With football season now in the rear-view mirror, it’s finally time for baseball season! Here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day today:
1. Signings to be made official:
A flurry of signings were reported over the weekend that have yet to be made official: Michael Fulmer signed with the Cubs, David Peralta and Alex Reyes both landed with the Dodgers, while Andrew Chafin returned to the Diamondbacks. As with any not-yet official signings, a 40-man roster move will be necessary to accommodate each of these players. The Cubs and Dodgers both have a handful of players who could move to the 60-day IL once Spring Training gets underway this week, thus clearing 40-man spots for Fulmer, Peralta, and Reyes, but the Diamondbacks lack a clear candidate for such a roster move, meaning they’ll like need to clear roster space some other way.
2. FA market heating back up:
The free agent market had entered a bit of a lull in recent weeks, with signings becoming increasingly sparing despite several strong players left on the market clearly deserving of big league deals. That dam seems to have finally broken over the weekend with the signings of Fulmer, Peralta, Reyes, and Chafin. Could more deals be on the way, with Spring Training just around the corner? There’s a variety of quality free agents still available who could impact a club: Jurickson Profar and Michael Wacha, the last remaining of free agents from MLBTR’s Top 50 earlier this offseason, highlight the group, but others such as Luke Voit, Gary Sanchez, Elvis Andrus, and Matt Moore are all interesting players who should be able to find a big league job somewhere before Opening Day as well.
3. Will the Astros keep going with Javier extended?
Over the weekend, the Astros managed to extend starting pitcher and 2022 World Series hero Cristian Javier on a five-year deal that covered three arbitration years and bought out a pair of free agent years. This came as no surprise, seeing as newly-installed GM Dana Brown stated publicly that he was focused on extending members of the core that just brought last year’s World Series trophy to Houston. In addition to Javier, Brown name-dropped Kyle Tucker, Jose Altuve, and Alex Bregman as players he’s hoping to have extension conversations with. Recently, Tucker lost his arbitration case against the Astros for his 2023 salary, leaving him with a lower platform salary than he was hoping for as he proceeds through the rest of his arbitration years. An extension, of course, could change that situation entirely, and it’s possible the baseline for Tucker’s arb years being set could make extension talks go a little easier. Altuve and Bregman are both under team control through 2024, but Brown and agent Scott Boras have reportedly been in contact about extensions nonetheless.
I know I’ve asked this before but does anyone know EXACTLY what day you can put people on the 60 day IL?
Today
My understanding from looking at transaction logs for prior seasons is that you can start moving players to the 60 day once pitchers and catchers report. I looked at a handful of teams for 2021 and these transactions usually take place the day pitchers and catchers report.
This would mean that there isn’t one single day that all teams can start moving players to the 60 day IL, it’s dependent on when they open up their spring training.
It’s good to hear they all passed their physicals.
Where does it say that? I don’t see that.
I’m only joking about this…
1. Signings to be made official:
If they’re being made official, the physicals were probably passed.
You’re probably right but after Correa, Until their signatures are on the dotted line I wouldn’t assume anything. Plus there has to be some kind of rule about holding guys off the 40 to bypass the roster limits. Just guessing.
Do rosters expand or something as soon as spring training starts? Is that why some teams don’t need corresponding moves with some signings?
No Joshy, rosters do not expand, Some signing are not official yet ( waiting to put players on IL to open roster spots instead of DFA’ing a player), on others the team may not have a full 40 man roster yet.
Okay thanks. I briefly skimmed over parts of the article, so I missed the 60 day IL part. That helps.
Yeah, There’s no roster expansion. For instance the Cubs are locks to add Canario, Roberts and Heuer to the 60 day DL. Maybe even Amaya as I have no idea why he’s even on the 40 man or how he’s progressing on his latest surgery. He’s a walking game of Operation. That could open up 4 spots to sign relievers that are left but it’s been pretty well picked clean. Is that a fact, That today is the day? Or was the goof just being sarcastic like it seems?
They technically don’t expand in the traditional sense of the word. In the Jays case they can move Ryu and Green to the 60 day IL freeing up two spots on the 40 man roster.
Players placed on the 60-day injured list are temporarily removed from a club’s 40-man roster.
Joshy – Let me try to explain this a little more. When a player is put on the 60 day-IL, teams are allowed to temporarily remove that player from their 40 man roster, which opens up an extra spot on their 40 man. During the offseason, players are not allowed to be on the IL, so if a team has 2-3 pitchers who underwent Tommy John surgery, they have counted against their 40 man roster all off season. Once Spring Training starts, the IL becomes active again, so teams can move players with long term injuries back on to the 60 day IL and open up these extra spots on their 40 man roster to add recently signed players, but keep in mind the 60 day period officially starts as of opening day (3/31), so if any team puts a player on the 60 day IL starting next week, that player won’t be eligible to rejoin the major league team until 5/31 (60 days from the start of the regular season). Assuming this team has a full 40-man roster when the injured player is ready to come off the 60 day-IL, the team will need to drop someone from their 40-man roster to add that “healed” player back. Does that make sense?
Players like Walker Buehler & Bryce Harper (both TJS) will be added to the 60 day-IL as soon as possible since neither are expected back until June or July at the earliest. Newly signed Alex Reyes (Dodgers) may also start the season on the 60 day-IL as well since he is recovering from shoulder surgery.