The Braves announced that they have acquired left-hander Taylor Hearn from the Rangers in exchange for cash considerations, with right-hander Dereck Rodríguez designated for assignment in a corresponding move. Mark Bowman of MLB.com first reported that Atlanta was acquiring Hearn while David O’Brien of The Athletic first had the cash return. It’s the second pitching addition of the day for Atlanta, who also acquired Pierce Johnson from the Rockies.
Hearn, 28, has pitched for the Rangers since 2019, both as a starter and as a reliever but with much better results in the latter role. He’s allowed 6.36 earned runs per nine innings when starting but a far more palatable 3.94 ERA out of the bullpen. Despite that stark difference, Hearn generally got many starting opportunities as the club struggled to put a good rotation together.
They eventually did put a good starting corps together, signing pitchers like Jacob deGrom, Nathan Eovaldi, Martín Pérez, Jon Gray and Andrew Heaney, while trading for hurlers like Jake Odorizzi and Dane Dunning. Despite some injuries suffered by that group, it freed up Hearn to work more often as a reliever. But he spent much of 2023 on optional assignment, as he’s made just four big league appearances this year. He’s thrown 39 1/3 Triple-A innings with a 3.66 ERA, striking out 30.2% of opponents and getting grounders at a 45.2% clip, though also issuing walks to 13.4% of batters faced.
Despite some encouraging numbers in there, the Rangers wanted to get a look at Alex Speas, which nudged Hearn off the roster. Hearn will now get a fresh start with an Atlanta club that has a lead of 11.5 games in their division. Since no other club has a lead larger than four games, they are the biggest postseason shoo-in at the moment and seem to be making moves aimed at a postseason run. Their relievers have the second-best ERA in the league but they are still trying to improve the depth there, acquiring both Johnson and Hearn today. The latter is in his final option season and could potentially be sent to the minors when needed. If he hangs onto his roster spot through the rest of the season, he can be retained via arbitration for 2024, though he’ll be out of options next year.
In order to bring Hearn into the fold, Rodríguez is bumped off. The 31-year-old started the season with the Twins on a minor league deal, getting selected to the big league roster but designated for assignment after just one big league appearance. Atlanta put in a claim in mid-May and have used the righty as a frequently-optioned depth piece, making just two appearances at the major league level. He’s thrown 42 minor league innings this year between those two different organizations, with a combined ERA of 5.79. He’s struck out 24.1% of batters faced but walked 11.2%. Atlanta will now have a week to trade him or pass him through waivers. In the latter scenario, he would have the right to elect free agency as a player with a previous career outright.
Another meh move but he is a lefty and they can get good all of a sudden. Left handed relief pitchers are like cats they can have 9 lives.
Meh move. But has MLB experience and options remaining. So there is value in that.
Not much. Live arm, but gets rocked because of control issues.
Its a move in case Dylan Lee dosent come back to form.
“Another meh move”..Some teams clearly prefer the attention-grabbing headline move, to “win the press conference”, but smarter teams will often do a series of smaller, less costly moves. Do not discount the smaller move and improving your team around the margins.
sometimes those turn out to be the best moves. Braves do have AJ, Lee, Chavez and Anderson due back at some point which are big leverage guys. With 14 teams making the playoffs now that means 18 or so teams still in it. Prices for top in arms are going to cost more than in past seasons. Right now looks like Alex is just trying to get some pieces for cheap to see if any of them will stick. Would rather that then give up a Shewmake, Grissom, Dodd, Shuster or Smith Sheaver for a rent a arm.
“Sometimes those turn out to be”..IF Marco Scutaro is a Giants legend and he was one of those “smaller moves” that helped the SF Giants to a World Series victory. Always pushing all your chips to the center of the table every year, is a good way to shorten your team’s competitive window.
Anyone hear what up with Dylan Lee?
ajc.com/sports/atlanta-braves/braves-notes-injury-…
and
David O’Brien
@DOBrienATL
#Braves manager Brian Snitker acknowledged Dylan Lee’s recovery from shoulder strain has been slower than expected. Didn’t say setback, but said it’s lingered longer than expected. Isn’t ready to begin rehab assignment yet, but when he is, won’t require many rehab appearances.
July 18
Fried should be back next week. Chirinos will likely be given a chance to start this weekend. Soroka is slowly coming around
Soroka can’t be relied upon to go through a lineup a 3rd time, so we’ll need to rely on the bullpen (i.e. Tonkin for long relief) a good bit. Vital to have any 2 SPs go 6 IP right now.
Looks like things are setting up for Fried to start Monday vs Angels if all goes well Wednesday. I don’t think Soroka can be counted on this year hopefully next year he can get a full spring and get back on track. He does show signs of having the stuff just been tough going 3rd time through right now.
Correct! I think this is just about how much we can ask of Soroka in 2023.
They just sent Soroka down.
Lee threw a bullpen session a couple days ago. He may go out on a rehab assignment soon
For the record I posted the 1st Dylan Lee question and it didn’t appear on my screen and I refreshed it like 5 times so I posted the 2nd question then the 1st question appeared and there is no delete so I’ll just own it and while I’m at it I’ll make it a 3rd time asking and ask What is going on with Dylan Lee?
Anyone hear what is happening with Dylan Lee?
Ask a 3rd time and you might get an answer
Same answer as above.
You ruined it.
Wow, Chaim should have tried to dump some of the Red Sox useless pitchers still on the 40-man if Atlanta was willing to trade pieces for a mediocre 6.00 ERA reliever and another mediocre 10+ ERA reliever (recognizing the small sample size)
Not a big reader, eh
Is no one going to talk about how the Braves really only have 3 established rotation members right now? They need starting pitching. Probably just a rental like Montgomery.
They won a WS with 2 functioning starters in the WS. Trust in AA
“Trust in AA”…There’s only 1-3 GMs in MLB that I’d hesitate to second guess, bash or criticize and AA is one of those three.
> only have 3 established rotation
Fried should be back soon, assuming no setbacks.
Who in the minor leagues you willing to give up for a starting pitcher? Morton and Strider, looks like Elder maybe back after two bad starts and Fried is back next week. For post season with days off only need really 3 starters most teams at most carry 4 with 9 guys in the pen.
Pierce Johnson.
Sounds painful.
Nevermind the Taylor Hearn acquisition – did you hear about Dylan Lee?
D Rod and Leutege both DFA’d to make room for the two new acquisitions.
I have to admit that many of these moves are like Atlanta trying to fish a winning lottery ticket out of the dumpster in the back alley.
“Atlanta trying to fish a winning lottery ticket”… .Didn’t they do just that at the deadline a couple yrs back in winning the World Series?
@mlb fan
Yes, Atlanta has been very successful in turning other team’s trash into treasure.
It seems they attempt to put players in the situations that they are most likely to succeed in. So far they’ve been lucky enough to be right enough that it matters.
AA knows the honey hole in that pond. He knows how to fish.
Theo Epstein was the king of dumpster diving and only 1-10 it worked
ATL has suffered some injuries to rotation and most of their young pitchers are above or nearing career high IP for a season. They have a pretty comfortable lead in division and giving some of these guys a couple chances to start seems like a wise move. They d b preserving their proven arms and possibly stumbling upon something of value. I’m very impressed yet again with what they re doing. Between locking up the young talent, rebuilding an OF on the fly, and now looking ahead to the fall and preserving their arms. They have become the gold standard as far as running a current MLB team.
Same with Soler hitting .171 2 years ago !
Lots of rotation’s running on fumes once they burn up their bullpens doing “ bullpen days “ it’s over
Given Atl is coasting, grabbing a couple BP arms to preserve their important guys for postseason makes perfect sense. If they morph into key contributors in Oct, that is a bonus.
Hearn allowed a .595 OPS out of the bullpen last year with 9.4 K/9. The results weren’t there for him this year, and the volatility of bullpen arms may mean they’ll never be there again, but not a bad depth pickup. Hope he finds some success in Atlanta.
Let’s go. You got this Mr. Hearn.
Lonestarball.com has a tiny snippet of Hearn.
lonestarball.com/2023/7/24/23805881/taylor-hearn-t…
Looking at Hearn’s stats vs Dereck’s — am not sure its an upgrade, but they must think Hearn can provide more innings here.
The Rangers’ biggest need is bullpen help. So they trade away a serviceable reliever for cash? I’m not saying Hearn is any kind of star, but he did mange to keep his career ERA on the right side of 4.00 as a reliever. For a team with a 4.74 relief ERA (27th out of the 30 teams) the Rangers might have wanted to keep a guy like that around.
Relievers are volatile. He was good last year, but not this year. His walk rate in AAA this year is concerning despite the generally positive results. The Braves have a massive lead in their division and can afford to experiment with some depth signings to give their main guys some rest, the Rangers do not have that luxury. Hearn is not someone who was ever going to pitch for the Rangers again this year, and was not a viable solution. You people are ridiculous, and I like Hearn.
It looks like a Bigger trade is Brewing , So sit back and hold on until Aug 1 it’s going to be fun, it’s our time and Will not be like the team of the 90 and only win 1 World Series. Now that I say that it doesn’t mean they failed, they just for whatever reason couldn’t get past losing game 7 when Lonnie didn’t score in the 8 th inning when he went back towards second base instead of scoring. They still went to 5 of the 10 World Series . They will always be my team no matter what. Go Braves
I think this and Pierce Johnson are the type of trades we can expect. The farm is thin at the top and the Braves don’t trade top picks for rentals. We usually only trade those for controllable pieces. But again, the prospects we have won’t get us a young controllable pitcher
Hearn is from this area. I want to see him do well.
It’s a cash deal, so no reason to truly be mad about this transaction…. But the guy is simply bad and nothing anyone can say ultimately make this a “good deal” as of right now.
Another K-Mart Blue Light Special head scratcher from the best team in baseball. Every time I’ve seen Hearn pitch the guy has been atrocious & worse than replacement level. Maybe the Braves can fix him.
This is a small bunch of trades so he can do a bigger trade Aug 1 .