The Rangers and right-handed reliever Kyle Funkhouser are in agreement on a minor-league contract, reports Robert Murray of Fansided. The Boras Corporation client will presumably receive an invite to major league Spring Training.
Funkhouser, who is headed into his age 29 season, was an effective member of the Tigers bullpen in 2021, when he posted a 3.42 ERA (124 ERA+) in 68 1/3 innings of work. His arsenal has four pitches, including a sinker and four-seamer that both averaged 96 mph in 2021 in addition to a 87 mph slider and a rarely used changeup. Despite his impressive velocity, Funkhouser struck batters out at just a 21.1% rate in 2021.
Though his strikeout rate was below-average and his 12.8% walk rate was downright troubling, Funkhouser seemed set to reprise this role in 2022 nonetheless. This was in part due to an excellent 53.1% groundball rate that helped him settle in among the best in the game at avoiding the barrel of the bat (92nd percentile opponents’ barrel rate, per Statcast). Unfortunately, Funkhouser suffered a right shoulder strain that kept him from pitching at all in 2022. That contributed to the Tigers designating him for assignment in November, after which point Funkhouser elected free agency to search for his next opportunity.
That opportunity will come in Texas, where Funkhouser will likely compete with the likes of Josh Sborz, Taylor Hearn, John King, and Dane Dunning for a spot in the Opening Day bullpen. While Texas has a handful of quality options for the late innings, such as Jose Leclerc, Brock Burke, Jonathan Hernandez, Joe Barlow and Brett Martin, Funkhouser adds some depth to a bullpen that lost Matt Moore to free agency and Matt Bush in a deadline trade with the Brewers last July. If he doesn’t crack the Opening Day roster, he can head to Triple-A Round Rock and serve as a depth option in the event of an injury.
I’m jealous of his last name
Agreed. Pretty boss name.
Loved him on Curb Your Enthusiasm
RIP Bob Osborne….most of his comedy was on the clean side or slapstick (Super Dave)….but he created one the best dirty jokes I’ve ever heard.
Super Dave Osborne was actually Albert Brooks real life brother. Their real last name was Einstein so Albert really had no choice but to change his name.
It’s time to get funky!
Decent depth; now maybe 5 more of these may turn out 2 or 3 BP arms Texas needs. This works for the BP, but left field needs a top guy and you have to trade for a solid guy there. No minor league guys for lf
I agree. Who do you think they should add? In order of preference, I would go McCutcheon, Duvall, Santander, Kepler, or Verdugo. I also like the idea of adding Mancini or Belt to relieve Lowe at 1B on occasion. I think they will resign Moore or sign Fulmer for the BP. Maybe look at Barlo in KC, Soto in DET as trade possibilities.
Reynolds if the GM makes a drunk trade (or accepts no Carter/Zavala and lets us keep at least 2 of the big 3 – Porter, Leiter, and Rocker), Kepler, Verdugo, Canha/Marte (Tax reasons?), Yaz – grandson of that Yaz, McCarthy, Yelich + cash/Williams, Bryant + cash, Santander, Mullins, Hays, Stone Garrett, Alek Thomas, Gurriel, Pollock, McCutchen, or Mancini would work. I prefer Pollock to others, and McCutchen is second, but it makes 0 sense to keep spending money when they have a 6th ranked farm system and 1000000 middle infield top prospects.
The Mets aren’t getting rid of good players for tax reasons, and it’s weird your big 3 doesn’t include the big 1, Owen white.
Balt already has a plethora of MIF as we do, so that doesnt really line up, Yelich, Bryant, Marte all much too expensive. Canha, if they were willing to take Leclerc/ MIller and maybe Saggase or ornelas works. Acuna possibly if they include Luchesi. Thomas is essentially BUbba though I like McCarthy a lot. That changes my acquisition via trade order to Gurriell, Verdugo, McCarthy, Thomas and Garrett.
A 3 team trade is in the works maybe. Pitt doesn’t need middle infielders.
Imo, he is overrated due to recent performance. He isn’t Leiter or Rocker with a 100 MPH fastball and multiple 70 or 60 rated pitches, and he doesn’t have Brock Porter’s HS track record either (yeah, it’s HS, but I think he had more no hitters than runs allowed and a deGrom-like K/BB ratio). I’d probably say if they want White, they have to settle for Winn and other arms plus a few of Foscue/Duran/Smith/Acuna/Harris, so White is probably top 4, with him at the bottom.
Who do you think might be involved in this trade and for whom?
recent performance? he was great at every stop the last two years. leiter was aggressively put at AA and struggled. rocker hasn’t pitched. and porter played high school baseball in Michigan.
upside i like porter the best. the most trade value right now, and the safest bet for the rangers (or an acquiring team) planning to add to the middle of their MLB rotation soon (midseason maybe) is either white or leiter if you believe another offseason of big league training coaching will set him right. rocker is a question mark, porter would have big value, but is a looong way off and navigating a pitcher from HS to the bigs is tough
See, that’s why I would rather deal White. He would be a sell high guy, while Leiter struggled and would be sold low. If they have the same value, obviously sell high on White.
lmao, Mets aren’t trading Marte.
Pirates made that mistake.
Maybe Oakland or LA (Anaheim) could provide the middle infielders to Balt/Pitt for Duran/Smith. Oakland has been linked to both of those guys. Or, add a 4th team if necessary.
No
I thought he followed that prostitute to Spain and got trampled to death by a bull after he broke his elbow fighting over the pickle jar…
Best last name ever.
yea…but bam bam funkhouser was completely insane.
When he enters the game, so they say “Bring on the Funk”? Is his entrance music “Funky Town”?
Just stopping by to read the comments about his name.
Funky
But can he go left? Nobody can go left!
Pretty, pretty, pretty good signing.
Let out all the funk y’all!
Went to high school with Kyle. Hope his shoulder is better.
I asked the guy, Why you so fly?
He’s pretty fly for a white guy.
He said Funky Cold Medina
now we know exactly WHO has the Funk!
Great signing…..Funkhouser is their best BP arm already. No way he’s competing for anything with those other arms you named.
And this is how we know you dont know.
Rangers have the worst BP in baseball, thats really not up for debate.. If he repeats what he did his previous yr hes #1 according to fg.
Whats shocking more than anything, is the rangers had the worst arms in mlb last year and somehow their front office didn’t protect mason englert. Tigers stole him.
Oh yeah Arrington is now Funkytown.
Bring back da funk. Gotta have that funk.
Nobody’s gone Stones? There’s fever in the Funkhouser now….
The Funks old Brother check it out now!
When the Tigers did not tender him a contract, I was disappointed – he is still injured, but he has been good before and the savings were pretty marginal. But I really hate to see that the Tigers didn’t even manage/bother to sign him to a minor-league deal. This may be an insignificant move, but it illustrates perfectly how different this off-season goes for the Rangers and the Tigers…
Gruß,
BSHH