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Braves Option Ian Anderson, Bryce Elder

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The Braves announced today that right-handers Ian Anderson and Bryce Elder have been optioned to Triple-A Gwinnett. The club now has 50 players in camp.

The club is going into the season with four of its five rotation spots spoken for, with Max Fried, Spencer Strider, Kyle Wright and Charlie Morton firmly cemented. The only question was who would get the fifth spot. Anderson and Elder seemed like the frontrunners for such a job since they have some major league experience and are currently holding down spots on the 40-man roster. With players like Michael Soroka and Kolby Allard dealing with injuries, that seemed to only work in their favor. However, it seems that strong spring performances from Jared Shuster and Dylan Dodd may have changed the calculus.

Anderson, 25 in May, seemed like a key member of the rotation at this time a year ago. Over 2020 and 2021, he tossed 160 2/3 innings with a 3.25 ERA, 24.5% strikeout rate, 10% walk rate and 49.9% ground ball rate. Based on the fact that he was the third overall pick in 2016 and a highly-touted prospect, there was every reason to suspect he would just continue on that kind of trajectory for years to come. Unfortunately, he took a big step back last season, posting an ERA of 5.00 with all of his rate stats going in the wrong direction. He got sent down to the minors and was later recalled but finished the year on the injured list. Though his stock was down after that rough season, many still expected the club to give him another shot here in 2023. The results haven’t been especially strong here in spring so far, as he’s registered a 6.14 ERA in 7 1/3 innings.

In the case of Elder, 24 in May, he has less major league experience, just 54 innings last year. But he posted a solid 3.17 ERA in that time, continuing his groundball-heavy approach from the minors. 49.3% of balls in play allowed in the majors were on the ground, and he had slightly better rates on the farm. But like Anderson, he’s had a rough spring, posting a 6.17 ERA in 11 2/3 innings.

Shuster, 24, was the club’s first round pick in the 2020 draft and has been pushing his way up the minor league ladder since then. He tossed 90 2/3 innings in Double-A last year with a 2.78 ERA, but that jumped to a 4.25 ERA in 48 2/3 innings at Triple-A. He also saw his strikeout rate drop from 30% at Double-A to 19.4% at Triple-A. Coming into 2023, he was still considered one of the club’s top prospects, though it didn’t seem as though he was kicking the door down. But in 8 2/3 spring innings so far, he has a tiny ERA of 1.04, striking out nine batters while issuing just a single walk and allowing just a pair of hits.

Dodd, 25 in June, was selected in the third round of the 2021 draft and jumped three levels last year. Going from Class-A Advanced to Double-A and Triple-A, he tossed 142 innings on the year with a 3.36 ERA. He struck out 26% of batters faced and walked just 5.3%. He’s also had a strong showing here in camp, tossing 8 1/3 innings without allowing an earned run, striking out 11 against no walks and five hits.

Clubs will occasionally start a season with a four-man rotation, as the early parts of the schedule will sometimes have extra off-days that negate the need for a fifth. That doesn’t seem to be the case for Atlanta, as they have just two days off in the month of April, playing in 12 straight days to start the month and then a 17-day stretch without a day off that covers the end of the month and the start of May. They will certainly need someone to take the ball alongside their front four in that time.

Neither Shuster nor Dodd are currently on the 40-man roster. If one of them is eventually called upon to join the Opening Day rotation, the club will need to make a move to get them a spot. That should be fairly easy, however, as both Huascar Ynoa and Tyler Matzek are expected to miss most or all of this season after undergoing Tommy John surgery late last year. They will be moved to the 60-day injured list at some point and won’t count against the club’s roster number. There’s still a couple of weeks until the opener and the club could always change its plans, but it seems that signs are pointing to a surprise ending to the club’s rotation battle.

Offseason In Review: New York Mets

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The Mets had a huge number of players departing via free agency, but owner Steve Cohen signed off on new heights of spending to replenish the roster. In some cases, familiar faces were brought back, but there are also some intriguing new additions. The payroll almost went even higher, as the Mets took center stage in the middle chapter of the Carlos Correa saga. Even though that mega deal ultimately fell through, the Mets still shot way past previous spending records and the highest luxury tax bracket in their aim of putting together another competitive team for 2023.

Major League Signings

2022 spending: $144.5MM
Total spending: $498.17MM

Option Decisions

Trades And Claims

Extensions

Notable Minor League Signings

Notable Losses

The Mets had a very strong season in 2022, winning 101 games, their second-highest tally in franchise history. However, it ended with a few sour notes. Though the Mets were leading the National League East for most of the year, a scorching-hot Atlanta club blasted past them in the final days of the season to capture the division title and secure a bye through the Wild Card round. That left the Mets to face off against the Padres in a three-game series that they eventually lost.

In the aftermath of that tough finish, the Mets were looking at a challenging offseason scenario, with a great number of impending departures. Brandon Nimmo was the most notable position player heading into free agency, but he was potentially going to be joined by a huge chunk of the pitching staff. Jacob deGrom opted out of his contract, while Chris Bassitt and Taijuan Walker each declined options. The club decided to trigger their option over Carlos Carrasco to prevent a fourth departure. In the bullpen, Edwin Díaz, Adam Ottavino, Trevor Williams, Joely Rodriguez, Mychal Givens, Seth Lugo, Trevor May and Tommy Hunter were all headed out the door. That left general manager Billy Eppler a huge to-do list, but owner Steve Cohen greenlit unprecedented spending in order to get things back in order.

First up was Díaz, who was already one of the most-feared relievers in MLB before taking his game to new heights in 2022. He posted a 1.31 ERA over 61 appearances with a ridiculous 50.2% strikeout rate. Based on that monster campaign, the Mets wasted little time in bringing him back aboard. The day after the World Series ended, the Mets and Díaz were already in agreement on a five-year, $102MM deal, a record-setting guarantee for a relief pitcher in terms of both annual value and total guarantee.

There would still be more work to do in the bullpen, but the switched to the rotation following the Díaz deal. In a span of less than two weeks in early December, deGrom signed with the Rangers, Walker with the Phillies and Bassitt with the Blue Jays. The Mets effectively replaced them by signing free agents Justin Verlander, Kodai Senga and José Quintana.

The deGrom and Verlander moves amount to a swap of aces, though they come at different point in their careers. deGrom will turn 35 in June but has been limited by injuries over the past two years. Nonetheless, he secured a five-year deal from the Rangers. Verlander, on the other hand, is now 40. He essentially missed the entire 2020-2021 seasons, making just a single start in the former season before Tommy John put him on the shelf. Incredibly, he returned to the mound in 2022 and made 28 starts with a 1.75 ERA, earning a Cy Young Award in the process. He tied Scherzer’s record-setting average annual value from the Mets, but on just a two-year guarantee.

Overall, this flutter of moves left the Mets with a strong on-paper rotation, but one with lots of risk. Senga has been an excellent starter in Japan, with a career ERA of 2.42 in NPB and a 1.94 figure last year. However, the move over the Pacific doesn’t always go according to plan, making Senga less than a sure thing. Quintana is coming off a great 2022 campaign but had a real rough showing in the two prior seasons.

There’s also the general looming risk of pitcher injuries to consider, which is present for every team but will be particularly notable with this group. Of the projected starting five, Senga is the only one who’s under 34 years old. Though Senga is just 30, he will be making the transition from Japan where pitchers usually take the ball once a week, to the five-day rotation preferred in North America. It’s virtually impossible for any five-man rotation to stay 100% healthy for an entire season, and this club’s relatively older group might need some extra focus on this department.

It looks like they might have to lean on their depth right out of the gate, as Quintana is set to undergo bone graft surgery to address a benign lesion on his rib and will be out until at least July. Fortunately, the Mets have a solid group of depth starters like David Peterson, Tylor Megill and Joey Lucchesi. They also acquired Elieser Hernández from the Marlins this winter, giving them another option.

In the midst of all that rotation shuffle, the club also took the Díaz approach to Brandon Nimmo, outbidding the field to keep him in the fold. There’s certainly risk in giving an eight-year deal to a player who has long had the injury-prone label, but he’s avoided lengthy absences in the past few years and he was easily the best center fielder available. High-risk options like Cody Bellinger and Kevin Kiermaier were the primary free-agent alternatives, and the trade market lacked options. The Mets clearly preferred to just stick with Nimmo and put down $162MM to prevent him from getting away.

There was one other outfield addition to come later, with Tommy Pham being brought in. He’s long been a strong option against left-handed pitchers and could perhaps take over that specialist role that Darin Ruf was supposed to fill last year. With left-handed hitting Daniel Vogelbach seemingly lined up to be the primary designated hitter, Pham could take the small half of a platoon there, while also occasionally giving the regular outfielders time off on occasion.

The club also decided it was time to move on from the James McCann experiment. He parlayed two good years with the White Sox, one of which was the shortened 2020 season, into a four-year deal with the Mets. But the first two years in Queens were quite dismal and it was decided to make a switch. The Mets signed Omar Narváez and traded McCann to the Orioles, eating most of his contract in the process. That’s a defensible move from a pure baseball perspective, but it’s an expensive one. The Mets will essentially have both catchers on the books and will be paying significant taxes on each, given where their payroll eventually ended up.

Circling back to the bullpen, bringing Díaz back was an impactful move, but there was still much more to do. The club would eventually re-sign Ottavino, in addition to adding David Robertson via free agency. Trades also brought aboard Brooks Raley and Jeff Brigham, while Sam Coonrod and Stephen Ridings were claimed off waivers and Zach Greene was selected in the Rule 5 (though he’s since been returned to the Yankees). There will also be a pseudo new addition in John Curtiss, who was signed a year ago but missed all of 2022 recovery from Tommy John surgery.

As mentioned, all of these moves shot the payroll up to incredible new heights, but it almost went even higher due to the unprecedented Carlos Correa free agency. Correa seemed destined to be a Giant for a time, as he and the club agreed to a 13-year, $350MM deal in December. However, the club raised concerns about something in his physical, later revealed to be his right ankle. The Mets swooped in and agreed to bring Correa aboard for $315MM over 12 years, slightly less than his first agreement. The club already had a shortstop in Francisco Lindor but was planning to install Correa at third, displacing Eduardo Escobar. Correa’s agent Scott Boras reportedly contacted Cohen directly as the latter was vacationing in Hawaii, with Cohen both greenlighting the agreement and discussing it publicly with the media. “I felt like our pitching was in good shape,” Cohen said at the time. “We needed one more hitter. This puts us over the top.”

The holiday slow-down period arrived without the deal becoming official and reports started to emerge that the Mets had similar concerns to the Giants. In a stunning twist, the Mets and Correa’s camp couldn’t get the deal over the finish line and he eventually signed with the Twins on a much smaller $200MM guarantee. The six-year deal with Minnesota is just half the length of his agreement with the Mets, though there are four vesting options that could potentially take the contract to the ten-year mark.

With that deal falling through, the Mets will go into 2023 with a position player mix that’s fairly similar to last year’s club. Pham is a new addition but Dominic Smith is out after being non-tendered. Narváez will swap in for McCann behind the plate and Danny Mendick will be in the mix for a reserve infield role.

The pitching staff has seen much more turnover, but the outlook doesn’t appear to be drastically different. With Max Scherzer still around, the club can still deploy a strong one-two punch at the top of the rotation, with Verlander slotting into deGrom’s place. Carrasco is back and hanging onto a spot, and Senga will replace one of Bassitt or Walker. A healthy Quintana could eventually offset the loss of the other, but the Mets will test their depth early in the season. Peterson and Megill are both solid options who’d likely have rotation jobs elsewhere, and either could capably hold down a spot while Quintana mends. The bullpen ended up retaining Díaz and Ottavino, while players like Robertson and Raley will try to make up for the departures of Lugo, May, Rodriguez and others.

It can be debated about whether the 2023 roster is stronger or weaker than the 2022 version, but it seems to be in roughly the same area. The Mets are still good and should be in competition with Atlanta and Philly for the division yet again — but keeping pace with those clubs wasn’t cheap. Even without Correa on the books, Roster Resource pegs the Mets for a pure payroll of $355MM and a competitive balance tax figure of $374MM. Both of those numbers are well beyond anything in baseball history.

Since the Mets paid the luxury tax in 2022, they will be a second-time payor in 2023. The new collective bargaining agreement significantly pushed the tax thresholds but also added a fourth tier, colloquially dubbed the “Steve Cohen tax,” as it has been seen by many as an attempt to rein in baseball’s richest owner. However, it doesn’t seem to have been terribly effective, given that the Mets have blown past that $293MM tier. As a second time payor, the Mets’ taxation tiers at the four different thresholds are 30%, 42%, 75% and 90%. The CBT isn’t calculated until the end of the season, so midseason moves will change the calculus, but the club is currently facing a tax bill of about $102MM on top of that $355MM payroll. They will also certainly have their top 2024 draft pick pushed back ten slots, as is the case for any clubs going over the third CBT tier.

This staggering commitment to winning is surely welcomed by segments of the fanbase, especially those who were so critical of the Wilpon family for not acting like a big market club during their tenure as owners prior to selling to Cohen. But not everyone around the majors is as enthused, with some of the league’s less-spendthrift owners recently forming an economic reform committee. The goal of this huddle seems to be some early game-planning for the next CBA, with some desiring a hard salary cap that would more adequately handcuff Cohen. That might be difficult to achieve with the MLBPA understandably having no real desire to allow such a cap to come into being, but it’s clear that Cohen’s imprint on the game is going to have reverberations. The current CBA lasts through the 2026 season, so it’s not a short-term concern, but it seems this offseason from the Mets has contributed to a future collision course.

How would you grade the Mets’ offseason? (Link to poll)

In conjunction with the Mets’ offseason review, we hosted a Mets-focused chat on March 15. You can click here to read the transcript.

Cade Cavalli To Undergo MRI On Throwing Elbow

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Nationals right-hander Cade Cavalli departed today’s game after a visit from the trainer, appearing to shake his throwing arm in discomfort. After the game, manager Dave Martinez told reporters that Cavalli felt “something behind his throwing elbow” and will get an MRI tomorrow, as relayed by Andrew Golden of The Washington Post.

Cavalli, 24, was the club’s first round draft pick in 2020 and quickly rose up prospect rankings. In 2021, he tossed 123 1/3 innings across three different levels with a 3.36 ERA. He struck out an excellent 33.5% of batters faced, though with a concerning 11.5% walk rate. Based on that strong campaign, Baseball America ranked him the #27 prospect in the league around this time one year ago.

Last year, Cavalli made 20 Triple-A starts with a 3.71 ERA, striking out 25.9% of batters faced while walking 9.7% of them. He was able to make his major league debut in August, tossing 4 1/3 innings in his first outing, but shoulder inflammation sent him to the injured list and ended his season.

The Nats are deep into a rebuild at the moment, having traded away most of their established big leaguers for prospects. The 2023 season is lined up to be one dedicated to evaluating many of those younger players, with Cavalli among them. With Stephen Strasburg seemingly not a factor until further notice, the rotation is going to have a couple of veterans in Patrick Corbin and Trevor Williams. That leaves three spots open for the club to get long looks at pitchers like Cavalli, MacKenzie Gore and Josiah Gray.

At this point, it’s unclear what’s next for Cavalli, but the fact that the issue surrounds his pitching elbow is certainly somewhat worrisome. Though the club isn’t expecting to be in a playoff race this year, it would still be unfortunate if an injury absence delivered a blow to his continued development. If he does have to miss some time, a rotation spot could open up for someone like Paolo Espino, Joan Adon or Cory Abbott, with Martinez also mentioning Jake Irvin as an option. Irvin is on the 40-man roster but has yet to pitch above Double-A. If the club decides it needs to bring in a veteran to soak up some innings, the free agent market still features names like Chris Archer, Dylan Bundy and Michael Pineda.

Paul Blackburn, Manny Piña Questionable For Opening Day

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Athletics manager Mark Kotsay provided reporters with some injury updates on a few players today, with Matt Kawahara of the San Francisco Chronicle relaying the information. Right-hander Paul Blackburn and catcher Manny Piña have each been slowed down by injuries recently and it’s now unclear if either player will be available to the A’s when Opening Day rolls around.

In Blackburn’s case, he has a fingernail avulsion, or torn nail, on the middle finger of his right hand. He’s playing light catch at the moment but it seems that he can’t do much else and he won’t make his scheduled spring start tomorrow.

The 29-year-old Blackburn is going to be one of the more seasoned pitchers in the A’s rotation this year, at least in terms of major league experience. Shintaro Fujinami and Drew Rucinski are slated for two spots after lengthy showings in Japan and Korea, respectively. Blackburn and James Kaprielian each have just over 50 major league appearances and should also have spots, with another job available to one of the club’s pool of less-established pitchers like JP Sears, Ken Waldichuk, Adam Oller, Kyle Muller or Adrián Martínez.

Blackburn had a nice breakout campaign last year, pitching to a 4.28 ERA over 21 starts. That ERA might not jump out so much, but he had a much lower 2.90 figure through early July. His 18.8% strikeout rate in that time was subpar, but he paired that with a strong 6.2% walk rate and 48.7% ground ball rate. His results took a step back from that point as he dealt with pain in his pitching hand, eventually resulting in a diagnosis of a torn tendon sheath in his right middle finger.

Blackburn was looking to get back on track here in 2023 but it seems he will at least be delayed now due to that same finger. Blackburn tells Kawahara that the current issue is unrelated to last year’s injury. At this point, it’s still not clear if he’ll need to miss some of the start of the regular season, but if he does, it would potentially open up an opportunity for one of those aforementioned pitchers looking to earn a job with the club.

One other pitcher who could have been in that mix but is also facing his own setback is Freddy Tarnok. Kawahara relays that Tarnok is experiencing some right arm discomfort and is shut down from throwing while undergoing testing. At this point, it’s unclear what’s ailing Tarnok or how long he will be out of action, but he’ll be on the sidelines of the rotation competition for the time being. The 24-year-old, acquired in the Sean Murphy trade, made a one-game MLB debut with Atlanta last year. He spent most of the year in Double-A and Triple-A, posting a 4.05 ERA over 106 1/3 innings.

As for Piña, Kotsay says he “felt something” in his left wrist and will be evaluated. He signed a two-year deal with Atlanta last year but was shut down in May with surgery on that left wrist, limiting him to just five games on the year. The A’s brought him over in the Murphy deal to serve as a veteran complement to rookie Shea Langeliers, who is going to take over Murphy’s job as the primary backstop in Oakland. At this point, it’s unknown how significant this issue is for Piña, but it will be noteworthy to watch for the A’s as he and Langeliers are currently the only two catchers on the 40-man roster. If Piña does end up needing to miss some time, that would create an opening for a non-roster invitee, with Kotsay naming Yohel Pozo or Kyle McCann as potential options. When asked about prospect Tyler Soderstrom, Kotsay had this to say: “I think Tyler could handle himself. I also think from a polished, development side for Tyler, I think it would be a bit rushed. But not to exclude him in the process.”

José Quintana Out Until At Least July Due To Rib Surgery

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March 14: Eppler today provided reporters with more information, including Anthony DiComo of MLB.com. Quintana will undergo bone graft surgery on his rib and isn’t expected back until July at the earliest.

March 13, 3:15 pm: General manager Billy Eppler tells reporters, including Tim Britton of The Athletic, that the report of the three-month shutdown is “premature.” They are still talking to doctors about next steps.

1:30 pm: The Mets are planning to shut down starter José Quintana for the next three months, reports Mike Puma of The New York Post. The left-hander had recently been diagnosed with a stress fracture in one of his ribs and was sent for more imaging. It seems the injury is significant enough that he will miss roughly the first half of the season. However, Andy Martino of SNY has a slightly different viewpoint, reporting that the club is still considering different scenarios and will decide what to do in the next few days, with the three-month shutdown being one of the options being considered.

Quintana, 34, has long been a steady and reliable big league starter, primarily with the two Chicago clubs. From 2012 to 2019, he tossed 1,485 innings between the Cubs and White Sox with a 3.72 ERA. Outside of his rookie season in 2012, he made at least 31 starts and reached the 170-inning mark in each of those campaigns. That was followed by a couple of frustrating seasons, with a thumb injury holding him back in 2020 and the lefty struggling to get back on track in 2021. However, he finally got back into a good groove last year, tossing 165 2/3 innings between the Pirates and Cardinals with a 2.93 ERA, 20.2% strikeout rate, 6.9% walk rate and 46.4% ground ball rate.

The Mets were facing a great deal of rotation uncertainty this winter, with Jacob deGrom opting out of his contract while Chris Bassitt and Taijuan Walker each declined options. With all three of those hurlers reaching free agency and eventually signing elsewhere, the Mets spent aggressively to rebuild their rotation around incumbents Max Scherzer and Carlos Carrasco. They gave Justin Verlander an $86.67MM guarantee, $75MM to Kodai Senga and $26MM to Quintana, the latter on a two-year deal.

That gave the Mets a strong on-paper rotation but one with risk. Four of those five starters are over 34 years of age, while the 30-year-old Senga is going to be transitioning from a once-a-week throwing schedule in Japan to the five-day cycle of North American ball. We’re still not through spring and the Mets are already going to be turning to their depth options with Quintana set to miss significant time. Whether Quintana is ultimately shut down for three months or not, he’s likely facing an extended absence either way. Assuming Quintana is back to health in three months as planned, he will return to the mound in June. But he will then have to effectively redo his Spring Training, taking a few weeks to build back up to a starter’s workload, meaning the Mets will possibly have to look to other options until July or so.

Fortunately, the Mets have some solid depth options to turn to, such as David Peterson or Tylor Megill. The left-handed Peterson made 19 starts and nine relief appearances last year, posting a 3.83 ERA while striking out 27.8% of batters faced, walking 10.6% of them and getting grounders at a 49.4% clip. However, Puma reports that the club appears to be leaning towards Megill taking the rotation spot at this time. His 5.13 ERA from last year isn’t terribly impressive at first glance, but it’s possible that injuries played a role in that. As the Mets were dealing with injuries to start last year, they gave Megill a rotation spot and he posted a 1.93 ERA over five April starts. However, he allowed three earned runs in his next start and eight in the one after that, lasting just an inning and a third in the latter. He went on the injured list for biceps inflammation after that, came back for a couple more rough outings and went back on the IL for a shoulder strain.

Regardless of whoever ultimately gets the job, the Mets are now moving down their depth chart with this Quintana injury. It’s extremely rare for any team to get through a season without an injury like this, so the Mets surely anticipated having to call upon Peterson or Megill at some point. Still, it’s always unwelcome news when it actually comes into play. The club is set for what should be another tight divisional race this year, likely jockeying for position with Atlanta and Philadelphia for the top spot in the NL East, with the Mets already facing a significant hurdle in their path.

Tigers Claim Freddy Pacheco, Place Tarik Skubal On 60-Day IL

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The Tigers announced that they have claimed right-hander Freddy Pacheco off waivers from the Cardinals. To make room for him on their roster, left-hander Tarik Skubal has been placed on the 60-day injured list.

Pacheco, 25 next month, is a relief pitcher who was added to the Cards’ roster in November of 2021 to protect him from being selected in the Rule 5 draft. He earned that spot based on a strong campaign that saw him rise through three levels, going from Class-A Advanced to Double-A and Triple-A. He posted a 3.67 ERA that year in 54 innings, striking out an incredible 44% of batters faced but walking a concerning 13.4%.  Last year, he split his time between Double-A and Triple-A, tossing 62 innings with a 3.05 ERA. His strikeout rate fell to 33.6% but he also got his walks down to 11.2%.

Those are fairly strong results but Pacheco’s near-term status is up in the air at the moment. A couple of weeks ago, the team informed reports that Pacheco had some tightness around his elbow, with Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat among those to relay the update. The club did some imaging but didn’t find anything concerning, deciding to simply shut him down for a few weeks and then try to ramp him back up again.

There had not been any previous indication that Pacheco had been placed on waivers but the Cardinals evidently tried to pass him through recently, though the Tigers have swooped in to grab him. The latter club has seen a lot of bullpen turnover in the past year, as they traded away Michael Fulmer at last year’s deadline and then Gregory Soto and Joe Jiménez this offseason. Pacheco still has a couple of option years, meaning they can shuttle him between the majors and minors as a depth arm, as long as he’s healthy.

They were able to give Pacheco a roster spot due to Skubal’s health status. He had flexor tendon surgery in August and is still working his way back to health. The timeline on his return still isn’t clear but this IL placement means he can’t return until late May at the earliest, since the 60-day clock doesn’t start until Opening Day.

For the Cards, they now have an open roster spot that they could potentially use to add a non-roster invitee to their club. There’s a lot of hype around prospect Jordan Walker making the Opening Day roster, though nothing official has been announced. There’s now just over two weeks to the March 30 season opener.

Mets Return Rule 5 Pick Zach Greene To Yankees

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Right-hander Zach Greene, whom the Mets selected in the 2022 Rule 5 Draft, has cleared waivers and will be returned to the Yankees organization, reports Anthony DiComo of MLB.com (via Twitter). The Yankees are not required to add him to the 40-man roster.

Greene, 26, was the Yankees’ eighth-round pick back in 2019. As a player selected in the Rule 5 Draft, he’d have had to spend the entire season on the Mets’ roster or injured list (with at least 90 of those days coming on the active roster) in order for the Mets to be able to option him the following season. Before being offered back to his original team, a Rule 5 selection must first pass unclaimed through the entire league on outright waivers, which was the case in this instance.

Greene spent the 2022 season, his age-25 campaign, pitching with the Yankees’ Triple-A affiliate. He logged 68 1/3 innings out of the bullpen, notching a 3.42 ERA with a huge 33.3% strikeout rate but a bloated 11.1% walk rate. Eric Longenhagen and Tess Taruskin of FanGraphs called him a potential three-pitch middle reliever when profiling last year’s Rule 5 class, noting that Greene’s delivery generated tremendous carry on his heater, which helps to offset the pitch’s below-average velocity.

With five relievers who can’t be optioned — Edwin Diaz, David Robertson, Adam Ottavino, Brooks Raley and Stephen Nogosek —  the Mets were always going to have a hard time carrying a Rule 5 pick. That’s especially true considering one of the few optionable arms they do have was also one of their most effective relievers in 2022: right-hander Drew Smith. Carrying Greene would’ve likely left Smith and righty John Curtiss as the team’s only two optionable relievers, creating minimal flexibility to shuffle the staff when the bullpen needs an extra arm or the rotation needs a spot starter.

Blue Jays Sign Ernie Clement To Minor League Deal

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The Blue Jays have signed infielder Ernie Clement to a minor league contract and invited him to spring training, tweets Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet. The A’s released Clement over the weekend.

Clement, 27 next week, had gone 2-for-11 with a walk, a strikeout and a stolen base in camp with Oakland, who claimed him off waivers from the Guardians back in September. He’s totaled 312 plate appearances and appeared in 109 big league games over the past two seasons, posting a tepid .204/.261/.264 batting line in that time. He’s also posted plus defensive grades in a small sample of innings at third base and is capable of bouncing around the entire infield.

The versatile Clement has spent parts of three seasons in Triple-A, where he’s a .261/.311/.419 hitter with experience at all four infield positions and in left field (to say nothing of extensive work at center field back in his college days at the University of Virginia). He’s not on the 40-man roster for now, but if the Jays eventually add him, he does have a minor league option remaining.

Toronto has a full big league infield and already has multiple bench spots allotted to infielders Cavan Biggio and Santiago Espinal, so the addition of Clement is likely just a pure depth move. Barring some late injuries in camp, he’ll likely open in the upper minors and give the organization some defensive versatility and a bit of speed to stash in Buffalo.

Giants’ Luis Gonzalez To Undergo Back Surgery

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Giants outfielder Luis Gonzalez will undergo surgery to repair a herniated disc in his back later today, reports Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic (Twitter link). The procedure comes with a sizable 16-week recovery timetable, which takes him through late June on the calendar. Once recovered, he’ll still need to build back up to baseball activity and game readiness.

Gonzalez, 27, got out to a hot start in 2022, his first season with the Giants after spending his entire career with the White Sox organization prior to that point. Through June 21, Gonzalez was hitting .302/.361/.447 in 180 plate appearances, but a lower back strain shelved him for the next two and a half weeks. He returned on July 9 but was back on the injured list with another back strain about six weeks later — this time missing the remainder of the season. Gonzalez may never have been fully healthy upon returning, as he batted only .204/.282/.270 in 170 trips to the plate between those two IL stints.

It was already known that Gonzalez would miss the start of the season due to ongoing back troubles, but an absence of this magnitude hadn’t been previously revealed. The Giants initially placed a  four- to six-week timetable on his absence early in camp, but the team announced yesterday that he was seeking a second opinion from a spinal specialist.

The Giants are now down two outfielders, as offseason signee Mitch Haniger is dealing with a Grade 1 oblique strain that threatens his readiness for Opening Day. With that pair on the sidelines for now, the Giants will utilize Michael Conforto, Mike Yastrzemski and likely a combination of Joc Pederson and Austin Slater in the outfield to begin the season. Prospect Heliot Ramos was optioned the other day.

If Haniger is to begin the season on the injured list, that could also open the door for a non-roster invitee like Stephen Piscotty — who’s having a strong showing so far in camp — to make the Opening Day roster as well. Gonzalez’s long-term absence would create an easy avenue for adding such a player to the 40-man roster, as he’s now an obvious candidate to be shifted to the 60-day injured list.

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