Jordan Montgomery took the ball for the Diamondbacks tonight in their series opener against the Angels. It’s the tenth start of the season for the left-hander, an expected but notable threshold. It officially unlocks a 2025 player option in his contract with a base value of $20MM.
Montgomery had a disappointing first trip through free agency last winter. While he reportedly set out in search of a deal approaching or exceeding the seven years and $172MM which Aaron Nola received from the Phillies, that didn’t materialize. Montgomery lingered on the market longer than any other top free agent before agreeing to terms with the Diamondbacks just before Opening Day. He signed a one-year guarantee with a $25MM salary and the conditional player option.
That triggers at $20MM with his tenth start. Its value would escalate to $22.5MM at 18 starts and max out at $25MM if he starts 23 games. Montgomery wasn’t equipped to make his team debut until April 19. He needed a couple Triple-A appearances to build his workload after sitting out during Spring Training. He’ll still have plenty of time to get to 23 starts and maximize the option value if he stays healthy.
At signing, the conditional player option looked more like injury protection than anything else. Montgomery certainly anticipated declining it and heading back to free agency in search of the long-term deal that eluded him last offseason. Yet his early-season performance hasn’t positioned him well for a return trip to the market.
After tossing 5 2/3 innings of three-run ball tonight, Montomgery carries a 6.58 earned run average across 52 innings. He has punched out just 13.7% of batters faced — easily the lowest rate of his career and nearly eight percentage points below last season’s 21.4% mark. His 8.2% walk rate is a couple points above its typical level. Montgomery entered tonight’s outing averaging roughly 92 MPH on both his sinker and four-seam fastball. Each pitch sat north of 93 MPH last year.
It’s difficult to say how much of that drop-off is attributable to Montgomery’s late signing and atypical preparation for the season. Perhaps he’ll find the extra tick of velocity and more closely resemble his old self as the year progresses. Before his stint in the desert, Montgomery had been the picture of consistency. He reached the 30-start threshold in each season between 2021-23. The southpaw allowed between three and four earned runs per nine with solid strikeout and walk rates in all three years.
Signing Montgomery punctuated an aggressive offseason for an Arizona team looking to build off its Cinderella pennant run. The Snakes had already brought back Lourdes Gurriel Jr., acquired Eugenio Suárez and landed Eduardo Rodriguez on a four-year deal to stabilize the rotation. None of those transactions is off to an auspicious start. Gurriel is hitting at a league average level. Montgomery has struggled. Suárez has hit poorly enough that the Snakes are reportedly considering alternatives at third base and could try to offload some of his $12MM salary. Rodriguez suffered a lat strain during Spring Training and has been on the injured list all season.
That has contributed to a disappointing 31-35 start that has Arizona sitting in fourth place in the NL West. The prevailing mediocrity beyond the top four teams in the National League nevertheless provides hope for everyone other than the Rockies and Marlins. The final two Wild Card spots are currently held by teams at or below .500. Despite being four games under, the Snakes are one game out of the postseason picture.
Along with Rodriguez’s absence, the D-Backs have been without Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly for the past few weeks. Montgomery is the most established member of a rotation that also includes Brandon Pfaadt, Ryne Nelson and Slade Cecconi at the moment. Gallen and Kelly have begun throwing programs.
Since Montgomery opened the season on an assignment to Triple-A, he will not be eligible for a qualifying offer if he hits free agency next winter. His slow start and the player option would complicate any efforts to trade him if Arizona falls out of the playoff race. The D-Backs have roughly $64MM in guaranteed commitments for next season, as calculated by RosterResource.
Montgomery’s option could push that into the $84-89MM range depending on how many starts he makes. The D-Backs will almost certainly exercise a $7MM option to retain Kelly and would owe Gallen a raise on this year’s $10.011MM salary for his final year of arbitration. Christian Walker, Joc Pederson and Paul Sewald are their top impending free agents. Montgomery could still join them, but it’d take a better second half than he has managed thus far. If he does retest the market, he’ll be doing so with new representation. Montgomery switched from the Boras Corporation to Wasserman in April.
Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Micheal Lorenzen has been a better deal so far than Montgomery Rangers got him at the perfect time for the stretch run.
The Rangers won’t go into postseason, though.
Montgomery wouldn’t have changed anything this year.
AL West is up for grabs and the Rangers will get deGrom and Scherzer back at some point. Plus Jung soon.
aragon – I think the Rangers have a solid shot at the postseason.
You don’t immediately go from World Champions to missing the playoffs with basically the exact same team …. unless Cora is the manager anyway.
Unless you’re the Washington Nationals.
Abysmal for 4 years in a row.
Yeah, that team is an absolute train wreck
Clo – That was a little different though, can’t really count the Covid year after winning the title. Then Rendon was gone, Strasburg was done, Turner and Scherzer were traded … that was pretty much a tear-down.
This is why these small and mid market teams are scared to sign free agents, I feel bad for them because they tried to build on their roster but it totally backfired. E-Rod seems to get injured or disappear any time his pen reaches paper, they also have Bumgarner a big deal and are maybe still paying him. They can’t just shake it off and try to sign more next season, this will probably hurt them and force them to cut costs in the future.
Bumgarner comes off the books after this year.
Other
I seem to recall that Bumgarner will still be paid $5M per year in deferred money from 2022, 2023 and 2024 contracts to be paid in 2025, 2026 and 2027. So technically, he’s still on the books.
hole – Monty would have been a whole lot better if he had a normal ST with a team.
It’s kinda funny how everyone acknowledges the importance of ST, but because Boras downplayed ST as a way to build up his clients’ value some people actually believed him.
I’m certain Monty will have a much better season next year, assuming he has a normal ST.
Arizona has had an average success while spending top dollar. Some organizations do better some do worse but it doesn’t have as much to do w market size than it does targeting the right players. Phillies are excellent at that. As has the rangers been. I credit the organizational leadership over luck or market size
Large market teams can afford to make mistakes with free agents. Yankees, Mets, Dodgers, etc. eat bad contracts for breakfast!
It really pays to be a starting pitcher.
Well, technically no since Montgomery wanted a longer deal with more money, but had to settle for a structured deal with Arizona.
$25M for what he’s done so far, it pays. And another $25M for showing up at the mound, even better.
You wonder why they didn’t think to put a “but not if he stinks” clause in that contract.
Apparently both teams and players underestimate the importance of a full spring training
Rsox – Yep, Monty didn’t even have ANY spring training.
He signed March 29th thanks to Boras.
At the time it seem like a good gamble for the d-backs. This might just be a case of world series hangover. Then again all they need is a hot two weeks and sneak in.
Early days, but where are all the Yankees fans who were apoplectic about not re-signing Montgomery?
Where are all the fans who thought the DBacks were better than the Dodgers?
It’s almost like they don’t know baseball
They were better in the post-season last year though.
I don’t think anyone thinks the Dodgers can be beaten in the regular season though so if you are looking for fans who think the Diamondbacks are better than the Dodgers: it is probably easier to find someone from Mars living on Earth.
LGD
“They were better in the post-season last year though.”
Sure. They were better for those few games
“if you are looking for fans who think the Diamondbacks are better than the Dodgers”
There were plenty
I’m a fan and was very fine not signing him. He’s a solid 3 who was coming off a career year. With his pedestrian stuff and lack of a cutaway pitch his decline has already started. Nothing personal but he blew his chance for 100 million+. Boras does his best work with top talent not the guys in the B range.
“It’s difficult to say how much of that drop-off is attributable to Montgomery’s late signing and atypical preparation for the season. ”
You mean “impossible”
Seems like it was the right way to go to offer him nothing .
With hindsight being 20-20 and all.
I think that Montgomery signed on the 2nd day of the season, and thus he cannot be offered a Qualifying Offer as he did not spend the entire (season calendar) season with one team. This is *if* he does not pick up his player option for 2025.
the best part of this article was to learn Montgomery dropped Scott Boras.
Joe – When the Boras dropping was reported here months ago, there was a massive collective Gomer-style “Suh-prise, suh-prise, suh-prise.”.
Let’s see how long Snell holds onto him.
6.58 ERA. Methinks that option needed some sort of clause. Like “Provided you don’t stink up the joint”.
The last four major free agents that I can remember that signed after spring training and 2 after the draft were all were Boras clients if I remember correctly. You had Stephen Drew and Kendrys Morales years back and Snell and Monty. All of them had terrible seasons because they missed spring training. It’s really important especially for pitchers who need to build up. Looks like no big contract coming for Snell or Monty coming next year. With the way they both have pitched they are lucky to have guaranteed big money next season because it certainly looks now that they aren’t going to get near what they where last year. Nice job of Boras overplaying his hand. He basically ended Drew’s career with that move and Morales was hurt alot but the year before was very productive and like Snell and Monty old Scott told them to wait I’ll get you what you want and didn’t. I know he has Soto this off season. With Soto’s talent he should get a near 500 million dollar contract. So go figure on Boras. I truly think FO’s and ownership are tired of his BS. Mystery teams are great for fans not for clubs making a push to sign a major free agent acquisition. Just my thoughts.
As good as it seems to have playoff expansion, this illustrates how little the regular season matters. There should be more reward for the top teams rather than taking nearly a week off from baseball to host a wild card team that has had enough rest between regular season, best 2 of 3 and then the Division round.
Something like, season ends on the Sunday, play immediately Monday thru Wednesday, start the LDS Thursday. If a team wins 2-0, it starts Wednesday. Another option: top team hosts all home games in LDS best of 5.
I would add that for top seeds it’s a 2 game win series format and lower seeds should be penalized with an extra win.
Sooner or later, Montgomery will regain his stride. He’s never been lights-out in the first place, but he’s definitely better than he’s pitched. All that said….colossally poor judgment by his former negotiating team (and him, since he could have repriced) and, for now, it seems like Diamondbacks.
Mike – I’m thinking the teams that signed Snell and Monty had to have expected the possibility of a bad first half, and priced it into their offers.
Montgomery’s negotiating style reminded me more of Johnny Damon’s post-Yankee trip through Free Agency. He had a terrific WS for Yankees in 2009, made a huge (for that time) ask in money and years (he was going into his age-36 season) and the Yankees wouldn’t bite. What followed was three teams in three years with a lot less money
Snell and Montgomery both waited far too long to sign because they wanted a long term deal, and now neither one of them will get a long term deal next off-season.
Pitchers are creatures of habit. They crave routine; both daily and seasonal. It had to be a mind bend for both Snell and Montgomery not to be able to kick off 2024 in ST camp. IMO, their agent did each a disservice by chasing after the almighty dollar like that.
CYJ
“their agent did each a disservice by chasing after the almighty dollar like that.”
Agents do what the players want
CBeisbol. So in this case both Snell and Montgomery told Boras; “I want the most money you can get me regardless of how long it takes.” No way. The agent drives that bus, not the player. Montgomery didn’t leave Boras because the agent didn’t do what the player wanted. He left him because he was sold “a bad bag of goods”. Completely blind sided that the process took as long as it did.
With 10 starts, eggroll
Agents do what the players want
=======================
Agents are paid to give advice. If all they did was to take the players demands to management, I could do that or half the price Boras charges.
The agent drives that bus
=========================
I’m not absolving the players, since they could have stepped in at any time to say “accept that offer”. But the players don’t know the market. They rely on their agents to say “I think you’ll get $xxx for x years in this market.
CYJ
Please support your assertions
JB
“Agents are paid to give advice”
Sure
And the player decides what do to based on that advice. And tells the agent
Red Sox fans were clamoring for management to sign Snell and Montgomery. I guess management knew what they were doing.
With hindsight being 20-20 and all.
Guys Montgomery was a dominant pitcher for the stretch run that’s it. With the Yankees and Cardinals he was a very good consistent 2-3 starter. He was never going to maintain that level of dominance. He got hot at the right time and people who thought he missed out on a big pay day simply ignored what Montgomery has been 90% of his career. I personally think he cashed in as much as he could on a high aav short term deal. He’ll be better than he has been but after exercising his option he’ll get a few year deal in line with a mid rotation arm. Snell and Montgomery were two totally different pitcher histories that caused them to settle for short term deals. Snell was either lights out or practically hot garbage and Montgomery was a consistent arm who was hot for 4-6 weeks. For that big money you need to be Cole, Verlander, Kershaw, etc.. big time pitchers season after season. Montgomery wanted to be paid like he’d pitched his whole career the way he pitched for a month or so and that was never happening
When the Cardinals dealt Montgomery they both talked about resigning afterwards but Montgomery pitched so much better for the Rangers for a short span the Cards had to quickly shift away but that goes to show you what his value looked like before the trade. I have little doubt that Montgomery returns to form but that form is not a frontline starter
borass caught another sucker
JP Sears is having a much better year than Jordan
JP will be a star as he gets more experience
Regardless of what most fans say.
Montgomery should think about throwing more sliders like he started doing some games back.