The Rangers announced this evening they’ve signed reliever Greg Holland to a minor league contract with an invitation to big league Spring Training. If he cracks the Opening Day roster, he’ll receive a $2.1MM base salary, reports Levi Weaver of the Athletic (Twitter link).
Holland is a 12-year big league veteran and a three-time All-Star. An elite closer and vital piece of the bullpens that made the Royals so tough to beat in the middle of the last decade, he unfortunately blew out his UCL late in 2015 and required Tommy John surgery. Holland returned to post an NL-best 41 saves with the Rockies in 2017, but he wasn’t quite as dominant as he’d been in K.C. before the surgery.
Since then, Holland’s performance has fluctuated wildly as he’s bounced between a few different clubs. He posted an ERA above 4.50 in both 2018 (which he split between the Cardinals and Nationals) and 2019, where he played in Arizona. Holland returned to his old stomping grounds in Kansas City for 2020, where he pitched to a 1.91 ERA over 28 1/3 frames. The Royals re-signed him to a $2.75MM guarantee last winter, but he couldn’t replicate that success over a larger body of work.
Holland posted a 4.85 ERA in 55 2/3 frames last season. His 21.8% strikeout percentage and 10.7% walk rate were each a bit worse than the respective league averages, although he still generated swinging strikes at a decent 12.3% clip. The 36-year-old joins a rather crowded list of righty bullpen options the Rangers have added as non-roster invitees. Dan Winkler, Brandon Workman, Matt Bush, Justin Anderson and Jesús Tinoco are among the other players in camp.
Jon Heyman of the MLB Network reported Holland was signing with the Rangers shortly before the team announcement.
Holland is sadly one of those flash in the pan closers who had a great 2 or so year stretch and then flamed out
He was great for a lot longer than 2 years.
Amazing pitcher…until my Cardinals signed him. WOW, did THAT not work out!
Oh hey there Bill Dewitt! Not sure why you’re commenting here though.
Well after 2015 yes but he does have a shiny piece of hardware on his finger.
Good thing they didn’t extend holland long term
@JG – He has 220 career saves so he’s been good for much longer than 2 years. Over 40 saves 3 times in his career and another year of 32 saves too. He may finally be reaching the end of his career but he’s been one heck of a pitcher for a long time. Not Hall of Fame worthy, but he’s in the hall of very good.
I don’t think saves are a great stat. You can come in with a lead of more than 3 runs in certain situations and still get credited with a save. You can even come in for a batter and get one lol. There are many mediocre closers on the all time list who have around the same save totals as holland has
Even the relievers in the HoF barely belong in there.
Other than Rivera and Hoffman I don’t think the others should be there. Especially smith
I’m thinking 1 year/$2.3M or so.
Read the article. It stared 2 million $⚾️
I think when a guy plays in a flyover baseball city like KC, there’s a tendency on many peoples parts to just look past said player. In their minds, if that guy didn’t play for NY or LA or a big market team, then they tend to overlook them. It’s typical.
Is he overlooked though ? After 2014 he really started to fade. He did post 2 good era’s after that but in both seasons he had small innings totals
I don’t think ERA is the greatest stat. Particularly not for relievers with limited innings, where one or two outlier innings can wreck an ERA. There are many more better advanced metric stats. And all of them conclude that Holland has been highly effective over his career.
I gotta think this is Holland’s last hurrah. A lot of miles on that arm, and who knows how much (if anything) left in the tank.
To strengthen bullpen, Rangers go to HOLLAND !!