Diamondbacks To Promote Yoan Lopez

3:17pm: Arizona has announced Lopez’s promotion, and it made room for him by transferring third baseman Jake Lamb to the 60-day disabled list. Lamb underwent season-ending left shoulder surgery last month.

1:37pm: The Diamondbacks will promote right-hander Yoan Lopez from Double-A Jackson, Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic reports. Lopez is not on the D-backs’ 40-man roster, which is currently full, so they’ll need to make a corresponding move.

Lopez, a holdover from the Diamondbacks’ ill-fated Dave Stewart/Tony La Russa/De Jon Watson regime, is finally coming to the majors three years after the team signed him out of Cuba. Arizona gave Lopez a whopping $8.27MM bonus, and in doing so, it paid a 100 percent overage tax and limited itself in future international markets. As a result of the Lopez signing, the Diamondbacks were barred from adding any international prospect for more than $300K over the next two signing periods. The club happened to have the majors’ largest bonus pool in 2015-16, making the Lopez-caused limitations all the more costly.

Of course, had Lopez developed into the front-line starter the Diamondbacks thought they were getting, there would be little to no criticism of the signing. Lopez’s tenure with the organization has been rocky at times, however, and he initially had such a difficult time adjusting to his new surroundings that he considered giving up baseball. However, Lopez – now 25 years old – persevered and may have put himself in position to make an impact with the D-backs. While he’s no longer a starter, the hard-throwing Lopez impressed as a Double-A reliever this season, recording a 2.92 ERA/2.85 FIP with 12.7 K/9 against 3.79 BB/9 in 61 2/3 innings.