White Sox Acquire Trevor Richards
The White Sox have acquired right-hander Trevor Richards from the Phillies in exchange for cash considerations, according to announcements from both clubs. Chicago has transferred right-hander Drew Thorpe to the 60-day injured list to open a 40-man spot. A corresponding active roster move will be required once Richards reports to the Sox.
The Phillies have had a number of bullpen injuries in the past few weeks. Closer Jhoan Duran hit the injured list with an oblique strain, while Zach Pop and Kyle Backhus also landed on the shelf. Duran was set to be reinstated tonight and Matt Gelb of The Athletic reported that Richards would be bumped off the roster for the closer. He is a veteran with at least five years of service time and therefore can’t be optioned to the minors without his consent. But instead of designating Richards for assignment, the Phils have found a trade partner and flipped Richards to Chicago.
Presumably, the Sox are interested in the recent form Richards flashed in the minors. The Phils signed him to a minor league deal in the offseason and started him at Triple-A this year. He got out to an amazing start. He faced 50 batters and struck out 26 of them, a massive 52% rate. He only issued three walks, a 6% clip. All that resulted in a 1.93 earned run average in 14 innings.
The Phils called Richards up to the big leagues a week ago when Backhus hit the IL. Between that promotion and today’s trade, he made two appearances for the Phils. He allowed one earned run over 4 1/3 innings, striking out five while issuing three walks.
Richards has shown flashes of potential in the big leagues before, as he’s been able to strike guys out but has also struggled with command. From 2021 to 2023, mostly with the Blue Jays, he logged 201 innings. His 31.3% strikeout rate was much better than league average, which is usually around 22 to 23%. But he also gave out walks at a 10.9% clip, about two ticks north of par. The end result was a 4.61 ERA for that span.
The control problems got even worse for him late in 2024. The Jays flipped him to the Twins at the deadline that year but Minnesota released him before the month of August was done. He faced 59 batters as a Twin and gave out 11 walks, an 18.6% clip. He also hit two batters and threw seven wild pitches.
Since then, he has only been briefly in the majors. He made five appearances last year, three for the Royals and two for the Diamondbacks. As mentioned, he had to settle for a minor league deal with the Phils coming into 2026. The White Sox will see if Richards can sustain any of the exciting numbers he showed in Triple-A to start this year.
As for Thorpe, he had Tommy John surgery in March of 2025. His 60-day count is retroactive to the beginning of the season, so he’ll be eligible for reinstatement in a few weeks. His current timeline is unclear but he hasn’t yet begun a rehab assignment, so it doesn’t appear as those he’s close to a return.
Photo courtesy of Morgan Tencza, Imagn Images
Marlins Notes: Alcantara, Rotation, Ramirez
Sandy Alcantara‘s name is all but perpetually ingrained on the rumor mill. The Marlins are always in a state of needing to keep an open mind to trade offers regarding their stars, and he’s currently one of two members of the roster earning more than $4MM. (Closer Pete Fairbanks is earning $13MM on a one-year deal.)
Alcantara is earning $17MM in the final season of his contract, though the team holds a $21MM club option (or $2MM buyout) on the 30-year-old for the 2027 season. After a shaky 2025 campaign — his first season back from Tommy John surgery — Alcantara looks a bit more like his old self. His 3.04 ERA is quite strong, but his rate stats are less encouraging.
Alcantara’s 16.1% strikeout rate is about six points shy of average. His 7.8% walk rate is better than average but still up a ways from his 5.6% peak. Ditto his 47.2% grounder rate — it’s about five points higher than par but about six points shy of his previous top levels. On the plus side, Alcantara’s 97.3 mph average four-seamer remains strong, he’s getting good results on a new 90.1 mph cutter, and his overall 11.2% swinging-strike rate is right in line with the league average, thereby suggesting his strikeout rate could climb up in the weeks ahead.
It’s still been a strong start overall, and other clubs would surely love to get their hands on Alcantara in hopes of restoring some whiffs and adding a former Cy Young winner to their playoff rotations. However, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic cautions that Alcantara isn’t a lock to be traded. Beyond being a leader in the clubhouse, he’s a personal favorite of owner Bruce Sherman.
It’s not as though the Marlins, who opened the season with a comically low payroll in the $73-74MM range, feel financial pressure to trade Alcantara. If anything, the opposite might hold true. The Major League Baseball Players Association has filed grievances against the Marlins and a few other bottom-of-the-barrel payroll clubs in recent years, arguing that said teams aren’t sufficiently spending the money they receive from larger clubs via MLB’s revenue-sharing system.
In all likelihood, Alcantara will again command plenty of headlines this summer as the Aug. 3 trade deadline approaches. Miami is currently in second place in the NL East, but that’s a nominal feat in a generally disappointing division. The Fish are 8.5 games behind the Braves for first place. They’re technically only four games out in the Wild Card chase, but at 16-19 overall with a -28 run differential, the outlook isn’t especially rosy.
Rosenthal suggests that the Marlins could instead listen on righties Janson Junk and Max Meyer this summer, but Junk is a journeyman with a similarly low strikeout rate (17.4%) and a swinging-strike rate (8.4%) that sits considerably shy of league average. It’s doubtful another team’s going to part with much to acquire him, although given that he was a minor league free agent pickup in the 2024-25 offseason, any return would be considered found money. Meyer would make a far more compelling trade target (37 innings, 2.68 ERA/3.60 SIERA, 26 K%, 8.4 BB%), but the Marlins control the former No. 3 overall pick for three more years beyond the current season. If he’s pitching like this in July/August, the Marlins should have an even higher ask for him than they would Alcantara.
Miami probably hoped that free-agent pickup Chris Paddack would pitch well enough to make himself a deadline candidate as well, but that didn’t happen. The Fish designated him for assignment this morning, cutting bait on a $4MM contract and opening a spot in the rotation in the process. Reliever William Kempner is up from Triple-A Jacksonville to give the bullpen a fresh arm, but the Marlins will need a starting pitcher this Friday.
Braxton Garrett and top prospect Robby Snelling have been mentioned as candidates, but Fish On First reports that Garrett is still slated to make his scheduled start for Jacksonville tonight. If Garrett indeed takes the mound, he won’t be an option to start Friday. That’d be Snelling’s natural turn in the rotation. He’s been starting once every seven days in Triple-A, and his last start came on Friday, May 1.
Snelling, 22, is a former No. 39 overall pick who came to Miami from the Padres as part of the Tanner Scott trade. His stock was down a bit at the time of the swap, but he’s rebounded nicely and now ranks among the sport’s 100 best prospects. So far in six Triple-A starts, he’s posted a 1.86 ERA, a mammoth 40% strikeout rate and a concerning 13.6% walk rate. He has kept 57% of batted balls against him on the ground. He looks to have little left to prove in Triple-A after also posting a 1.27 ERA there in 11 starts last year (2.51 ERA overall in 25 starts between Double-A and Triple-A). He’s not on the 40-man roster, but the Fish have an open spot after Paddack’s DFA.
While the Marlins’ ability to develop young pitching always makes their rotation a point of focus, their catching situation has been a long-running point of focus for the opposite reasons. Miami has struggled to find a solution behind the plate since trading J.T. Realmuto to the Phillies nearly a decade ago. They’ve cycled through Jorge Alfaro, Jacob Stallings, Nick Fortes with cameos from veteran backups like Sandy Leon, Chad Wallach and Bryan Holaday.
There’s more hope on the Marlins’ catcher horizon than at any point in recent memory. Liam Hicks is enjoying a breakout showing at the plate, and Miami just called up top prospect Joe Mack for his major league debut. If Mack hits the ground running, Miami could shift from that revolving-door setup to suddenly having a pair of solid catchers on the roster — a luxury they haven’t enjoyed at any point in recent history.
Mack’s promotion coincided with a demotion for former top prospect Agustin Ramirez, but despite Ramirez’s immense defensive struggles behind the dish, the Marlins aren’t giving up on him as a catcher. Manager Clayton McCullough told the Marlins beat this week that his message to Ramirez was simple (link via MLB.com’s Christina De Nicola): “You’re going to go down to Triple-A, and you’re going to continue to catch. You’re not the first young player that has come up and had bouts of struggle and had to get optioned.”
Ramirez caught only 605 innings last year but was still dinged for a remarkable -14 Defensive Runs Saved. Statcast pegged him as the game’s least-effective catcher in terms of both throwing out would-be base thieves and even more so at blocking balls in the dirt. His minus-28 “blocks above average” was nearly double the second-worst player on the list (a 35-year-old Salvador Perez). Things haven’t improved in 2026, and Ramirez’s bat wilted as well; he hit just .230/.318/.345 in 129 plate appearances.
Ramirez was always a bat-first catcher, and the Marlins don’t have clear long-term options at first base or designated hitter. If he can get his swing back on track, there could yet be a path to seeing semi-regular time between first base, designated hitter (where he’d presumably share times with Hicks) and perhaps some occasional starts behind the plate. It’ll be Mack and Hicks getting the major league opportunities right now, but Mack is just getting his feet wet and Hicks has already cooled a bit after a blistering start to the season.
Astros Designate Dustin Harris For Assignment
The Astros announced a series of roster moves prior to tonight’s game. On the position player side, they reinstated infielder Nick Allen from the 10-day injured list and recalled infielder/outfielder Zach Dezenzo from Triple-A. In corresponding moves, they placed Yainer Diaz on the 10-day IL with a left oblique strain and designated outfielder Dustin Harris for assignment. The Diaz move was reported yesterday. On the pitching side, they recalled right-hander Jason Alexander and optioned fellow righty Ryan Weiss.
Harris, 26, was claimed off waivers a little more than two weeks ago. At the time, the Astros needed some help in the outfield. Dezenzo and Jake Meyers were both on the IL already. Joey Loperfido was also banged up and landed on the IL the next day. Zach Cole was on the IL in the minors.
Since being claimed, Harris has stolen four bases and been solid in the field but produced a tepid .226/.286/.290 line at the plate. That’s a small sample size of 11 games but it roughly matches his general profile. Harris is considered a speed-and-defense guy who isn’t likely to provide much with the bat. He has a .225/.307/.371 line in his big league career. His Triple-A line of .276/.366/.417 looks pretty solid but most of his time at that level has been in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League, so the line actually translates to a 101 wRC+, barely league average.
Both Cole and Dezenzo have now gotten healthy, which has squeezed Harris off the roster. Harris spent most of the past few years with the Rangers but exhausted his final option season in 2025. Texas outrighted him off the roster at the end of last season. He elected free agency and signed a minor league deal with the White Sox. He got a brief stint on Chicago’s roster before being put on waivers and claimed by Houston.
He now heads back into DFA limbo, which can last as long as a week. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so Houston could take five days to explore trade interest, though they could also put him on the wire sooner than that. If he clears waivers, he has the right to elect free agency since he has a previous career outright.
The Weiss option is also a notable development, since he was an interesting part of their offseason. The Astros needed rotation depth but had budgetary concerns. Weiss got a major league deal with a $2.6MM guarantee. He came into this year with no big league experience but had just finished a good season in South Korea. He made 30 starts for the Hanwha Eagles last year with a 2.87 earned run average, 28.6% strikeout rate, 7.7% walk rate and 48.5% ground ball rate.
If Weiss were able to put up similar numbers in North America, he could have been a sneaky bargain, but that has not panned out thus far. He has logged 26 innings in a swing role this season with a 7.62 ERA. His 22.9% strikeout rate is around average but he has walked 15.3% of batters faced, almost double league average. He’ll look to get back on track in Triple-A and could get another look with the Astros later in the year if he succeeds.
Photo courtesy of Jamie Sabau, Imagn Images
Diamondbacks Outright Aramis Garcia, Jesus Valdez
The Diamondbacks announced that they have outrighted catcher Aramis Garcia to Triple-A Reno and infielder Jesus Valdez to Double-A Amarillo. Garcia had been designated for assignment last week when Gabriel Moreno was activated from the 10-day injured list. There wasn’t any previous indication that Valdez had been removed from the 40-man roster. Arizona’s count on that 40-man is now down to 38.
Garcia, 33, is a veteran depth catcher who is out of options. He is a competent defender but is has hit just .210/.245/.321 in his career. That has put him in position to bounce on and off the Arizona roster with regularity. He signed a minor league deal with the Snakes ahead of the 2025 season. Last year, he was twice added to the big league roster. In both cases, he was designated for assignment a few days later and sent back to Reno after passing through waivers.
It’s possible the same sequence of events plays out this year. Garcia was called up to the big leagues to cover for Moreno’s injury and then was bumped off when Moreno was reinstated. Garcia has the right to elect free agency but might be comfortable sticking with the Aces and waiting for the next catching injury to pop up.
The Valdez outright might be a more unique situation. The 28-year-old was just added to the club’s roster a little over a week ago. The Diamondbacks and Padres were playing in Mexico City and were allowed a 27th man on the roster. Valdez was added to fill that extra bench spot for the Diamondbacks, getting called up from Double-A Amarillo. He didn’t appear in either of the Mexico City games and was optioned back to the Sod Poodles right after that series.
It appears that the Diamondbacks quietly put him on waivers and no one claimed him. That’s not especially surprising since Valdez hasn’t really been a notable prospect in his career and is a 28-year-old playing in Double-A, though he does have some Triple-A experience. Dating back to the start of 2021, he has a combined .241/.292/.401 line and 76 wRC+ in the minor leagues.
Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images
Brewers Release Jacob Waguespack
The Brewers have released right-hander Jacob Waguespack, who’s been pitching with their Triple-A affiliate in Nashville, Curt Hogg of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports. He’s free to explore opportunities with other clubs now.
Waguespack, 32, has pitched in parts of three big league seasons with the Blue Jays and Rays. He’s totaled only 105 2/3 innings in the majors and has a 5.11 ERA, 18.9% strikeout rate and 10.1% walk rate to show for his efforts.
Lack of big league track record notwithstanding, Waguespack’s 2026 work in Nashville has been quite strong. The well-traveled righty has tossed 16 innings and held opponents to a 2.25 ERA with a huge 33.8% strikeout rate and an even gaudier 17.4% swinging-strike rate. His 16.2% walk rate could obviously stand to improve. Waguespack is sitting 92.1 mph on his four-seamer and coupling the pitch with a mid-80s cutter and a low-80s changeup.
Waguespack last pitched in the majors with the Rays in 2024. He split the 2025 season between the Triple-A affiliates of the Rays and Phillies, combining for a 2.45 ERA in 33 innings. Overall, he’s pitched in parts of six seasons in Triple-A and has a 4.13 ERA in 285 2/3 innings there. Beyond his work at the top minor league level, Waguespack has pitched a pair of seasons for Japan’s Orix Buffaloes. He was excellent there in 2022 (2.97 ERA, 26.2 K%, 9.4 BB%, 72 2/3 innings) before struggling in 2023 (5.77 ERA, 33.3%, 12.9 BB%, 43 2/3 innings).
It’s common this time of year for veterans on minor league deals to reenter the market, whether via an opt out or simply being granted their release with no clear path to a spot in the current organization’s big league roster. They’ll sometimes simply return to the setting where they’ve already been playing, but if a team with a more dire need for bullpen help shows interest — even on a another minor league deal — that might prove to be a better arrangement for the journeyman Waguespack as he looks to push his way back into the majors.
Tigers Designate Zack Short For Assignment
The Tigers announced that infielder Zach McKinstry has been reinstated from the 10-day injured list. Fellow infielder Zack Short has been designated for assignment as the corresponding move.
Short is a glove-first infielder who was just brought into the mix by Detroit to address their recent injuries. He was acquired from the Nationals in a cash deal last week and then was added to the roster two days ago. He went hitless in three plate appearances and has now been quickly bumped off.
Though he’s competent in the field at multiple positions, Short is a .171/.269/.295 hitter in his career. The Tigers only really turned to him because they had a trio of infielders on the IL at the same time. McKinstry hit the IL over two weeks ago due to left hip/abdominal inflammation. Trey Sweeney has been on the shelf all year due to a shoulder strain and was moved to the 60-day IL in April. Javier Báez suffered a right ankle sprain about a week ago and hit the 10-day IL.
Short was used as an emergency tourniquet to stop the bleeding but he’s no longer needed with McKinstry’s return. Short now heads into DFA limbo, which can last as long as a week. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so the Tigers could take five days to explore trade interest, but they could also place him on waivers at any point before that. Given his light hitting, Short would likely clear waivers, as he has done before.
If he does clear waivers again, he would have the right to elect free agency, but perhaps he would stay. He is plenty familiar with the organization and the Detroit infield depth is still a bit light due to injuries, though they did add Paul DeJong via a minor league deal earlier today.
Now that McKinstry is back, he can return to the multi-positional role that he was in before. He has experience at the three infield spots to the left of first base and in the outfield as well. He’s at third base tonight with Colt Keith heading to the bench. Second base is mostly covered by Gleyber Torres but he has missed a few recent games due to side tightness, which has led to more playing time for Hao-Yu Lee. Shortstop was being shared by Kevin McGonigle and Báez but the IL stint for the latter has largely left that spot to McGonigle. With Parker Meadows on the IL, the outfield mix includes Matt Vierling, Wenceel Pérez, Riley Greene, Kerry Carpenter and Jahmai Jones.
Photo courtesy of Junfu Han, Imagn Images
Rays Place Steven Matz On IL With Elbow Inflammation
The Rays announced that left-hander Steven Matz has been placed on the 15-day injured list, retroactive to May 4th, with left elbow inflammation. Right-hander Chase Solesky has been selected to take his place on the active roster. The 40-man roster had a vacancy due to righty Yoendrys Gómez being designated for assignment a few days ago, so Solesky can take that vacated spot without a corresponding move.
Matz’s status is unclear. He has been having a good season so far, with a 3.86 earned run average through seven starts. He last took the ball on Sunday and pitched six innings of one-run ball against the Giants. Apparently, something has popped up between that start and today. The severity isn’t publicly known but it’s enough that the Rays are going to put him on the shelf for at least a couple of weeks.
The Tampa rotation has been good this year and has been a key part of their early-season success. The Rays are 22-12 and have gotten a 3.16 ERA from their starters. That includes some openers and is therefore skewed a bit but it’s third-best ERA in the majors, behind only the Yankees and Dodgers.
Despite the good results, there are some concerns. Ryan Pepiot is going to miss the whole season due to hip surgery. Joe Boyle is on the IL with an elbow strain. Even in the healthy rotation, there are questions. Shane McClanahan missed the entire 2024 and 2025 seasons and may face load management questions at some point. Drew Rasmussen has plenty of injuries on his track record. Nick Martinez has a 1.71 ERA but is a 35-year-old swingman who has often been pushed to the bullpen in recent years. Jesse Scholtens is a pretty inexperienced guy who was just claimed off waivers last year.
Top prospect Brody Hopkins is in Triple-A but probably isn’t going to be called up anytime soon because he has a massive 20.2% walk rate so far this year. The depth is enough of a concern that the club is planning to stretch out both Griffin Jax and Mason Englert.
The Rays will have to juggle things for at least a couple of weeks or perhaps longer, depending on the timeline with Matz. Their next off-day isn’t until next Thursday. Martinez started last night. Rasmussen and McClanahan are scheduled for tonight and tomorrow, respectively. Thursday could be a Jax/Scholtens combo, which is what the Rays have done the past two times through the rotation. That would leave Friday open for a bullpen game or a spot start, before going back to Martinez on Saturday.
Solesky, 28, gets called up for now. This is his first time on a major league roster. A 21st-round pick of the White Sox from 2019, he has never really been on the radar of prospect evaluators. He was in the Nationals’ system last year and had a 5.17 ERA in Triple-A. He signed a minor league deal with the Rays in the offseason and has a 6.57 ERA in Triple-A so far this year.
Most likely, he is just on the roster temporarily to absorb some innings, if needed. He has been pitching as a starter and went 5 1/3 innings on Thursday. The results haven’t been good but he could take on some mop-up work and spare the rest of the bullpen, if the situation calls for it. Even if it ultimately proves to be a brief stint in the show, it’s likely a thrill for a guy who has been grinding for a while and turns 29 in a few months.
Photo courtesy of Pablo Robles, Imagn Images
Marlins Designate Chris Paddack For Assignment
1:08pm: The Marlins have now officially announced the Paddack and Kempner moves.
8:22am: The Marlins are designating veteran righty Chris Paddack for assignment, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. The team has yet to formally announce the move or a corresponding transaction, but Christina DeNicola of MLB.com reports that reliever William Kempner will be recalled from Triple-A Jacksonville. It’s Kempner’s first big league promotion. He’ll be making his MLB debut when he gets into a game.
It’s a hook on the 30-year-old Paddack, who signed a one-year, $4MM deal to return to the organization that originally drafted him (but traded him to the Padres in a 2016 swap for reliever Fernando Rodney). The hope had been that Paddack could provide some stable innings following offseason trades of Ryan Weathers (to the Yankees) and Edward Cabrera (to the Cubs). He looked great this spring (two runs, 13 innings pitched) but was shelled in seven regular season appearances with Miami (six of them starts).
Paddack only completed five frames once in his return to the Marlins organization: a quality start against his former Tigers teammates in Detroit (six innings, two runs). He allowed at least two runs in fewer than five innings each other time he took the mount, including a trio of appearances that saw him tagged for five, seven and eight runs apiece. His time with the Fish will draw to a close with a 7.63 ERA, an 18.5% strikeout rate and a 6.8% walk rate in 30 2/3 innings.
A former top prospect, Paddack debuted with a 3.33 ERA in 140 2/3 innings for the 2019 Padres. He’d have been a Rookie of the Year finalist, if not winner, in most seasons, but he happened to be up against Pete Alonso‘s 53-homer debut, Michael Soroka‘s 174 2/3 innings of 2.68 ERA ball, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Bryan Reynolds; excellent as Paddack’s debut was, he didn’t even receive a down-ballot vote.
Injuries have held Paddack back in the years since. He missed time with a UCL sprain in 2021 and then underwent his second career Tommy John surgery — his first came as a prospect — with the Twins in 2022. His 2024 season was cut short by a forearm strain.
In 471 2/3 innings since his terrific debut campaign, Paddack has posted a 5.23 ERA. He regularly shows strong command but has never missed bats at the same level he did as a rookie. He’s also been far too homer-prone, serving up an average of 1.55 round-trippers per nine frames from 2020-26.
It’s fair to wonder how many more rotation opportunities Paddack will get. He struggled out of the rotation more often than not in Minnesota, and the Tigers dropped him to the bullpen after just seven starts last summer following a trade to acquire him. The Marlins, obviously, are moving on in quick fashion.
Perhaps another club with a pile of rotation injuries will plug Paddack into its starting five when he’s inevitably released, but other clubs will surely be interested in what he might look like as a reliever. When Paddack returned from his second Tommy John procedure with the Twins late in the 2023 season, he pitched 8 2/3 innings between the regular season and postseason, allowing three runs with a 14-to-1 K/BB ratio. He looked particularly dominant in the postseason, and his typically 93 mph four-seamer was averaging 95.5 mph. He was hit hard out of the Detroit ‘pen last year, but they were using him as a long man, and not the short-relief role in which he excelled during that brief, post-surgery run with the Twins.
For the time being, the Marlins will have five days to trade Paddack or release him. (They could also place him on outright waivers, but he’d surely clear due to his salary and struggles, and Paddack has enough service time to reject an outright assignment while retaining his remaining guaranteed salary.) It’s possible they’ll find a taker who’s willing to pay a nominal portion of that guarantee, but the most common outcome in these scenarios is a simple release. The Marlins will remain on the hook for that $4MM salary. A new team would owe Paddack just the pro-rated league minimum for any time spent on the major league roster.
As for the 24-year-old Kempner, he came to the Marlins in a Jan. 2025 swap that sent international bonus pool space back to the Giants. The 2022 third-round pick had a big season in the minors last year between High-A, Double-A and Triple-A, combining for a 2.26 ERA with a 33.6% strikeout rate in 67 2/3 frames of relief. Command is a clear flaw, as Kempner walked 14.1% of his opponents along the way.
Kempner was selected to the 40-man roster back in November, thus shielding him from December’s Rule 5 Draft. He’s out to a tough start in ’26, with a 6.46 ERA in his first 15 1/3 frames at Triple-A. However, he’s fanned a preposterous 47.9% of opponents and allowed only a 63.8% contact rate. Kempner sits 95.5 mph with his heater and pairs it with a low-80s slider. He has a seldom-used cutter for a third offering but is primarily a two-pitch righty.
Kempner gives Miami a fresh arm for the next few days. Paddack’s spot in the rotation would be up this weekend. De Nicola lists Braxton Garrett and top prospect Robby Snelling as options to step into the rotation. Both pitchers have sub-2.00 ERAs with strong strikeout rates (Snelling in particular) but poor walk rates through their first handful of starts in Jacksonville.
MLBTR Chat Transcript
Steve Adams
- Good afternoon! I’ll get underway at the top of the hour, but feel free to start sending in questions ahead of time.
- Let’s get going
White Sox
- Since a 1-5 start, Sox are 16-13. Do you think they’ll finish within 3 games of .500 or better?
Steve Adams
- No. I just don’t think the pitching staff can support that level of winning. None of Burke, Martin, Kay or Fedde are average big league starters. Noah Schultz is super fun, and he very well could be, but he’s far from a sure thing yet and I expect some growing pains for him with the command issues.
John
- It’s too late to trade Mayo and Cowser imo. Do they have any value? Kjerstad as well. This team is so frustrating
Angel Zerpa To Undergo Tommy John Surgery
Brewers left-hander Angel Zerpa will undergo Tommy John surgery on Monday, reports Adam McCalvy of MLB.com. The left-hander will miss the remainder of this season and part of 2027 as well. He is on the 15-day injured list but will be transferred to the 60-day IL whenever Milwaukee needs to open a roster spot.
The news is awful but not surprising. Zerpa hit the IL about a week ago due to forearm tightness. Manager Pat Murphy said the injury was fairly concerning and that Zerpa would be going for further testing. In the following days, it was revealed that Tommy John surgery was a possibility. It now seems that no alternative was available, so Zerpa will go under the knife and face the standard recovery timeline of 14-plus months.
The Brewers clearly felt good about Zerpa’s chances of taking a step forward. He gave the Royals 177 innings from 2021 to 2025, allowing 3.97 earned runs per nine. His 19.7% strikeout rate was subpar but he had a strong 7% walk rate and excellent 57.1% ground ball rate. Milwaukee has a good reputation when it comes to helping players get the best of their talents. With Zerpa featuring upper-90s velocity, perhaps they could have found a way to have him miss more bats. Or maybe his ground ball tendencies could lead to him getting stretched out as a starter.
Milwaukee sent outfielder Isaac Collins and right-hander Nick Mears to Kansas City this past offseason in a two-for-one deal to get Zerpa. Whatever the Brewers had in mind for that deal is not going to pan out in the short term. Zerpa posted a rough 6.39 ERA in 12 appearances to start this year and will now be out of action until next summer.
Zerpa hit three years of big league service in 2025 and qualified for arbitration for the first time going into 2026. He and the Brewers agreed to a $1.095MM salary. He’ll be eligible for arbitration again for 2027 and 2028.
The Brewers will have to decide if they want to tender him a contract for next year when he might miss half of it. Since he is going to miss most of 2026, he won’t be able to secure much of a raise. Assuming the Brewers still feel good about Zerpa’s talent, giving him a bit over a million won’t be too much, since that is barely above this year’s league $780K minimum salary. It’s also possible that the next collective bargaining agreement pushes the minimum even higher. If Zerpa can get healthy and produce good results in the second half of 2027, the Brewers could retain him at a relatively affordable rate in 2028.
Despite having a number of injured lefties, the Brewers still have a balanced bullpen. Zerpa, Jared Koenig and Rob Zastryzny are all on the IL but they still have Aaron Ashby, DL Hall, Shane Drohan and Brian Fitzpatrick taking up four of their eight relief spots. Injuries and underperformance will surely lead to changes throughout the season. Zerpa won’t be able to help out but perhaps Koenig or Zastryzny will.
Photo courtesy of Sam Navarro, Imagn Images