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2021-22 MLB Free Agent Power Rankings

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Much has changed since our last installment of these rankings back on June 10th.  Six players signed extensions in lieu of free agency, none beyond Lance Lynn’s two-year, $38MM deal with the White Sox.  Trevor Bauer has been removed from the rankings, as he remains on paid administrative leave after being accused of sexual assault.

Four players who might have been considered for qualifying offers were traded in July: Kris Bryant, Javier Baez, Anthony Rizzo, and Starling Marte.  Those players are now ineligible for qualifying offers.  Kevin Gausman, Marcus Stroman, Max Scherzer, Zack Greinke, and AJ Pollock are among those who are ineligible on account of having received one previously.  The Rockies inexplicably retained Trevor Story at the trade deadline, so he will be subject to a qualifying offer.

As a reminder, these power rankings are based on my projection of the players’ earning power.  Keep in mind that the current collective bargaining agreement expires on December 1, though that doesn’t necessarily mean free agency will be frozen.

1.  Carlos Correa.  Prior to this year, Correa had played 110+ games in a season with a 120 wRC+ exactly once, back in 2016.  This year, Correa has avoided the regular injured list and is fourth among qualified shortstops with a 136 wRC+.  Correa did go on the COVID-19 IL in July, but he missed only a week.

Just 27 years old in December, Correa also has youth on his side, and appears headed toward a monster free agent contract.  The $340MM deals of fellow shortstops Fernando Tatis Jr. and Francisco Lindor will surely be a target.

2.  Corey Seager.  After getting hit by a pitch and suffering a broken right hand in mid-May, Seager missed two and a half months.  Upon his return July 30th, the Dodgers had acquired another of the game’s top shortstops in Trea Turner.  Turner has switched to second base as a member of the Dodgers, but serves as a strong option at shortstop for 2022 for L.A.  Seager didn’t have much to say on the topic, but clearly his negotiating leverage took a hit with the Turner acquisition.

As for what Seager can control, he’s shown no ill effects from the broken hand.  He’s got a stellar 134 wRC+ in 87 plate appearances since returning from the injury.  Seager is only about five months older than Correa, so he too will be seeking a very long contract in excess of $300MM.

3. Kris Bryant.  19 games into his Giants career, Bryant’s solid season has continued.  The Giants have enjoyed his versatility, playing Bryant at third base as well as all three outfield positions.  He’s saying all the right things about the possibility of staying in San Francisco long-term, telling Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area, “It’s definitely enticing.”  Even with a new deal for Brandon Crawford, the Giants have less than $36MM on the books for 2022, so they could certainly afford Bryant.

4. Trevor Story.  Though Story expressed confusion at the Rockies’ decision not to trade him, he hasn’t let it affect him on the field.  Since the trade deadline, Story sports a 147 wRC+ in 81 plate appearances.  29 in November, Story isn’t quite as young as Correa and Seager, but he’s still in good shape for a contract well beyond $100MM.  There’s still a case to be made for Story above Bryant, and the Rockies’ shortstop has outplayed Bryant since June.

5. Freddie Freeman.  Freeman has turned it on since June, posting a 151 wRC+ in 324 plate appearances.  32 in September, Freeman remains one of the best hitters in baseball.  The Braves wisely held onto the 2020 NL MVP despite a 12% chance at the playoffs at the trade deadline, and now the club has a 77% chance according to FanGraphs.  Braves fans continue to wonder why the club hasn’t hammered out a deal with their perennial All-Star.

6. Kevin Gausman.  Gausman has scuffled as of late, with a 5.17 ERA and 10.6% walk rate in his last seven starts.  However, he remains the prize pitcher of the free agent class, and he has seven regular season starts plus the playoffs to cement his free agent bona fides.  Dating back to 2020, Gausman has a 2.94 ERA and and 30.4% strikeout rate in 205 2/3 innings for the Giants.

7. Marcus Semien.  Semien joins this list for the first time, as he’s putting together his second MVP-caliber season within three years.  Maybe his 53-game 2020 season was the fluke, and Semien really is one of the best players in the game.  31 in September, he’s a candidate for at least a strong five-year deal in free agency.  Semien has played mostly second base this year in deference to Bo Bichette, but as a free agent he’ll be a consideration at both middle infield positions.  Semien’s 5.2 WAR is only bested among position players by the incomparable Shohei Ohtani.

8. Marcus Stroman.  Stroman, 30, ranks seventh among qualified NL starters with a 2.84 ERA in 145 1/3 innings.  He succeeds on the strength of his home run prevention and solid control and is a candidate for a five-year deal.  Stroman has shown no rust after opting out of the 2020 season.

9. Robbie Ray.  Ray, with an identical WAR to Stroman at the moment, presents an interesting contrast.  Ray’s 30.7% strikeout rate ranks second in the AL, coupled with a career-best 6.4 BB%.  It’s truly shocking to see Ray with such a low walk rate, as he had baseball’s worst walk rate – by far – last year among those with at least 50 innings.  He ranked the second-worst in that regard in 2019.  While Toronto’s $8MM deal for Ray has turned into a masterstroke, the lefty will be very difficult to value as a 30-year-old free agent.

10. Nick Castellanos.  With a 146 wRC+, Castellanos has been the seventh-best hitter in the NL this year.  He sports a solid 121 mark since returning from a microfracture in his right wrist on August 5th.  Castellanos, 30 in March, has the ability to opt out of the remaining two years and $34MM on his contract with the Reds after the season.  He’ll almost certainly do that, and reject a qualifying offer from the Reds as well.

Honorable mentions

Max Scherzer, Carlos Rodon, Chris Taylor, Javier Baez, Michael Conforto, Starling Marte

Scherzer and Rodon in particular just missed making my top 10.  Even at age 37, Scherzer could land a three-year deal in the $100MM range.  But he could also seek something just above two years and $72MM, which would result in a new record for average annual value.  Rodon is having a season for the ages after being non-tendered by the White Sox and then returning on a $3MM deal.  However, he’s currently on the IL for shoulder fatigue, and even at age 29 he’ll be hard-pressed to find a five-year deal given his health history.  Taylor, the Dodgers’ super-utility man, has a 133 wRC+ since the start of 2020 and will likely surprise many with the size of his next contract.  Still, it figures to fall short of $100MM.

Mets To Activate Francisco Lindor From Injured List

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The Mets are activating star shortstop Francisco Lindor from the 10-day injured list before tonight’s game against the Giants, Anthony DiComo of MLB.com was among those to relay. He’ll be making his first appearance since mid-July after missing five weeks with a right oblique strain.

Things were looking up for the Mets before Lindor hit the IL on July 17. New York had been leading the National League East for the prior couple months and looked to have a good chance at snapping a four-year playoff drought. That’s no longer the case, as the Mets have fallen flat in August and dipped below .500 in recent days. New York enters play tonight sporting a 61-63 record, sitting in third place in the division. They’re six and a half games back of the Braves and two games behind the Phillies, giving them very little margin for error if they’re to make a playoff push over the season’s final five-plus weeks.

For the first time, Lindor will pair with trade deadline acquisition Javier Báez in the middle infield. The Mets acquired Báez from the Cubs in the hope that he could hold down shortstop for a few weeks before sliding to second base upon Lindor’s return. Unfortunately, Báez missed ten days himself due to back spasms, but he made his return to the lineup over the weekend.

Lindor started the season very slowly, but he’d begun to find some rhythm offensively before the injury. Overall, he’s carrying a .228/.326/.376 line over his first 364 plate appearances. That’s career-worst production — no doubt a disappointing start to his time in Queens — but Lindor has continued to offer Gold Glove caliber defense and should see an improvement in his hitting numbers, since he’s been plagued by a .248 batting average on balls in play.

Reds Activate Tejay Antone, Designate Sean Doolittle For Assignment

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The Reds announced they’ve reinstated right-hander Tejay Antone from the 10-day injured list. To open space on the active roster, Cincinnati designated southpaw Sean Doolittle for assignment. The move also clears another spot on the 40-man roster, which now sits at 37.

Antone has missed the better part of three months dealing with forearm issues. He landed on the IL with inflammation on June 11, then returned after a minimal stint. Just four days later, he was placed back on the IL with a forearm strain that has kept him out ever since. Before the injury, Antone had been the Reds’ best late-inning weapon. He’s worked to a 1.87 ERA over 33 2/3 frames this season, striking out a fantastic 33.1% of opponents against an average 9.4% walk rate. It’s the second consecutive quality season for the 27-year-old, who posted a 2.80 ERA over 35 1/3 innings as a rookie in 2020.

Cincinnati welcomes back their top reliever at an opportune time. The Reds’ recent hot streak, coupled with the Padres’ free fall, has Cincinnati up a game over the Friars with a little less than six weeks remaining in the regular season. That’s a far better position than the Reds were in as recently as a couple weeks ago, but it’s also nowhere near a comfortable advantage. The Cincinnati bullpen was a disaster earlier in the season, but they’ve performed better over the past few weeks.

Doolittle has been a fixture in that relief corps for the entire season. He’ll now lose his spot as part of a broader makeover in the late innings. In addition to Antone, Cincinnati welcomed Lucas Sims back from a lengthy IL stint earlier this month, and they overhauled the bullpen before the July 30 trade deadline. The Reds brought in Mychal Givens, Luis Cessa and Justin Wilson via trade, pushing Doolittle out of the picture.

The veteran southpaw was one of the sport’s premier relievers from 2012-18. He broke in with the A’s and eventually earned the closer’s role in Oakland, a job he retained after being traded to the Nationals midway through the 2017 season. Doolittle pitched at a league average level in 2019 before struggling through an injury-wrecked 2020 campaign to end his time in Washington. He signed a one-year, $1.5MM guarantee with the Reds in February.

Doolittle has stayed healthy this season, but he’s amidst the worst year of his career. The 34-year-old has worked 38 1/3 innings of 4.46 ERA ball across 45 appearances, striking out 23.7% of opposing hitters against a 10.4% walk rate. That’s not disastrous work — it’s a little worse than league average after adjusting for the Reds’ hitter-friendly home park — but it’s nowhere near the elite heights Doolittle reached at his peak.

That said, it’s plausible another team will add Doolittle off waivers over the coming days. Even if he’s only a league average pitcher at this stage of his career, that kind of competence could upgrade many teams’ current middle innings situations. And Doolittle’s low base salary would reduce the financial responsibility for claiming teams, as he’s only due around $311K from now through season’s end. Should Doolittle pass through waivers unclaimed, he’d have the right to elect free agency while collecting the remainder of that guaranteed salary as a player with five-plus years of big league service.

Gregory Polanco Goes Unclaimed On Waivers

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Aug. 24: Polanco went unclaimed on waivers and has been returned to the active roster, Mike Persak of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports (via Twitter). He’s not in today’s lineup but remains with the club.

Aug. 22, 8:14pm: Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says that, if Polanco goes unclaimed, he will remain with the Pirates. (Twitter link 1, 2 and 3.) This seems to imply that, if Polanco clears waivers, the team will choose not to outright him off the roster. According to Mackey, placing Polanco on waivers was about giving him the chance to play for a contender, if any are interested. Although, speculatively speaking, the notoriously thrifty Pirates would also be delighted to get the $2.4MM off their books, as well as the $3MM buyout on his 2022 option.

7:16pm: The Pirates have placed Gregory Polanco on outright waivers, according to Rob Biertempfel of The Athletic. Polanco is playing on a salary of $11.6MM this year, with about $2.4MM of that still to be paid out. Any team claiming him would be responsible for that remaining salary. But if he goes unclaimed, Polanco would be able to elect free agency. At that point, any club could sign him and just pay him the prorated league minimum, with the Pirates being on the hook for the remainder.

Whether he is claimed or not, this seems to be the end of Polanco’s time as a Pirate, an unceremonious conclusion to a relationship that once had such promise for both parties. Originally signed by Pittsburgh in 2009 as a 17-year-old, Polanco debuted in 2014 and, after two solid seasons, showed enough promise that the club agreed to give him a five-year extension, which guaranteed him $35MM, in April of 2016. At the time, Polanco’s line of .249/.316/.369 was nothing outstanding, but it was expected that the 24-year-old would grow into more power and provide more offensive production to pair with his excellent defense and speed. With the team having already extended Starling Marte and Andrew McCutchen, it was thought that Polanco could be the third piece of a superb outfield that they could build on for years to come.

For the remainder of the 2016 season and the first two years of the deal, everything seemed to be going in the right direction. Over those three seasons, Polanco hit 56 home runs and stole 37 bases, producing an overall line of .255/.324/.455. That was good enough for a wRC of 105 and 5.3 fWAR. Thanks in no small part to Polanco, the Pirates qualified for the National League Wild Card Game three years in a row, from 2013 to 2015. Unfortunately for both he and the team, it’s been mostly downhill since then. In September of 2018, Polanco underwent surgery for a dislocated shoulder and hasn’t been able to play at anything approaching that level since.

In 2019, Polanco was only able to get into 42 games and, even when on the field, had his line slide to .242/.301/.425, a wRC+ of 87. With the shoulder issues still ailing him, Polanco went on the IL June 22nd and didn’t make it back on the field for the rest of the year. Polanco returned in 2020 but saw his numbers slip even farther, to a dismal line of .153/.214/.325 during the COVID-shortened season. That amounted to a wRC+ of 41.

This year, Polanco has bounced back from that nadir, but only slightly. In 101 games, he has put up a line of .198/.277/.343, which adds up to a wRC+ of 67. With the Pirates sitting on a record of 44-80 and firmly into rebuild mode, it seems they wanted to allocate Polanco’s playing time over the season’s final weeks to players who will be auditioning to be part of the club’s future plans.

Polanco now seems destined to move on from the only organization he’s ever known. Despite three straight disappointing seasons, he won’t be turning 30 until next month, meaning there’s potentially plenty of time for him to turn things around and re-energize his career. However, it may be hard for him to get a lengthy opportunity to do so this year. Competing teams will be giving playing time to players with a more recent track record of success, whereas rebuilding team will want to use that time to showcase younger building blocks, as the Pirates are doing now.

Red Sox Option Jarren Duran

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The Red Sox have optioned outfielder Jarren Duran to Triple-A Worcester, Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com reports. Righty Tanner Houck will take his spot on the active roster. The Red Sox have yet to formally announce this and any other roster moves that will be made this afternoon.

Duran, 24, is regarded as one of the top all-around prospects in baseball but did not hit the ground running upon his initial call-up from Worcester last month. The 2018 seventh-rounder was plugged in as the everyday center fielder in Boston upon his debut but has struggled to adjust to big league pitching. Through 89 plate appearances, Duran has posted a .221/.236/.372 slash. He’s drawn just two walks in that time and struck out at a whopping 37.1 percent clip to begin his big league career.

The Red Sox surely still view Duran as a key piece to their future. However, with deadline acquisition Kyle Schwarber now in the fold as an option in left field — Alex Verdugo is capable of manning center — the Sox can send Duran back to Worcester for further refinement in a lower-pressure setting. The fact that Boston has slid down the AL East standings in rapid fashion due both to the Sox’ own poor play and the Yankees’ 10-game winning streak surely also adds some pressure to get better immediate results on the field.

Duran appeared in 46 games with Worcester earlier this season and fared quite well, batting .270/.365/.561 with vastly better walk and strikeout percentages — 11.0 and 23.7, respectively — than he showed in the Majors. He’ll need to spend 10 days in the minors unless he’s recalled as the corresponding move in an injury. Rosters can expand from 26 to 28 players beginning Sept. 1, so he could very well get another opportunity in the Majors before too long.

The decision to option Duran today won’t impact his path to free agency or his arbitration schedule. Based on the July 17 date of Duran’s initial promotion to the big leagues, the maximum amount of service time he could’ve accrued in 2021 was 79 days — well shy of a full year of service (172 days). He’s controllable through at least the 2027 season as it stands and would reach arbitration in the 2024-25 offseason. Even if Duran stays in Triple-A for the remainder of the current season, that free agency timeline would remain intact so long as he accrues at least 134 days of service time next season. The Sox would need to keep him in Worcester through late May next year to change that timeline, which seems unlikely.

Even With No CBA, MLB Transactions Can Happen

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When baseball’s seventh collective bargaining agreement expired on December 31, 1993, there was no fanfare.  Murray Chass of the New York Times dropped it in this way, writing, “If negotiations for a new labor agreement ever begin — the old one expired uneventfully at midnight Friday — the owners will try to put salary arbitration in a time capsule and bury it deep underground, leaving it to be discovered by someone seeking the reason for the decline and fall of the business of baseball.”  The expiration of the old agreement was basically an aside in Chass’ article about the owners’ desire to eliminate salary arbitration.

With the current collective bargaining agreement set to expire on December 1 this year, there’s an assumption a freeze will be placed on free agency and perhaps trades as well.  Maybe that’s because we experienced a transaction freeze quite recently, spanning March 26-June 26 of 2020.  But that was part of an agreement between MLB and the MLBPA, and it was triggered by a global pandemic that halted not just baseball, but life as we knew it.

So, the expiration of the CBA at the end of 1993 seems more instructive when trying to assess the possibility of a freeze this winter.  In January 1994, the MLB offseason continued unabated, with seeming scant consideration for the lack of a collective bargaining agreement.  The Padres agreed to a two-year, $8.5MM extension with star outfielder Tony Gwynn.  The Mets and Royals exchanged problems in a swap of Vince Coleman and Kevin McReynolds.  The Rockies inked free agent shortstop Walt Weiss to a two-year, $2.2MM deal.  All the sorts of typical headlines you’d find on MLB Trade Rumors back in January ’94, had this site existed back then.  None of these linked New York Times articles made mention of the just-expired CBA.

Of course, as Mark Armour and Dan Levitt of The Hardball Times put it, “in the summer of 1994, baseball’s owners and players were headed for the showdown to beat all showdowns.”  MLBPA leader Donald Fehr correctly surmised in July, “We believe absent an agreement the owners will impose a salary cap sometime after the season. That leaves players with two choices — take what’s on the table or try to secure a new agreement by setting a strike date.”  The owners followed by withholding the players’ $7.8MM pension payment, and the players soon followed through on their August 12 strike date.

With the 1994 World Series canceled and acrimony between the owners and players through the roof, it’d only be natural for ownership to implement a free agency freeze.  Instead, they proposed a 45-day delay, which the union did not accept, and the 1994-95 offseason proceeded.  It was far from a normal offseason, with Mets GM Joe McIlvaine saying things like, “We can’t do anything because we don’t know what the rules are.”  Players like Jim Abbott and Jack McDowell were unsure if they had reached the six years of Major League service required for free agency, due to disagreement about whether service time was accrued during the strike.  McDowell would eventually be traded to the Yankees despite that uncertainty.  Other players were thought to be potential restricted free agents as four and five-year players, as part of the owners’ plan to eliminate salary arbitration.

Paradoxically, as Chass put it on October 28, “The business of baseball went on yesterday as if the strike did not exist.”  Managers and GMs were hired and fired, sure, but clubs also continued doing big-money deals with players.  On the eve of free agency, the Yankees and George Steinbrenner signed Paul O’Neill to a four-year, $19MM deal.  A $1.2MM signing bonus included in the deal ran afoul of MLB recommendations, as they’d warned, “Clubs should keep in mind the payment of the bonus amounts to a decision by the club to help fund the continuing players strike.”

Teams continued signing free agents during the strike in the final months of 1994.  “I’m not sure our words match our actions,” remarked Dodgers GM Fred Claire in this Bob Nightengale article.  Angels GM Bill Bavasi commented, “I’m not saying teams are wrong for what they’re doing, it just has people confused. I know I can’t figure it out.”  One of the winter’s top free agents, Gregg Jefferies, inked a four-year, $20MM deal with the Phillies.  Not long after, the Mariners re-upped Jay Buhner for $15.5MM.  December 23, 1994 marked a turning point, as the owners implemented their salary cap plan.  It was only then that the union advised players not to sign free agent contracts, Chass wrote.

History shows us that if the current collective bargaining agreement expires on December 1 without a new deal in place, a freeze on free agency and/or trades is not fait accompli.  It’s fair to say that the environment now is less contentious than it was 27 years ago, as ownership isn’t attempting to impose a salary cap and the players aren’t planning to strike this season.  There is technically nothing stopping Carlos Correa, Corey Seager, Kris Bryant, and all the rest from signing free agent contracts despite the lack of a CBA.  While uncertainty around things like the new luxury tax thresholds and the universal designated hitter seems likely to suppress hot stove action, an actual free agency freeze won’t happen unless MLB or the players impose it.

Young: Rangers Expect To Be “Very Active” In Free Agency

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The Rangers had a quiet 2020-21 offseason, at least in terms of free agency, as the club focused on creating opportunities for younger players to prove themselves at the Major League level. Lance Lynn, Elvis Andrus, Rafael Montero and Rougned Odor were traded away. Nate Lowe, Dane Dunning and Jonah Heim were acquired and dropped right into the big league mix. Even the team’s limited free-agent activity was focused on younger names with multiple seasons of control: David Dahl, Mike Foltynewicz, Kohei Arihara.

The 2021-22 offseason could be a bit more active for the Rangers, however, as general manager Chris Young told reporters this week that he expects his club to be active in free agency this coming winter (link via Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News).

“With the financial flexibility we have moving into the offseason, I expect us to be very active in the free agent market, targeting players who fit kind of our next few years and what we’re trying to accomplish,” Young said.

[Related: 2021-22 MLB Free Agent List]

The mention of “financial flexibility” is something of an understatement. The only two guaranteed salaries on the Rangers’ books for the 2022 season are those of Jose Leclerc ($4.75MM) and the aforementioned Arihara ($2.6MM). Looking solely at guaranteed contracts can be misleading when gauging a team’s payroll at times, as many clubs have large arbitration crops that will inflate that number further, but that’s not the case in Texas. Only Mike Foltynewicz, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, Matt Bush, Ronald Guzman and Willie Calhoun are up for arbitration this winter. Foltynewicz and Bush are non-tender candidates. Kiner-Falefa will be getting a raise on a $2MM salary. Guzman and Calhoun are first-time players whose platform seasons have been disrupted by serious injuries; neither will be costly.

The Rangers do still owe the Yankees about $12MM for the remainder of the Odor contract next season, and they’ll pay nearly $7MM to the Athletics as part of last offseason’s Elvis Andrus/Khris Davis swap. Even with arbitration raises and dead money owed from previous trades, however, the Rangers shouldn’t expect to pay any more than $30-35MM for the current roster. Considering this is a team that just opened a brand new park and trotted out an Opening Day payroll of $165MM as recently as four years ago, that level of bare-bones payroll commitments should leave them open to just about anything this winter.

That doesn’t mean that the Rangers will necessarily go wild and sign multiple players to $100MM-plus contracts this winter, of course. The current club is more than just a handful of free agents from competing, but it sounds as though the Rangers are willing to begin spending to augment the roster as they await the arrival of more prospects on the MLB scene. The Rangers’ farm isn’t necessarily elite, but Baseball America listed their system 11th on last week’s midseason farm rankings.

The upcoming class of free agents will be one of the deepest in recent memory. Much has understandably been made of the star-studded crop of free-agent shortstops — Carlos Correa, Corey Seager, Trevor Story, Marcus Semien, Javier Baez — but the market will also be deep in outfielders (Nick Castellanos, Starling Marte, Kyle Schwarber, Michael Conforto and more) and in starting pitching (Max Scherzer, Kevin Gausman, Marcus Stroman, Zack Greinke, Robbie Ray and Justin Verlander, among others). The looming collective bargaining talks between the league and players association could give some teams pause, but those that are motivated to spend will have ample high-quality targets to pursue.

Diamondbacks Release Ryan Buchter

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The D-backs released veteran left-handed reliever Ryan Buchter over the weekend, per an announcement from their Triple-A club in Reno. He can now sign with any club for the final few weeks of the season.

Buchter, 34, was tagged for a dozen earned runs in 16 1/3 innings with Arizona’s big league club in 2021, but he held opponents to six runs on 13 hits and seven walks with 20 strikeouts in 16 Triple-A frames (3.38 ERA). And while he didn’t fare particularly well in his short MLB run with the D-backs this season, he has a track record of quality results at the MLB level. Buchter tossed just six innings with the Angels in 2020 but posted a sub-3.00 ERA each season from 2016-19 while averaging 53 innings per year along the way.

Overall, Buchter carries a career 3.16 ERA (4.18 SIERA) through 236 1/3 innings as a big leaguer. He’s turned in a strong 26.3 percent strikeout rate but an elevated 11.7 percent walk rate during that time and is an extreme fly-ball pitcher (26.1 percent ground-ball rate). There could be some concern about his velocity, which dipped to 90.4 mph in 2021 after averaging exactly 92.6 mph in each of the prior three seasons. Still, Buchter pitched quite well in Triple-A this season and has a lengthy track record of run prevention in the Majors. Given the number of clubs seeking bullpen depth following the trade deadline, he’d figure to have a good chance at latching on with another team that could use some left-handed insurance in the upper minors.

Padres Fire Pitching Coach Larry Rothschild

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The Padres announced Monday that they’ve fired pitching coach Larry Rothschild. Bullpen coach Ben Fritz will step up as the pitching coach for the remainder of the 2021 season.

“Larry has been a tremendous asset for our organization over the last two seasons, and we appreciate the experience, hard work and dedication that he brought to the position,” Padres manager Jayce Tingler said in a statement within today’s press release. “We wish him nothing but the best in the future.”

Rothschild’s ouster comes after a weekend in which the Padres were overtaken by the Reds for the second Wild Card spot in the National League. San Diego has been in a freefall in the standings, losing nine of the past 11 games due in no small part to woeful performances from a pitching staff that has not lived up to expectations in 2021. The Padres have yielded an average of 5.91 runs per contest across that 11-game swoon.

Even beyond their recent slide, the Padres’ pitching staff simply hasn’t been as dominant as many would’ve hoped on the heels of an active winter. Joe Musgrove has taken his game to new heights and Yu Darvish has performed well, but San Diego starters rank 17th overall with a 4.37 ERA this season.

Left-hander Blake Snell, a marquee offseason acquisition, has had the roughest season of his career, recording career-worst marks in ERA (4.82), expected ERA (5.62) and walk rate (13.7 percent). Rookie Ryan Weathers has been hit extremely hard of late and is sitting on a 5.83 ERA. Young Chris Paddack, meanwhile, had a brilliant debut in 2019 but has struggled since Rothschild’s hiring prior to the 2020 season. Paddack posted a 3.33 ERA in 140 2/3 innings  as a rookie but has a 4.97 mark in 152 innings since. That certainly can’t all be pinned on Rothschild alone, but the timing couldn’t have helped Rothschild’s cause.

Fritz will hold things down for the remainder of the season, but Rothschild’s dismissal means there will be a search for at least one spot on the coaching staff this winter. The fate of others on the field staff could well be tied to how the team performs in the coming weeks. It’s unlikely that there will be major turnover at the top of the baseball operations department, however — not after A.J. Preller was promoted to president of baseball operations and extended through the 2026 season back in February.

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