Free agent right-hander Jason Hammel is leaving Octagon and will likely join ACES, major league sources told FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal.
Hammel’s agency switch comes at a time when he’s clearly among the best starters remaining on the open market. The 34-year-old became available Nov. 6, when the World Series champion Cubs surprisingly declined his $12MM option for 2017 in favor of a $2MM buyout. Hammel surely would have had value as a trade chip, but Cubs president of baseball operations Theo Epstein decided to give the 11-year veteran a chance to cash in as a free agent.
Hammel has had two stints with the Cubs, the first of which lasted for part of the 2014 season and ended when they traded him and fellow righty Jeff Samardzija to the Athletics that July in exchange for shortstop Addison Russell, who’s now a franchise cornerstone. Hammel, who was also previously with the Rays, Rockies and Orioles, then rejoined the Cubs the next winter on a three-year, $30MM pact. Thanks to Chicago’s decision to buy him out, Hammel ultimately collected $20MM of that sum.
Over the past three seasons, including his short stint in Oakland, Hammel has recorded a 3.68 ERA, 8.3 K/9, 2.4 BB/9 and 40 percent ground-ball rate over 513 2/3 innings. Hammel logged a 3.83 ERA with 7.78 K/9, 2.86 BB/9 and a 42.1 grounder mark in 166 2/3 frames in 2016. He also posted a double-digit swinging-strike rate (10.2 percent) for the second straight year and maintained his typical velocity. However, late-season elbow tightness helped lead the Cubs to keep Hammel off their roster for all three of their playoff series.
There are no indications that Hammel’s elbow will be an issue going forward, though, and several teams have shown interest in him this offseason. MLBTR’s Tim Dierkes predicts a three-year, $42MM deal for the potential ACES client. MLBTR will include Hammel’s defection from Octagon in its Agency Database, which contains agent information on more than 2,500 major league and minor league players. If you see any notable errors or omissions, please let us know via email: mlbtrdatabase@gmail.com.
The Pirates should be in on him.
Too expensive for their taste. They tend to sign players with more red flags, but potential upside as free agents and hope they can fix them.
Like who
Volquez, Liriano, Morton, the list goes on. Some are hits and some are big busts.
Most are hits, look at Nova…
I feel like he can only pitch well with the Cubs so I whatever team signs him better not be expecting an era below 4
tend to agree, but I think he can do catch lightning in a bottle on another team in the right situation
I guess somebody isn’t too happy about the way he’s being marketed around the league. I can’t imagine too many players switch agents after they’ve hit the open market and have been available for almost a month and a half.
surely comes across that way
I feel Yankees are a logical landing spot, maybe rangers?
He’ll get crushed in the AL. Especially in the East. I would say the Marlins would be a better landing spot for him.
Like when he was an Oriole and A?
Yankees, I agree, but not if they are as broke as they say they are.
Yankees broke yeah I must be dreaming
No cub pitcher is going to have as good as season as they had last year.
They still face the Pirates and Reds 38 times. Last year that was a combined 29 wins. So the pitchers will still get nice ballooned stats from this.
What about Brewers
themed: I doubt that your crystal ball will be right. Only Kyle Hendricks had a career-best season in ’16. The defense will be as good if not better, the bullpen will be much better, and the offense won’t lose a step in ’17 and may even be better than ’16.
You’re still hooked on this Cubs trolling? Well, I’ll predict that Diaz doesn’t have near as good as season that he was on track to have last year and Molina has a huge drop off.
The only Cubs pitcher that I think will have a worse year is Arrieta. Teams started to figure him out. He adjusted a little but wasn’t as good. Another season of him and I think he will have a mediocre season. Hendricks on the other hand is my preseason Cy Young pick.
Teams started to figure Arrieta out? His BB/9 went up because he has ridiculous break on his pitches which in turns makes him a little wild (and he struggled with command for a bit last year) so he’d walk people and then get burned when their were runners on base, but outside of that nothing really changed. He had the 2nd best H/9 of his career and held opposing batters to the lowest BAA in the MLB, lol.
Sorry bro, but the Cubs are champs and favorites yet again.
Does he think a new agent will help him with his control issue?
Even if he solves that, he has an annoying getting perpetually injury problem as well,
Nothing major but he does get nagging injuries.
SMH
Yes, when he is healthy and can find the strike zone, he is good, when he doesn’t look out.
Mariners?
I was thinking Mariners too, Marlins if they could get a deal like 2 @ less than $20m. One would think that a guy who won half of his 30 starts, has a better than league average in both WHIP and ERA. -although he averaged only 5 1/2 innings per start, could get a three-year deal somewhere. Maybe teams are worried that the tight elbow that shut him down was the precursor to something more serious.
I thought the Braves would make him their #2 or #3 .. but they went wayyy older and wayyy cheaper
He is probably seeking a deal that is too long for a stop gap like the Braves are looking for.