The Royals placed Salvador Pérez on the 10-day injured list between games of today’s doubleheader with the White Sox. Pérez suffered a sprained left thumb during the opening contest, and Kansas City quickly moved to replace him with Sebastian Rivero on the active roster. Kansas City’s franchise backstop is off to a slow start, much like the rest of the lineup. Pérez is hitting .206/.239/.397 through 34 games. He’s popped six home runs but drawn only four walks with 38 strikeouts, contributing to one of the lowest on-base marks in the big leagues.
While Pérez is out of action, the Royals will get their first extended look at rookie MJ Melendez behind the plate. The 23-year-old backstop led all minor league players with 41 home runs last season, combining for a .286/.386/.625 line between Double-A Northwest Arkansas and Triple-A Omaha. That’s obviously elite production for any player, let alone a catcher, and Melendez is now regarded as one of the sport’s most promising prospects. He was recalled for his first MLB promotion at the beginning of the month and will take the majority of the catching time while Pérez is on the shelf.
The latest on a couple other injury situations around the league:
- The Braves placed reliever Tyler Matzek on the 15-day injured list, retroactive to May 14, due to inflammation in his throwing shoulder. That’s an ominous-sounding diagnosis, but an MRI this afternoon revealed no structural damage (relayed by Mark Bowman of MLB.com). Matzek will nevertheless be shut down from throwing for a couple weeks, indicating he’s likely to require a minor league rehab assignment even if he’s deemed alright to get back to action upon his next reevaluation. Matzek posted a 2.57 ERA in 63 innings for the World Series champions last season. He’s battled significant control woes in the early going this year, doling out nine walks among his 47 batters faced.
- Mets catcher James McCann underwent successful left hamate surgery this morning, manager Buck Showalter informed reporters (including Anthony DiComo of MLB.com). The team announced last Friday that he’d require a procedure after being diagnosed with a fracture, projecting a recovery timeline of approximately six weeks. McCann, who signed a four-year deal over the 2020-21 offseason, hit .232/.294/.349 during his first season in Queens. He’s off to a slow start this season, hitting .196/.266/.286 through 21 contests. New York is relying on a Tomás Nido – Patrick Mazeika pairing in McCann’s absence.
The Braves should probably shut down their entire terrible offense too
I figured something had to be wrong with Matzek.
Commentators mentioned he probably has a dead arm – which is no surprise given without him, the Braves wouldn’t be wearing a ring (and Soler, Rosario, and Freeman).
Let the man rest and let the season go. Funny how the core is just not enough last year and this season.
“Funny” how 3 parts of that core you’re always ranting about were injured for the better part of last season—–Acuna, Ozuna, D’Arnaud. Braves did just fine w/out them. Btw, are you over your Bumgarner obsession or do you still repeat your No MadBum No NLCS mantra every night before beddy bye? Troll on fake Braves fan.
The worst part is that this troll was celebrating these same Braves after they won it all last year and pretending he was always positive about them.
Yes, they did fine because of the aforementioned guys + Pederson. They proved they don’t need Acuna to win and so far, they are not anymore competent with him now.
So one of the best players in the game isn’t needed on his own team? Interesting theory. Wait, not interesting… absurd. It’s an absurd theory
This is the same guy who said Freddie would never get a ring with Atlanta.
What theory? It is a fact – they won without him and when he is on the team, they don’t win.
You can’t possibly be so naive as to think statistics can be used like that. I refuse to believe anyone here is actually that dumb. You’re saying he’s a great player but yet also somehow is the sole causation for the teams losses. Kindergartners see the absurdity in this.
Haha, how I knew you will spin what I said
The only correlation is if he didn’t get hurt, the Braves would not have acquired Soler/Rosario. Without them, the Braves would have been eliminated in the second round.
At the end of the day, the Braves core is not good enough to win – we know this since 2018 (excluding last season).
I’m not spinning, you’re the one who took the conversation in a direction that clearly implied you were arguing causation. Like I said, I refused to believe you were that naive. You may not truly believe that such causation exists, but it is what you said.
Haha no. I said it exactly how we saw it. They won without Acuna, they didn’t with Acuna. Hence, they don’t need Acuna to win.
NOW, am I going to say the Braves are a better team (on paper) without Acuna? Absolutely not, but I’m still firm that he is not a superstar. My standards how high though and I believe the word is thrown around too much nowadays.
Regardless, I’m also a firm believer the core is not good enough to win the ring.
Makes no sense. They’re good enough to win without Acuna, but yet somehow WITH him their core isn’t good enough. There is really no point there. And the last two years he’s had an OPS+ over 150. If that’s not a superstar who is?
A superstar shows up in the playoffs. That is where they are born. Again, by today’s standards, media and fans call him a superstar…fine. The game is desperate for them clearly so they are attaching it to any player without large sample size production and/or production in big moments.
As for the other comment, they won because the guys are mentioned 100x. You can be in denial all you want – without them, they would not have won.
Proof? First half of last season and so far the first half of this season.
You’re just entitling yourself to your own definitions now. So basically all he has to do is have a good run in the playoffs and you’ll 180 on your opinion of him? Do you not see how crazy that is? I don’t really think we’re disagreeing here. I think you stepped in it and rather than just back off your original absurd implication you’re trying to dig in to save face. Bottom line: he’s a great player by the stats. Teams are BETTER (certainly not worse) when they include great players, therefore…
I don’t think I’m stretching the definition. There is a difference between great players and superstars. Your bottom line is irrelevant to the argument since I never disagreed or argued that.
Acuna and Tatis are within the same category of players who have ppl kissing their butts constantly without them staying healthy on the field nor playing in big games. Both should probably strikeout less since a superstar should not be good at doing the worst thing possible per at bat at a high rate,
Feel free to trade Acuna to my Mets. We’ll be happy to take his contract off your hands.
I guess elite production standards have lowered over the years?
OPS over 1.000 sounds pretty elite even if it is in the minors, especially at a premium position like catcher.
no pleasing some people
It really has, but I also think it’s written relative to what the production is today. Production is down something like 30%, so naturally, elite protection boundary could drop 30% lower, if that makes sense.
I wrote on another article that Mickey Mantle’s 1968 season, one in which he was so incredibly disappointed & everyone knew he was closing in on the end, he still posted a .248 average with 23 bombs, good for a 150 OPS+. That’s like a superstar player on many teams today.
Times have certainly changed.
.286/.386/.625 for an entire season for a catcher has and always will be considered elite.
NOT MATZEK NO
Melendez responds with his double-header double-duty with his first ML bomb. If they can get Matheny from giving OHearn another & another last chance, maybe they’ll promote Pratto too & give suffering Royals fans a glimpse at the future…
O’Hearn has to have pictures of somebody. It’s perplexing when a 28yo DH/1B only type that hasn’t produced a plus .650 OPS in 4 years has a roster spot, let alone is batting in the middle of the order on occasion. Hoping that Pratto and Pasquantino start producing a little more so there’s pressure for the Royals to break the glass and thank O’Hearn and Santana for their service and bid adieu.
McCann can hit well only for the White Sox. I wonder why.
Because the White Sox put him in a position to succeed and he ran career high BABIPs in his 2 seasons with the WS? It was only 149 total games. I don’t think many people expected him to maintain that production.
McCann will be missed until his return. Neither Nido nor Mazeika are good enough for this team. We really need someone like W. Contreras right now. It kills me that Alvarez is a year away from call-up. We need someone of his caliber. It’s going to be painfully obvious that we don’t.
Dudes bat is a wet noodle. His agent should be given the Nobel Prize for getting him that contract
Then why do the pitchers prefer to throw to Nido?
Maybe because they feel like he calls a better game? With how bad McCann’s bat is, and he is awful, maybe that seemingly slight difference is huge to them? It’s not like McCann is Posey, Mauer or hell even Posada. The guy can’t hit at all. If he wasn’t a catcher he wouldn’t be in professional baseball!
Contreras will cost way too much. I’d target Roberto Perez.
What do you think we’d have to give up for WC? He’s a rental and Frankie Alvarez is probably realistically a 2023/early 2024 call up
I think Contreras is gonna command a pretty good haul by todays standards. The type of haul the Mets might do well to save for now; might need a SP or something in a more obvious way later on. Tons of teams are running out anemic offense from the catcher position. For now we can live with what we have. If deGrom has a setback and another starter gets injured, pitching might become a more dire need.
The Pirates transferred Perez from the 10-day injured list to the 60-day IL on Wednesday.
Oh boy, I missed that one. Ok so not Perez. That’s too bad. I really like his style of play.
I was really disappointed when they missed out on Omar Narvaez when the Brewers got him.
As one of the writers mentioned in a recent chat (Steve?), Cubs won’t get too much for Contreras because he’s a FA after the season. He didn’t even see him getting a top 100 prospect in return. (He is a Cards fan though…). If that’s true, then I don’t see why the Mets wouldn’t go hard after Willie. He can hit, great arm & truly wants to win. He has passion.
its harder for a catcher to be traded i think midseason because he needs acclimate to the pitching staff all the other positions are not tied to any other position. The mets might not be as tough though as he has worked with stroman and might help some.