Reds Designate Christian Encarnacion-Strand For Assignment
Reds first baseman Christian Encarnacion-Strand has been designated for assignment, the team announced. Catcher P.J. Higgins is taking his spot on the 40-man roster. Higgins was recalled after catcher Jose Trevino went to the IL due to a thoracic spine strain.
More to come…
White Sox Option Shane Smith, Promote Tyler Schweitzer
The White Sox sent right-hander Shane Smith to Triple-A, the team announced. Left-hander Tyler Schweitzer was promoted to the big-league club. To clear a 40-man roster spot for Schweitzer, outfielder Brooks Baldwin was moved to the 60-day IL. Baldwin recently underwent an internal brace procedure and is expected to miss the entire season.
Smith was knocked around for 10 earned runs over 8 2/3 innings across three outings to begin the season. He tossed 3 2/3 scoreless frames against the Orioles on Tuesday, but it was far from an effective outing. Smith walked five and threw just 57 of his 99 pitches for strikes. He was able to dance around the traffic on the bases with the help of eight strikeouts, but the erratic showing ultimately cost him his roster spot.
It’s a swift fall from grace for Smith. The former Rule 5 pick was one of the few success stories from a forgettable 2025 campaign. The righty broke camp with the team and hit the ground running, allowing three earned runs or less in 13 straight starts to open the season. Smith faded as the innings piled up, but finished the year with a solid 3.81 ERA with just under a strikeout per inning. The solid effort earned Smith the Opening Day nod for 2026.
Smith hasn’t been hit particularly hard during this difficult three-start run, but he’s struggled to consistently find the strike zone. The righty has now issued nine free passes following Tuesday’s five-walk performance. He had similar challenges in MLB Spring Training, walking nine over 10 2/3 innings. Smith has frequently fallen behind opposing hitters, posting a 51% first-pitch strike rate. That mark was 60.4% in 2025. Heading to the minors will give him a chance to iron out the control issues.
Schweitzer was selected in the fifth round of the 2022 draft. The lefty has steadily moved up the minor league ladder, reaching Triple-A by the end of last season. Schweitzer’s stint with Charlotte didn’t go so well (7.92 ERA over 50 IP), but he got off to a better start this year. The 25-year-old allowed just one earned run over five frames with the Knights before getting called up.
MLB Pipeline ranks Schweitzer at No. 23 among Chicago’s prospects. The southpaw boasts a mid-90s heater that reaches 98 mph, along with a changeup, slider, and curveball. MLB Pipeline’s scouting report identified the changeup as Schweitzer’s best pitch, given its movement and deception.
James Fegan of Sox Machine first reported Smith’s demotion. Elijah Evans of Just Baseball was first to report Schweitzer’s promotion.
Photo courtesy of Kamil Krzaczynski, Imagn Images
MLBTR Podcast: Previewing The 2026-27 Free-Agent Class
The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.
This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…
- The April edition of MLBTR’s 2026-27 Free Agent Power Rankings (1:15)
- Tarik Skubal‘s free agency (5:00)
- Freddy Peralta‘s free agency (16:10)
- Bo Bichette‘s free agency (21:20)
- Jazz Chisholm Jr.‘s free agency (27:50)
- Trevor Rogers‘ free agency (34:20)
- Michael King‘s free agency (38:55)
- Daulton Varsho‘s free agency (41:40)
- The Pirates promoting Konnor Griffin a few days into the season (recorded prior to his extension becoming official) (48:30)
Check out our past episodes!
- Lots Of Extensions And Big-Picture Topics – listen here
- The PCA and Sanchez Extensions, And Prospect Promotions And Reassignments – listen here
- Banged-Up Reds And Braves, Kevin McGonigle, And Spring Breakouts – listen here
The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff. Check out their Facebook page here!
Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images
Red Sox Place Justin Slaten On Injured List, Recall Tyler Samaniego
Red Sox right-hander Justin Slaten hit the IL with an oblique strain, the team announced. Left-hander Tyler Samaniego was recalled to take his spot in the bullpen. Samaniego was acquired from the Pirates as part of the trade that sent Jhostynxon Garcia to Pittsburgh. If he appears in a game, it will be his big-league debut.
More to come…
The Opener: Drohan, Braves, Angels, Pitchers’ Duel
On the heels of this morning’s big Pirates news, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day today:
1. Drohan to make MLB debut:
The Brewers promoted left-hander Shane Drohan to the majors earlier this week, and now he’s poised to make his MLB debut against his former club. Acquired from the Red Sox in the Caleb Durbin trade, Drohan was a fifth-rounder drafted by the Red Sox back in 2020 who posted a 2.27 ERA in 47 2/3 innings of work at Triple-A last year. Drohan made just one start with the Brewers at Triple-A this year before being promoted, but now he’ll face off against veteran righty Sonny Gray (4.28 ERA in 2025) at Fenway Park later today. The game is scheduled for 1:35pm local time in Boston this afternoon.
2. Braves, Angels brawl:
The Braves and Angels got into a brawl yesterday when right-hander Reynaldo Lopez hit slugger Jorge Soler with a pitch during last night’s game. As noted by Rhett Bollinger and Courtney Hollman of MLB.com, Soler charged the mound following the plunking and threw punches at Lopez, who retaliated by punching back. Both benches cleared as Lopez and Soler fought, and the pair were eventually ejected from the game. Suspensions and fines haven’t yet been handed down from MLB after the brawl, but it seems likely that disciplinary action could come as soon as today. Meanwhile, the clubs will have the opportunity to work out any lingering tensions during this afternoon’s game, where Grant Holmes will face off against Reid Detmers at 1:07pm local time in Anaheim.
3. Pitchers’ Duel today:
A rematch of the 2025 World Series is currently ongoing, and tonight’s game in that rematch features a particularly exciting pitching matchup. Shohei Ohtani will be taking the mound for the World Champion Dodgers in his second start of the season. He threw six scoreless innings in his first outing of the year, racking up six strikeouts while allowing just one hit. His opponent will be newly-signed Blue Jays ace Dylan Cease, whose first two starts in Toronto have seen him post a 2.79 ERA with 18 strikeouts in just 9 2/3 innings of work. The game is scheduled for 3:07pm local time in Toronto and comes as the Jays look to avoid a sweep at the hands of Los Angeles, who won the first two games by a combined score of 18-3.
Pirates Sign Konnor Griffin To Nine-Year Extension
The Pirates have announced that they’ve signed Konnor Griffin to a nine-year extension. The news was first reported by Jon Heyman of The New York Post this morning. The deal runs through the 2034 season, and MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand reports that the deal is worth $140MM. Heyman adds that the deal includes incentives that could take the deal up to $150MM for the Excel client, while Joel Sherman of the New York Post reports that there are no options or deferred money in the deal. Sherman adds that the deal’s incentives are based on MVP voting for the 2026-31 seasons. According to Noah Hiles of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the deal includes a $12MM signing bonus. $5MM of that bonus will be paid out this year, followed by $3.5MM in 2027 and $3.5MM in 2028.
ESPN’s Buster Olney first reported that the sides were working on a deal in the range of nine years and $140MM last week, and now the deal is done. Even as the sides working on an extension has been common knowledge for a while now, it’s still surely a huge relief to Pirates fans that the deal is officially done. The consensus top prospect in the sport is now locked up through the end of the 2034 season, giving Pittsburgh three additional years of team control over their up-and-coming star. The term is convenient for Griffin as well. The youngster is still a few weeks shy of his 20th birthday, meaning that he’ll hit free agency ahead of his age-29 season when the deal wraps up in 2034. That should leave Griffin in line for a massive payday down the line, assuming he plays up to expectations.
Those expectations are certainly lofty. The youngster has gotten rave reviews from prospecting outlets across the board, and he’s viewed as a legitimate five-tool player with MVP-level upside. He’s certainly done everything he can to support those fawning evaluations so far. In his first professional season last year, he slashed .333/.415/.527 across three levels of the minors with 21 homers, 23 doubles, four triples, and a whopping 65 steals in just 122 games. He did all that while playing impressive defense at shortstop, and picked right back up where he left off upon starting the season at Triple-A. He went 7-for-16 (.438 average) with three steals, three doubles, and more walks than strikeouts in five games with the Pirates’ Indianapolis affiliate before they pulled the trigger and called him up to the majors.
Since being promoted to the majors, Griffin has struggled somewhat, with a .176/.300/.235 slash line in his first five games. There’s not much reason to put significant stock into a sample size that small, but it is worth noting that Griffin isn’t exactly guaranteed to hit the ground running in the majors. There’s a reason Juan Soto was the last hitter to reach the majors as a teenager before Griffin, and even Mike Trout was a below-average hitter in the majors at Griffin’s age. For the time being, Griffin’s exceptional speed on the base paths and strong defense at shortstop are already a big asset for the Pirates even if the star-level hitting contributions come later.
The extension makes Griffin the highest-paid Pirates player in franchise history, and puts a bow on a busy offseason where the club got aggressive in its efforts to contend. Brandon Lowe, Ryan O’Hearn, and Marcell Ozuna were all brought in this winter by the Pirates after the club missed on some much bigger fish like Kyle Schwarber, Kazuma Okamoto, and Eugenio Suarez to whom they were linked. Even with those top-tier pieces signing elsewhere, Pittsburgh has undeniably upgraded their offense in a big way as they try to make the most of the time during which they’ll have both Griffin and reigning NL Cy Young award winner Paul Skenes in the same uniform. All that spending has raised the luxury tax payroll considerably, and RosterResource indicates that their figure sits just under $127MM for luxury tax purposes at the moment. That should rise to the $142MM range once Griffin’s extension is accounted for.
Free Agent Power Rankings: Players #11-15
Last week, MLBTR took our first look at the top 10 players (based on predicted earning power) in the 2026-27 free agent class. There's always a lot of volatility this early in players' walk years. That's especially true of next year's group, which has a clear headliner in Tarik Skubal but is otherwise light in high-end talent.
MLBTR's free agent rankings are an attempt at consensus between Steve Adams, Darragh McDonald, Tim Dierkes and myself. There's usually overlap within the top handful of spots, but our individual lists typically start to differ within the back half of the top 10. The second and third tiers of free agents become more muddled and personal preferences come more into play. Skubal was a consensus pick at #1, and we each had Freddy Peralta and Bo Bichette in some order at #2 and #3. It diverged from there.
For example, Steve Adams had Trevor Rogers as his #4 free agent, while I had Rogers outside my personal top 10. (The Baltimore lefty ended up at #5 in the consensus ranking.) There's not much separation between players at the back of the top 10 and the best of the honorable mentions. With that in mind, let's take a look at five players who landed just outside the top 10. Most of these players had some support from at least one MLBTR writer for making the list, and any of them could plausibly jump into future iterations based on their performance over the next few months.
Kevin Gausman, SP, Blue Jays
If we were ranking players by the projected annual value of their next contract, Gausman would probably have landed in the top five. The two-time All-Star should do very well on a per year basis. It's nevertheless difficult to see him getting to a nine-figure deal when he'll turn 36 next January. There hasn't been a four-year deal for a 36-year-old free agent pitcher in almost 20 years.
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Cade Horton To Undergo Season-Ending UCL Surgery
Cubs right-hander Cade Horton will undergo elbow surgery and miss the remainder of the 2026 season, manager Craig Counsell tells Sahadev Sharma of The Athletic. Per Meghan Montemurro of the Chicago Tribune, Horton has a torn ulnar collateral ligament. Whether he requires full Tommy John surgery or some sort of alternative won’t be known until the procedure is taking place. He is already on the 15-day injured list and will be transferred to the 60-day IL whenever the Cubs need to open a 40-man roster spot.
It’s a painful but unsurprising development for Horton. He started for the Cubs on Friday but threw a pitch that was about two miles per hour below his average. He summoned the trainer and was removed from the game, with the Cubs announcing his ailment as forearm discomfort. He was quickly placed on the IL and is now destined to stay there.
Horton entered the 2025 season as one of the top pitching prospects in the league. He delivered on that hype by giving the Cubs 118 innings with a 2.67 earned run average. He had big breakout potential here in 2026 but it will instead go down as a mostly lost season. The eventual details of his surgery will determine his path back to the mound. A full TJS usually has a timeline of 14 months or more, whereas an alternative such as the internal brace variety could allow a pitcher to return slightly quicker.
The young righty wasn’t called up until mid-May last year but pitched well enough to finish second in National League Rookie of the Year voting. As part of the Prospect Promotion Incentive, that gave him a full year of service time retroactively. He’ll continue to collect service time while on the IL this year and will get to the two-year mark. Along the way, he will turn 25 years old in August.
For the Cubs, they will have to proceed without Horton in their rotation plans for this year. They also lost Matthew Boyd to the IL in recent days, though his bicep strain seems fairly minor. From their season-opening rotation, they are down to the trio of Edward Cabrera, Jameson Taillon and Shota Imanaga. They began the campaign with Javier Assad optioned to the minors but he has quickly been recalled and will start today’s game. It seems likely that swingman Colin Rea will start tomorrow, though the Cubs haven’t made that official.
As mentioned, Boyd’s situation isn’t considered serious, so he could be back in a couple of weeks. There’s also Justin Steele, who is working his way back from his UCL surgery, which was performed around this time last year. He is on the 60-day IL and won’t be eligible for a return until late May.
In the short term, their depth is a bit questionable. Jaxon Wiggins is one the top pitching prospects in the league and he is pitching at Triple-A but he still needs to rein in his command. He walked 11.5% of batters faced last year and is up to 13.9% so far in 2026. Kyle Wright and Vince Velasquez are non-roster guys with big league experience but neither has been in the majors since 2023 and Wright is currently on the minor league IL.
Photo courtesy of Ken Blaze, Imagn Images
Astros Notes: Brown, Hader, Bullpen
The Astros provided an update on injured ace Hunter Brown on Tuesday, noting that the righty has been diagnosed with a Grade 2 shoulder strain. The club said he’ll be shut down from throwing for a few weeks.
Manager Joe Espada provided a little more specificity in his pregame media session with the Houston beat (link via Matt Kawahara of The Houston Chronicle). The skipper said Brown would be reevaluated in two weeks. Espada and GM Dana Brown stressed that there’s nothing structurally amiss and that the issue is muscular.
That’s a relief, but it’s still trending towards more than a monthlong absence. Even if Brown is able to resume throwing two weeks from now, he’ll need to recover from a few bullpen and live batting practice sessions. A multi-week shutdown is going to require one or two minor league rehab starts as well.
The Astros are sticking with their plan to move to a six-man rotation after tomorrow’s off day. They’ll play on 13 straight days beginning this weekend. The six-man staff will keep Tatsuya Imai on a weekly schedule and allow them to keep an eye on workloads for their back-end arms.
Imai joins Mike Burrows, Cristian Javier and Lance McCullers Jr. in the top four of Espada’s rotation. Cody Bolton made a spot start on Monday against the Rockies, stepping into Brown’s schedule when the latter was placed on the injured list over the weekend. Bolton could get continued run out of the rotation. Spencer Arrighetti is working out of the Triple-A rotation. Ryan Weiss, AJ Blubaugh, and Kai-Wei Teng are all pitching in relief but have starting backgrounds.
Espada provided a few more encouraging updates on rehabbing pitchers this evening (relayed by Chandler Rome of The Athletic). The most notable is that closer Josh Hader, out all season with biceps tendinitis, is expected to face hitters for the first time next week. Depth starter Nate Pearson will throw a two-inning simulated game this weekend.
Houston’s bullpen has been shaky in Hader’s absence. Fill-in closer Bryan Abreu has allowed at least one run in each of his first four appearances. Abreu has only successfully locked down one of his three save opportunities this year. That came with a three-run lead and still required him to rebound from a Roman Anthony home run. Abreu took the loss in his most recent outing, giving up a walk-off three-run homer to Brent Rooker in the tenth inning on Sunday.
Bryan King and Steven Okert give the Astros a pair of quality left-handers. Abreu has a track record as a high-end setup man. Even if he gets on track, he’s a better fit earlier in games as a leverage arm given the Astros’ lack of established righty relievers. Blubaugh has been pushed up the bullpen hierarchy early in his big league career as a result.
Marlins Release Daniel Johnson
The Marlins released outfielder Daniel Johnson, according to the MLB.com transaction log. He’d been at Triple-A Jacksonville on a minor league deal.
Johnson had only appeared in five minor league games. He started very slowly, striking out seven times with one hit through his first 16 trips to the plate. The lefty hitter had taken 23 plate appearances during big league Spring Training. He batted .222 with one home run.
The 30-year-old Johnson has played parts of four big league seasons. He got into a career-high 31 games last year, dividing that time between the Giants and Orioles. The New Mexico State product is a .196/.243/.322 hitter across 152 MLB plate appearances. Johnson owns a .255/.321/.448 line over parts of seven seasons at the Triple-A level, including this year’s brief look.