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Mets Select Deven Marrero

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The Mets announced they’ve selected infielder Deven Marrero onto the major league roster. He replaces Luis Guillorme, who has landed on the 10-day injured list with a left groin strain (as reported earlier). New York also recalled catcher Michael Pérez from Triple-A Syracuse, placing fellow backstop Tomás Nido on the COVID-19 injured list in a corresponding move. Nido doesn’t count against the team’s 40-man roster while on the virus list, so no additional move was necessary to accommodate Marrero’s promotion.

Marrero, 32 next week, is headed to the big leagues for the second straight year. He appeared in 10 games with the division-rival Marlins last season, frequently bouncing on and off the roster depending on Miami’s need for additional infield insurance. He didn’t reach the majors in the shortened 2020 campaign, but he’d also gotten to the big leagues each year from 2015-19.

A former first-round draftee of the Red Sox, Marrero has settled in as a journeyman utility type. He’s never made much of an offensive impact, compiling a career .194/.250/.284 line with six home runs over 367 career big league plate appearances. Marrero owns a .230/.292/.335 line in parts of eight seasons at the Triple-A level, including a .236/.325/.358 showing in 32 games with Syracuse since signing a minor league contract with the Mets last month.

Marrero has the ability to cover anywhere on the infield, with the vast majority of his professional innings coming at shortstop. He can play second and third base as needed, and that defensive flexibility is of value to a New York team dealing with a couple injuries on the infield. None is more notable than the groin strain that’s likely to cost Guillorme more than a month of action, but New York also saw Eduardo Escobar sit out two games over the weekend due to some soreness in his left side. Escobar is in tonight’s staring lineup at third base and shouldn’t require an injured list stint, but Marrero adds some additional cover if manager Buck Showalter wants to mix in a few more rest days for the veteran Escobar.

Anthony DiComo of MLB.com first reported Marrero was being promoted.

Walker Buehler To Undergo Season-Ending Elbow Surgery

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The Dodgers announced Monday that right-hander Walker Buehler will undergo season-ending surgery on his right elbow on Aug. 23. He’s been out since June 10 after being diagnosed with a Grade 2 flexor strain. Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic tweets that Buehler’s recent MRIs weren’t conclusive enough to determine the extent of the damage in his elbow, but Dr. Neal ElAttrache saw enough to recommend surgery. Presumably, the Dodgers will provide further details once the procedure has been performed.

That injury initially called for a six- to eight-week shutdown from throwing, and the Dodgers had surely hoped that Buehler might be able to make a comeback in late September and/or perhaps in the postseason. Instead, he won’t pitch again until next season at the earliest. Further details aren’t clear, as the team declined to provide specifics on the nature of the procedure in its initial announcement.

Buehler, 28, finished fourth in National League Cy Young voting last season but has now had multiple arm issues this season. Once it was clear that the forearm strain would sideline Buehler for as long as three months, he underwent an arthroscopic procedure to remove a bone spur from his elbow — an issue he said had plagued him for the past few seasons.

The arm issue(s) have limited Buehler to 65 innings in 2022, during which time he’s posted a 4.02 ERA with a career-low 21.2% strikeout rate. They’re pedestrian numbers by his lofty standards — both roughly in line with the league-average production among MLB starting pitchers (4.09 ERA, 21.4% strikeout rate).

Dating back to his first full big league season, in 2018, Buehler has established himself as a rock in the Dodgers’ rotation and as one of the most talented arms in the National League. He ranks 23rd in the Majors in innings pitched from 2018-22 — even with this year’s glut of missed time — and also ranks seventh in ERA (2.95), 25th in strikeout rate (27%) and 32nd in walk rate (6.2%) amid a field of 152 qualified starting pitchers in that time.

For the time being, Buehler will join both Clayton Kershaw (lower back discomfort) and Dustin May (recovering from 2021 Tommy John surgery) on the injured list. Both May and Kershaw figure to return before the end of the regular season. May recently punched out 10 hitters over five innings in his fifth Triple-A start of the season. He’s built up to 70 pitches. Kershaw, meanwhile, recently underwent an epidural injection and has resumed throwing, though there’s no immediate timetable for him to return to the Major League mound.

With that trio on the shelf, the Dodgers will look to Julio Urias, Tony Gonsolin, Tyler Anderson, Andrew Heaney and rookie Ryan Pepiot as rotation options — though Pepiot could soon be pushed out by May. Even absent a pair of big-name arms like Kershaw and Buehler, it’s a formidable group thanks to breakout performances from each of Gonsolin (2.24 ERA, 116 1/3 innings pitched), Anderson (2.81 ERA, 128 1/3 innings) and Heaney (1.16 ERA, 32.3% strikeout rate in 31 innings).

Obviously, not being able to pencil Buehler into a hopeful postseason rotation stings, but the group of Urias, Gonsolin and Kershaw is still a formidable top three, with May, Anderson and Heaney  all standing as potential playoff starters as well. The broader question for the Dodgers is just what Buehler’s recovery and 2023 outlook will be.

Even in the event that Buehler required Tommy John surgery and would need to miss the majority of the 2023 season — which, to be emphatically clear, has not been indicated or even implied by the team — he’d still be a lock to be tendered a contract. The 2022 campaign was the second of a two-year, $8MM deal buying out Buehler’s first two arbitration years. He’ll be arb-eligible four times as a Super Two player, meaning he has two raises to go. Because of this year’s limited workload, he’ll be due only a modest raise on his $4.25MM salary, making it a no-brainer for the Dodgers to keep him in the fold.

That said, the extent of Buehler’s recovery period will surely impact the Dodgers’ offseason direction and inform the level of aggression with which they pursue rotation help. The Dodgers currently stand to see Kershaw, Anderson and Heaney all potentially walk as free agents, so they’ll definitely be in the mix for starting pitching help this offseason.

Mets Place Luis Guillorme On Injured List

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The Mets are placing infielder Luis Guillorme on the 10-day injured list due to a groin strain, the team announced. MLB.com’s Anthony DiComo reported the diagnosis and the potential 3-4 week recovery period that Guillorme will need shortly before the team made it official (Twitter link). Once Guillorme recovers from the injury, he’ll need some time to build back up and go out on a rehab assignment, so he could be on the shelf as long as six weeks, Mike Puma of the New York Post tweets.

There’d already been some speculation about top prospect Brett Baty joining the Mets to make his big league debut in place of Guillorme, but manager Buck Showalter quashed those rumors in meeting with reporters today. Neither Baty nor Mark Vientos are viewed as options to take Guillorme’s spot on the roster at this time, DiComo tweets.

The loss of Guillorme is tough for the Mets, whose infield mix has thinned out a bit recently. Eduardo Escobar isn’t on the injured list but has been battling oblique discomfort. He’s in the lineup tonight, but the veteran switch-hitter is limited to batting left-handed for the time being. J.D. Davis, meanwhile, was traded to the Giants prior to the Aug. 2 trade deadline.

Guillorme has been solid on both sides of the ball in 2022, batting .283/.355/.357 while taking a career-high 289 plate appearances. He’s offered next to no power but has also shown strong bat-to-ball and plate discipline skills, evidenced by a career-low 13.5% strikeout rate and a sharp 10% walk rate.

It’s not yet clear how the Mets will handle filling Guillorme’s spot on the roster, though Showalter indicated that someone is on the way to take that spot, specifically mentioning a need to add a player who can cover some middle infield work as needed, as well. (Guillorme is the team’s lone backup to shortstop Francisco Lindor.) Speculatively, the Mets have both JT Riddle and Deven Marrero as veteran options in Triple-A Syracuse, though there’s been no indication from the team that either is being selected to the MLB roster.

Guillorme isn’t the only player the Mets will be without for the time being, either. Showalter indicated that catcher Tomas Nido is away from the club due to illness, which has prompted the Mets to recall catcher Michael Perez from Triple-A. Perez, acquired from the Pirates in late July, will make his team debut if he gets into a game while Nido is unavailable.

Blue Jays, Yoshi Tsutsugo Close To Minor League Deal

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The Blue Jays are close to signing first baseman Yoshi Tsutsugo to a minor league contract, interim manager John Schneider indicated to reporters Monday (Twitter link via Kaitlyn McGrath of The Athletic). Yuki Yamada of Japan’s Sankei Sports first reported that Tsutsugo was likely to land with Toronto on a minor league pact.

The 30-year-old Tsutsugo began the 2022 season on a one-year, $4MM deal with the Pirates but was cut loose by Pittsburgh last week after hitting just .171/.249/.229 with a pair of homers and four doubles through 193 plate appearances. That output was miles from the .268/.347/.535 slash turned in by Tsutsugo through 144 plate appearances down the stretch with the Pirates in 2021. The Pirates are on the hook for the remainder of his salary, so the Jays would only owe Tsutsugo the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the Major League roster.

Once a star-caliber slugger in with Japan’s Yokohama DeNA BayStars — when he posted a combined .293/.402/.574 with 139 home runs, 116 doubles, five triples, a 15.1 percent walk rate and a 20.4 percent strikeout rate in his final four NPB campaigns from 2016-19 — Tsutsugo has struggled in the big leagues. Originally signed by the Rays to a two-year, $12MM contract back in Dec. 2019, Tsutsugo has drawn plenty of walks throughout his big league tenure (11.6%) but has struggled with strikeouts (26.9%) while showing a particular susceptibility to sliders.

Tsutsugo likely amounts to little more than a depth addition for the Jays at this point, though with a nice showing in Buffalo he could emerge as an option to give Toronto an extra left-handed bat when they pick up another couple roster spots in September. Following today’s DFA of outfielder Bradley Zimmer, the Blue Jays currently have just three left-handed hitters on the Major League roster — Raimel Tapia, Cavan Biggio, Jackie Bradley Jr. — none of whom are especially productive hitters. Tapia is the only one logging regular at-bats right now, and he figures to continue doing so in center field for at least a few days, with George Springer being eased back in as a designated hitter following today’s activation from the injured list (Twitter link via Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi).

The righty-heavy Jays have still been one of baseball’s most productive clubs against right-handed pitching, but there’s little harm in picking up a lefty bat with some thump and taking a low-cost look at him in Triple-A in order to see if they can help to coax some more production out of his swing later this season.

Blue Jays Designate Bradley Zimmer For Assignment

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The Blue Jays have designated outfielder Bradley Zimmer for assignment, according to a club announcement. The move opens a spot on the active roster for George Springer, who has been activated from the 10-day injured list.

Zimmer, 29, has held down a spot on the Toronto roster since being acquired in an Opening Day trade that sent righty Anthony Castro back to Cleveland. He’s had an extremely limited role this season and struggled mightily when plugged into the lineup, hitting just .105/.209/.237 on the season. Of course, despite appearing in 77 games this year, Zimmer has just 87 plate appearances — a total that’s reflective of his status as a pure late-game defensive replacement and pinch-running option. He’s posted solid numbers with the glove and ranks in the 95th percentile in Statcast’s average sprint speed, but it’s hard to overlook the glaring level of offensive output.

That said, it’s surely difficult for anyone to perform with such sparse opportunities to see big league pitching in a competitive setting. Zimmer had never hit much prior to the 2022 campaign, but he at least entered the year with a .226/.310/.348 batting line in 858 big league plate appearances. Were he able to replicate that line while still functioning in a late-game substitute role, he’d make for a fine fourth outfielder, but the Jays seemingly feel as though the roster spot could be better used elsewhere.

Zimmer was the 21st overall pick out of the University of San Francisco back in 2014. Current Toronto general manager Ross Atkins was Cleveland’s farm director at the time of Zimmer’s selection and surely knows him quite well after spending several years in that role while Zimmer developed into one of the game’s most highly touted outfield prospects. A sky-high strikeout rate and some glaring struggles against left-handers have kept Zimmer from ever reaching that ceiling, however, and when the Jays added Jackie Bradley Jr. on a big league deal last week, it seemed quite likely that Zimmer’s Jays days were numbered.

Trades of anyone who’s been on a Major League roster are prohibited at this point in the season, so the only resolution for Zimmer’s DFA will be to place him on outright waivers or release waivers. He technically has enough big league service time to reject a minor league assignment if he does clear outright waivers, but he does not yet have the five years of service needed to reject an outright assignment and retain the remainder of his salary. As such, assuming he indeed passes through waivers unclaimed, Zimmer figures to accept the assignment in order to avoid forfeiting the remainder of this season’s $1.3MM salary.

Phillies Place Corey Knebel On Injured List, Designate Andrew Vasquez

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The Phillies announced they placed reliever Corey Knebel on the 15-day injured list with a right lat strain. Bullpen mate Sam Coonrod is back from the 60-day IL to take Knebel’s spot on the active roster. To clear a place on the 40-man for Coonrod, recent waiver claim Andrew Vasquez has been designated for assignment.

An IL stint for Knebel seemed likely after the veteran left yesterday’s appearance on account of the lat issue. The team announced he was headed for an MRI last night, the results of which still aren’t clear. The imaging results will determine how long Knebel’s on the shelf, but he’ll at least have to miss the next couple weeks. A right lat strain cost Knebel upwards of three months with the Dodgers last season, although it’s presently unknown whether his current issue is of a similar severity. Signed to a one-year, $10MM deal over the offseason, the 30-year-old has a decent 3.43 ERA over 44 2/3 innings in a Phils uniform, although that’s come with a personal-worst 21.1% strikeout rate.

To take Knebel’s bullpen spot, the Phils reinstate Coonrod to make his season debut. The hard-throwing righty was acquired from the Giants over the 2020-21 offseason and made 42 appearances during his debut campaign in Philadelphia. He posted a 4.04 ERA through 42 1/3 frames, striking out batters at a solid 25.9% clip while inducing a massive 57.1% ground-ball percentage. Paired with a fastball that averaged nearly 99 MPH, those peripherals suggested Coonrod could have an opportunity to carve out a key high-leverage role in 2022.

Instead, he’s missed the first four months of the season after straining his throwing shoulder during Spring Training. The 29-year-old has been on a rehab assignment since July 22, including seven appearances with Triple-A Lehigh Valley. He’s now apparently healthy enough for a return, where he’ll add a power right-handed arm for interim manager Rob Thomson.

Vasquez hasn’t made a major league appearance as a Phillie. Claimed off waivers from the Blue Jays on deadline day, he was immediately optioned to Lehigh Valley. He’s appeared four times with the IronPigs, allowing two runs (one earned) with three strikeouts and a walk. He also performed very well with Toronto’s top affiliate through the season’s first few months, allowing just three runs in 11 frames with a 15:2 strikeout-to-walk ratio while inducing grounders on two-thirds of batted balls.

That hasn’t carried over in his brief big league look with the Jays, as the 28-year-old served up six runs in 6 2/3 frames. This year’s nine MLB appearances match a career high for Vasquez, who has 13 1/3 career big league innings despite having reached the majors in four of the past five years. He’s performed quite well in Triple-A over the last two years, however, with those numbers intriguing enough he’s bounced between four organizations in the past 12 months.

It’s possible Vasquez will change uniforms again soon, as he’s slated to hit the waiver wire within the next few days. He’s in his final minor league option year, so any claiming team could stash him in Triple-A for the rest of this season (although he’d have to crack the Opening Day roster in 2023 or be taken off the 40-man roster). With Vasquez’s strong minor league work, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him land with another club seeking lefty bullpen depth.

Read The Transcript Of Today’s Fantasy Baseball Chat With Brad Johnson

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Brad Johnson has been writing about fantasy baseball for more than a decade and has considerable experience in Roto, H2H, dynasty, DFS, and experimental formats.  As an expert in the field, Brad participates in the Tout Wars Draft and Hold format and was crowned the league’s winner in 2020. Brad’s writing experience includes RotoGraphs, NBC SportsEDGE, and right here at MLB Trade Rumors. He’s also presented at the First Pitch Arizona fantasy baseball conference.

We’ll be hosting fantasy baseball-focused chats with Brad regularly, and feel free to drop him some questions on Twitter @BaseballATeam as well.

Click here to read a transcript of today’s fantasy baseball chat with Brad!

Guardians Designate Jake Jewell For Assignment

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The Guardians have designated right-hander Jake Jewell for assignment, tweets Mandy Bell of MLB.com. His spot on the 40-man roster will go to right-hander Xzavion Curry, who will indeed be selected to  the 40-man roster to start the second game of today’s doubleheader (as already covered here). Cleveland also reinstated James Karinchak from the restricted list and returned righty Peyton Battenfield to Triple-A Columbus.

Jewell, a longtime Angels farmhand, has begun to bounce around the league via waivers and minor league free agency in recent years, spending time with the Giants, Cubs, Dodgers and now Guardians since being let go by the Halos organization. He’s been hit hard in 38 1/3 career innings at the MLB level (7.75 ERA) but has posted a strong season in Cleveland’s system so far this year.

Through 43 1/3 innings in Triple-A Columbus, Jewell has pitched to a 2.49 ERA with a 27% strikeout rate, 8.4% walk rate and a huge 63.3% ground-ball rate. Despite that strong showing, Jewell wasn’t selected to the 40-man roster until a few days after the trade deadline. He didn’t make it into a big league game before being optioned back to Columbus and now jettisoned from the 40-man roster. With trades of players who’ve been on the Major League roster at any point now prohibited, Jewell will be placed on waivers or released within the next week. All 29 other clubs would be able to claim him.

Despite the lack of big league success, there’s a chance Jewell could end up claimed by another club. He’s optionable for the remainder of the season, creating some flexibility, and beyond the strong numbers he’s logged so far in 2022, he has a lengthy track record of sharp numbers at the game’s top minor league level. Jewell had a rough showing in Triple-A in 2019 — a season that saw  Triple-A leagues use the same juiced ball as the Majors — but has otherwise managed ERAs well south of 4.00 and solid strikeout rates in his other three Triple-A campaigns. On the whole, Jewell has racked up 151 innings of 3.64 ERA ball with a 25.1% strikeout rate, a 10.5% walk rate, an impressive 59.8% ground-ball rate and just 0.50 HR/9 at the game’s top minor league level.

 

Guardians To Select Xzavion Curry

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The Guardians will turn to right-handed pitching prospect Xzavion Curry to start the second game of today’s doubleheader, manager Terry Francona announced (Twitter link via Cleveland.com’s Joe Noga). He’ll need to have his contract formally selected to the 40-man roster, which is currently at capacity.

Curry, 24, was Cleveland’s seventh-round pick back in 2019 and has enjoyed a strong season between Double-A and Triple-A, working to a combined 3.48 ERA, 27.5% strikeout rate and 7.3% walk rate over the life of 101 innings (17 starts, two relief appearances). Curry didn’t post dominant numbers in his college days at Georgia Tech and was listed at “just” 5’10”, which might’ve contributed to him landing in the seventh round of his draft. However, he’s had little to no problems adapting to professional ball, posting strong results at every minor league stop — culminating in a career 2.90 minor league ERA.

FanGraphs tabs Curry 12th among Guardians farmhands in an absolutely stacked system, and he lands 18th on Baseball America’s midseason rankings. Scouting reports on Curry note that even though his heater sits in the low 90s, its huge spin and his deceptive delivery help it play up as a plus pitch that can miss bats in bunches. His secondary offerings don’t garner as much praise, though his slider is regarded as a potentially above-average pitch — and Curry’s outstanding command helps all of his pitches exceed expectations at times. He’s walked just 46 off the 795 hitters he’s faced as a pro (5.8%).

Curry will give Guards fans their first look at the latest rotation option to step out of the organization’s pitching factory. Cleveland seems to grow viable big league starters on trees, with both Curry and righty Peyton Battenfield (drafted two rounds after Curry) the latest unheralded prospects to surge through the system and position themselves as potential big league contributors. The Guardians’ five-man rotation is presently full, thanks to the presence of Shane Bieber, Triston McKenzie, Aaron Civale, Zach Plesac and Cal Quantrill, but both Curry and Battenfield have seemingly pitched their way to the upper levels of the organization’s depth chart.

Success in routinely turning out promising arms is one of the many reasons the Guardians have regularly been able to trade from their Major League pitching staff to keep the minor league system stacked without needing to dive headlong into a tedious, years-long rebuilding effort in recent seasons. Cleveland was reportedly open to trade offers on some controllable arms prior to the deadline — Plesac’s name was most commonly speculated upon — and promising late showings from arms like Curry who make their debuts this season will make it easier for the Guardians to renew any of those conversations this winter if they choose.

Cardinals Release T.J. McFarland

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The Cardinals have released left-hander T.J. McFarland following last week’s DFA, as first indicated on their transactions log at MLB.com. He’s free to sign with any of the 29 other clubs and, so long as he’s in a new organization prior to Sept. 1, could be postseason-eligible with that new team.

Of course, the veteran McFarland would need to rediscover his 2021 form before even being considered for such a role with a new team. The 33-year-old was a rock-solid member of the Cardinals’ bullpen last year, racking up groundouts in droves (63.7%) while rarely issuing free passes (6.3%) or surrendering home runs (0.70 HR/9). Despite a paltry 14.6% strikeout rate, that blend of grounders and lack of walks/dingers resulted in a 2.56 ERA through 38 2/3 frames. Fielding-independent metrics weren’t as bullish but generally pegged the southpaw as a quality bullpen option (3.78 xERA, 3.79 FIP, 3.85 SIERA).

McFarland faced exactly one more batter with the Cardinals in 2022 (145) than he did in 2021 (144), but his return stint in St. Louis proved nightmarish in that near-identical sample. All of his rate stats trended in the wrong direction (11% strikeout rate, 7.6% walk rate, 53% grounder rate, 1.38 HR/9) — and so, too, did his results. In 32 2/3 innings, McFarland was rocked for a 6.61 ERA. Fewer strikeouts and grounders, paired with a considerable uptick in walks, long balls and general hard contact is hardly a recipe for success for any pitcher, after all.

That said, McFarland’s 88.9 mph average sinker in 2022 was pretty closely in line with his 89.2 mph average in 2021, and even his “diminished” walk and ground-ball rates are well better than the league average. The bottom-of-the-barrel strikeout rate is an obvious concern, but McFarland has never been one to miss bats (13.8% career strikeout rate) and nonetheless still carries a 4.13 ERA in 472 1/3 Major League frames.

If a new team can help McFarland get his sinker back on track and bump that grounder rate closer to the 63% mark he carried into the season, it’s possible he could get back on track and contribute some useful innings in the season’s final few weeks. The Cardinals are paying the remainder of this year’s $2.5MM salary regardless, so a new club would only need to pay McFarland the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the big league roster. At the very least, any contender looking for some lefty depth to stash in Triple-A could take a chance on stashing McFarland in the upper minors.

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