but he’s been at Triple-A for over a month now. Winckowski last appeared in a Triple-A game on May 11 and had been on the shelf in the minors with elbow inflammation, but the club clearly does not expect him back any time soon as he’ll now not be eligible to return from the shelf until early August.

Red Sox Outright Blake Sabol

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The Red Sox have sent utility player Blake Sabol outright to Triple-A Worcester, per Tim Healey of The Boston Globe. That indicates he cleared waivers after being designated for assignment a few days ago.

Sabol, 27, was acquired from the Giants in January. He had been designated for assignment by that club but some international bonus pool space was sent from Boston to San Francisco in order to add Sabol to the Red Sox’ roster. That gave the Sox some extra depth at various positions, with Sabol capable of playing catcher, first base and the outfield.

Boston started the year with Connor Wong and Carlos Narváez as their big league catching duo, with Sabol optioned to Worcester. Wong suffered a finger fracture a week into April. That got Sabol up to the majors for close to a month while Wong recovered. However, they didn’t put him in the lineup often, as he only got into eight games and was only sent to the plate 18 times. He struck out seven times, a 38.9% clip, and produced a line of .125/.167/.188.

Sabol was once a nice Rule 5 pickup of the Giants. Going into 2023, he was technically plucked from the Pirates by the Reds, but Cincinnati flipped him to San Francisco for cash. He went on to appear in 110 games for the Giants that year, slashing .235/.301/.394 for a wRC+ of 91 while splitting his time between catcher and left field.

It seemed like he had a path to being a useful utility player but it hasn’t quite panned out that way. He spent most of last year on optional assignment, having a fine-but-unexceptional season. He slashed .246/.340/.388 for a wRC+ of 96 at the Triple-A level and was only called up for 11 big league games. In his 25 Triple-A games this year, he has a .193/.304/.341 line while striking out in a third of his trips to the plate.

The 29 other clubs passed on the chance to grab Sabol off waivers. Since this is his first career outright and he has less than three years of service time, he doesn’t have the right to reject the outright assignment. He’ll stick with the Sox as non-roster depth and try to earn his way back to the majors.

Narváez and Wong are the only two catchers on the 40-man so Boston is probably happy that Sabol is sticking around as non-roster depth. Yasmani Grandal was in Triple-A on a minor league deal but it seems like he might be retiring.

Photo courtesy of Eric Canha, Imagn Images

MLBTR Podcast: Jarren Duran Rumors, Caglianone And Young Promoted, And Pitching Injuries

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Steve Adams of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

Plus, we answer your questions, including…

  • If the Diamondbacks can’t climb in the standings, what does their deadline look like? (48:45)
  • As a thought experiment, if the Orioles were willing to listen on Gunnar Henderson, what teams would even have the pieces to pull off a trade? (54:10)

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

Photo courtesy of Brett Davis, Imagn Images

Yasmani Grandal Steps Away From Red Sox

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Yasmani Grandal informed the Red Sox’s Triple-A team that he is stepping away from his minor league deal. Grandal did not officially announce his retirement, but it appears he’s leaning that way.

“At the moment, it looks like he’s probably going to walk away and potentially hang them up,” Triple-A manager Chad Tracy told MassLive’s Katie Morrison-O’Day on Tuesday. “We talked (Monday), and I knew he was going to pack up and go…his response was ‘it’s time to be dad.’” The Sox technically placed him on the restricted list, according to the MLB.com transaction log. Francys Romero confirms that Grandal does not intend to return to the Boston organization.

Grandal signed a minor league deal with the Sox in mid-April. He bypassed a contractual opt-out on May 1 and ultimately appeared in 23 games for Worcester. While he posted a decent .256/.372/.397 batting line, the Sox have a more locked-in catching duo than they did at the time he signed. Connor Wong had just broken his finger. Carlos Narváez was playing in front of Blake Sabol. Wong returned on May 2, while Narváez has impressed enough to take over as the primary catcher. Sabol was recently designated for assignment, so Grandal would probably have been the first one up in the event of an injury, but that was his only real path to the big leagues.

If this is the end of his playing days, he’ll walk away as one of the more productive catchers of his generation. Grandal was a two-time All-Star who twice received down-ballot MVP votes. He has spent parts of 13 seasons in the big leagues. A first-round pick by the Reds in 2010, he was dealt to San Diego as a prospect in a blockbuster deal for Mat Latos. Grandal played parts of three seasons with the Padres before he was packaged in another significant trade, moving to the Dodgers alongside then-prospect Zach Eflin for Matt Kemp.

Grandal arguably did his best work in a Dodger uniform. He hit .238/.337/.453 while grading as an elite pitch framer over four seasons. He played one All-Star season with the Brewers before joining the White Sox on a four-year, $73MM free agent deal. The contract didn’t end well, but he posted a career-best .420 on-base percentage over 93 games in 2021. His most recent (and potentially final) MLB work came with the Pirates last season, when he hit .228/.304/.400 across 72 contests as the veteran in a catching group that also included Joey Bart and Henry Davis.

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