The Dodgers have expressed interest in Teoscar Hernández, reports Jorge Castillo of the Los Angeles Times (X link). General manager Brandon Gomes told reporters this afternoon that a corner outfielder was among the items on the team’s offseason checklist (relayed by Fabian Ardaya of the Athletic).
Hernández is one of the higher-upside bats on a market light on free agent hitting. A two-time Silver Slugger award winner, he hit .283/.333/.519 for the Blue Jays between 2020-22. He hits the open market on the heels of an underwhelming platform season, however. After an offseason trade to the Mariners, Hernández put together a .258/.305/.435 line across 678 trips to the plate.
He’s still a solid source of right-handed power, connecting on 26 home runs this past season. It was an atypically streaky offensive performance, as excellent showings in June and August were muted by below-average play in the other four months. Seattle made the somewhat surprising decision not to issue Hernández a qualifying offer. Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto explained yesterday the club wanted to pivot in a more contact-oriented direction.
Even at his best, Hernández brings a lot of swing-and-miss. He fanned in 31.1% of his plate appearances this year and has gone down on strikes more than 28% of the time through the past four seasons. The profile is built more around power than strong on-base skills.
MLBTR nevertheless predicts Hernández to find a four-year pact that pays around $20MM annually, slotting him as the #12 free agent. He recently turned 31 and is arguably the #4 position player in the class behind Shohei Ohtani, Cody Bellinger and Matt Chapman. Hernández has a bat-first reputation but logged nearly 1200 right field innings with Seattle, grading as a league average corner outfield defender by Defensive Runs Saved and Outs Above Average.
Los Angeles can go in a number of directions on the position player front. They’re presently shorthanded in the corner outfield and designated hitter mix after Jason Heyward, J.D. Martinez and David Peralta reached free agency. L.A. will obviously be among the teams pursuing Ohtani and could look to bring Martinez and/or Heyward back depending on how the offseason progresses.
Mookie Betts showed the ability to play an effective second base in addition to his Gold Glove caliber outfield work. Gomes indicated the Dodgers would continue to get Betts into action at the keystone, noting that the club plans to give plenty of shortstop work to Gavin Lux. The 25-year-old infielder missed the entire season after tearing the ACL in his right knee during Spring Training. The Dodgers have glove-first veteran Miguel Rojas under contract but could kick him into a utility role if Lux steps into something approaching an everyday shortstop job.
Meanwhile, Gomes added that younger infielders Miguel Vargas and Michael Busch could find their way into the corner outfield (via Ardaya). They’ve each seen limited time in left field in the minors but are primarily second and third basemen. Neither player has hit well against MLB pitching in limited looks but they have accomplished offensive track records in Triple-A. Given the multi-positional flexibility throughout the roster, the Dodgers can go in a number of ways over the coming months.
I hope so, that was my prediction of where he’d sign
As a Phillies fan as much as it pains me to say if there is a team that can get back the 2021 version of Hernandez it’s the Dodgers.
I have him going to the twins. Just a hunch
Twins are cutting payroll.
Somehow I think this won’t be the biggest off-season signing for the Dodgers.
If Ohtani has any sense, he won’t go there.
The Dodgers are not likely to be able to top the Guardians massive 5 year proposal for Hernandez
5 years for a total of $20 million?
?
I like Teoscar so I hope he shops for a team that will actually include him in the roster. The Dodgers would likely relegate him to the minors.
You think a guy who has averaged almost 100 RBIs and 30 bombs over the last three years would be sent to the minors? Especially when this article says he’s going to get 20M annually? Ummm, really?
While he’s obviously not being sent to the minors (particularly since he can block that move), I highly doubt he’s getting the contract the article suggests.
Teo is regressing on offense, plays terrible defense, and can’t steal or run the bases effectively despite being fast. His speed is actually probably his best attribute at this point except he doesn’t use it to do any positive baseball things (although it could help his defense if he can learn to make better reads because his first step and routes are the issues, not his range). If anyone pays him 4/$80M, they’re going to regret it. I think he gets something closer to 3/$48M.
based on…..?
When will the Dodgers go after good players? They have no excuse if they can’t win the postseason when they go after players who are just okay.
He’s a 2 WAR player
Teo did average a 132 wRC+ in the previous 3 years from 2020-2022 so I’m sure whoever pays him will be counting on a return to that level.
He’s a career .887 ops against lhp which is something the Dodgers have been terrible against since I can remember maybe he’s a fall back if no Ohtani
They weren’t terrible against them last year
Getting a one-sided player doesn’t help. Dodgers have enough money to spend for a guy who can hit well against righties, lefties, ad to all fields.
Vargas or Busch and a pitching prospect to the Tigers for Matt Manning.
For who?
Not enough if you’re the Tigers. Both have looked over matched at the plate and realistically probably don’t offer the Tigers better than what they already have in guys like McKinstry and Maton
They can trade Vargas and Busch for Maton and McKinistry then 😉 I’m sure LA would be all over that.
Wow. An MVP award for a league where almost every ball park is Coors Field without the humidor. By that logic Manning for Jose Marmolejos, David Villar or Josh Fuentes would be fair
If they sign Ohtani, they wouldn’t touch any other FA’s who would cost more than $10 million/year.
Their payroll is 140 mill. They roll at 240 mil usually. Think they can offers Ohtani and more.
I have a feeling he’ll go back to Toronto.
These “show interest “ articles are just filler. I dont know why they write them other than to fill empty space or reach a production quota. Its not news.
News? Perhaps you should take another look at the name of the site you’re on. It’s not MLBTN.
Touché
And it’s free!!
Yeah, crazy a website about baseball rumors with the byline “if it’s whispered, we hear it” writes an article about a baseball rumor.
Unfortunately this is what we’ll get til the winter meetings when the stove really starts to get hot. Still it’s fun to speculate
This fits the site’s content & this is a business. Clicks = Cash.
If you didn’t know that already
I’m gonna miss Mr. Seeds. Dude is always in a good mood.
No way he is still a league average outfielder. Good arm but terrible fielder. Watching him last year in right field was brutal. He never looked comfortable in Seattle but not many power hitters profile well here in the PNW.
Just watch he’s going to go to LA and be an All Star. Typical Dodger luck.
I see him back in The Six
Dodgers, please pass on anyone with a 30% whiff rate.
Chris Taylor, Josh Outman, Gavin Stone and a lottery pick player for Dillon Cease, and Luis Robert.
It would be smart to take anything you could get back for Josh Outman.
If there were only 2 teams in all of Major League Baseball – the white sox still wouldn’t do that trade
Josh outman? Never heard of him. Lol
Mariners threw away a high draft pick by cheaping out on the QO. It’s clear what their true goal is. Risk-averse financial growth. Yeah! Exciting!!! GO M”S!!!
He threw away the draft pick bc he projected Hernandez to take the QO and they’d be stuck w him instead of investing elsewhere. If sea was cheap or the gm passive – I wouldn’t believe it. But with this group – it was the right move regardless of what Hernandez really would have done
I don’t think it has anything to do with being cheap. The Mariners just didn’t like the alignment with Teo.
But that said, I agree that there was only a small chance that Teo would’ve accepted. This was probably the last chance for a multi-year contract. I doubt he gets less than maybe $45M/3.
I agree. The M’s should have just made the offer and IF he signed, which would not make sense, you could just trade him. The QO was 20 mill I believe and if he stayed and got hot? If he doesn’t your down a one year salary.
Another Dipoto blunder.
just what the team needs. a guy who strikes out 30% of the time when he’s clicking. can’t have enough of that type of bat can we?
Teoscar is a bad Fit for the Dodgers. Too much swing and miss they already have enough of that with Muncy and Outman.
OTOH, Friedman seems to like the math for these low contact-rate guys.
@jimmyboots
Agree that the Dodgers need to avoid this type of player. For the life of me I can’t figure out why they extended Muncy for 2 years. Terrible defense and the guy is about 40 lbs overweight.
I can’t understand how anyone can possibly question the Muncy extension. It’s effin brilliant.
If they didn’t resign Muncy, they’d need to sign or acquire a 3B. Matt Chapman is projected to get about 5-years and $150 million. If they missed on Chapman, the next best 3B in free agency would’ve been… Max Muncy.
Offensively, Chapman is similar to Muncy with the power/hard hit rate/K rate. Only much worse.
When Chappy swings at balls in the strike zone he only makes contact ~77% of the time vs. Muncy ~83%. Muncy strikes out because he is passive, Chapman strikes out because he can’t hit the ball, which means he doesn’t walk so he creates a bunch more outs than Muncy does.
Being LH, Muncy enjoys the platoon advantage about 75% of the time, Chapman is fighting it about 75% of the time.
Chapman grounds into a double play every ~70 ABs in his career even though he’s had no one on base in front of him. Muncy GIDP once every ~107 ABs even though he’s had everyone on base in front of him. Chapman ends up being considerably inferior offensively.
Muncy isn’t terrible at 3B. He was worth about -5 runs this year. Chappy was ~ +5. And that’s not cherry-picking, in 2022 Chapman added ~4.5 runs defensively, and Muncy cost ~2.7. So even though the defensive gap was only 7.2 runs in 2022 and ~1o runs in 2023, say it is 10 runs – that 10 run swing doesn’t cover their difference in offense.
And Muncy can play 2B and 1B as he has often done – ~3600 career innings at positions other than 3B – if needed. Chapman has 10 career innings at positions other than 3B (not that you’d want to move Chapman off 3B, especially when he was younger).
Oh, and they somehow managed to trim their luxury tax by $2M this year, because Muncy took a pay cut.
Oh, and they have a $10 million dollar club option for a 3rd year if they want to exercise it, completely risk free, no buyout.
The Muncy signing was the most team friendly signing since Jose Ramirez, literally 29 other teams would’ve been happy to give Muncy more than 2 years/$24MM with a team option that would make it 3 years/$34MM.
Or Matt Chapman for 5-years and $150 million. I’d say “Pick your poison”, but only; one of those options is poison. And it definitely isn’t Muncy.
Muncy isn’t terrible at 3B? He’s flucking terrible. Chris Taylor is a better option. Michael Busch the top player in the minors is another option. Hell, even 39 year old Justin Turner is better defensively than Muncy who doesn’t play any particular position well.
Only the Mariners send away a player who is then picked up by the Dodgers… and in turn will create a resurgent Teoscar where he’ll hit 40 bombs with 125 RBI’s and drop his K% by 12%
Teoscar isn’t ever gonna be the lead actor, but every team could use his pop. Seattle’s home park suppresses power. . Overall numbers should improve in 2024, and especially if he lands in a hitter’s park.
TMoble field is an extreme pitchers park that suppresses many things, one of which is not power.
I live an hour from T-Mobile and my suppression there is $14.00 beer. This suppresses my beer intake. (probably a good thing)
$20 a beer at Dodger stadium this year. no way i’m paying that but those seats are always full.
add $40 parking and they’ve suppressed my appetite for live games.
pretty obscene stuff.
Stop drinking and save yourself a fortune.
truth. not a two fisted beer swiller but its nice to have a couple of beers watching live bb. point being they’re going full gouge on all fronts.
You have to make contact to create power and TH’s at bats were rifled with saaaaaahwing and a misses. He was quite awful in the outfield as well.
T-Mobile diminishes contact more than power, it’s a fairly neutral park for power.
Mariners fan here. Teo seemed like a super good clubhouse guy, but a slow starter to the season. His swing & miss ABs in April-May were painful to watch.
M’s should have traded him.
Only way this happens is on a one-year deal.
211 strikeouts with only 26 homers? Thanks but no thanks!
Didn’t realize how bad this guy was until you posted the 211 Ks. He also only walked 38 times.
I believe Whit Merrifield makes the most sense for the Dodgers
Merrifield doesn’t swing and miss enough for the Dodgers.
Hell No on Teoscar.
@BlueSkies_LA
It would be smart to take anything you could get back for Josh Outman.
Most ridiculous post of the year and coming from a Dodger fan.