Latest On Twins’ Front Office Search
9:34pm: ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick reports (via Twitter) that while Mets assistant GM John Ricco has recently been linked to the Twins’ job, Ricco is no longer in the running at this point. Berardino adds to that report, tweeting that Ricco was never under heavy consideration.
9:28am: The Twins appear to be homing in on a handful of possibilities for their open president of baseball operations position, as Mike Berardino of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press reports. Though the team could still conduct interviews with additional executives, it may be that the slate of candidates is already set, he adds on Twitter.
One outside option who has impressed, per Buster Olney of ESPN.com (Twitter link), is Cubs vice president of player development and amateur scouting Jason McLeod. He is “well-regarded” and “well-positioned” in the Twins’ search after impressing in his early interactions with Minnesota’s top brass, according to the report.
McLeod obviously isn’t the only highly-regarded young executive under consideration. Prior reports have suggested that Rays AGM Chaim Bloom, Indians AGM Derek Falvey, and Royals AGM J.J. Picollo are also in the discussion.
Then, there’s sitting Twins interim GM Rob Antony, who rounds out the five names known to be in the hunt. Per Berardino, he’s the only internal candidate who will receive an interview. The club did consider VP of player personnel Mike Radcliff, scouting director Deron Johnson, and special assistant (and former Reds GM) Wayne Krivsky, but elected not to hold meetings with them.
Pirates Have Made Extension Offers To Ivan Nova
Ivan Nova has been a revelation in the Pirates’ rotation since being acquired for a pair of minor leaguers (Stephen Tarpley and Tito Polo), and Bill Brink of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that Pittsburgh is already working to prevent Nova from reaching the open market. The Pirates have made a pair of extension offers to Nova, according to Brink, but Nova’s representatives with the Legacy Agency opened talks with an asking price of $70MM over five years.
While that’s a shocking number, to be sure, given Nova’s lack of a track record, it’s not surprising to see any agency come in with high starting point. (Conversely, while Brink doesn’t report the size of Pittsburgh’s early offer, one can only imagine that it was probably considerably lower than the top of their comfort zone and than Nova’s market value.) Brink does note that the Pirates were the ones to initiate talks with Nova’s camp in the first week of September, and they came back with an increased counter-offer after hearing the early asking price. While Brink doesn’t indicate that anything is close between the two sides, discussions are still alive at this juncture.
Two months ago, that number for Nova would’ve seemed preposterous, but like many pitchers before him, Nova has experienced a renaissance in Pittsburgh. Though he finally had a rough outing in his most recent start, the 29-year-old Nova has worked to a brilliant 2.93 ERA with 7.3 K/9 against a superlative 0.5 BB/9 in 55 1/3 innings of work. He’s maintained his strong ground-ball rate (50.9 percent since the trade) and issued an unthinkable three walks to the 220 batters he’s faced. While there will, of course, be skepticism about his ability to sustain this performance (particularly the superlative command), this isn’t the first prolonged stretch of excellence that Nova has enjoyed in his career. He tossed 139 innings of 3.10 ERA ball for the Yankees in 2013, but Tommy John surgery in late April of the 2014 season prematurely halted his opportunity to build on that success.
MLBTR’s Charlie Wilmoth recently likened Nova’s emergence with the Bucs to that of J.A. Happ last season following a trade from the Blue Jays, and the comparison is apt. However, Happ was three years older than Nova at the time of their respective trades, and he was walking into a considerably stronger market for starting pitching. I’ve been slow to warm to this idea, personally, as I recently explained in the MLBTR Mailbag, but a four-year contract for Nova is looking increasingly likely on this year’s dreadful market for free-agent starters. His primary competition will be a 36-year-old Rich Hill (37 next March) and Jeremy Hellickson. However, while Hellickson is more comparably aged to Nova (29) and has been an outstanding buy-low investment for the Phillies, he’ll almost certainly have to deal with a qualifying offer this winter. Nova, though, will be free of that burden by virtue of the midseason trade that sent him from New York to Pittsburgh and made him ineligible to receive a QO.
Three Needs: Tampa Bay Rays
MLBTR will provide a broader view of each club’s winter plans when our annual Offseason Outlook series kicks off at the end of the regular season. Until then, the Rays are the latest team to be featured in our quick look at this season’s non-contenders. We’ve already covered the Angels, Brewers, and Twins.
Things fell apart this year for Tampa Bay, which entered with hopes that a deep rotation and bolstered offense would spur a return to the playoffs. Instead, the club vanished into the basement of the AL East — a place it hadn’t visited since 2007 — and ended up dealing away Matt Moore, Brandon Guyer, and Steve Pearce at the trade deadline.
Still, the most significant of those trades, the Moore swap, brought back a controllable major league asset in Matt Duffy — who, they hope, will fill a need at shortstop — and the organization continues to field a number of affordable players with reasonable promise. A full-blown rebuild seems unlikely for a team that has typically focused on remaining competitive even while hunting for value and exchanging increasingly expensive veterans for youthful talent.
Operating on the presumption that the Rays don’t intend to shop their best assets this winter, preferring instead to build around their core, here are three areas where the team has significant needs this winter:
Minor MLB Transactions: 9/22/16
We’ll keep tabs on today’s minor moves right here:
- The Marlins announced that right-hander Bryan Morris has been outrighted to Triple-A New Orleans. Morris was designated for assignment two days ago after missing the majority of the season due to back surgery. Because of the Major League service time he’s accrued — four-plus year — Morris will be able to elect free agency this winter and hand-pick the best environment and the best offer from interested teams. The 29-year-old (30 next March) has a 2.30 ERA in parts of three seasons with the Fish and a 2.80 career ERA in 215 innings between Pittsburgh and Miami. He’s also sporting one of the league’s best ground-ball rates (58.4 percent) among pitchers with at least 200 innings dating back to the 2013 campaign.
- The Royals have released righty Chien-Ming Wang, MLB.com’s Jeffrey Flanagan reports on Twitter. Wang had been designated on Saturday, and with the minor league season in the books, that all but assured that the veteran would end up being released. It’s remarkable, really, that the once-excellent starter was able to last as long as he did in the big leagues this year given all the arm troubles and failed comeback attempts already in his past. Now 36, Wang managed to put up a 4.22 ERA with 5.1 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9 to go with a 49.3% groundball rate over his 53 1/3 innings in his first major league action since 2013. This was also his first season as a full-time reliever.
Rangers To Sign Yanio Perez
The Rangers have agreed to terms with Cuban third baseman Yanio Perez, reports Jorge Ebro of El Nuevo Herald. Perez, who rates 13th on Jesse Sanchez’s top 30 international prospect rankings at MLB.com, will receive a $1.1MM signing bonus.
The 21-year-old Perez was cleared to sign on May 20 and receives plus grades for his raw power, per Sanchez, though some scouts have questioned his athleticism and ability to stick at third base. He’s said to have a good makeup by scouts, according to Sanchez, and is also an above-average runner. Baseball America’s Ben Badler has a full scouting report up on Perez, noting that he was once a 45-grade runner (on the 20-80 scale) but is now up to roughly 70 speed once underway, based on his 60-yard dash time. Badler, too, spoke to some scouts who graded Perez’s power well, though he heard above-average as opposed to the more impressive 65 grade used by Sanchez in his report. Perez hasn’t played in Cuba’s top league since the 2014-15 season and was just a career .259/.335/.328 hitter in Serie Nacional, though those stats came in his age 18-19 seasons. Perez is now listed at 6’2″ and 205 pounds, so it seems reasonable to believe that he’s filled out a bit since his last bit of pro experience in Cuba. Badler writes that he could begin next season at the Class-A level.
While Texas has taken an aggressive approach to the international market in seasons past, they’ve been more measured thus far in 2016. Perez’s bonus is the largest they’ve issued, with the next-biggest bonus going to Venezuelan catcher David Garcia, who received an $800K signing bonus in early July, per Sanchez. Even with this notable signing on the books, the Rangers haven’t cleared their allotted pool, so they’re not facing any type of long-term penalization.
Masahiro Tanaka Diagnosed With Mild Flexor Mass Strain
Yankees ace Masahiro Tanaka has been diagnosed with a slight flexor mass strain in his right forearm and won’t throw for the next five days, manager Joe Girardi told reporters, including Mark Feinsand of the New York Daily News (Twitter link). Tanaka’s injury obviously means that he’ll miss at least one start, though pitching coach Larry Rothschild emphasized that there’s nothing wrong with the right-hander’s ulnar collateral ligament (via ESPN New York’s Andrew Marchand). Tanaka suffered a minor tear of the UCL during his rookie season but never underwent Tommy John surgery and has seemingly recovered (or at the very least has pitched through it without issue).
The loss of Tanaka, even for one start, is a difficult pill for the Yankees to swallow as their dwindling Wild Card hopes now look a bit more bleak. New York currently sits two and a half games back in the AL Wild Card race, but they’re trailing both Wild Card holders (Baltimore and Toronto) as well as the Tigers, Astros and Mariners in that race. Tanaka himself feels that the injury won’t be season-ending, telling reporters that he believes he’ll be able to “come back strong” before year’s end (Twitter link via MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch).
If, however, Tanaka isn’t able to return to the hill, it’ll only add another layer of uncertainty to the Yankees’ rotation picture heading into an offseason where starting pitching will almost certainly be a focus for general manager Brian Cashman and his staff. The Yankees can currently only pencil in Tanaka, Michael Pineda and CC Sabathia to next year’s rotation, and while that trio somewhat incredibly has combined to make 89 starts so far this season, there are notable injury concerns with each of the group, making it difficult to assume they’ll be able to replicate that feat in 2017. Beyond those veterans, the Yankees have inexperienced (and, in some cases, inconsistent) arms like Luis Severino, Chad Green, Bryan Mitchell and Luis Cessa as rotation options, but that group of seven doesn’t figure to be enough depth to survive a season, let alone to contend for an AL East title.
Steven Matz Scratched Due To Shoulder Discomfort, Unlikely To Start Again In 2016
Not long after declaring Steven Matz ready to go for Friday’s start, the tables have turned, as the Mets have scratched the left-hander due to lingering discomfort in his left shoulder, per Joel Sherman of the New York Post (links to Sherman on Twitter). Furthermore, general manager Sandy Alderson stated that with so few games remaining on the schedule, it’s unlikely that Matz will be able to take the hill for another regular season start, per Sherman.
It’s now been nearly six weeks since Matz took the mound on Aug. 14, making it difficult to envision a scenario where he’d be able to ramp back up in time to make any kind of impact on the Mets’ postseason roster — if the Mets are able to hang on in the National League Wild Card race. The flare-up in Matz’s shoulder means that the Mets will be without him, Jacob deGrom (elbow surgery) and Matt Harvey (thoracic outlet syndrome surgery) in the event that the team reaches the postseason. Right-hander Gabriel Ynoa is set to step into Matz’s spot in the rotation tomorrow, but the postseason rotation, if necessary, would now seemingly consist of Noah Syndergaard, Bartolo Colon and one of Seth Lugo, Robert Gsellman or Ynoa. Of that bunch, Lugo has been the most effective and would represent the leading candidate to join the rotation in a theoretical NLDS appearance.
Alderson indicated to Sherman that surgery doesn’t appear to be necessary on Matz’s shoulder, though it’s been a foregone conclusion for months that he’ll need to go under the knife in order to remove a bone spur from his left elbow following the season. If, as Alderson indicated, this ends the season for Matz, the 25-year-old southpaw will finish with a 3.40 ERA, 8.8 K/9 and 2.1 BB/9 in 132 1/3 innings. Certainly, he’ll hope to be able to take on a greater workload in 2017, though concerns about Matz’s durability are nothing new. The 141 innings he threw between the minors and Majors last season represent a career-high for Matz.
MLBTR Live Chat: 9/22/16
Click here to read a transcript of today’s live chat with host Jeff Todd.
Pitcher Injury Notes: Wendelken, Matz, Kazmir, Salazar, Wright, Solis
Athletics righty J.B. Wendelken is likely to undergo Tommy John surgery, as Joe Stiglich of CSNBayArea.com reports. The 23-year-old, who came over as part of last winter’s Brett Lawrie trade, had received scattered major league work in Oakland, allowing 14 earned runs with a dozen strikeouts and nine walks over 12 2/3 innings. He showed more promise at Triple-A, with a 4.11 ERA and 12.7 K/9 in his 46 frames, but he also experienced control problems (5.1 BB/9) for the first time in his professional career.
Here are some more pitching health notes:
- The Mets plan to put lefty Steven Matz on the hill tomorrow after he showed well in a bullpen session yesterday, MLB.com’s Anthony DiComo tweets. “He looked very good,” said manager Terry Collins. “He looked nice and easy.” New York’s most recent attempt to ease a starter back into the rotation did not end well, and the team is certainly hoping for a smoother transition this time around. If he can stay healthy, Matz would represent a key asset over the final ten days of the regular season as well as a hopeful postseason berth beyond that.
- While their own rotation health situation is generally on the upswing, the Dodgers will be looking to see whether southpaw Scott Kazmir can hold up in a major league start, as MLB.com’s Ken Gurnick tweets. The 32-year-old last appeared a month ago and carries a 4.59 ERA in 135 1/3 innings on the year. He’ll follow Brett Anderson, who goes today, as the team looks to assess its options for the playoffs.
- Also facing postseason roster decisions with a key arm are the Indians, who are hoping that righty Danny Salazar can return — albeit as a reliever, per MLB.com’s Jordan Bastian. Salazar is still not ready for mound work, but has begun rebuilding arm strength in hopes that he can be ready for a possible relief role in the ALDS. For now, it’s still a measured process. “If he starts to feel real good, they can speed it up,” said manager Terry Francona.
- It’s unclear whether the Red Sox will give serious consideration to using right-hander Steven Wright in the postseason, if he’s able to return, but there’s some hope that he’ll soon present that option. As Scott Lauber of ESPN.com tweets, Wright is set to meet up with the team and may be ready for a pen session as he continues to test his balky shoulder.
- It’s also not apparent what plans the Nationals may have for left-handed reliever Sammy Solis, who has been sidelined with his own shoulder troubles. But it seems he’s now making forward progress, as Dan Kolko of MASN tweets that Solis felt good after a 25-pitch session on the mound. He could soon face hitters, which might pave the way for a return to the majors right at the end of the regular season, conceivably making him a playoff option.
Pirates Acquire Phil Coke
The Pirates have acquired lefty Phil Coke from the Yankees for cash considerations, the teams announced. Pittsburgh will need to make a 40-man roster move to accommodate the acquisition.
Coke, 34, made three major league appearances earlier in the year for New York, but has spent the bulk of the season at Triple-A. Though he has pitched almost exclusively as a reliever for most of his big league career, Coke made 11 starts during his time at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
On the year, Coke threw to a 2.96 ERA over 70 frames at the highest level of the minors. He compiled 7.8 K/9 against 2.7 BB/9, with 68 hits and just three home runs recorded against him.
It’s a bit unclear what Pittsburgh plans to do with Coke, though he will indeed be headed for the major league roster. He could conceivably take a start or two in an effort at a Rich Hill-like metamorphosis, or may just log some frames from the pen. The Pirates are technically still alive in the Wild Card race, but only barely. Coke will again be a free agent at season’s end.