Indians Release Rene Rivera
The Indians have released veteran catcher Rene Rivera, per the transactions log at MLB.com. Cleveland designated him for assignment this past weekend after activating Roberto Perez from the injured list.
Rivera, who’ll turn 38 at the end of the month, was signed to a minor league deal earlier this year and made his way to the big leagues when Perez first landed on the injured list. He logged 21 games behind the plate with Cleveland, batting .236/.300/.400 in 63 plate appearances. Rivera connected on a pair of homers and three doubles, but he also fanned in 24 of those 63 trips to the plate (38 percent).
The Indians currently have fellow veterans Ryan Lavarnway and Wilson Ramos (who recently signed with Cleveland) on their Triple-A roster, which left Rivera without much of an opportunity even in the upper minors. He’ll head back to the free-agent market and look for another opportunity. In parts of 13 seasons split between nine different clubs, Rivera is a .221/.273/.355 hitter who boasts an elite 36 percent caught-stealing rate and a generally strong defensive reputation (though his defensive marks were down during his brief Cleveland run).
Cubs’ Recent Losing Streak Changes Trade Deadline Outlook
A couple weeks ago, the Cubs had positioned themselves as likely buyers during trade season. As recently as June 24, Chicago was tied with the Brewers atop the NL Central, nine games over .500. The past two weeks have been an unmitigated disaster for the North Siders, though.
Between June 25 and July 7, the Cubs lost eleven consecutive games. They snapped that streak with a win over the Phillies last night, but Chicago enters tonight’s matchup against Philadelphia with an uninspiring 43-44 record. The Brewers, meanwhile, have rattled off a 10-3 stretch over that time, opening up an 8.5 game lead on Chicago within a 14-day span. (The 45-41 Reds have also since passed the Cubs to jump into second place in the division). Chicago isn’t a whole lot closer in the Wild Card race, trailing the Padres by seven games (with Cincinnati and the Nationals also above them in the standings).
An eleven game losing streak can certainly tank a team’s season, and it seems it might’ve in the Cubs’ case. On June 24, FanGraphs gave Chicago a 35.7% chance of making the playoffs; entering play today, their odds were down to 6.4%.
With a playoff berth all of a sudden seeming highly unlikely, the calculus for the Cubs front office changes considerably, a fact that president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer acknowledged this evening. Speaking with reporters (including Jordan Bastian of MLB.com, Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune and Gordon Wittenmyer of NBC Sports Chicago), Hoyer sounded far more willing to move players off the big league roster than he’d been a couple weeks ago.
“Eleven days ago, we were certainly fully on the buying side … and obviously (teams) are now calling to see which players are available,” Hoyer said. “So it’s a very different scenario than we’d expected. Life comes at you fast.” Asked whether the front office is willing to make players available, Hoyer noted their responsibility to consider anything “that can help build the next great Cubs team,” citing their aforementioned dwindling playoff odds.
The implications for the Cubs are obvious. Three of their highest-profile players — Kris Bryant, Javier Báez and Anthony Rizzo — are all slated to hit free agency at the end of the season. If the team isn’t contending in 2021, it stands to reason any or all of them could find themselves on the move over the next few weeks.
Certainly, there’d be plenty of interest in every member of that group. Bryant has bounced back from a disappointing 2020 to hit a very strong .269/.349/.498 with sixteen home runs over 324 plate appearances this year. He’s making far more consistent hard contact and barreling balls up at a rate he hasn’t since his MVP peak. Bryant’s production has tailed off after he got out to a scorching start to the year, but his combination of excellent season-long numbers and overall track record would make him perhaps the top player on the trade market were the Cubs to make him available.
Rizzo’s .250/.343/.439 line is down rather significantly from his best seasons. It’s still above-average offensive production, though, and he continues to offer a rare combination of bat-to-ball skills and hard contact (to say nothing of quality defensive marks at first base). Báez has struck out at an alarming 36.6% clip this year en route to a .234 batting average and a .282 on-base percentage. But he’s also popped 21 home runs and slugged .496, and he’s a comfortably above-average defender and baserunner.
Between their career accolades, key roles on the 2016 World Series team, and impending free agencies, that trio figures to draw the most fanfare in advance of the July 30 trade deadline. They’re far from the only players on whose availability other teams might inquire, though. Zach Davies, Joc Pederson and Jake Marisnick are useful players set to reach free agency this winter. (Marisnick has a mutual option for 2022, but mutual options are rarely exercised by both parties).
Willson Contreras, controllable via arbitration through 2022, is one of the game’s best catchers and was the subject of trade discussion last offseason. Closer Craig Kimbrel is having an incredible bounceback campaign, pitching to a 0.57 ERA with a 46.2% strikeout rate and 8.5% walk percentage after struggling mightily between 2019-20. Kimbrel’s $16MM salary for 2021 now looks more than reasonable, as does the matching option on his contract for 2022.
Certainly, it’d be a surprise to see all of those players change teams in the next few weeks. Hoyer pushed back against the idea the Cubs were planning to kick off any sort of full-on rebuild, even as he acknowledged that the 2022 roster will look different from the current iteration. He also noted there’s still some possibility — slim as it now seems — the team plays its way back into contention over the coming weeks.
The Cubs have eighteen more games before the deadline. After facing the Phils tonight, their slate through July 29 consists of seven games against the Cardinals, six against the lowly Diamondbacks, and four against the Reds, one of the teams they’ll need to leapfrog for a postseason spot.
Winning thirteen or fourteen of those contests might get the Cubs sufficiently close to the postseason picture that the front office decides not to orchestrate a sell-off. The core of the current club has been pivotal to arguably the franchise’s most successful five-year run in over a century. It certainly wouldn’t be a surprise to see Hoyer and his front office give the group as long a leash as possible this summer to try to play their way back into the mix.
Nevertheless, the most likely scenario is that the club’s dreadful past two weeks dug them a hole too deep to come back from. That’s an inescapable reality Hoyer acknowledged this afternoon, one that may result in a few of the franchise’s most important players of recent memory donning new uniforms in a few weeks’ time.
Minor MLB Transactions: 7/8/21
Today’s minor moves:
- The Blue Jays announced they’ve acquired outfield prospect Darlin Guzman from the Reds as the player to be named later in the teams’ January deal that sent right-hander Héctor Pérez to Cincinnati. Guzman joined the Reds during the 2017-18 international signing period and spent the next two seasons in the Dominican Summer League. He hit .306/.361/.537 over 391 plate appearances in the DSL and was with the Reds’ Arizona Complex League team in 2021. The 20-year-old has never appeared on a Reds system ranking at Baseball America or FanGraphs. Pérez, meanwhile, was outrighted off the 40-man roster last month after struggling with Triple-A Louisville. He remains in the organization but hasn’t made a big league appearance with Cincinnati.
- The Cubs announced that catcher Taylor Gushue has cleared waivers and been sent outright to Triple-A Iowa. The 27-year-old does not have the requisite service time to refuse an outright assignment, so he’ll remain in the organization as high minors depth. A longtime Nationals farmhand, Gushue signed with the Cubs over the winter and has hit .272/.328/.440 over 137 plate appearances with Iowa this season. That earned him his first promotion to the major leagues last week, but he was designated for assignment having appeared in just two games when Chicago signed Robinson Chirinos to a big league deal.
MLBTR Chat Transcript: 7/8/21
Click here to view today’s chat transcript.
Indians Activate Zach Plesac
The Indians are reinstating right-hander Zach Plesac from the 10-day injured list to start this evening’s game against the Royals, the team informed reporters (including Mandy Bell of MLB.com). Righty J.C. Mejia was optioned to Triple-A Columbus to create active roster space.
Plesac has missed about a month and a half since suffering a non-displaced fracture in his right thumb in late May. Before the injury, the 26-year-old had tossed 58 2/3 innings of 4.14 ERA/4.50 SIERA ball over his first ten starts. That’s a step back from the sterling 2.28 ERA/3.41 SIERA he pitched to over 55 1/3 frames in 2020, but it’s still solid production.
Cleveland hasn’t gotten much decent work from the starting staff in recent weeks. The Indians lost Shane Bieber and Aaron Civale to IL stints of their own after Plesac went down, leaving them relying on an unproven rotation. Over the past month, Indians starters have pitched to a woeful 7.16 ERA that bests only the Orioles rotation (8.40). That’s contributed to a significant drop in the standings, as the Indians are amidst a nine-game losing streak that has knocked them back to .500 (42-42), eight games behind the division-leading White Sox.
Mejia has been a big part of those struggles. Over his seven starts, the 24-year-old has given up 25 runs in 25 1/3 innings. It has also been a difficult season for Triston McKenzie, who has walked 20.6% of opposing hitters en route to a 6.38 ERA. That led the Indians to option McKenzie last month, but he’ll be recalled to start tomorrow evening’s game, relays Zack Meisel of the Athletic (Twitter link).
Reds Place Sonny Gray On Injured List
3:51 pm: Gray seemed wholly unconcerned when speaking with reporters (including Mark Sheldon of MLB.com) this afternoon. He said he pitched through the discomfort during his start yesterday and expects to be back when first eligible. In that case, he wouldn’t need to skip a turn in the rotation.
1:38 pm: The Reds announced Thursday that they’ve placed right-hander Sonny Gray back on the 10-day injured list due to a rib cage strain. It’s the third IL stint of the season for Gray, who had very recently returned from a four-week absence due to a groin strain. Right-hander Tony Santillan is up from Triple-A Louisville in his place.
Cincinnati hasn’t provided a timetable for Gray’s return, though it’s possible that with the All-Star break looming, the impact of his absence could be minimal. Gray started yesterday’s game (and pitched quite well), so he wouldn’t have been in line to make another start prior to the break anyhow. He’d be eligible to return for the Reds’ third game after the break, so it’s technically possible that he won’t even miss a start.
If the injury does prove to sideline Gray for a few outings, however, it’ll be a particularly ill-timed IL trip. The Reds, winners in 10 of their past 15 games, will come out of the break to host a pivotal three-game series against the division-leading Brewers. They’ll then take on a first-place Mets club before playing a string of seven straight divisional games (four against the Cubs, three against the Cardinals) in the days leading up to the July 30 trade deadline. Getting multiple starts from Gray, who has a 3.19 ERA in 62 frames this year, would obviously be ideal.
The Reds’ recent hot streak has propelled them back to second place in the NL Central. They’re six back of the Brewers at the moment, making these next seven games in particular quite important to their season. General manager Nick Krall recently characterized his club as deadline buyers, although one would imagine that is at least somewhat dependent on how the team performs in the looming seven-game stretch against the current division leaders.
For now, Santillan will give the Reds’ staff some depth. All four of his outings with the big league club this season have been starts, but he’ll give manager David Bell a multi-inning option out of the ‘pen for now, it seems. In 16 2/3 innings of big league work so far, Santillan has allowed seven earned runs (3.78 ERA) on 18 hits and 10 walks with 20 punchouts.
Mariners Notes: Trade Deadline, Sheffield, Dipoto
2:50pm: Dipoto revealed in an appearance on 710 ESPN Radio today that Sheffield has been diagnosed with a mild flexor strain in his left forearm but also a Grade 2 oblique strain (Twitter link via 710’s Shannon Drayer). The oblique injury is the more significant of the two, and based on the fact that it’s a Grade 2 strain, it seems fair to expect Sheffield to be absent from the Seattle rotation for a rather notable chunk of time. Even less-severe Grade 1 oblique strains can sideline players for around a month at a time.
10:20am: After slipping a few games below .500 in mid-June, the Mariners have rallied back with a 14-7 showing that has them three games over .500, at 45-42. That still places them nine games back in a tough AL West, but they’re only three and a half games down in the Wild Card standings. Seattle has looked like one of the many teams whose deadline trajectory could very well be determined by how the team fares in its next 10 games or so, but manager Scott Servais suggested in an appearance on MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM that he expects the front office to operate as buyers (Twitter link, with audio).
“We’ve got a ton of prospect capital, and we’ve got young players in our system — our minor league system has improved so much,” Servais told hosts Mike Ferrin and Jim Duquette. “…Our Major League team is moving in the right direction, so the possibility to add players to help this year and to help going forward is really important for us. I’m sure [GM Jerry Dipoto] and [assistant GM] Justin Hollander are talking to everybody out there and seeing what they can do to better us now and then also take a look into 2022 and beyond.”
Asked about specific areas of need, Servais said with a chuckle that “every manager out there says he needs more pitching.” While that was something of a tongue-in-cheek comment, the rotation is a fairly obvious area of focus if Dipoto and the front office do indeed look to add to the roster. The Mariners have received solid results from Yusei Kikuchi, Justin Dunn, offseason signing Chris Flexen and top prospect Logan Gilbert, but on the whole, their starters are 23rd in the Majors with a 4.76 ERA.
Opening Day starter Marco Gonzales missed more than a month with a forearm injury and hasn’t looked like himself when healthy enough to take the mound. The typically steady left-hander has posted a career-worst nine percent walk rate, which has been exacerbated by the fact that he’s been one of MLB’s most homer-prone pitchers in 2021 (2.29 HR/9).
Fellow left-hander Justus Sheffield, meanwhile, has recently struggled through a brutal stretch — a slump that looks all the more alarming after the Mariners announced last night that he was headed to the injured list with a forearm strain of his own. No timetable for the southpaw’s return was provided.
The 25-year-old Sheffield pitched to a 4.17 ERA and 3.97 FIP from Opening Day 2020 through June 3 of this season and looked to be settling in as a reliable member of the Seattle rotation. But over his past five starts, Sheffield has managed only 19 1/3 innings and been hammered for 24 runs on 33 hits (seven homers) and 12 walks. His velocity hasn’t dipped in that time, but it’s still the worst stretch of his young career — one that’s ballooned his 2021 ERA to 6.48 in short order.
Looking long-term, the Mariners have some high-end arms still on the way. Recent first-rounders George Kirby and Emerson Hancock were both drafted as polished college arms, but they’re currently pitching at Class-A Advanced and aren’t immediate options to help round out the MLB group. The Mariners have some depth options in Triple-A — Robert Dugger is already on the 40-man roster — but they’ve also lost a lot of their depth to injuries. Dunn is currently on the IL with a shoulder strain. James Paxton‘s return to Seattle lasted just 1 1/3 innings before he required Tommy John surgery. Righty Ljay Newsome also went down with a UCL tear, and lefty Nick Margevicius underwent thoracic outlet surgery earlier in the year.
Given that slate of injuries and new concerns surrounding Sheffield, it’d only be natural for the Mariners to look for some help on the trade market. And while that’ll be especially likely if they remain within arm’s reach of a postseason berth, the Mariners are the type of team that could look to add longer-term pieces to their MLB group even if they begin to fall back in the standings. Servais foreshadowed as much when mentioning “[taking] a look into 2022 and beyond” — a nod to the possibility of acquiring a pitcher with multiple years of club control remaining.
Regardless of how the Mariners finish in the standings this year, the offseason expectation will be that they’re going to start adding to the roster via free agency and trades. Much of the team’s young core has either emerged in the big leagues already or will do so over the next calendar year. Acquiring a pitcher with multiple years of club control would only serve to jumpstart that process for Dipoto & Co.
Then again, as Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times points out, there’s at least some degree of uncertainty surrounding the organization’s top decision-maker himself. Dipoto is in the final season of a three-year contract right now and has yet to sign a new deal. Divish reports that the Mariners have “floated” the idea of a one-year extension for the 2022 season, which would give Dipoto a chance to finish off his rebuild and ownership the chance to take a look at a more finished product, so to speak.
For the time being, however, Dipoto is approaching a pivotal trade deadline with no guarantee he’ll still be at the helm this coming offseason. It’s still possible that ownership will get something done this month — Dipoto’s last three-year extension was signed in early July, 2018 — but it’s not clear whether there’s been any formal offer made.
Marlins Pick Up Don Mattingly’s Option For 2022 Season
Don Mattingly will return as the Marlins’ manager in 2022. General manager Kim Ng announced on today’s broadcast that Mattingly’s mutual option for the 2022 campaign has been picked up by both parties (Twitter link, with video, via Bally Sports Florida).
“Donnie’s been steady at the helm,” Ng said when asked about the job Mattingly has done. “I think that’s one of his greatest attributes. He’s incredibly patient. I think he’s got a great way with the young players. He’s very positive with them.”
The 2022 season will be Mattingly’s seventh as the Marlins’ manager. He joined the Fish in 2016 on the heels of a five-year run as the Dodgers’ skipper and has since managed the team to a 345-446 record. Of course, the manager of a club that has gone through yet another broad-reaching fire sale, turned over its front office and gone through an ownership change can’t be judged solely on wins and losses. Mattingly has stuck with the club through all of those sweeping changes, convincing multiple front offices and ownership groups alike that he’s the right person to be leading an up-and-coming Marlins club.
Mattingly’s Marlins made a surprise postseason bid last year in the expanded format and did so in spite of a Covid outbreak that gutted the roster and left him with a host of replacement players for several weeks. That unexpected playoff berth contributed to Mattingly’s first NL Manager of the Year win. His club toppled the NL Central champion Cubs in the Wild Card round of play before falling to the Braves in the NLDS.
The 2021 season hasn’t gone exactly according to plan for the Marlins, who’ve fallen into a prolonged stretch of losses and dropped to 38-47 in the standings. The loss of touted young right-hander Sixto Sanchez due to shoulder surgery has been a particularly tough hit for Miami, and they’ve also been without third baseman Brian Anderson and promising righty Elieser Hernandez for much of the 2021 campaign as well.
Still, there are some important pieces in place for the franchise moving forward. Jazz Chisholm is enjoying a nice season in the middle infield, and the Marlins’ rotation has the makings of an impressive group, headlined by Sandy Alcantara, Pablo Lopez and 2021 Rookie of the Year candidate Trevor Rogers. Miami has several interesting prospects just breaking into the Majors or on the cusp of doing so, including outfielders Jesus Sanchez and JJ Bleday. Last year’s first-round pick, righty Max Meyer, has utterly dominated the Double-A level and could be a quick-to-the-Majors arm.
Mattingly will get the chance to work with that upcoming wave of talent, and if all goes according to plan next season, it wouldn’t at all be a surprise to see Ng, principal owner Bruce Sherman and CEO Derek Jeter extend Mattingly beyond the 2022 campaign.
A’s Select Jacob Wilson, Place Chad Pinder On IL
The Athletics announced Thursday that they’ve selected the contract of infielder Jacob Wilson from Triple-A Las Vegas and placed Chad Pinder on the 10-day injured list due to a hamstring strain. A’s skipper Bob Melvin tells reporters that Pinder’s injury is going to sideline him “awhile,” noting that the strain is in the middle of the hamstring muscle and that such injuries are “probably at least a month” (Twitter link via Matt Kawahara of the San Francisco Chronicle).
Wilson, 30, will be making his MLB debut nine years after being selected by the Cardinals in the 10th round of the 2012 draft. He’s since bounced to the Nationals for a few seasons and also spent a year with the Korea Baseball Organization’s Lotte Giants. After inking a minor league deal over the winter, he headed to Vegas and has mashed at a .288/.385/.630 clip while slugging 14 home runs, 17 doubles and a pair of triples in 218 plate appearances.
Wilson has played all over the diamond in his pro career, though his primary positions have been second base and third base. He’s also logged nearly 500 innings at first base, and the A’s have been giving him time in left field so far in 2021 as well. He’ll give them a right-handed bat to help cover for Pinder’s absence. In 1409 career plate appearances at the Triple-A level, Wilson is a .263/.341/.462 hitter.
This is the second IL stint of the season for Pinder, who missed more than a month earlier in the year thanks to a left knee sprain. The 29-year-old has been a versatile and valuable role player for the A’s in recent years, but he’s struggling through the least-productive season of his MLB tenure to date, batting just .216/.269/.358 with the second-highest strikeout rate (27.6 percent) and second-lowest walk rate (5.5 percent) of his career.
Eloy Jimenez To Begin Rehab Assignment
The White Sox announced this morning that slugger Eloy Jimenez has been cleared to begin a minor league rehab assignment this weekend. Jimenez, who suffered a ruptured pectoral tendon during Spring Training and has yet to play in 2021, will start out with Class-A Advanced Winston-Salem.
Minor league rehab assignments can last up to 30 days, so this doesn’t necessarily mean that Jimenez will be back with the Sox in the very near future, but it effectively places a clock on his return to the roster (barring any kind of setback). Assuming all goes well with the rehab, it seems he’s on track to return on the more optimistic end of the four- to five-month recovery period the White Sox placed on him after he underwent surgery back on March 30.
It’s a welcome development for a White Sox club whose roster has been hammered by injuries to key players. Center fielder Luis Robert suffered a Grade 3 hip flexor strain in early May that came with a 12- to 16-week recovery period. Nick Madrigal‘s season is over due to a torn hamstring that required surgery. Yasmani Grandal underwent surgery to repair a tendon in his knee this week.
Despite losing some of their best players for half the season or more, the Sox have run away with the feeble American League Central. The rival Twins have been perhaps baseball’s most disappointing team in 2021, while the Indians have lost their top three starters to injury and have plummeted in the standings while their replacements have posted a combined 6.87 ERA over the past month. Kansas City’s offseason spending hasn’t produced a winner on the field, and the Tigers are in what they hope to be the final stages of what has felt like an interminable rebuild.
That’s not to detract from what the ChiSox have accomplished. Few would have been surprised to see the team wilt with so many major injuries. The front office deserves credit both for bringing in veteran Brian Goodwin, who has helped to stabilize the outfield with a .253/.349/.493 batting line in his first 22 games, and for generally cultivating a deep farm system over the past several years. Prospects Gavin Sheets and Jake Burger have both hit the ground running in their big league debuts, for instance.
The Chicago pitching staff, meanwhile, has been the backbone of the club’s success. Spearheaded by offseason acquisition Lance Lynn and a remarkable breakout by Carlos Rodon, Sox starting pitchers rank seventh in the Majors with a collective 3.62 earned run average.
The general thought has been that the White Sox will be looking for help in the outfield and/or at second base in the three weeks leading up to the July 30 trade deadline. That Jimenez is already on the mend and perhaps on track to be back in the lineup by early August could directly impact the team’s strategy. The Sox recently designated Adam Eaton for assignment, but they’ve been more prominently linked to infield acquisitions thus far — namely Eduardo Escobar and Adam Frazier. An apparently looming Jimenez return can only make GM Rick Hahn and his staff feel better about the outlook in the outfield, whereas second base is still a fairly obvious area to upgrade.