Twins right-hander Matt Shoemaker has cleared outright waivers and accepted an assignment to Triple-A St. Paul, reports Dan Hayes of the Athletic (Twitter link). Minnesota designated him for assignment last week.
The Twins signed Shoemaker to a one-year, $2MM deal over the winter in the hope he’d stabilize the back of the rotation. That’s not how things have played out, though, as Shoemaker has been one of the least effective pitchers in the league this season. The 34-year-old has taken the ball sixteen times (including eleven starts) but the results haven’t been there. Shoemaker has been tagged for an 8.06 ERA/5.37 SIERA across 60 1/3 innings. He has struck out just 14.1% of batters faced — by far the worst mark of his career — and he’s given up fifteen home runs. It’s the second consecutive season in which Shoemaker has given up more than two longballs per nine innings pitched, an untenable mark.
Nevertheless, there’s little harm for the Twins in giving Shoemaker a chance to try to work things out in Triple-A. Prior to 2020, he’d carved out a nice career as a solid back-of-the-rotation arm when healthy. His velocity is still in line with its range from recent seasons. Despite the lack of strikeouts, Shoemaker’s 10.3% swinging strike rate is only a little worse than league average.
As a player with more than six years of major league service, Shoemaker had the right to refuse a minor league assignment while still collecting the remainder of his guaranteed salary. He’s instead decided to stick around in the Twins system and hope to pitch his way back to Target Field before the end of the season.
Probably didn’t want to hit free agency fearing nobody would sign him. At least an outright assignment would give him a chance if someone in the rotation got injured
I hope he is back the next time the Twins face the White Sox!
The next time is tonight. So, no.
Correct, we missed him.
Doesn’t this guy know that he’s supposed to be making shoes?
There is no reason for this comment to have made me laugh as much as it did.
The Cardinals have a guy who would be better off making furniture at this point in his career.
Bad news for St Paul.
Infielders are sure to be maimed
Looks like the shoe didn’t fit for the twins …….
i can see him as a deadline pickup by a team like the Diamondbacks who need inning fillers
10.38 ERA vs. The White Sox this season… More like Matt Socktaker.
Colome should be soon as well, then Happ. Awful results.
say what you want about how poorly he’s performing, he wants it. he could take the rest of the year off paid and he’s going to go ride the busses in the minors to figure out how to get better and get back. 9 out of ten guys in his shoes say I’m going home rather than going back down and playing in aaa for free.
I think it has a lot more to do with a comment above where Shoemaker was pretty concerned he’d generate no interest and spend weeks out of baseball looking for a suitor since this is such a late DFA. This way, Shoemaker remains part of a baseball organization with serious pitching issues, one step away from MLB while he can work on his stuff. There’s still the potential Shoemaker could rebuild some limited value this year and get himself a contract next year.
Put your best foot forward.
Come on toronto…(cue daft punks “one more time”)
And pirates are overrated.