Tigers right-hander Jason Foley underwent season-ending surgery. Manager A.J. Hinch announced the news to reporters, including Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic.
It’s been an odd season for Foley, who led the 2024 Tigers with 28 saves. Detroit surprisingly optioned him to Triple-A Toledo after a rough spring training. He took the demotion in stride and carved up Triple-A opposition, firing 6 2/3 shutout innings with a 41% strikeout rate in five appearances. He looked as though he was on the cusp of a return to the majors, but Foley was diagnosed with a shoulder strain in the middle of last month and hasn’t pitched since. Now, he won’t throw again until the 2026 season.
Unfortunately for Foley, he won’t accrue big league service time right now since he’s on the minor league injured list. He could pick up some big league time if the Tigers call him to the majors and place him on the 60-day IL whenever they next need a roster spot. Enough time has passed in 2025 that Foley won’t be able to move from three years of service to four years. The Tigers surely weren’t intending for their original demotion of Foley to buy them another season of club control, but it’s effectively done just that — so long as they tender him a contract anyhow.
Foley and the Tigers agreed to a $3.15MM salary this past offseason, avoiding a trip through the arbitration process. Typically, when a player who’s agreed to an arbitration salary subsequently misses the entire season, he and the team agree to the same salary for the following year. That could well be the case here.
Even with Foley out for the year, there’s good reason for the Tigers to tender him this winter. He was sharp in Triple-A prior to the injury and just last year posted 60 innings of 3.15 ERA ball. Dating back to 2022, Foley has given the Tigers 189 1/3 innings with a 3.18 ERA, an 18.4% strikeout rate, a 5.9% walk rate and a 54% ground-ball rate. He’s saved 35 games and picked up another 40 holds along the way.
They kind of knew something was up when he didn’t make the team out of Spring training. This is sad news. Good guy. Hope he recovers and contributes next year.
He pitched multiple games for Toledo, and looked good, right until he got hurt.
You think so? He had a good Spring, I assumed the reason he didn’t make the team was due to something behind closed doors. Maybe attitude? He is pretty outspoken with the media and voiced his displeasure by not making the playoff roster last year. Regardless, I hope everything gets resolved during all this and he can come back in ’26.
I doubt they sent him down over attitude. Remember, he didn’t perform great in the playoffs last year. I think the Tigers wanted to see him dominate AAA before trusting him again….but he got hurt.
He was left off the playoff roster last year. Said he felt he deserved to be on it if I remember correctly.
He pitched 1/3 of an inning vs the Astros (Tigers won that series) and gave up 1 run on 3 hits.
He did not pitch in the Cleveland series, though I think he was on the roster.
That’s it.
Inconsistent velocity plus command issues. HIs slider feeds off the sinker and isn’t particularly effective when the sinker isn’t well located. I was hoping the stint in Toledo would get him ready for a return to the majors, but I didn’t think that meant 2026. Get well Jason.
First Alex Lange, and now Jason Foley. If both are healthy next year, along with Will Vest, the Tigers will have one dominant bullpen!
I wonder when things started to unwind healthwise? Wouldn’t surprise me if things began to deteriorate late last season.
His health was fine until mid April.
Stinky stink stink
Stinks
Unfortunate for Foley. We’’’ll see what the Tigers do in the off season. Seems like a non-tender candidate. Kind of lost it towards the end of last season and was a non-factor in the playoffs. Didn’t have a great spring but seemed to be doing better in Toledo before getting hurt.
I think they’ll tender him, but it wouldn’t be as surprising as him not making the team this spring, if they didn’t, at this point. He’s had decent numbers and seemed to have gotten back on track, like you said. It’ll probably come down to how he’s recovering from the injury, obviously. If it’s slow and arduous, he may be nontendered.
It WAS very odd they straight up optioned him to start the year unless there’s some internal issue they didn’t want to reveal. That just doesn’t happen at all hardly. Tigers bullpen has been just plain weird the last two seasons
Trouble with Lange was you never knew which pitcher was coming to the mound. Sometimes he got everyone out and others it was nobody. You cant have a closer that is inconsistent. Foley didn’t have a very good spring and the Tigers took the best pitchers on their roster. He would have been called up if he hadn’t got hurt
Darn those Tigers, if they wouldn’t have optioned Foley they’d have the best win/loss record in baseball. Oh wait, they do.
Haha. Exactly.
Well, it turned out to be a good idea in Detroit’s case. Even though I was surprised at the time. They have a good, deep BP and now they gained an extra year of control.
Thank you, Clueless Commander for your comment on a team you presumably know nothing about. Hinch doesn’t have a designated closer and has done closer by committee for the past season and half. Every time this team has had a designated closer like Gregory Soto or Jose Cisnero it’s been a certified disaster.
I don’t see why Beau Brieske is on the big club.
Maybe they’re hoping he’ll recapture some of last year’s magic. He hasn’t shown much in 2025. With the pitching depth in the minors, I don’t think anyone is going to have a really long leash.
I’m looking forward to Sawyer Gibson Long’s return. He was looking outstanding when he went down.
An effective pitching staff needs a variety of pitching styles. Maybe Breiske’s offering is unique?