The Braves announced their slate of non-roster invitees to spring training Friday, and while the majority of names within have already been reported or announced over the course of the offseason, there are a few notable names revealed within today’s release. Former Astros and Blue Jays closer Ken Giles, who recently worked out for teams, will be in camp after inking a minor league pact. Former Reds infielder Alejo Lopez and former Royals catcher Sebastian Rivero have also signed minor league contracts with non-roster invitations.
Now 33 years old, Giles was one of the game’s best relievers at his peak. He debuted with the 2014 Phillies and delivered consecutive sub-2.00 ERA seasons. From 2014-19, Giles racked up 114 saves between Philadelphia, Houston and Toronto while pitching to a 2.67 ERA and striking out one-third of his opponents against a 7.5% walk rate. Injuries have derailed that excellent start to his career; he underwent Tommy John surgery in 2020, which wiped out his 2021 season entirely.
Giles inked a two-year deal with the Mariners spanning the 2021-22 seasons, with Seattle hoping he’d be healthy for the second year of that arrangement. A strained tendon in his pitching hand pushed back his debut, however, and Giles only wound up pitching 4 1/3 innings with the M’s over the course of that two-year contract. Seattle declined a club option for the 2023 season. He pitched 20 innings in the Dodgers’ minor league ranks last year and fanned 32 hitters but also walked 19 while recording an 8.55 ERA.
Four full seasons have now been completed since Giles was last a dominant big league reliever. It’s perhaps a long shot for him to ever recapture that form, but there’s also little harm in the Braves taking what amounts to a no-risk look at him during spring training. Jon Heyman of the New York Post reports that the Rowley Sports Management client would earn at a $1.75MM rate if he’s added to the big league roster at any point.
Lopez, 27, has seen MLB time in each of the past three seasons with Cincinnati. He’s played second base, third base and all three outfield positions while posting a .265/.309/.329 batting line over the course of 181 plate appearances. The versatile Lopez has excellent bat-to-ball skills, evidenced by a 14.9% strikeout rate in the big leagues. In Triple-A, he’s walked at a 12.5% clip against a tiny 11.4% strikeout rate while batting .289/.384/.412 in 1030 plate appearances.
The 25-year-old Rivero appeared with the Royals in 2021-22, appearing in 34 games and batting .167/.236/.197 in 73 plate appearances. Rivero spent the 2023 season in the White Sox minor league system, splitting time between Double-A and Triple-A. He slashed .219/.273/.326 in that one-year stint with Chicago and is a career .247/.297/.369 hitter in parts of three Triple-A seasons. Rivero is touted as a plus defender behind the plate and sports strong framing marks in the minors in addition to a solid 27% caught-stealing rate across all levels in his professional career.
When was Ken Giles an All-Star?
Giles has had his moments as a premium, high leverage reliever. I’m not an expert on his career, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he made the All Star game once or twice.
Yea, he was great for a while
no record of this per baseball reference
there was that moment when he saw ‘all stars’
Giles was last an All Star in 2004 Albuquerque Little League… probably.
He has turned players into All-Stars.
You’ve got pretty good wifi for being 6 feet under, Layne!
No ASG as far as I can see, but a career 150 ERA+. Better than many all stars.
He should have been one in 2014, 2015, and 2019. The first 2 years were inexcusable snubs.
He wasn’t. He was snubbed in 2019 and should have been there.
Still kinda young. Maybe he can reinvent his stuff and repertoire a bit. Never too late to find your form again
Hopefully he has grown up a little bit.
I hope not. Beating himself up coming off the mound was epic.
I’m sure the article will be updated with his injury information but can someone fill me in? Was it TJ surgery? Seems like the last 3 years have been lost.
Yes, Tommy John in 2020.
Most guys bounce back but every once in a while, someone doesn’t. Wonder if he’s struggling to rebound from the surgery
Who was that guy pitching for the Marlins against Roy Holliday when Holliday got his Perfect Game in a 1 – 0 Phillies win?
Looks like they already removed that. He was never an all-star. Although, I find it surprising that he’s only 33 years old. Seems like an eternity ago when he was relevant
Maybe Giles flew to the Dominican Republic and bought a new birth certificate?
He is only 33, nothing to lose by giving him a spring training invite. I’m sure scouts will be watching and if he doesn’t make the Braves roster but is good enough to pitch in MLB I’m sure they will work something out for him to do that.
If it doesn’t work out he can be at peace saying he tried as well.
Personally I hate the words what if? And I’m sure I’m not alone with that.
It feels not unlike the ATL/Kirby Yates experiment that led to Yates signing with TEX this past offseason, though Yates had a better track record.
“What if”? Most should be fine by using those words. If it’s a reasonable prediction.
“Never”, now that’s a word people miss use all the time in sport.
It’s fine using “never” in past tense form if it never happened.
But it’s wrong to use it talking in future terms or events. Well let’s say, you only have a chance at being wrong. Examples:
Right: the Rockies have never won a WS.
Wrong: the Rockies will never win a WS.
I guess it’s just haters mainly that use “never” wrong.
High upside
Hard thrower at one time. Tough guy mentality.
Low-risk lottery ticket. If the TJ surgery and other medical issues have really finished Giles’ career, the Braves are on the hook for little money. If he can get back anywhere close to his form in 2019 (2.3 bWAR with a 1.87 ERA in 53 innings) he’ll be a nice plus for the team’s bullpen.
The Braves once turned mercurial closer Craig Kimbrel into 3 useful players AND future core 3bman Austin Riley, so we’ll always trust in A.A.
That wasn’t even AA. We all know Melvin was the big get for SD in that deal.lol. Well in all fairness that was a good draft decision but the return woulda been huge if not for Upton being in the deal. Really should’ve just released him and gotten better rated prospects. They weren’t gonna spend much over the next several years anyway. In all fairness don’t remember the return tho but at time seemed disappointing. I was more intrigued by the return they got for one year of BJs brother. A horrible decision by SD likely dictated by ownership, tho I’m no Preller fan.
Mercurial? He was a 4-time All-Star and finished top-9 in Cy voting 4x during his stint with ATL. He also had an extension that was decent, but not record-breaking that secured 4 years of control. A rebuilding ATL club didn’t need a high-priced closer, but he had to be traded to get rid of what was MLB’s worst contract in BJ Upton. A contract so bad he had to change his name. (And still this franchise’s largest FA contract ever).
AA didn’t make that trade, Coppy/Hart did.
I said “Braves once turned”, not “A.A once turned”, although I clearly could have made it more clear. I was trying to make the point that the Braves front office has been among the best for over 30+ years(over multiple GMs) and should be trusted.
What 3 useful players? 1 season of Maybin (which eventually brought back Ian Krol, Gabe Spier that didn’t do much), Austin Riley (via comp pick), but Wisler wasn’t useful for ATL, Quentin was a salary dump and Paroubeck never made it to the majors.
Great they landed Riley in that deal and got money off the books, but they also traded 4 prime years of a future HoF closer.
Well later in Schurholtz’s career he made some bad moves (Mark Tex trade comes to mind) but some good ones (I forgive Wainwright trade because the division title streak would’ve ended if not for a monster JD Drew year). Coppy made some bad moves but some good ones too. The good ones largely looked good (a lot of time) because of the staff who for decades have been noted for having players have nice years on their team. I think some of that was players liked playing for Bobby Cox and Atlanta is a pretty chill place anyway to play. Lots of rebound years and peak years (Dickey, Harang, Jared Wright, Eli Marrero, Inciarte, lots of relievers (OFlaherty, Darren Holmes, etc)(recently Pierce Johnson), Russ Ortiz, Laroche (when he was traded back), Rosario and Soler (in 2021), JD Drew (best year of career), Estrada, Jorge Sosa, many catchers most backup/part time (from Darnaud going back further to David Ross, Kurt Suzuki, etc). I know you could do this for many teams but I have noticed for 20 years this is definitely a theme.
Coppy/Hart left AA in an incredibly good position. AA hasn’t disappointed but that job was a great landing spot for him.
It was a good position and I think Coppy was a very dedicated and decent GM but at the same time he made 2 or 3 really bad trades. I mean the Simmons trade is unforgivable, only getting back one highly questionable prospect and another with very limited upside. The Kimbrel trade largely looks good because of the draft pick but that’s more scouting than the GM (although he was likely responsible for some of those scouts being in organization). Also he should get a ton of credit for Fried trade but who wouldn’t trade a year of Justin Upton for 4 prospects including the best pitcher in the draft a year or so prior? Also he deserves credit for starting this trand of locking young players up in ATL. And Heyward trade was a steal along with subsequent Shelby Miller trade (once again who wouldn’t do that trade tho? I think his diligence and nerve was a great asset (and targeting desperate teams like ARZ and SD).The Padres and As have largely built this franchise. I mean As have been burned by ATL in Hudson, Olson, and Murphy deals the last decade plus. They need to stop dealing with ATL.
Should’ve traded Inciarte after the 200 hit year. It was pretty obviously a bit fluky (he was really hot all year and he’s usually very streaky). They weren’t competing then. I’m done. Sorry for long posts. I’m a bit bedridden today
Yes, thankful he didn’t get rid of the farm, but leaving your future employer with years of sanctions, less farm depth (minus 13 now-questionable prospects), draft picks and inability to sign int’l FA for years is the reason ATL’s farm is in the bottom-third of MLB, unlike a team like LAD. Silver lining is that it allowed AA to come in with his own people and get more control from the start.
For sure, but AA entered a situation where many felt Atl was about to breakout and they did so in his first year.
Well the sanctions were BS. I don’t care if he was more “flagrant”-the word which was used by MLB, about it. That is literally MLB admitting that although the other teams (or many at least) were cheating they were only going to punish one. That is BS. IDC if he even did it more or not. Coupled with taking the all-star game away (admittedly unrelated) MLB should be ashamed of their treatment of a scapegoat.
If they punished many teams at once they woulda hurt the international market. I think they knew ATL could take the hit because they had such a supposedly deep farm.
@Rishi — I still can’t forget about they cleared John Hart of any knowledge of anything, while Hart re-signed scot-free and jumped into a cushy studio job for MLB Network, while his subordinate was banned from the sport for life (until last year when the ban was lifted). I don’t believe for one sec that Hart knew nothing. Hart participated in MLB’s investigation, while Coppy did not (hence the extreme sentence). Sounds like a scene from a Scorcese film.
*resigned (no dash)
The MLB moral of the story was “Its okay to cheat if you are good at hiding it.” That’s assuming we buy that they were the only ones not really hiding it much in the first place.
Also though, the moral is that you must throw your peers under the bus, or else. Look at how Astros players were granted immunity if they all allowed their GM/manager to take the fall. Hart the same way with Coppy. No way was MLB going to allow a reputed MLB exec like Hart fall on his sword, rather some up-and-coming brash exec, like Coppy, who ruffled some feathers throughout the league. Like the lesson we’re learning with Bauer, you can get away with a lot more stuff if you’re not a jerk.
It also occurs to me Wren signed those extensions. Not coppy. I forgot about Frank.
What extensions? The first of the favorable extensions (Albies) came in 2019 under AA.
No. Kimbrel was a good extension tho they traded him. Freeman extension. There were more too. He signed a bunch of them. It was a big deal at time as he was one of the only ones doing these to that degree. Notably he didn’t extend heyward which hurt his feelings. Kimbrel extension was what allowed them to shed BJ contract and end up ultimately with Riley. I think Kimbrel would’ve been better on ATL but it was still a good value
I guess I should note that it was a big deal mainly because he signed them all about the same general time.
Apparently, AA was playing 42 dimensional chess even before being hired by the Braves.
He was up and down in Toronto. Prior to the 2015 deadline his tenure was a bit of a disappointment. The deadline deals changed everything.
I don’t see an article lol
I think Steve pulled it to insert the new write-up, it’s there now.
I’m curious to see if they get anything out of Giles this year. If so, could be a real good pickup. If not, no harm done on a minor league signing…
Is anyone else having a problem with not actually seeing the articles and just going to the comments when you click on any of the stories?
John rocker 2.0 with his antics not beliefs lol
My opinion this is what makes the Braves so good; they already have a deep bullpen but still looking for low risk / high reward bullpen arms. Braves always seem to be making little transactions that could have great benefit.
I like the Ken Giles signing. Thumbs up!
Even if he doesn’t make the Braves, spring training is a great way to get some exposure. Best of luck Kenny G
Not a bad get for a minor league deal, virtually no risk
Not a single mention of him tomahawk chopping himself in the face! Nicely done!
Wow, in 2020 & 2022, the guy’s BB% doubled. Last year, that didn’t improve (18%, even worse). He’s still got a consistent K% but probably isn’t going to be as effective if he can’t get his BB% back to normal. Good think this is a minor deal.
The 2020/2022 seasons add up to a total of 8 innings. I don’t think anyone should try and draw to much from that whether it’s walk rates or K%. I think Giles is a little more like Sale at this point in that you simply need to keep expectations in check because you really don’t know what they’re going to give you because it’s been so long since they had any kind of a meaningful season.
Right, but you can also see it continuing into 2023 in the minors. Not a good look.
The 2020/2022 seasons add up to 8 innings. I don’t think anyone should try and draw to much from that. I see him similarly to Chris Sale in that it’s been so long since they had a meaningful season us Braves fans should make sure we check on expectations because we don’t really know what they can do anymore.
Apologies for the double post. My original disappeared on me even after I reloaded and now it’s there making me look stupid.
Those 2023 numbers in the minors are 20 innings.
Fine give Giles a chance, but why won’t anyone give Osuna a second chance?
The lack of forgiveness in this league is disturbting!
I think its less about forgiveness and more about perception. In this day and age of social media, 24 hour news cycles and 24/7 365 coverage there is far less margin for error in which players have and thanks in large part to social media someone in Buffalo can cause a commotion all the way to Seattle if they disagree with a team signing player X due to past indiscretions.
Did he punched himself in the face in celebration after signing the deal?
Tomahawk chopped himself in the kisser.
this the guy that punched himself ?
I was wondering the same thing
Braves have a knack for taking flyers on vet relievers who end up pitching meaningful innings for them.
Chris Martin, Matzek, Stephens, Tonkin, Nick Anderson all exceeded expectations in the Braves bullpen. Definitely worth a shot.
I’m very disappointed that Jesse Chavez is not on the list of Spring Training invitees. He has pitched great for the Braves in recent years and is both a fan and clubhouse favorite
Ken Giles to minor league deal is a good move. He maybe able to be healthy and make the roster and give us some good innings or it maybe another guy that just doesn’t make the roster and may accept a minor league assignment. Every team has a handful of guys like this they bring into camp to see if they have anything left or can rebound