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Rays Designate Zack Burdi For Assignment, Select Ben Heller

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The Rays announced Wednesday that they’ve designated right-hander Zack Burdi for assignment and selected the contract of fellow righty Ben Heller from Triple-A Durham. It’s the second time this season Burdi has been designated for assignment by Tampa Bay. He cleared waivers and accepted an outright assignment to Durham the first time around.

Burdi tossed three shutout innings during his first stint with the Rays earlier this season but was mauled for six runs (five earned) on five hits and a walk — all in one inning — during yesterday’s 20-1 drubbing at the hands of the Blue Jays. Tampa Bay needed at least one fresh arm in the ’pen, and Burdi surely wasn’t going to be available after laboring through a six-run, 36-pitch frame.

The 28-year-old Burdi is a former first-rounder whose results have not yet aligned with his former top prospect status. That’s due largely to injury, as he underwent Tommy John surgery in 2018 and then suffered a torn patellar tendon in his knee the following year. There were no minor leagues to return to in 2020, so Burdi jumped straight to the big leagues with the White Sox after pitching just 33 combined innings in 2018-19. The results weren’t good (nine runs in 7 1/3 innings) and Burdi has yet to find his footing. In 21 1/3 big league innings, he has an 8.44 ERA. The Rays will have a week to pass him through outright waivers, trade him or release him.

Heller, 31, has appeared in parts of four big league seasons. All of those came with the Yankees, who acquired him alongside Clint Frazier, Justus Sheffield and J.P. Feyereisen in the trade sending Andrew Miller to Cleveland. Heller has been successful in limited opportunities, pitching to a 2.59 ERA in 31 1/3 MLB frames — albeit with worse-than-average strikeout and walk rates (21.7%, 10.9%).

Had it not been for 2018 Tommy John surgery, he might’ve had additional opportunities with the Yankees. Heller missed that entire season, was only healthy enough to throw 21 innings in 2019, and spent much of the shortened 2020 season on the injured list due to a nerve injury in his biceps.

Heller has spent the season in Durham’s bullpen, working in a multi-inning role and logging a 3.91 ERA in 23 frames spread across 16 outings. He’s fanned a strong 26.6% of his opponents against a sharp 6.4% walk rate and only allowed a pair of homers so far. Assuming he gets into a game with the Rays, it’ll be his first big league appearance since that injury-shortened 2020 campaign.

White Sox Giving Jake Burger Reps At Second Base

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The White Sox will soon welcome Eloy Jimenez back to the lineup, which would potentially cut into the number of designated hitter at-bats available to breakout slugger Jake Burger. With Yoan Moncada holding down third base (Burger’s natural position) and Jimenez taking many DH at-bats in addition to some work in right field, the White Sox are getting Burger some reps at second base, manager Pedro Grifol tells Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times.

The experiment is “past the exploratory stage,” per Grifol — a strong indication that Burger will indeed slot into the lineup at second base at least occasionally. Logging work in the outfield is not under consideration at this time due to Burger’s history of Achilles injuries, but he’ll be mixed in at third base, second base, first base and designated hitter.

The White Sox’ desire to keep his bat in the lineup is understandable. Despite fanning in an untenable 32.4% of his plate appearances, Burger holds a robust .257/.315/.634 batting line thanks to a hefty 10 home runs in 111 trips to the plate.  Burger has seen a massive 31.3% of his fly-balls clear the fence for a home run. While it’s unlikely he can sustain quite that level of power output — Aaron Judge had a 35.6% homer-to-flyball rate in 2022 and was the only hitter in baseball to even top 26% — there’s plenty of legitimacy to Burger’s power surge. Statcast ranks him in the 85th percentile of MLB hitters in terms of average exit velocity, and he’s in the 93rd percentile for hard-hit balls and the 99th percentile for barreled balls.

Beyond a pure desire to keep Burger in the lineup, the Sox are surely motivated by the catastrophic production they’ve received from the second base position so far in 2023. Elvis Andrus, Hanser Alberto, Romy Gonzalez and Lenyn Sosa have combined to take all of the team’s at-bats at second base this season. That group has combined for an unthinkably bad .144/.188/.207 while playing the position. Chicago second basemen have posted an astonishing single-digit wRC+ of 5 — indicating that they’ve been 95% worse than an average hitter when weighting for home park and league run-scoring environment.

Second base has been a black hole in the White Sox’ lineup all season, and while Burger likely won’t be an average defender at the position — he’s considered well below average at third base — the Sox are content to trade off some defensive shortcomings to bolster their run production. That’s been a familiar refrain for the Sox in recent seasons, as they’ve regularly trotted out poor defensive alignments — e.g. Andrew Vaughn and Gavin Sheets in the outfield — in the name of improving the offense. Of course, that approach was one of many reasons the Sox fell shy of expectations in 2022; last year’s White Sox ranked 24th in MLB with -17 Outs Above Average, 27th in Defensive Runs Saved (-35) and dead last in Ultimate Zone Rating (-40.5). Only the rebuilding Pirates and Nationals made more errors.

The organization’s hope heading into the season was for a more well-rounded, better defensive product on the field. The Sox let Jose Abreu walk in free agency, thus clearing the way for Vaughn to return to first base after he’d rated as one of the game’s worst outfielders. Andrew Benintendi was signed to shore up left field. Andrus, long a well-regarded defender at shortstop, was brought back to handle second base. Top prospect Oscar Colas isn’t seen as an elite defender but was expected to be an upgrade over the Sheets/Vaughn/Jimenez carousel in right field and was given the Opening Day nod at the position.

As it stands, however, the Sox are only a marginally improved defensive club. They’re still in the bottom third of the league in DRS, UZR and OAA. Andrus hasn’t hit a lick but has played a sound second base, so swapping him out for Burger would weaken one of the few solid spots around the field in order to help beef up a lineup that ranks 20th in runs scored, 20th in home runs, 19th in batting average, 27th in on-base percentage and 20th in slugging percentage.

Jimenez’s return and continued at-bats for Burger figure to boost some of those offensive rankings. But the White Sox, who ranked as one of the game’s best defensive teams as recently as 2020, are trending toward a third straight season on the opposite end of that spectrum.

Yankees Notes: Donaldson, Rodon

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The Yankees have only gotten five games out of Josh Donaldson this season, as he’s been hobbled by a hamstring strain for the remainder of the current campaign. Manager Aaron Boone said yesterday, however, that a minor league rehab stint for Donaldson is “imminent,” which would signal a return to the lineup in the near future (Twitter links via The Athletic’s Chris Kirschner). Whenever Donaldson is cleared to return, Boone added that expects the 37-year-old to be an everyday player.

Many Yankee fans will surely bristle at that notion. The former American League MVP has largely underwhelmed since coming to the Bronx alongside Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Ben Rortvedt in a trade that sent Gio Urshela and Gary Sanchez to the Twins. Donaldson hit just .222/.308/.374 in 546 plate appearances last season, though he continued to rate well on the defensive side of the game, drawing +7 marks from both Defensive Runs Saved and Outs Above Average. In the five games Donaldson has played so far in 2023, he went 2-for-16 with a double, a walk and six strikeouts.

In Donaldson’s absence, DJ LeMahieu has drawn the bulk of the starts at third base. The 34-year-old LeMahieu is still a ways off his peak performance with the Yankees in 2019-20, but his .250/.320/.406 slash in 178 plate appearances this year is solid nonetheless. Of course, LeMahieu is plenty capable of playing first base and second base as well, and he also hits enough to factor in at designated hitter on days he’s not in the field. Even with Donaldson playing regularly at third base, Boone could still work LeMahieu into the lineup on a near-regular basis by rotating him through those four spots in the lineup.

While many Yankee fans have been ready to move on from Donaldson for the better part of a year, it’s understandable if the Yanks at least want to take a look at how he fares in his return from the injured list. He’s owed a $21MM salary this season and the $8MM buyout on next year’s $16MM option regardless, and as previously noted, last year’s defensive showing was strong. Donaldson also put the ball in play at an average of 90.7 mph last year and saw 43% of his batted balls leave the bat at 95-plus miles per hour.

At the same time, it’s fair to question just how long a leash Donaldson will be granted if he struggles out of the gate. The Yankees have won eight of their past ten games to boost their record to 30-20, but they’re still five games behind the division-leading Rays. They gave fellow veteran Aaron Hicks about a quarter of the season before designating him for assignment, though Hicks only tallied 76 plate appearances and appeared in 28 games during that time. Still, Hicks was signed through the 2025 season — albeit at a lower annual rate — whereas Donaldson is inked only through season’s end. The total financial commitment to both players is comparable.

Turning to another high-priced, injured veteran — Boone added that the organization’s hope is for Carlos Rodon to be able to throw off a mound at some point this week (Twitter link via Bryan Hoch of MLB.com). Rodon hasn’t thrown a pitch for the Yankees since signing his six-year deal over the winter, owing largely to a forearm strain but also to some back discomfort that popped up while he was rehabbing that initial injury.

Even if the 30-year-old Rodon is able to throw off a mound without issue, a return would still be a ways down the road. The lefty would likely need multiple bullpen sessions before then facing live hitters in a simulated setting and eventually making multiple minor league rehab appearances. It’s hard to envision him completing that cycle in anything less than a month.

Athletics Reach Tentative Stadium Funding Deal With Nevada Lawmakers

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May 24: Nevada governor Joe Lombardo has given his stamp of approval, formally announcing the tentative agreement in a press release (Twitter link via Akers).

“This agreement follows months of negotiations between the state, the county and the A’s, and I believe it gives us a tremendous opportunity to continue building on the professional sports infrastructure of southern Nevada,” Lombardo said in a statement within today’s release. “Las Vegas is clearly a sports town, and Major League Baseball should be a part of it.”

The agreement will be introduced in Nevada Legislature “in the coming days to be publicly debated and considered,” per the press release.

May 23: The Athletics and lawmakers in Nevada have reached a tentative agreement on a stadium funding structure, per reports from both Mick Akers and Steve Sebelius of the Las Vegas Review-Journal and Tabitha Mueller and Howard Stutz of the Nevada Independent.

The Athletics initially agreed to a land purchase just west of the Las Vegas strip and were going to be asking for $500MM in public funding via county-issued bonds to be paid by tax dollars related to the stadium and relocation project. A few weeks later, they changed their target to a plot of land on the strip currently occupied by the Tropicana hotel, and were planning on filing a funding request last week for a lesser amount of $395MM.

Reporting on Friday indicated that there was a meaningful gap in what the A’s were seeking and what legislators was willing to provide. That seemed to suggest that there was at least some chance of the whole plan falling through and the club turning their attention back to Oakland, but this deal seems to push the organization closer to manifesting their relocation plans.

Per both reports, the agreed-upon deal includes a total of around $380MM in public money heading to the project. That is composed of $180MM from the state in transferable tax credits, with $90MM to be repaid over time from stadium revenues. Then there’s $120-125MM coming from Clark County in the form of bonds and another $25MM for infrastructure improvements. There will also be a 30-year property tax exemption issued by the county, which has an estimated value of $55MM.

Although the sides seem to have reached an agreement, there are still some more steps to go through. It has to be formally presented to the legislature, with filing potentially happening as soon as Wednesday, and then it needs to be approved as well as being signed by Governor Joe Lombardo. Major League Baseball’s relocation committee also needs to rubber stamp the project. The site is also close enough to Harry Reid International Airport that the Federal Aviation Administration will need to provide approval before construction can begin. Though those feel like small and surmountable hurdles to overcome compared to agreeing on the financial numbers.

Assuming those hoops are smoothly jumped through, Gaming and Leisure Properties Inc. will provide nine of the 35 acres of the Tropicana site to the A’s for free. The club hopes to construct a 30,000-seat stadium with a retractable roof in time to open for the 2027 season. Once the construction is complete, ownership of the land will transfer to the Las Vegas Stadium Authority. That body also came to own the Allegiant Stadium site, home of the Raiders, after that was completed.

Mariners, Pedro Severino Agree To Minor League Deal

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The Mariners have agreed to a minor league pact with veteran catcher Pedro Severino, tweets Tacoma Rainiers director of communications Paul Braverman. Severino, a client of Republik Sports, opted out of a minor league deal with the Padres last week. He’s been assigned to Triple-A Tacoma and will give the Mariners some catching depth there.

The 29-year-old Severino had a strong start at the plate with the Padres’ Triple-A club, slashing .286/.400/.476 with three home runs, three doubles and more walks (12) than strikeouts (10) in his first 75 plate appearances. He even added a surprising three stolen bases, matching his career-high from any prior season.

Severino has logged Major League time in each of the past eight seasons, typically serving as a backup or the right-handed end of a catching platoon. Dating back to the 2019 season, he’s a .248/.316/.396 hitter with 29 homers, 38 doubles, an 8.6% walk rate and a 23.9% strikeout rate in 959 plate appearances (mostly with the Orioles).

As far as catchers go, Severino is a solid hitter — evidenced both by his big start to the season in El Paso and that respectable four-year run from 2019-22. However, he’s long graded out as a poor defensive backstop. Severino routinely posts below-average framing marks, and Defensive Runs Saved dings him for -18 in his 2574 career innings behind the dish. He does have a solid 28.5% caught-stealing rate in the big leagues, but his 33 passed balls from 2015-22 are the 22nd-most in MLB — despite the fact that all but one name ahead of him on the list (the now-retired Josh Phegley) have at least 600 more innings behind the plate. Statcast’s tracking of catchers’ blocking data only dates back to 2020, but Severino ranks last among big league catchers in its Blocks Above Average metric.

The Mariners are largely set behind the plate, with slugging Cal Raleigh taking the majority of the playing time and veteran Tom Murphy backing him up. In Tacoma, the Mariners have Jacob Nottingham and minor league veteran Brian O’Keefe as their primary options, though catcher/outfielder Cooper Hummel has also logged a pair of games behind the plate. Bringing Severino into the mix will give them another option behind the dish and another bat to work into the lineup against left-handed pitching. In 449 big league plate appearances against southpaws, Severino is a .260/.325/.436 hitter.

The Opener: A’s, Morel, Brewers

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As the 2023 regular season continues, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day today:

1. A’s stadium deal on the horizon?

Yesterday, it was reported that the Athletics have reached a tentative agreement with Nevada legislators regarding the financials for a stadium in Las Vegas. Though the deal has not been made official, it’s possible that process could begin quickly. Mick Akers and Steve Sebelius of the Las Vegas Review Journal note that the A’s stadium bill still needs to be formally presented to the state’s legislature, a move which could happen as soon as today. If passed by the legislature and signed into law by Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo, the stadium project will still have to be approved by a handful of other parties, but the most significant hurdle in the A’s relocation effort will have been cleared.

2. Morel’s hot streak:

Cubs youngster Christopher Morel is off to a torrid start in 2023. After tearing up Triple-A to the tune of a .330/.425/.730 slash line across 29 games to open the season, Morel was promoted to Chicago and has seen his production reach new heights while playing second base and all three outfield spots. In twelve major league games so far this season, Morel boasts a slash line of .367/.404/.980 that’s good for an unbelievable 265 wRC+. His nine home runs leave him tied for 32nd in the majors with sluggers like Freddie Freeman, Paul Goldschmidt, and Juan Soto despite having played less than a quarter of the games that the aforementioned trio have.

Perhaps most impressively, Morel is now on a five-game streak with at least one home run after launching a solo homer off Mets right-hander Stephen Nogosek last night. Should Morel hit another long ball, he’ll become just the 34th player in major league history with a home run streak of six games or longer. Morel and the Cubs take on the Mets tonight at 6:40pm CT.

3. Brewers’ rotation:

The Brewers have an entire rotation’s worth of arms on the injured list, with each of Brandon Woodruff, Wade Miley, Eric Lauer, Aaron Ashby and Jason Alexander sidelined at the moment. The slate of injuries prompted Milwaukee to bring in veteran righty Julio Teheran, who reportedly agreed to a big league deal with the Brewers yesterday after opting out of a minor league pact with the Padres a day prior. The Brewers have yet to announce the move, though with Thursday’s starter currently listed as TBD, they’ll likely do so in the near future (assuming that start is earmarked for Teheran). Milwaukee has an open 40-man spot but will still need to make a corresponding 26-man roster move to add Teheran.

With so many arms on the injured list, it’s fair to wonder whether the Brewers might look for further ways to bolster that rotation depth. Prior to the agreement with Teheran, general manager Matt Arnold told MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy that the Brewers had also considered prospect Robert Gasser for his debut, making him a name to keep an eye on in the event of further injuries.

Diamondbacks Release Jandel Gustave

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Right-hander Jandel Gustave has been released by the Diamondbacks, reports Chris Hilburn-Trenkle of Baseball America.

Gustave, 30, was with the Brewers last year but was non-tendered at season’s end and signed a minor league deal with the Diamondbacks in the winter. He made nine appearances with the Triple-A Reno Aces this year with an unfortunate 16.43 ERA before landing on the minor league injured list about a month ago. It’s not publicly known what his injury is, but it’s possible it contributed to his poor results this year.

Prior to this season, he’s been able to produce quality results in the big leagues. He has a 3.56 ERA in his career over 91 innings, dating back to 2016. He spent 2021 and 2022 with the Brewers, tossing 46 1/3 innings over 41 appearances with a 3.69 ERA. He struck out 20.1% of batters faced while walking 8% and got grounders at a 48.2% clip.

Gustave will now be free to sign with any club, though his unknown injury situation will undoubtedly be a factor in how much interest he draws on the open market. If he’s healthy, he should intrigue clubs based on his track record of effective big league work. Should he eventually find his way back onto a major league roster, he still has an option year remaining and a service time count of 4.027.

Orioles Sign Ben DeLuzio To Minor League Deal

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The Orioles have signed outfielder Ben DeLuzio to a minor league deal, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. He has reported to the Triple-A Norfolk Tides and is in the lineup for tonight’s game.

DeLuzio, 28, was with the Cardinals last year but was non-tendered at season’s end and became a free agent. He signed a minor league deal with the Cubs this winter but didn’t make the club out of camp and was released. He landed with the Dodgers on another minor league deal but he hit just .180/.286/.258 in Triple-A and was again released last week, now landing with the Orioles.

His only major league experience came with the Cards last year, when he hit .150/.292/.200 in a small sample of 25 plate appearances. Although he didn’t steal a base in that time, his speed and defense are his best assets. He stole 30 bases in Triple-A last year and added another five in his brief stint with the Dodgers this year. While he was in the majors last year, Statcast pegged his sprint speed in the 98th percentile.

The Orioles already have plenty of speed, as their collective 43 steals put them fifth out of the 30 clubs in the league. Nonetheless, if DeLuzio can take a meaningful step forward with the bat, he could serve as an intriguing bench piece for the club, serving as a pinch runner and defensive replacement. He hit .283/.359/.430 in the minors from 2019 to 2022 and perhaps is capable of a stronger showing than what he’s mustered here in 2023 so far. If he’s able to make the roster, he has a full slate of options and less than a year of service time.

Miguel Andujar Accepts Outright Assignment From Pirates

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May 23: As expected, Andujar has once again accepted his outright assignment, per Kevin Gorman of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

May 22: The Pirates have outrighted outfielder Miguel Andujar to Triple-A Indianapolis, per his transactions tracker at MLB.com. That suggests he cleared waivers after being designated for assignment last week.

It’s hardly a shock that Andujar, 28, didn’t get scooped up by one of the 29 other clubs off waivers. He hit just .161/.212/.387 in his 33 plate appearances since having his contract selected at the end of April. He had already passed through waivers in January and that mediocre performance didn’t do much to increase his stock around the league, though he did hit a much stronger .284/.364/.500 in Triple-A prior to getting called up.

The peak of his career so far came with the Yankees back in 2018 when he hit 27 home runs and slashed .297/.328/.527, leading to a second-place finish in American League Rookie of the Year voting behind Shohei Ohtani. But shoulder surgery wiped out much of his 2019 and he found his third base position staffed by players like DJ LeMahieu and Gio Urshela when he returned, pushing him to a depth role and a move to the outfield. Since then, he continually mashes in the minors but struggles when given another chance in the majors. Going back to the start of 2020, he’s hit .291/.346/.508 on the farm but just .237/.268/.354 in the show.

Andujar technically has the right to reject this outright assignment and elect free agency, both because he has more than three years of service time and a previous outright. However, he lacks the five years of service required to reject it while retaining his salary. He’s making $1.525MM for the season, which likely led to him going unclaimed both times he was on waivers and him accepting the outright assignment the first time. It seems likely he will accept the outright a second time and stick with in the Pirates’ organization, trying to work his way back to the majors yet again.

Tim Locastro To Undergo Thumb Surgery

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Mets outfielder Tim Locastro will have surgery on the torn ulnar collateral ligament in his thumb, with manager Buck Showalter relaying the news to reporters, including Tim Healey of Newsday.

Locastro, 30, joined the Mets on a minor league deal this winter and made the club’s Opening Day roster. He got into 11 games with the Mets in the early going, though only made 10 trips to the plate since he was largely serving as a pinch runner and defensive replacement. He then landed on the injured list April 17 due to back spasms, heading out on a rehab assignment about two weeks later. It appears that he injured his thumb during that rehab, with Showalter telling Healey that it occured when diving back into first base. It seems the issue is serious enough that he will now have to go under the knife.

The outfielder is already on the 60-day injured list, having been transferred there when Gary Sánchez was added to the roster last week. That makes Locastro officially ineligible to return until mid-June, 60 days from his initial IL placement. The Mets haven’t announced a timeline on his return but the surgery will undoubtedly keep him out of action well beyond the next few weeks. Gilberto Celestino of the Twins also underwent surgery on the UCL in his thumb this year, with that club announcing his timeline as six to eight weeks. It’s now been almost 12 weeks and he’s yet to begin a rehab assignment. Not all injuries are the same but it seems like Locastro won’t be an option for some significant period of time.

Locastro wasn’t going to be a core member of the club but the Mets likely gave him a roster position to take advantage of his baserunning abilities. His sprint speed was ranked in the 99th percentile last year and he has 43 career steals in 48 attempts. The club’s 31 steals on the year place them right in the middle of the league, tied with three other clubs in 14th place. Though Starling Marte, who has 12, is the only player on the roster with more than four. Locastro has a career batting line of .224/.325/.326 in 559 plate appearances.

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