Veteran right-hander Kyle Hendricks is calling it a career. The longtime Cubs hurler, who spent the 2025 season with the Angels, is retiring, per Maddie Lee of the Chicago Sun-Times.
More to come.
Rays Trade Kameron Misner To Royals
The Rays announced Monday that they’ve traded outfielder Kameron Misner to the Royals in exchange for a player to be named later or cash. Tampa Bay had designated Misner for assignment last week.
More to come.
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Royals Add Marcus Thames To Coaching Staff
The Royals are hiring former big league outfielder and veteran coach Marcus Thames as a hitting coach, reports Anne Rogers of MLB.com. He’ll join recently hired Connor Dawson, 32, as a second hitting coach under senior director of hitting Alec Zumwalt. Kansas City did not renew the contracts of now-former assistant hitting coaches Joe Dillon and Keoni DeRenne at season’s end.
Thames, 48, enjoyed a decade-long career in the big leagues as an outfielder and designated hitter from 2002-2011. Shortly after his playing career ended, he took a job as a minor league hitting coach in the Yankees’ system. Within a three years, he’d been promoted to the major league staff in the Bronx.
From 2016-21, Thames was an assistant hitting coach or hitting coach with the Yankees’ big league staff. He’s since jumped to the Marlins, Angels and White Sox, holding hitting coach titles within each system. The Mississippi native spent the past two seasons as the hitting coach for the White Sox but was let go as part of a coaching staff shakeup at season’s end.
Thames played in 640 major league games and totaled 2016 plate appearances as a big leaguer. In that time, the former 30th-round pick slashed .246/.309/.485 with 115 home runs, 83 doubles, four triples, a 7.9% walk rate and a 25.3% strikeout rate. Thames’ bat was particularly potent against left-handed pitching in his playing days, as evidenced by a .260/.328/.496 line in his career. The 2026 season will mark his eleventh consecutive year on a big league coaching staff.
Nationals To Hire Rays’ Michael Johns As Bench Coach
The Nationals are planning to hire Rays first base coach Michael Johns as the bench coach under new manager Blake Butera, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Butera, like Johns, was with the Rays prior to being hired in Washington. He’d been Tampa Bay’s senior director of player development and surely has a strong rapport his new bench coach.
Johns has been in his current position for the past two seasons and has more than two decades in professional baseball as a minor league manager, coach and coordinator. The 50-year-old has spent his entire career to date in the Rays organization and previously managed Tampa Bay’s Triple-A, High-A and Rookie-ball affiliates, totaling nine years as a minor league skipper.
In addition to his lengthy coaching/development background, Johns had a brief career as a player. The former Tulane infielder was selected by the Rockies in the 19th round back in 1997 and spent two seasons in the low levels of Colorado’s system before playing a third year on the independent circuit.
Johns is the first known hire who’ll serve on what’s expected to be a fully revamped coaching staff in 2026. New president of baseball operations Paul Toboni has previously suggested that big league experience is not a prerequisite but would be a bonus to any candidates’ cases as they look to fill out the staff.
Orioles, Enoli Paredes Agree To Minor League Deal
The Orioles are in agreement on a minor league deal with free agent righty Enoli Paredes, reports Ari Alexander of 7News. He’ll be in major league camp as non-roster invitee next spring.
Paredes, who turned 30 in September, is no stranger to Orioles president of baseball operations Mike Elias. He originally signed with the Astros as an amateur back in 2016, when Elias was the scouting director in Houston. Elias had already jumped to Baltimore by the time Paredes had emerged as one of Houston’s more notable pitching prospects and then made his subsequent MLB debut, however.
In parts of four major league seasons between the Astros, Brewers and Cubs, Paredes has totaled 54 innings with a tidy 3.00 ERA but far more concerning rate stats. He’s fanned a slightly below-average 21.7% of his opponents but walked a ghastly 16.8% of the hitters he’s faced in the majors. Paredes keeps the ball on the ground at a solid clip, has averaged better than 95 mph on his four-seamer and has done a nice job avoiding hard contact, but the lack of command is a glaring flaw.
In 2025, Paredes spent the season with Atlanta’s Triple-A affiliate in Gwinnett. He tossed 57 1/3 frames with a 4.40 earned run average, a strong 27.6% strikeout rate and an ugly 11.5% walk rate (plus another seven plunked batters and four wild pitches). Paredes posted sub-3.00 ERAs in Triple-A in both 2024 and 2022, but he’s consistently logged sky-high walk rates in both Triple-A and MLB.
The O’s have plenty of uncertainty in their bullpen after Felix Bautista underwent shoulder surgery that’ll keep him out for all of 2026. They further thinned out their relief corps at the July trade deadline, shipping out Seranthony Dominguez, Gregory Soto, Bryan Baker and Andrew Kittredge — though they’ve since reacquired Kittredge from the Cubs. Dominguez and Soto were free agents anyhow, but Baker was under club control through 2028. Yennier Cano’s uneven season and poor cumulative results this year make it hard to count on him heading into ’26 as well.
Kittredge, Cano, Keegan Akin and Albert Suarez are the only relievers on Baltimore’s roster with even two years of big league service. Given the lack of defined options in the late innings, the Orioles will be active in bringing in bullpen help — both in the form of established arms and also in the form of low-cost depth grabs like today’s Paredes deal.
Giants Hire Bruce Bochy For Special Assistant Role
Nov. 10: The Giants formally announced Bochy’s hiring as a special assistant to the baseball operations department.
“Having Boch back in the organization means a great deal to all of us,” Posey said within this morning’s press release. “His experience, leadership, and feel for the game are unmatched, and his perspective will be invaluable as we continue building towards sustained success.”
Nov. 5: Bruce Bochy is nearing a deal to return to the Giants in an advisory role. CEO Greg Johnson first told Susan Slusser of The San Francisco Chronicle on Tuesday that the sides were working on a deal. Bochy confirmed to Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic this evening that he’s in the process of finalizing a special assistant position. He’ll be on hand as an excellent resource for first-year manager Tony Vitello. Bochy will join another future Hall of Fame manager, Dusty Baker, as special assistants in San Francisco.
The 70-year-old Bochy has spent the past three seasons managing the Rangers. He led Texas to a World Series in 2023, the fourth title of his career. Bochy famously led the Giants to three World Series in a five-year span between 2010-14. President of baseball operations Buster Posey was a face of the franchise for most of Bochy’s 13 seasons at the helm. Only Hall of Famer John McGraw, who managed for 31 years between 1902-32 when the team was still in New York, has won more games in Giants’ history.
This might close the book on Bochy’s managerial career. “I would say that’s where I’m at right now,” he told Baggarly when asked if he expects that his stint with the Rangers would be his last one in the dugout. “I’ll add you don’t ever rule anything out. You don’t, you know? But I’m content with what I’m doing now. … This is what I want to do. I want more time for myself and family but also to contribute to a game that I love.”
Bochy is sixth all-time with 2,252 managerial wins between his stints with the Padres, Giants and Rangers. He and Baker are the only two skippers within the top 10 who have not been inducted into the Hall of Fame. That’s only because both men were managing within the past couple seasons. It’s a matter of time before they’re in Cooperstown. (The same is true for Terry Francona, who is 12th on the all-time list and now the winningest active manager with Bochy back in an advisory role.)
Managers are only inducted into Cooperstown via the Era Committees. Managers who are 65 and older are eligible for Hall of Fame consideration six months after they retire. Baker and Bochy would only be up for consideration by the Contemporary Baseball Era Non-Players Committee. That’ll come up during the 2026-27 offseason. Baker should get into the Hall next winter. Bochy could be eligible for that cycle if he officially retires within the next few months, but it seems he prefers not to shut the door entirely just yet.
There’s also some news on Vitello’s coaching staff. Baggarly reports that Twins bench coach Jayce Tingler has agreed to join the San Francisco staff in some capacity. He’ll bring a decent amount of experience, as he managed the Padres between 2020-21 and had been Rocco Baldelli’s top lieutenant in Minnesota for the last four years. The Twins fired Baldelli and hired Derek Shelton to manage, so it’s not surprising there’ll be some coaching turnover. Tingler and Vitello go back more than two decades. They were teammates at the University of Missouri in the early 2000s.
Justin Turner Plans To Play In 2026
The 2025 season was a tough one for two-time All-Star Justin Turner, who batted just .219/.288/.314 in 191 plate appearances with the Cubs. Between that rough showing and Turner’s looming 41st birthday later this month, some have wondered whether he’ll continue playing. Agent Greg Genske of Vayner Sports tells Jon Morosi of MLB Network that Turner indeed is intent on playing in what would be his 18th major league season in 2026.
The 2025 season was the first below-average season Turner has had at the plate since establishing himself as a big league regular. He hit .259/.354/.384 between Boston and Seattle in 2024 and was 16% better than average at the plate in both ’23 and ’24, by measure of wRC+. This year’s downturn in production was steep, but it came in a relatively minimal sample and wasn’t accompanied by a glaring uptick in punchouts Turner’s strikeout rate did climb from 17.6% to 19.4%, but his contact rate — specifically his contact rate on balls within the strike zone — was largely unchanged.
Virtually all of Turner’s struggles in 2025 came against right-handed pitching. He tallied 109 plate appearances versus lefties and delivered a solid .276/.330/.429 batting line (112 wRC+). Against right-handed opponents, he was one of the worst hitters in MLB: .141/.232/.155 in 82 plate appearances (a gruesome 16 wRC+). At least some of that is attributable to a .179 BABIP against righties, though his struggles can’t be blamed solely on poor fortune. Turner’s 39.7% ground-ball rate was his highest since 2014, and he posted career-worst marks in pop-up rate, line-drive rate and hard-hit rate.
Based on Turner’s age and last year’s lack of production, anything more than a modest one-year deal seems unreasonable. Turner’s one-year deal with the Cubs paid him a guaranteed $6MM, and he’ll almost certainly need to take a pay cut on that sum. Last year’s struggles will make a club reluctant to offer him regular at-bats, but a team with payroll concerns and a left-handed option at first base/DH could view him as an affordable veteran roll of the dice who brings plenty of clubhouse benefits to the fold. Clubs like the Padres (Gavin Sheets), Rangers (Joc Pederson), Guardians (Kyle Manzardo, C.J. Kayfus) and Royals (Vinnie Pasquantino) all have lefty-hitting first base and/or designated hitter options that struggled against southpaws in 2025.
Enter The MLBTR Free Agent Prediction Contest
The MLB Trade Rumors Free Agent Prediction Contest is now open! Click here to enter your picks for the destinations for our top 50 free agents. The deadline for entry is Thursday, November 13th at 11pm central time. You can edit your picks until then. Further contest info:
- After the window to make picks has closed, we’ll post a public leaderboard page so you can see who’s winning the contest as players sign with teams. We’re going to use entrants’ full names on it. So, if that concerns you, please do not enter the contest. Entries with inappropriate names will be deleted.
- We are also collecting email addresses, which I will use to notify winners.
- If a player signs between now and the close of the contest, that player will be excluded from the contest.
- After you submit your picks, you’ll receive an email from Google Forms. In that email, you’ll see a button that allows you to edit your picks.
- We will announce the winners on MLBTR once all 50 free agents have signed. We will award $500 to first place, $300 to second place, and $100 to third place. We will also be giving one-year memberships to Trade Rumors Front Office for everyone who finishes in the top 15. Winners must respond to an email within one week.
- The winners of this contest will be declared on March 25th, 2026, and any unsigned players will be excluded from the competition.
- Ties in the correct number of picks will be broken by summing up the rankings of the free agents of the correct picks and taking the lower total. For example: Tim and Steve each get two picks correct. Tim gets Kyle Tucker (#1 ranking) and Robert Suarez (#21 ranking) for a total of 22 points. Steve gets Framber Valdez (#6) and Michael King (#14) for a total of 20 points. Steve’s total is lower and he’s ahead of Tim for tiebreaker purposes.
If you have any further questions, ask us in the comment section of this post! Otherwise, make your picks now!
Mets, Jose Rojas Agree To Minor League Deal
The Mets agreed to a minor league deal with infielder/outfielder Jose Rojas, reports Anthony DiComo of MLB.com. The Gaeta Sports client will be invited to major league camp this spring and would be paid $820K if he makes the roster.
Rojas, 32, hasn’t appeared in the majors since 2022 but is coming off a monster 2025 season with the Yankees’ Triple-A club. The lefty-swinging slugger popped 32 home runs last year, tops in the Triple-A International League, and slashed .287/.379/.599 overall (153 wRC+). Since his last MLB appearance with the ’22 Angels, he’s spent a year in the Korea Baseball Organization (.253/.345/.474 with the Doosan Bears) and bounced between the Triple-A affiliates for the Pirates and Yankees.
All of Rojas’ big league experience has come with the Angels. He’s struggled considerably, hitting just .188/.245/.339 with a 28.6% strikeout rate — albeit in a relatively small sample of 241 plate appearances. He’s consistently torched Triple-A pitching in a much larger sample of 2050 plate appearances.
Defensively, Rojas is experienced at all four corner positions and, to a lesser extent, second base (865 innings). He played the outfield exclusively during his 2023 season in the KBO and has primarily played the infield and outfield corners since returning to North American ball. He’ll vie for a bench spot in camp and give the Mets some thump to stash in Triple-A if he doesn’t make the roster. Rojas also has a minor league option remaining, so if he’s selected to the 40-man at any point he can be shuttled between Syracuse and Queens without needing to be exposed to waivers.
