The Diamondbacks are optioning infielder Jordan Lawlar to Triple-A Reno, reports John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7 FM Phoenix. Infielder Ildemaro Vargas will be taking Lawlar’s roster spot. Vargas triggered an opt-out from his minor league deal and was released earlier this week. Gambadoro adds that Vargas will be re-signed to a major league deal. Arizona has an open 40-man roster spot at the moment, though it will be full once Vargas is officially added.
Lawlar, 22, earned a promotion to the majors earlier this month. One of the top prospects in the league, he had a monster line of .336/.413/.579 in Triple-A and it was getting harder and harder for the club to justify keeping him in Reno. However, they didn’t really have a great way to get him into the big league lineup. His primary position is shortstop, though he’s also spent some time at second and third base.
The Diamondbacks have Geraldo Perdomo at short, Eugenio Suárez at third and Ketel Marte at second. Pavin Smith and Randal Grichuk usually platoon in the designated hitter spot. They’re all performing well this year, to varying degrees. Nonetheless, manager Torey Lovullo felt there was a path to get Lawlar into the lineup about four times per week while others rested.
That hasn’t really come to pass. Lawlar was called up on May 12th and has subsequently appeared in eight games. Only six of those were starts. He entered one other game as a pinch hitter and another as a pinch runner. He hasn’t performed well in that sporadic playing time. In 22 plate appearances, he has three walks but nine strikeouts and no hits. Optioning him down therefore makes sense, as there’s not much use in having him scuffle in a part-time role. It’s far better for his long-term outlook to play regularly as he continues his development.
An injury to one of the current infielders would likely result in him making a quick return to the majors. His long-term path to playing time looks stronger since Suárez and Grichuk are impending free agents. With the Diamondbacks five games out of a playoff spot, it’s possible they end up traded this summer, which could get Lawlar another look in the big leagues. First baseman Josh Naylor is also an impending free agent, which could allow Smith to take over that spot in the near future.
For now, Vargas is a more logical bench infielder. A 33-year-old veteran, he has 422 big league games under his belt, having bounced around the field to every position except catcher and center field. He also hits from both sides of the plate. His .246/.289/.354 career batting line amounts to a wRC+ of 75, which is below average production in a vacuum but generally around what a club would expect from a versatile bench piece. He started this year with the Diamondbacks on a minor league deal but, as mentioned, opted out a few days ago. Before triggering that opt-out, he hit .261/.330/.397 over 49 games for Reno.
Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images
How to mishandle a prospect 101
Unless they were to move Marte to LF he wasn’t going to get everyday ab’s. Would still expect them to work him into the roster as the season progresses but 0-19 isn’t exactly forcing your way into the lineup.
I hear ya, he didn’t necessarily force the issue but Tyler is also right- Lawlar only started every four days and three of his six starts were against elite SP, while being passed over against LHP whom he rakes against.
Just really poor handling of a promotion.
Agreed. Mishandled.
But I wonder if this says more about Tory Lovullo’s future, than Jordan Lawlar’s future
You call this kid up and you can only get him into 8 games – two of them as a pinch-hitter / pinch runner?
If the snakes don’t make the playoffs, I could see them move off from Torey. This team has too much talent not to make the playoffs and Torey seems a little adrift this year for some reason. Why wouldn’t he be hyper-focused? Maybe off field issues.
This was the opportunity available to him. He got a couple weeks of MLB pay and experience. That could be worth a lot more than extra ABs in AAA. At least people can’t cry about service time
ohyeadam
could be worth a lot more than extra ABs in AAA.
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I doubt it.
A more realistic to look at it is that he had 6 starts and the Dbacks went 0-6. This included losing:
14-12
4-3
6-5
One could argue that, had a better player started, then Lawlar’s 0-9 might have won 1-2 of those games.
Could worth a lot more for Jordan’s development than a few extra AAA ABs. Is what I was going for. Obviously the snakes would’ve been better with Suarez in the lineup. They gave him the opportunity they had to give
I get that he’s struggled but you would imagine Lawlar would get more than 19 at bats
22 ABs (3 walks), but I agree with your point
They never give Lawlar a chance. Absolutly pathetic. If I’m the Braves, I would go right after Lawlar and make him their franchise SS
Luckily for the Dbacks, Dave Stewart isn’t their GM anymore.
Their Inf is too good. He doesn’t have a path. So, is it better for him to continue to sit in AAA and put up good numbers or is this detrimental and they should trade him?
3B is open in 2026, sooner if the sell at the deadline.
1B is also likely open in ’26 or after the deadline. I assume Marte moves to 1B and that opens 2B, presumably for Lawlar.
LFGMets (Metsin7) #BannedAgain&Again&AgainFireStearns
They never give Lawlar a chance. Absolutly pathetic.
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Of course not. He’s not half the player that Marte, Perdomo, or Suarez are.
Who did you think he was going to start over?
i am the biggest dbacks fan and this is what’s wrong with the organization. Torey needs to go! You bring up your best prospect to sit him on the bench. ridiculous how they ruined that kids confidence!
What’s up with Torey? He seems adrift and scatter-shot this year when he should be hyper-focused?? Too much talent on this team to be hovering .500 !!!!
You bring up your best prospect to sit him on the bench.
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Nonsense, imo.
Who did you plan on starting him over? He wasn’t pushing Marte, Perdomo, or Suarez to the bench. Right now, he isn’t nearly as good as any of them.
Let the kid continue to get MLB at bats. Need more than 19AB’s
Just a useless move bringing him up in the first place. He had no place to play….on a regular basis.
That was my response when he was promoted.
1-No place to play, so he has to sit on the bench.
2-He’s hardly a finished product. He’s on pace for > 150 Ks/600 AAA ABs.
3-Perdomo and Marte are locked in for a long time. Lawler should be in the minors working on his 3B skills.
Ik he hasn’t had much a chance but with how mich he isn’t playing, he may never pan out
Lawlar & mayo are minor lg superstars
And major lg flatliners
The Os have spread Mayo too thin
Jace Jung too
Why did they even bring him up? Ridiculous. Short-sighted all around.
Bigger Dbacks concern: What is wrong with Zac Gallen? Is an IL stint forthcoming?
Gallen tossed 240 innings in 2023 including the playoffs, and has never been quite the same since. He’s been healthy (supposedly), but it seems like the 2023 workload burned him out.
Montgomery. Same.
El, imo, Gallen nibbles too much. He gets ahead in the count, then tries to get chases out of the zone. Counts consistently go from 0-2 and 1-2 to 3-2. As a result, he’s at 90-100 pitches in the 5th inning. Gallen needs to trust his stuff and challenge hitters more. If he threw an 0-2 fastball right down the heart of the plate, Gallen would fool virtually every hitter in MLB because they are expecting Gallen to predictably throw a breaking ball off the plate.
I see no reason why they couldn’t use the DH to get him some more playing time. And Suarez is a free agent at years end so at that point finding him regular at bats shouldn’t be a problem. But he was also 0 for 19. He’s gotta do something with the limited opportunities he gets and he didn’t do a thing. My guess is someone will get hurt and he will be back up and playing everyday soon.
I see cause Torey is a moron! Just in case it wasn’t clear. Hes the worst!
19 at-bats is only 4 games. Mike Trout sucked for the first several months of his career. A much bigger sample size is needed to gauge whether a prospect is ready or not.
Judge was awful his first season in the bigs.
Judge has a note on his phone that says “.179” and he looks at it every day to remind him of his first year.
Hopefully they saw something in his plate appearances that can be corrected with a few weeks of practice at AAA. If the Diamondbacks continue to falter, Naylor to the Red Sox seems like an obvious move for both teams and that would open up some playing time for Lawler (Suarez moving to 1B, for example).
Naylor or Suarez to Seattle might make sense. The trick would be finding suitable pitching as a return. Suarez was regarded as a team leader during his previous time with the M’s.
It was dumb of the Mariners to trade him to Arizona to begin with. They got absolutely nothing in return for him, and have had a black hole at 3B ever since trading him away.
Actually Seattle has Carlos Vargas from that trade who has broken out this season as a reliable late inning reliever. M’s have rookie Williamson at 3B who is +++ on defense and okay offense but getting better. Love his glove. I see Naylor as a better fit.
Why not trade Suarez when he is hitting?
His numbers are deceiving. His BABIP is a lowly .226 and his K% is lowest it’s been since 2018.
This has all the signs of being desperate, they threw a hail mary bringing Lawlar up after only a month of playing every day in Reno. They said in an article that Lawlar was having trouble tracking anything spun thrown at him, great on fastballs. Was at the game yesterday, Lawlar looked really shaky in the field making two errors, the throwing error was a mental mistake, should have just thrown it to first, instead of trying to make a bang bang DP and threw it out to left field. He needs a year of AAA he is only 23, he just is not ready for the ML’s.
And as far as everything else on this team, its desperate times, this team was said by AZ management it was going to competitive which it is, but blows a game like Tuesday having a 6-2 lead into the seventh, but again for the fifth time already they lost a game with having scored a 10-run inning, had another game where they lost a home game to the Rockies which had only won 2 road games all year. It is the bullpen, but Hazen said basically there is nothing out there right now. Sounds like he has thrown up his hands and said we have what we have which is pathetic.
Hazen has continuously snubbed at reinforcing the bullpen during his time as GM. Now, in all honesty, you don’t need a terrific bullpen if you have awesome starting pitching but beside what the press had us believe in the two past offseasons, our starting pitching is catastrophic due to the money invested in it and the cheapest ones are the ones that have kept the team to stay competitive!
The Lawlar situation shows yet another flaw in this organisation: he is not going to learn how to hit breaking balls in Reno. It is a terrific environment to boost a hitter’s confidence, but that is about the only good thing about the Diamondbacks’ AAA team (and AA team).
That’s an opportunity for my Pads.
Preller type dude. Low downside high ceiling.
Go Pads!
Vargas shoulda had the job all along; Garrett Hampson should not have made the OD roster
Breaking the law, breaking the law
The Lawlar situation aside, I have never understood why Vargas keeps getting jobs. He is the kind of player who, when a team rosters him, that is their way of announcing to the world, “We’re bad.”
I would guess (without checking his defensive metrics) that he gets roster spots due to defensive versatility.
Lawlar will likely be up mi-season once some position players are traded away.
Exactly. Breaking Lawlar.
Also, washing the dog, washing the dog
Jordan was over-matched in his 22 PAs. He struck out or grounded out nearly everytime. The final straw was two errors in yesterday’s game. Torrey doesn’t stand for sloppy defense. Lawler would have gotten more regular playing time and ABs had he performed early. There were plenty of ABs to be had at 2B, 3B, SS and DH, but he didn’t earn them. Lawler still has huge upside. He will go back to Reno, work on hitting breaking balls and return by years end. The Dbacks primary problem is their BP. Martinez and Puk have missed time, but several RPs, with good track records, have woefully underperformed. Hazen needs to get a dependable BP arm or two now. He cannot afford to wait until the deadline. Also, Nelson needs to stay in the rotation in place of ERod.
From the outside looking in it does look like a bit of a quick hook. I can understand if it was an injured guy who was productive coming in and taking his place but Vargas doesnt seem like hes that type of guy. O’s gave Holliday something like 3oish AB’s before sending him back down and he looked pretty overmatched as well. Nowadays hes looking like hes starting to figure things out though. I would have given Lawlar another week to try to make some adjustments personally, but if he’s as good as I think he is, he’ll force his way back into the equation with some time.
Shouldve thrown it in the last post but I always remind myself when I see some of our O’s prospects struggle initially that Mike Trout looked pretty terrible at the dish in his first 120 AB’s
Just thought I would throw this in, D’Backs expected to call up Jeff Brigham (RP) 33yr old last pitched in the majors in 2023. This the best Hazen can do digging deep in the ML RP dumpster again.
Hazen has picked up Sewald, Thompson and Puk at the deadline the past two years. All three were outstanding down the stretch. I understand assessing internal options in April and May, but I expect Hazen is looking aggressively for a controllable high leverage arm or two right now. I just hope he finds a match sooner rather then later. The blown saves and late inning collapses take their toll on teams… and fans.
Angels, Felix Bautista and Kyle Finnegan would be two guys to consider, depending on how early the Orioles and Nationals are willing to deal relievers. Bautista has given up runs in each of his last three appearances. However, like Finnegan, he has had success in the recent past. They would at least start as more trustworthy than what they’ve got now.
A sleeper might be Dennis Santana. He doesn’t have a long track record, but he’s been excellent through 63 appearances since the Pirates picked him up last June. A good arm who has finally learned to throw strikes. He’s 5:1 strikeouts to walks since becoming a Pirate.
Thank you for the recommendations. You should work in the Dbacks Baseball Operations Department. I don’t think the Dbacks can wait until early July for Puks return or late July for the deadline. I know its hard to find trade partners right now, but imo, Hazen needs to act fast.
Yeah, they need to stop the bleeding now.