Red Sox Reliever Vinny Nittoli Undergoes Internal Brace Procedure
TODAY: In an update from earlier this month, Ari Alexander of 7News reports that Nittoli underwent an internal brace procedure. Nittoli’s rehab is expected to last 12-13 months, so he should be ready for most or perhaps even all of the 2027 season.
MARCH 5: Red Sox reliever Vinny Nittoli is weighing Tommy John or internal brace surgery, reports Tim Healey of The Boston Globe. The righty has been diagnosed with ligament damage in his elbow and is seemingly headed for a season-ending operation.
Nittoli is in camp as a non-roster invitee after signing a minor league contract last month. He made three appearances this spring, allowing four runs over 2 2/3 innings. Manager Alex Cora told Mac Cerullo of The Boston Herald on Wednesday that the team was awaiting imaging results after Nittoli reported elbow discomfort during his most recent appearance. The news obviously wasn’t what he had been hoping.
The 35-year-old Nittoli is on the 12th organization of a decade-long professional career. He has pitched at the highest level for five teams. His career high in MLB appearances with one team is seven, as he threw eight innings for the Athletics in 2024. Nittoli has had cups of coffee with the Mariners, Phillies, Mets and Orioles as well. He has logged 18 2/3 major league innings, striking out 13 against five walks while allowing five runs.
A former 25th round pick, Nittoli has spent six seasons at the Triple-A level. He owns a 4.76 earned run average in 223 innings despite a strong 28.3% strikeout rate. Nittoli combined for a 4.58 ERA with a 26% strikeout percentage and 8% walk rate between Baltimore’s and Milwaukee’s top affiliates last year.
Joe La Sorsa To Trigger Upward Mobility Clause In Pirates Deal
TODAY: La Sorsa has been told he won’t be breaking camp with the Pirates, so he’ll be triggering his clause tomorrow, Ari Alexander reports.
MARCH 17: Left-hander Joe La Sorsa has an upward mobility clause at the end of spring training in his minor league deal with the Pirates, reports Ari Alexander of 7 News Boston. If he triggers that clause, he’ll be offered up to the other 29 clubs. If any of them are willing to give him a roster spot, then the Pirates have to either give him a roster spot themselves or trade him to another club that will. If no club offers him a roster spot, then he can be sent to the minors as non-roster depth.
La Sorsa, 28 in April, agreed to a minor league deal with the Bucs right as free agency was beginning in early November. He hasn’t spent much time in camp because he joined the Italian team for the World Baseball Classic. The Azzurri went on a Cinderella run that just ended last night when they were eliminated by Venezuela in the semifinals. The lefty made four appearance for Italy, logging 2 2/3 innings, allowing two earned runs via two hits and one hit-by-pitch while striking out four.
His major league track record consists of 57 innings thrown for the Rays, Nationals and Reds over the past three years. In that time, he has a 5.21 ERA, 17.5% strikeout rate, 6.3% walk rate and 39.2% ground ball rate. In 2025, he only made five appearances in the majors. He spent most of the year in Triple-A, posting a 2.59 ERA in 48 2/3 innings. His 21.2% strikeout rate and 42.1% ground ball rate at that level were close to average but he walked 13% of batters faced.
With the upward mobility clause, La Sorsa will get a major league roster spot as long as one of the 30 clubs is willing to give him one, whether that’s the Pirates or not. The Bucs should have Gregory Soto and Mason Montgomery as their two primary lefties in the bullpen. Evan Sisk is also on the roster but he has already been optioned, so he should start the season in Triple-A. If La Sorsa does get a roster spot somewhere, he still has a minor league option remaining.
Photo courtesy of Thomas Shea, Imagn Images
RJ Petit Undergoes Tommy John Surgery
Rockies right-hander RJ Petit underwent Tommy John surgery with an internal brace on Friday, per Thomas Harding of MLB.com. He will miss the entire 2026 season and likely part of 2027 as well.
Petit, 26, was the top pick in the most recent Rule 5 draft. The Tigers left him unprotected even though he had just finished a strong 2025 season. He tossed 66 1/3 innings between Double-A and Triple-A with a 2.44 earned run average, 29.5% strikeout rate, 8.2% walk rate and 42.1% ground ball rate. While Petit was doing that, the Rockies were losing 119 games, therefore getting the top Rule 5 pick.
The righty made a few spring training appearances but it was revealed a couple of weeks ago that he had suffered a sprain of his ulnar collateral ligament. It seems that Petit and the Rockies took some time to consider the options before it was decided that surgery was necessary.
Petit should be placed on the 60-day injured list whenever the Rockies need a 40-man roster spot. He’ll spend the 2026 season earning big league pay and service time. The 60-day IL goes away five days after the World Series, so the Rockies would need to give him a spot at that time or else put him on waivers. If he clears waivers, he would have to be offered back to the Tigers.
Normally, a team gains full control of a Rule 5 player after holding him for a full season. However, the player has to be active for at least 90 days. If the Rockies want to keep Petit, they would have to keep him on the roster throughout the 2026-27 offseason. They could theoretically put him on the injured list to start the 2027 campaign and then activate him once he’s healthy. If were healthy in time to be active for 90 days in 2027, they would then gain his full rights. That would end the Rule 5 parameters and the Rockies could then option him to the minors.
Photo courtesy of Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images
Giants Release Joey Lucchesi
The Giants have released left-hander Joey Lucchesi, the New York Post’s Jon Heyman reports. Lucchesi was non-tendered by San Francisco last November and then re-signed to a minor league deal a couple of weeks ago, but the recent signing of southpaw Ryan Borucki apparently made Lucchesi again expendable. Heyman wrote that Lucchesi was “granted his release,” so it could be that the team agreed to Lucchesi’s request to be let go, or the left-hander might have triggered an out clause in his contract if he learned he wasn’t making the Opening Day roster.
Lucchesi first landed in San Francisco on a minors deal last offseason, and posted a 3.76 ERA, 7.3% walk rate, and 18.8% strikeout rate over 38 1/3 innings out of the Giants’ bullpen after his contract was selected in mid-June. The bottom-line ERA was respectable and Lucchesi had a strong 53% grounder rate, but the Giants still decided to pass on tendering a contract rather than pay Lucchesi a projected $2MM arbitration salary.
2025 marked the first time in Lucchesi’s seven MLB seasons that he worked exclusively out of the bullpen, and he went longer than an inning in only seven of his 38 Giants appearances. Rather than acting as a swingman or even a true long reliever, Lucchesi could be settling into more of a traditional relief role, though it certainly can’t hurt that he looks capable of slightly longer stints. Left-handed hitters have rarely been able to do much against Lucchesi, as he has held lefty swingers to a .219/.296/.301 slash line over his career.
Lucchesi is out of minor league options, which adds another hurdle in his quest to land with a new team. Unless he sticks in the majors and delivers particularly solid results, Lucchesi could find himself in DFA/waiver wire limbo, as the proverbial 26th man on the roster. That said, teams are always in need of left-handed depth, so Lucchesi may not have to wait long before he finds another contract.
Braves To Include Didier Fuentes On Opening Day Roster
TODAY: The Braves are planning to send Fuentes down to Triple-A in a couple of weeks to stretch him back out as a starter, MLB.com’s Mark Bowman writes. It seems like Fuentes’ long relief role will last only through Atlanta’s season-opening 13-game stretch.
MARCH 21: Right-hander Didier Fuentes has won himself a spot on the Braves’ Opening Day roster, ESPN’s Jeff Passan writes. The 20-year-old Fuentes made his big league debut last season with four starts and 13 innings for Atlanta, and he’ll now return to the Show in what Passan says will be a relief role.
Fuentes’ bullpen assignment provides some more clarity to the Braves’ rotation picture. Chris Sale, Reynaldo Lopez, Spencer Strider, and Grant Holmes have the top four positions, and Bryce Elder and Jose Suarez now appear to be the last two candidates for the fifth starter role. Fuentes is headed to the bullpen, top prospect JR Ritchie was assigned to the minor league camp yesterday, and minor league signing Martin Perez will remain in the organization but isn’t being included on the Opening Day roster.
With Spencer Schwellenbach, Hurston Waldrep, and Joey Wentz all felled by injuries, rotation depth has been one of the primary storylines of Atlanta’s spring. This opened the door for multiple pitchers to try and win a job, and while Fuentes isn’t being ticketed for rotation duty, he certainly caught the Braves’ attention with an incredible Grapefruit League performance. Over three appearances and nine spotless innings, Fuentes didn’t allow even one walk or a hit, while striking out 17 batters — one HBP was the only thing keeping Fuentes from an unofficial perfect game during his spring work.
It is certainly possible Fuentes could receive a proper starting assignment, depending on how exactly the Braves choose to line up their rotation through a busy opening to the season. Atlanta doesn’t receive its first off-day until April 9, so it is very likely that both Elder and Suarez (or Fuentes) could get starts if the Braves deploy a six-man rotation in the early going. Even if Fuentes may not start, his ability to eat multiple innings out of the pen should prove useful as the Braves navigate this stretch of 13 straight games.
Fuentes has started 48 of his 52 career games in the minors, and his 2025 season saw the righty pitch at three different minor league levels as well as his four-start cup of coffee with the Braves. It may have been too much too soon for Fuentes since he was torched for an 13.85 ERA in his first exposure to MLB hitters, but the Braves had to dig into their depth chart after a swath of injuries wiped out their rotation last summer.
Fuentes has shown a knack for recording strikeouts and limiting walks in the minors, and some bad batted-ball luck might be why his 3.73 ERA over 202 2/3 minor league innings doesn’t exactly stand out. Still, there’s some obvious potential here even at Fuentes’ young age, and his huge spring numbers indicate that Fuentes might thrive as a reliever. While the Braves’ hand with Fuentes may have been forced by injuries last year, the team hasn’t been shy about quickly promoting prospects they feel can provide immediate help.
Parker Mushinski To Opt Out Of Deal With Rockies
Left-hander Parker Mushinski was in camp with the Rockies on a minor league deal but is now heading back to free agency. Thomas Harding of MLB.com reports that the southpaw has been informed that he won’t break camp with Colorado and will now opt out of his deal.
Mushinski, 30, had a camp of extremes. He racked up some strikeouts but also saw a lot of runs cross the plate. In 8 2/3 innings, he struck out 12 opponents but allowed ten earned runs via 11 hits and four walks. His .391 batting average on balls in play and 41% strand rate point to some poor luck in that small sample.
The Rockies had an awful pitching staff in 2025 and certainly had room for some new arms but they couldn’t find a spot for Mushinski. They’ll go into 2026 with Brennan Bernardino as the only lefty in their bullpen. Luis Peralta and Welinton Herrera are on the 40-man roster but will begin the season on optional assignment.
Mushinski’s major league track record consists of 33 innings pitched for the Astros over the 2022 through 2024 seasons. In that time, he has a 5.45 earned run average, 17.4% strikeout rate, 8.1% walk rate and 45.2% ground ball rate. He spent the 2025 season with the Guardians on a minor league deal. He tossed 50 Triple-A innings with a 3.78 ERA, huge 29.6% strikeout rate and strong 47.9% ground ball rate, but an ugly 14.8% walk rate.
He’ll head to the open market to see what opportunities await him now. There’s a ton of roster shuffling happening this week as clubs make their final decisions before Opening Day. As some guys get released or head to waivers, some clubs may find themselves light on lefty relief.
Photo courtesy of Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images
Phillies Re-Sign Tim Mayza To MLB Deal, Return Zach McCambley To Marlins, Re-Assign Lou Trivino
4:47PM: The Phillies also re-assigned right-hander Lou Trivino to Triple-A. Like Mayza, Trivino is an Article XX(B) player with an opt-out in his minors contract this weekend. It isn’t yet clear if Trivino will trigger his clause and enter free agency, or if he’ll bide his time at Triple-A until his next opt-out date on May 1.
9:21AM: The Phillies announced this morning that left-hander Tim Mayza was re-signed to a major league contract after the lefty exercised his opt-out clause in his minor league deal and was granted his release by the organization yesterday. To make room for Mayza on the 40-man roster, right-handed Rule 5 selection Zach McCambley was returned to the Marlins. McCambley was evidently place on (and successfully cleared) waivers at some point prior to the move to return him to Miami.
Mayza, 34, is entering his ninth major league season. He’s spent the majority of his career to this point as a member of the Blue Jays, and after an uneven start to his career when he made his major league debut in 2017 through the end of the 2019 season, he emerged from a 2020 campaign lost to injury to become one of Toronto’s more steady relief arms. From 2021 through 2023, Mayza turned in high quality results for the Jays with a 2.67 ERA and a 3.20 FIP in 155 innings of work. Of course, it should be noted that those strong numbers came with a major platoon split. While his ERA against southpaws was just 0.67, his numbers against right-handers were far more pedestrian: he sported a 4.19 ERA, a 3.96 FIP, and a 24.7% strikeout rate across those three seasons.
Even factoring in those lesser numbers against righties, however, Mayza’s fall from grace in 2024 was a shocking one. Across 50 appearances, the lefty’s ERA ballooned all the way up to 6.33, and while his 4.50 FIP suggests some of that was due to poor fortune on batted balls and sequencing he still struck out a paltry 14.4%. Ugly as those season long numbers are, however, Mayza did show some signs of returning to form after he was shipped to the Yankees midway through the season; in 18 innings of work with the Bombers, Mayza turned in a 4.00 ERA with a 3.94 FIP, though his strikeout rate still sat at a well-below average 16.2%.
That left Mayza in an uncertain place headed into 2025, and while he landed a big league deal with the Pirates he spent most of the season on the injured list due to a lat strain. He pitched just 15 total innings in the majors last year between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia (who claimed him off waivers from the Pirates midseason). In that time, he posted a 3.78 ERA and 4.16 FIP that’s more or less in line with his work as a member of the Yankees. His strikeout rate did tick back up to a more respectable 20.3%, however, and that was enough to convince the Phillies to give him another shot on a minor league pact entering camp. Mayza’s 5.40 ERA in 8 1/3 spring innings isn’t exactly inspiring, but the big news from camp is that the strikeouts appear to be back. He’s punched out 27.0% of his opponents this spring, and that was enough to convince the Phillies to put him back on their roster for the 2026 season.
As for McCambley, the righty was a third-round pick by the Marlins back in 2020. Initially drafted as a starter, McCambley converted to relief during the 2022 season and climbed the rest of the minor league ladder as a reliever. He split the 2025 season between Triple-A and Double-A, and in that time posted a combined 2.90 ERA with a 33.1% strikeout rate in 62 innings of work. That was enough to catch Philadephia’s attention in the Rule 5 draft, but he walked (six) more hitters than he struck out (four) in his 7 1/3 innings of work with the Phillies during Spring Training. That lack of control was enough for the Phillies to decide to move on from McCambley, who now returns to the Marlins as a non-roster piece who could nonetheless be called upon to contribute out of the bullpen at some point this year.
Grayson Rodriguez To Begin Season On Injured List
TODAY: Suzuki told reporters (including Jack Janes) today that Rodriguez will indeed be placed on the IL. This sets Kochanowicz and Johnson up as rotation members, and Walbert Urena will also make the team in a long relief role. The 22-year-old Urena will be making his big league debut whenever he makes his first appearance for the Halos.
MARCH 19: Angels right-hander Grayson Rodriguez may begin the season on the injured list. Manager Kurt Suzuki told reporters, including Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register and Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com, that Rodriguez has a “dead arm” and will be slowed down. With Opening Day now just a week away, that makes it possible Rodriguez starts the season on the 15-day injured list, depending on how things progress in the coming days.
At this point, it doesn’t appear to be a major issue. Rodriguez isn’t even being shut down, with Fletcher noting that he still threw today, but it’s concerning nonetheless. Injuries have been in the spotlight for Rodriguez in recent years. He made 43 starts for the Orioles in 2023 and the first half of the 2024 season. He hasn’t made an official start since July of 2024, primarily due to shoulder issues.
He underwent elbow debridement surgery in August of last year. He was flipped to the Angels early this offseason in a one-for-one-trade for outfielder Taylor Ward. After that deal, Rodriguez spoke about his health and seemed optimistic. He said that he had been dealing with bone spurs in his elbow for three or four years. He believed this was adding stress to his shoulder and causing his numerous problems with that part of his arm.
For Rodriguez to now be dealing with arm problems once again is less than ideal. Perhaps it will remain a fairly minor issue but the Angels don’t have a lot of margin for error. They came into camp with a rotation projected to include José Soriano, Yusei Kikuchi, Reid Detmers, Alek Manoah and Rodriguez. Soriano and Kikuchi are fine but the group is fairly questionable after that.
Detmers had a 3.96 ERA in relief last year but a 6.70 ERA as a starter the year prior. He has a 7.27 ERA in spring training so far. Like Rodriguez, Manoah is looking to bounce back after a lengthy injury absence, but he has a 9.39 ERA this spring.
If Manoah gets optioned or Rodriguez needs to spend some time on the IL, that could open a spot for Jack Kochanowicz. He’s having a good spring but posted a 6.81 ERA in the big leagues last year. Fletcher suggested yesterday that Ryan Johnson has a chance to earn a spot, getting an aggressive Opening Day nod yet again. The Angels gave him a spot in their bullpen to begin last season even though he hadn’t yet played a game as a professional. He posted a 7.36 ERA through early May, at which point he was optioned down to High-A.
It’s worth reiterating that there’s still nothing to indicate Rodriguez is dealing with any kind of major issue. He may still avoid the IL if he feels better in the coming days. Even if he lands on the shelf, Opening Day IL stints can be backdated three days, so he could be back in less than two weeks.
But the Angels are going into a season where they hope to contend but need a lot of things to go right in order to that to be possible. They went 72-90 last year and didn’t make strong moves to upgrade the roster this winter. The Playoff Odds at FanGraphs give them just a 4.9% chance of cracking the postseason. The PECOTA Standings at Baseball Prospectus are even more pessimistic, giving the Halos just a 0.1% chance.
A minor setback for a club’s fourth starter wouldn’t always be a cause for worry but it looms larger for the Angels than with other clubs since any setback can further diminish already-slim those odds.
Photo courtesy of Allan Henry, Imagn Images
Phillies Extend Cristopher Sanchez
4:27PM: The breakdown of Sanchez’s extension is provided by Scott Lauber of the Philadelphia Inquirer. Sanchez will still earn $6MM in 2027 and $9MM in 2028, matching the terms of his previous contract. He’ll get $15MM in 2029, $16MM in 2023, and then a jump to $30MM in each of the 2031 and 2032 seasons. There is a $1MM buyout on a $44.5MM club option for the 2033 campaign.
8:01AM: The Phillies have announced a contract extension for left-hander Cristopher Sanchez, as first reported by Robert Murray of FanSided. It’s a six-year deal that runs from 2027 through 2032 and includes a club option for the 2033 season. The Athletic’s Matt Gelb reports that the deal guarantees Sanchez $107MM, including the $3.5MM salary the southpaw is set to make in 2026. Francys Romero of Beisbol FR reports that the deal also includes “more than $13MM” in performance incentives. Sanchez is represented by Mato Sports Management.
The news is a shocking development given that Sanchez is entering just the second season of his four-year, $23.5MM extension with the Phillies. That deal had two affordable club options attached to the end of it, so the lefty was set to make just $47MM over the next five seasons. That makes this contract effectively $60MM in new money for the lefty’s age-34 and -35 seasons, with a club option for his age-36 campaign at a value that has not yet been reported.
It’s a nearly unprecedented move by the Phillies, whose initial extension with Sanchez had made him one of the most valuable assets in the entire sport. They’ve now traded the most, if not all of that surplus value to lock up the left-hander into his mid-thirties. Other teams have given established, franchise players extensions that take them well past their primes after already having those prime years locked up in the past, including the Guardians with Jose Ramirez back in January and the Diamondbacks with Ketel Marte last year. Those deals weren’t quite the same as this one, however. Both Ramirez and Marte had more than a decade of MLB experience under their belt and had already played out significant portions of their initial team-friendly extensions, even signing with the club multiple times. In addition, those teams had the motive of restructuring their star’s previous deal to include deferred money.
That’s not to say Sanchez is undeserving of his new payday, of course. After breaking out in 2024 and earning a trip to the All-Star game, Sanchez enjoyed one of the most impressive pitching seasons in recent memory this past season. The lefty spun a 2.50 ERA with a 2.55 FIP in 202 innings of work, striking out 212 batters across 32 starts. He paired his 26.3% strikeout rate with a 5.5% walk rate and a 58.3% ground ball rate, giving him a lower SIERA than every qualified starter in the NL and the third-lowest in baseball behind Tarik Skubal and Garrett Crochet.
By measure of fWAR, Sanchez’s 2025 season was a top-20 campaign by a qualified starter since 2015, tied with Cy Young-winning campaigns by future Hall of Famers like Chris Sale (2024), Max Scherzer (2017), and Justin Verlander (2019). Sanchez ultimately finished second behind Paul Skenes in Cy Young voting last year, but nonetheless established himself as among the upper-echelon of starters in today’s game with that performance. Clearly, the Phillies are betting on Sanchez to age well like those other elite arms did by signing him to a big-money extension for his mid-thirties. Philadelphia has been unafraid of signing players well past their prime years previously, as shown by the fact that Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola are under contract through their age-37 seasons, while Jesus Luzardo‘s new contract extension includes a club option for his age-34 campaign.
With this new contract, Sanchez joins Luzardo (2032 club option) and Trea Turner (contract guaranteed through 2033) as the only three players under team control beyond the expiration of Bryce Harper‘s contract in 2031. This restructured contract for Sanchez could be an interesting data point for Harper and agent Scott Boras, as the two-time MVP and future Hall of Famer has previously publicly expressed a desire to extend or restructure his contract with Philadelphia to keep him in town beyond the 2031 campaign. Of course, those previous attempts were before this past offseason’s comments from Dave Dombrowski critical of Harper that drew the superstar’s ire, prompting trade speculation that Dombrowski later firmly shut down. Even if those tensions have been smoothed over at this point, it’s entirely possible that the Phillies would simply value adding a few more years to Sanchez’s contract more than doing the same with Harper, who will already be 38 years old in the final year of his current deal.
Craig Kimbrel Won’t Make Mets’ Roster
Mets manager Carlos Mendoza told the media (including SNY TV) that veteran reliever Craig Kimbrel was told that he won’t be breaking camp with the team. An Article XX(B) free agent, Kimbrel had the chance to trigger the first of three opt-out dates in his minor league contract this weekend, and Mendoza’s comments seemingly indicate that the right-hander hasn’t exercised an out clause, as Kimbrel is considering staying in the organization.
“Now he is deciding whether he wants to stay, which looks like he’s leaning that way,” Mendoza said. “He likes it here, he wants to win, but he also is going to look around for opportunities. But there’s a good chance he stays back here in Florida, to continue to pitch and [wait] until the opportunity presents.”
Kimbrel has a 4.50 ERA over six Grapefruit League innings for the Mets, with five walks and five strikeouts. It wasn’t the kind of performance that would help what was already something of a longshot bid to make New York’s roster, and it could be that Kimbrel is fine pitching in the minors for now. Given how the Mets cycled through an endless amount of relievers last season, Kimbrel may figure it won’t be too long before he is needed in Queens, even if his call-up would come with the added wrinkle of a contract selection to the 40-man roster.
Making the Mets’ roster would also guarantee a $2.5MM salary for Kimbrel, and since New York is over the highest level of luxury tax penalization, the Mets would pay more than double that amount in additional taxes. While money isn’t exactly a top concern for the big-spending Mets, it isn’t absolutely no concern, and the front office may feel a reliever on a minimum salary is a better investment both financially and results-wise than what Kimbrel can offer at age 37.
Kimbrel has been bouncing around the league for the last few years, showing some flashes of his old All-Star form but without much consistency. In 2025, Kimbrel had a 2.25 ERA and a 34.7% strikeout rate over 12 innings with the Braves and Astros, but with a hefty 14.3% walk rate as well. Control has been an issue for Kimbrel even during his prime years, and he has also been hurt by an increased tendency to allow home runs.
There could still be a market elsewhere for Kimbrel’s services, if another team feels he still has something in the rank. Mendoza noted that playing for a contender seems to be a priority for Kimbrel, so he might not want to sign with just any team if he does re-enter the open market.