Headlines

Go To Pro Hockey Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

Will Smith, Justin Dean Make Dodgers’ Wild Card Roster; Michael Conforto Left Off

By | at

Catcher Will Smith and outfielder Justin Dean are on the Dodgers’ Wild Card roster for their series against Cincinnati. Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic reported Smith is expected to be used as a pinch-hitter off the bench. Notable absences from Los Angeles’ 26-man squad include outfielder Michael Conforto and lefty reliever Anthony Banda. Clayton Kershaw will also be watching the Wild Card series from the sidelines.

Smith was placed on the injured list in early September after taking a foul ball off the hand. Follow-up testing revealed a hairline fracture that ultimately kept him out of game action for the rest of the regular season. Manager Dave Roberts said Smith would take live at-bats this week to determine his availability for the postseason. Apparently, Smith showed he was capable of contributing in the Wild Card round, at least as a hitter. The Dodgers are also carrying catchers Ben Rortvedt and Dalton Rushing.

Having Smith’s bat in the mix, even as just a pinch-hitter, should be a big boost for the Dodgers. The 30-year-old backstop put together a career year at the plate, slashing .296/.404/.497 with a 153 wRC+. Smith was hitting over .300 beyond the All-Star break until a sluggish August brought down his numbers. Rortvedt is a glove-first option, and Rushing hasn’t lived up to his prospect pedigree as a rookie, so both could cede at-bats to Smith if they come up in a big spot. It’s unclear when Smith will be able to return to the lineup in a defensive capacity.

Conforto put together a solid September to make a late bid for the Wild Card roster, but came up short. He finished the regular season with a .199 batting average and just 12 home runs. Conforto put together a strong season in San Francisco last year, earning him a 1-year, $17MM deal to stay in California with the rival Dodgers. He was signed to provide a left-handed complement to LA’s righty-heavy outfield group, but fell well short of expectations.

The Dodgers opted for a more dynamic player in their final outfield spot, with Dean making the team. The 28-year-old spent seven seasons in Atlanta’s minor league system before joining Los Angeles via minor league free agency. He made 18 appearances with the big-league club, all of which came as a pinch runner or defensive sub. Dean went 1-for-1 as a base stealer and showed plenty of prowess swiping bags in the minors. He’s posted three separate minor league seasons with 35+ steals, including a career-high 61 swipes across two levels in 2024.

Kershaw is the most prominent name to be left of the Dodgers’ Wild Card roster, but another lefty might be the biggest snub. Banda was a solid contributor in LA’s bullpen for a second consecutive year. He finished the regular season with a 3.18 ERA across a career-high 71 appearances. The Dodgers have coaxed an extra tick on the fastball out of Banda, and the results have been the best of his tumultuous MLB career. Banda’s handedness seems to be the main culprit for his exclusion from the roster. The Dodgers will carry four lefty relievers in the first round, with closer Tanner Scott joined by Jack Dreyer, Alex Vesia, and Justin Wrobleski. The bullpen has been a frequent talking point this season after the unit finished with an ugly 4.27 ERA.

One new face among the LA relievers will be Roki Sasaki. The right-hander rejoined the team last week after missing four months with a shoulder injury. He transitioned to a bullpen role near the end of his rehab assignment and made a pair of effective relief appearances following his return to the MLB squad. Sasaki’s fastball velocity was up considerably in his two relief outings. After sitting at 94.8 mph in his final start back in May, he averaged over 99 mph out of the ’pen. Sasaki could be a real weapon in shorter stints this postseason.

Marlins Could Be Active In Bullpen Market This Offseason

By | at

The Marlins’ 2025 season marked a step forward. The rebuilding Miami club finished just four games under .500, thanks largely to a 56-50 record from June 1 onward. The Fish went 14-11 in September and won 13 of their final 17 contests. A fair portion of those wins came against last-place teams in Washington and Colorado, but Miami also won series against the Tigers and Mets, swept the Rangers and won a pair of games against the Phillies during that blistering finish.

With those improvements fresh in mind, they’re expected to be more active in free agency than in recent offseasons, per Craig Mish of FanDuel Sports Network Florida & Sun (video link). Specifically, Mish highlights the bullpen as a likely area of focus, noting that the Marlins seem poised to target late-inning arms with closing experience and/or left-handed relievers.

The Miami bullpen was a below-average unit in 2025, ranking 22nd in the majors with a 4.28 ERA on the whole. Marlins relievers ranked 24th in strikeout rate (21.2%) and 18th in walk rate (9.3%). Only six teams saw their bullpens give up more home runs per nine innings pitched than Miami.

That’s not to suggest that there were no bright spots. Waiver claim Ronny Henriquez was outstanding in his first full season in the majors (2.22 ERA, 32.3 K%, 73 innings), and other low-cost pickups like Lake Bachar, Calvin Faucher, Anthony Bender and Tyler Phillips all pitched well, too. Homegrown lefty Cade Gibson had a nice rookie showing as well, but other Marlins draftees/signees like George Soriano and Josh Simpson struggled.

Relief pitching is the most volatile commodity in the game, and it should be noted that the vast majority of the Marlins’ success stories in relief this year carried rate stats that were less encouraging than their earned run averages. Bender, Gibson and Phillips all had well below-average strikeout rates. Bachar, Bender, Gibson and Faucher all had walk rates that were worse than the league average.  Gibson (.260), Phillips (.253), Bachar (.250) and especially Bender (.213) each benefited from BABIP marks that were well shy of the league-average .289.

The extent to which Marlins ownership will allow president of baseball ops Peter Bendix and his staff to spend is an open question, but it’s worth noting that Miami’s payroll is exceptionally clean. Sandy Alcantara is the only player with a guaranteed salary for the 2026 season ($17MM). They still owe the since-released Avisail Garcia the $5MM buyout on his 2026 option and owe the Yankees $10MM as part of the Giancarlo Stanton trade, but those are their only notable expenditures.

The Marlins also have a small arbitration class featuring Bender, Faucher, Edward Cabrera, Braxton Garrett, Ryan Weathers, Max Meyer and Andrew Nardi. Each of Faucher, Weathers, Meyer and Nardi is eligible for the first time, meaning their salaries will be small. Bender, Garrett and Cabrera all earned under $2MM in 2025.

Suffice it to say, there’s ample room for the Fish to spend on some bullpen help if the market presents offers to their liking. That could include buy-low opportunities for star relievers like Devin Williams and Ryan Helsley, or short-term deals for older veterans like Raisel Iglesias and Kenley Jansen. It’s not likely that they’d shell out the money needed to sign a prime-aged reliever who’ll command a notable multi-year deal (e.g. Edwin Diaz, Luke Weaver), but they’ll have plenty of opportunities to consider both in free agency and potentially via trade, where names like Pete Fairbanks, JoJo Romero and Dennis Santana will be among the potentially available names.

Report: NPB’s Hanshin Tigers Considering Potential Posting Of Hiroto Saiki

By | at

The Hanshin Tigers of Nippon Professional Baseball are weighing whether to make their ace, Hiroto Saiki, available to MLB teams via the posting system, according to a Japanese-language report from Yahoo! Japan. The report notes that the 26-year-old Saiki (27 in November) has previously expressed a desire to pitch in MLB by his late 20s. The Tigers have not made any announcements, and it is not guaranteed that a posting — even if one does eventually occur — would happen this offseason.

NPB players do not qualify for international free agency until they’ve reached nine years of service time. (They can reach domestic free agency and sign with a different NPB team after eight years.) In order to make the move to MLB before reaching the nine-year service mark, players require their NPB team to make them available through the posting system. That ensures the NPB club financial compensation tied to the player’s MLB contract. The Japanese team needs to weigh that against the roster hit that comes with losing the player.

Saiki has pitched in parts of seven NPB seasons but wasn’t fully established at the top level until 2023. He’s reportedly still four years away from international free agent eligibility. The Tigers could wait another offseason or two to post him. Different NPB teams have varying levels of willingness to honor players’ posting interest. Some teams more highly value the reputational boost that could come with that.

There’s also a financial benefit to posting a star player while he’s in his mid-late 20s. They’re likelier to command a long-term deal with a larger guarantee that raises the proportional fee that the MLB signing team owes to the NPB club. The posting fee is calculated as 20% of the contract’s first $25MM, 17.5% of the next $25MM, and 15% of spending above $50MM. Saiki is old enough (older than 24) and has enough professional experience that his contract would not be capped by MLB’s amateur bonus pool restrictions the way that Roki Sasaki’s was last winter.

Saiki, a 6’2″ right-hander, is coming off his third consecutive season with a sub-2.00 earned run average in Japan’s extremely pitcher-friendly league. He tallied 157 innings of 1.55 ERA ball across 24 starts. That run prevention isn’t matched by huge swing-and-miss stuff. Saiki’s 19.2% strikeout rate is an almost exact match for the Central League average and a few points below the typical MLB mark. Former big league depth pitchers Jon Duplantier (1.39 ERA, 32.4% strikeout rate) and Anthony Kay (1.76 ERA, 21.5% strikeout rate) have posted similar or stronger rate metrics to those that Saiki has turned in this season.

Still, that doesn’t mean Saiki wouldn’t draw plenty of attention from MLB evaluators if he were available within the next year or two. He faced the Dodgers in an exhibition start at the Tokyo Dome in mid-March. Saiki fired five scoreless innings of one-hit ball while recording seven punchouts (including fanning Shohei Ohtani, Teoscar Hernández and Freddie Freeman). His fastball sat in the low-to-mid 90s and he showed a swing-and-miss splitter that landed around 85 mph. Saiki’s mid-70s curveball was a clear third pitch. After the game, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts opined that the righty showed “major league stuff” (via Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic).

Regardless of Hanshin’s decision on Saiki, there’ll be a few intriguing NPB players who make the jump this offseason. Slugging corner infielder Munetaka Murakami and back-end starter Kona Takahashi will be posted. It’s expected that infielder Kazuma Okamoto and right-hander Tatsuya Imai could also be available. NPB teams generally don’t make postings official until early December, so it’s possible there’ll be a few other candidates who emerge over the next couple months.

Guardians Promote Chase DeLauter For Wild Card Series

By and | at

The Guardians are carrying top outfield prospect Chase DeLauter on their Wild Card series roster against the Tigers, the team announced. Zack Meisel of The Athletic first reported yesterday that the Guardians were considering that possibility. Guardians Prospective reported overnight that DeLauter would indeed be on the roster. Cleveland already had an opening on the 40-man roster, so they didn’t need to make another move to select the former first-rounder’s contract.

If he gets into a game, it’ll be the 23-year-old’s first MLB action. It’s rare but not entirely unheard of for top prospects to get a postseason roster spot before making their regular season major league debut. The Twins went that route with Alex Kirilloff in 2020, while the Royals had Adalberto Mondesi make his first appearance during the 2015 World Series. DeLauter is not in the starting lineup for this afternoon’s Game 1. Cleveland is going with Steven Kwan, Angel Martínez and Johnathan Rodriguez in the outfield against Tarik Skubal.

It’s certainly feasible that DeLauter finds his way into a game, of course, be it in the later innings this afternoon or tomorrow, when Detroit sends righty Jack Flaherty or Casey Mize to the mound. The lefty-swinging DeLauter is on the bench at least in part due to the presence of a southpaw on the mound. DeLauter posted much better numbers versus lefies than righties in a small sample during an injury-shortened 2025 season, but he’s historically been better against righties. Beyond that, left-handed batters have slashed a putrid .214/.235/.269 against Skubal in 2025.

DeLauter, the Guardians’ first round pick out of James Madison University in 2022, opened the season on the shelf after undergoing sports hernia surgery and was sidelined for two months later in the season after suffering a hamate fracture when he was hit by a pitch. That pair of health troubles limited him to just 42 games and 177 plate appearances, but the touted young outfielder lived up to his reputation when on the field, slashing .278/.383/.476 in Triple-A. DeLauter is a career .302/.384/.504 hitter in the minors since being selected 16th overall in 2022.

While DeLauter won’t gain any big league service time for days spent on the postseason roster, his ascension to the 40-man roster and the fact that the organization is entrusting him with a spot on the playoff roster is a clear sign that he’ll be in the mix for an Opening Day roster spot next year

Kwan is locked in as Cleveland’s left fielder, but other two outfield spots are far less certain. DeLauter has more than 300 professional innings in center and over 600 innings in right field. He’ll be an option in either spot, depending on other moves the front office makes over the winter. The Guardians can control DeLauter through at least the 2031 season, and assuming he breaks camp with the club in ’26, he can gain the Guardians a future draft pick depending on award voting during his pre-arbitration seasons.

That’s a matter for another day, though. For the time being, the focus for DeLauter and the organization will be on advancing as deep into the playoffs as possible. Cleveland just wrapped up one of the most stunning late-season comebacks in modern baseball history, erasing a 9.5-game deficit over the final two and a half weeks of the season, usurping the Tigers as division champions in the American League Central.

The Opener: Wild Card Series, DeLauter, Bloom

By | at

Here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world today:

1. Wild Card Series to begin:

Each of the four Wild Card matchups are scheduled to have their first game today. Things will kick off in Cleveland with Gavin Williams on the bump for the Guardians. He’ll be facing Tigers ace Tarik Skubal. The reigning AL Cy Young winner will be looking to redeem Detroit after their shocking slump, paired with Cleveland’s surge, caused the Tigers to fall out of the top spot in the AL Central. Two hours after first pitch in Ohio, the NL’s first game will start with Nick Pivetta on the mound for the Padres at Wrigley Field, where the Cubs and Matthew Boyd will be looking to secure the franchise’s first win in a playoff game since 2017. Three hours later, attention will turn to the east coast, where one of baseball’s most storied rivalries will add a new chapter when Garrett Crochet and the Red Sox take the mound in the Bronx against Max Fried and the Yankees. That battle of aces will be followed by another on the other side of the country, when the Reds and right-hander Hunter Greene visit the reigning champion Dodgers, who send southpaw Blake Snell to the mound for Game 1.

2. A potential MLB debut in the postseason?

Guardians outfield prospect Chase DeLauter has not yet appeared in an MLB game. That might change this week, as Zack Meisel of The Athletic writes that DeLauter is on the club’s taxi squad and participated in Cleveland’s workouts at Progressive Field yesterday. That leaves him at least potentially in the conversation to make the roster, and as a consensus top-50 prospect in the sport who hit .278/.383/.476 at Triple-A this year, it’s not hard to see why a Guardians team light on offense might be interested in seeing if the 23-year-old can provide a spark. Daniel Schneemann, George Valera, Johnathan Rodriguez, and Angel Martinez are all presently mixing and matching in the Guardians outfield alongside Steven Kwan, so there’s plenty of flexibility to fit DeLauter into the mix if the club so desires.

3. Bloom to be formally introduced:

In news not related to the postseason, the Cardinals are set to hold a press conference at 10am local time where, as relayed by Katie Woo of The Athletic, owner Bill DeWitt Jr. will introduce Chaim Bloom as the club’s new president of baseball operations. Both DeWitt and Bloom will discuss the future direction of the Cardinals. Bloom has already been in the Cardinals organization for a couple years, having joined the club as an advisor to the front office in 2023 before it was announced late last year that Bloom would be taking over for longtime baseball operations president John Mozeliak following the 2025 season. Now that Mozeliak has stepped aside, Bloom will now fully step into his new role and fans in St. Louis will have the opportunity to hear more of what this changing of the guard means for the franchise.

Torey Lovullo Will Return As D-Backs’ Manager In 2026

By | at

The Diamondbacks are bringing back manager Torey Lovullo for what’ll be his 10th season, as first reported by Nick Piecoro of The Arizona Republic. Lovullo was already under contract for one more year after signing an extension shortly after the team won the National League pennant in 2023.

While the Diamondbacks aren’t making a managerial change, it seems they’ll keep Lovullo in a lame duck setup. John Gambadoro of 98.7 FM reports that the 60-year-old Lovullo is not expected to sign an extension this offseason. Teams generally shy away from having managers and top front office personnel on expiring deals, but it seems leadership in Arizona is content with that arrangement heading into 2026.

The D-Backs have come up short of the playoffs in each of the two seasons following their league championship. Last year’s team won 89 games and finished on the outside on the final day of the season. They backed up to an 80-82 finish that placed fourth in the NL West this year. The Mets’ collapse helped keep the Diamondbacks mathematically alive into the final weekend, but they finished with their first losing season since 2022.

They’ve dramatically ramped up spending in each of the last two winters. They’ve focused most of their free agent activity on the rotation. None of the deals for Corbin Burnes, Eduardo Rodriguez or Jordan Montgomery have worked out. All three pitchers have been some combination of ineffective or injured. The Snakes signed each of Ketel Marte, Brandon Pfaadt, Geraldo Perdomo and Justin Martinez to extensions last winter.

With all that mind, owner Ken Kendrick told Gambadoro on Sunday that he’d “never been more disappointed in a season than this one because (their) expectations were so high.” Kendrick expanded on that comment during an appearance on the Burns & Gambo show this afternoon, saying it’s rooted largely in the injuries that wrecked the pitching staff. Losing Burnes to Tommy John surgery was the biggest blow, but the Snakes were also left with a patchwork bullpen for four-plus months by season-ending injuries to Martinez and A.J. Puk.

The Diamondbacks sold impending free agents Merrill Kelly, Eugenio Suárez, Josh Naylor, Shelby Miller and Randal Grichuk at the deadline. It’s to their credit that they didn’t phone in their last two months. The Snakes went 29-24 after the deadline. It ended in disappointing fashion with a five-game losing streak, but they improbably remained on the postseason periphery with a bullpen comprising mostly rookies or journeymen depth pickups.

Lovullo came under some fire in the middle of August when reports emerged that some players were frustrated with Marte for taking too many games off. The manager defended his star second baseman, who subsequently apologized for missing the first few games of the second half after returning to the Dominican Republic following the All-Star Break. Marte later said he was upset upon learning that his home in Arizona had been burglarized while he was attending the All-Star festivities. D-Backs’ ownership and the front office are evidently confident that Lovullo handled the situation well enough to not lose the clubhouse.

General manager Mike Hazen is also headed into his tenth season. Lovullo had worked with Hazen with the Red Sox and followed him to the desert not long after the GM’s hiring. The D-Backs have made two postseason berths in their nine seasons. They won 93 games and were bounced in the Division Series in 2017. The ’23 NL championship season is their only other playoff berth during that stretch. The D-Backs have a .490 regular season win percentage under Lovullo.

Francisco Alvarez To Undergo Thumb Surgery In Coming Days

By | at

Francisco Alvarez has been known to be dealing with an thumb injury over the final six weeks of the season that he was capable of playing through but would eventually require him to go under the knife. That eventuality has now arrived, as Anthony DiComo of MLB.com relayed today that Alvarez is set to have surgery to repair the UCL in his right thumb “in the coming days.” 

An exact timeline for Alvarez’s return to regular baseball activities won’t be known until he undergoes the procedure, but the surgery should not be expected to impact his 2026 campaign. The typical timeline for recovery from the procedure is between six and seven weeks; Mike Trout famously underwent the procedure back in early June of 2017 and was back in the lineup when the Angels returned from the All-Star break. A similar timeline would put Alvarez in line to return to his regular offseason activities before the new year, assuming no setbacks.

Once he’s recovered from the procedure, Alvarez will prepare for a 2026 season where he’ll look to build on a brilliant second-half performance. After scuffling badly throughout the first half of the season, Alvarez was optioned to Triple-A in late June. Since being recalled near the end of July, however, he’s been one of the better hitters in baseball with an incredible .276/.360/.561 slash line. That tear came across a sample size of just 41 games and 139 plate appearances, but the hot stretch still inspires some confidence in the longtime top prospect’s bat after his first two years in the big leagues saw him post results that generally hovered around league average.

Once a consensus top-10 prospect in the sport and still just 23 years old, there’s plenty of reason for optimism about Alvarez’s future even as he receives mixed grades for his work behind the plate and has not yet found consistency with the bat. In both areas, Alvarez has shown flashes of greatness at times, such as his aforementioned hot streak in the second half of this year at the plate and his phenomenal defensive numbers in 108 games behind the plate back in 2023. If the youngster manages to find the consistency necessary to offer even a facsimile of that production over a full season, he’ll be on the shortlist for the very best catchers in baseball.

That would surely be a welcome development for the Mets, who relied on the well-regarded defender Luis Torrens behind the plate when Alvarez was in the minors or injured this year. Strong as Torrens is with the glove, he hit just .226/.284/.345 in 92 games this year. That won’t cut it for a primary catcher, especially for a team that figures to risk losing star slugger Pete Alonso in free agency this winter after his recent announcement that he’ll be opting out of his contract this November. Alvarez figures to be a core piece of the club as they look to get back into the postseason next year, and if all goes well it’s not impossible to imagine him joining Francisco Lindor and Juan Soto as a middle-of-the-order threat for the Mets next year.

Bruce Bochy Will Not Return As Rangers Manager Amid Financial Uncertainty

By | at

The Rangers announced this evening that the club and Bruce Bochy have mutually agreed that Bochy will not continue in his role as manager of the club next year. The announcement adds that Bochy has been offered a front office role to remain with the organization in an advisory capacity. As relayed by Jeff Wilson of DLLS_Sports, president of baseball operations Chris Young told reporters on a call this evening that they plan to focus on youth amid financial uncertainty and the sides decided to part ways due to the lack of a clear picture for the 2026 season.

Bochy, 70, has 28 seasons of managerial experience under his belt at this point after getting his start with the Padres back in 1995. He won the NL Manager of the Year award in 1996 and led San Diego to a 98-win season and an NL pennant during the 1998 season, but the club generally struggled throughout the remainder of his tenure until he departed the organization during the 2006-07 offseason to join the division-rival Giants in San Francisco. Bochy rose to his current status as one of the most respected managers in the game during his tenure in the Bay Area, famously leading San Francisco to three World Series titles in five years from 2010 to 2014.

The Giants tried to recreate that even year magic by returning to the postseason in 2016, but fell to the eventual World Series champion Cubs in four games. Bochy’s final three years as the club’s skipper saw them fail to make the postseason with 98-, 89-, and 85-loss campaigns. Bochy stepped away from managing following the 2019 season, making way for Gabe Kapler to take over as manager in San Francisco. With three World Series rings and more than 2,000 wins as a manager in the majors, it seemed as though Bochy’s career in the dugout was coming to a close.

That changed during the 2022-23 offseason, when the Rangers coaxed Bochy out of retirement to take over the helm of their franchise. Texas had signed Corey Seager and Marcus Semien to hefty contracts the prior offseason, but a 94-loss season did not see the club reap the rewards of those superstar signings. Ownership clearly felt new leadership was needed, as Young was installed as president of baseball operations while Chris Woodward was fired during his fourth season as manager. That new leadership turned out to be Bochy, and his first year with the club saw him lead them to greatness. The 90-win 2023 Rangers followed in the footsteps of the 2014 Giants as they failed to secure a division title but went on to achieve something far greater when they were crowned World Series champions.

Unfortunately, that championship was not the start of a period of sustained success. The Rangers has hovered around .500 in each of the past two years, with a 159-165 record in that time. They finished with an 81-81 record this year, six games out of a playoff spot despite the club’s decision to push forward and buy at the trade deadline despite the fact that the decision would push them over the luxury tax, which was known to be something the Rangers were hoping to avoid dating back to October of last year.

Given that the team has failed to make the postseason in each of the past two years and very clearly went over budget this year, it’s not exactly shocking that the Rangers would be looking to take a step back of sorts. Texas has around $131MM in guaranteed contracts on the books for next season according to RosterResource, and that number will jump to around $150MM once Joc Pederson picks up his $18.5MM player option for the 2026 season after a campaign marred by injuries and ineffectiveness.

The vast majority of that money is tied up in just four players: Seager, Semien, Jacob deGrom, and Nathan Eovaldi. While those expenditures weren’t too onerous for a team that was spending in the $240MM range annually, as the Rangers have since the start of the 2023 season, a pullback in terms of payroll would leave less room to maneuver around those hefty contracts. It’s unclear just how much payroll is expected to go down at this point, but the club’s previous high-water mark prior to the past three seasons (according to Cot’s Baseball Contracts) was in the $175MM range. With $150MM on the books already for 2026 before considering arbitration raises for players like Jonah Heim and Josh Smith, it’s at least possible that Young and the front office will be facing a significant budget crunch this winter.

Scaling back payroll doesn’t necessarily have to mean a full rebuild, and Young explicitly emphasized that the club is not intending to embark on a rebuild. That makes sense, given that exciting young talents like Wyatt Langford, Evan Carter, Jack Leiter, and Kumar Rocker are already in the majors with MLB Pipeline’s #4 prospect Sebastian Walcott potentially on the radar to make his big league debut as soon as next season. Good health from stars like deGrom and Seager in conjunction with steps forward from those young players could easily be enough to lift this Rangers team to the postseason next year even with only minimal additions, though it goes without saying that a lot would have to go right for an 81-81 team to substantially scale back payroll while simultaneously improving enough to make it back to October the following year.

From that perspective, the mutual parting of ways between Bochy and the Rangers makes plenty of sense. Bochy’s already stepped away from managing once and may only want to manage a club with genuine expectations at this stage of his career, if he isn’t considering retiring altogether. The Rangers, meanwhile, could perhaps benefit from a younger, more long-term voice in the dugout as their young players reach and develop in the majors. Young told reporters (including Wilson) that he expects the next manager of the Rangers to have roots in player development before adding that Skip Schumaker is a candidate for the job.

That Schumaker would be in the conversation to take over for Bochy is hardly a surprise. Will Venable had served under Bochy as associate manager during his first two years with the Rangers and seemed likely to be the veteran skipper’s successor at some point, though any such plans were dashed when Venable took over as manager of the White Sox last winter. Once Venable exited the organization, the Rangers brought Schumaker in as a senior advisor to the baseball operations department. While Schumaker’s role was not that of a member of the coaching staff like Venable, his well-regarded tenure as manager of the Marlins makes him a somewhat obvious choice to take over for Bochy as far as internal candidates go.

White Sox Making Multiple Coaching Changes

By | at

The White Sox announced today that manager Will Venable’s coaching staff will be overhauled this winter. Specifically, the club announced that they will not be renewing the contracts of pitching coach Ethan Katz, hitting coach Marcus Thames, first base coach Jason Bourgeois, and catching coach Drew Butera. James Fegan of Sox Machine adds that Sergio Santos, who manages the club’s Triple-A affiliate in Charlotte, will also not have his contract renewed. Chicago’s announcement goes on to note that offensive coordinator (and former interim manager) Grady Sizemore will be offered a role within the organization for 2026, although USA Today’s Bob Nightengale clarifies that he’ll be reassigned if he decides to remain with the team.

The news nearly entirely eliminates holdovers from former manager Pedro Grifol’s coaching staff, which led the White Sox to a season that saw them post the season with the most losses in modern MLB history. Bench coach Walker McKinven and assistant hitting coach Joel McKeithan were both hired by Venable last winter. Third base/infield coach Justin Jirschele was hired shortly after Grifol was dismissed in August 2024, meaning that the only remaining member of Grifol’s staff if Sizemore departs the organization or is reassigned into a non-coaching role would be assistant pitching coach Matt Wise.

While virtually any team would look good next to the 2024 White Sox, the 2025 iteration of the club was still among the worst teams in baseball. Their 60-102 record gave them the second-worst record in the sport, behind only the Rockies’s disastrous 119-loss season. While there were some positive signs, such as strong showings from rookies Kyle Teel and Colson Montgomery as well as the emergence of Rule 5 pick Shane Smith, it’s impossible to deny that there was more bad than good for Chicago this year. Outside of Teel and Montgomery, their best hitter was 34-year-old Mike Tauchman, who was non-tendered last offseason and will be a free agent after the 2026 campaign. Andrew Benintendi may have rebounded to post league average offensive production this year, but that’s not likely to help them clear the $32.2MM remaining on his contract off their books.

With young players emerging from the minors to take significant roles on the team and a .333 winning percentage over the past three seasons, it’s understandable that White Sox brass would feel it’s time for a larger-scale change. That’s particularly true for Venable, who will be able to hand-pick the replacements for these coaches who had been in the organization prior to his arrival last offseason. A new coaching staff for 2026 should provide both Venable and the club as a whole a fresh start headed into 2026, which will be the first full season both Montgomery and Teel spend in the majors as well as an opportunity for fellow youngsters like Chase Meidroth and Edgar Quero to take a step forward after getting their feet wet in the big leagues this year.

Ben Cherington To Remain Pirates GM In 2026

By | at

Pirates GM Ben Cherington told reporters (including Alex Stumpf of MLB.com) earlier this afternoon that he has “received assurance” that he’ll remain in his current role with the club going forward. Cherington’s contract with the club runs through the 2027 campaign, as was reported last week.

The news that Cherington is remaining in the organization doesn’t register as a massive surprise after news broke earlier today that the Pirates were signing manager Don Kelly to a contract extension after he took over for Derek Shelton back in May. While Pittsburgh’s 71-91 record this year is impossible to view as anything other than a major disappointment, the team went 59-65 under Kelly. That’s still six games below .500, but the club’s .476 winning percentage under Kelly would be their best since 2018 if carried across a full season.

That stat makes it easy enough to understand why Pirates ownership would think it worthwhile to see how a full season of the partnership between Kelly and Cherington would look, but it also highlights the fact that the team’s issues run deeper than leadership in the front office or dugout. Cherington will begin his sixth year at the helm of Pittsburgh’s baseball operations department in November, and while the team hasn’t had much success during his time at the helm those struggles must be viewed through the lens of the budget he’s had to work with throughout his tenure.

RosterResource estimates the club’s payroll at $87MM this year, more or less identical to the club’s 2024 payroll. While the organization ran payrolls between $90MM and $100MM from 2015 to 2017 according to Cot’s Baseball Contracts, they began steadily dropping in 2018 before the trend line started to reverse in 2023. Even if the team’s payroll got back up to the $100MM range, however, that would still leave them as a bottom-five team in the sport by payroll (according to RosterResource). That would be a modest improvement over their current bottom-three status, but wouldn’t change the organization’s reputation as a financial bottom-feeder.

Of course, it should be noted that even getting out of that bottom-three range and back into the territory of around $100MM does not seem likely at this juncture. Noah Hiles of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that the team’s payroll isn’t expected to go up much in 2026, if it does at all, and that it might even wind up lower than it was in 2025 after attendance dropped this year relative to last season.

Fortunately, that still leaves some room to maneuver given that the team has just $31MM on the books for next year between the contracts Bryan Reynolds and Mitch Keller are currently signed to. That doesn’t include arbitration raises for players like Johan Oviedo and Joey Bart, not to mention Oneil Cruz’s first arbitration-level salary, however. It also doesn’t include the roughly $19MM the club would be spending even if the roster is filled out with players on the major league minimum. That could leave Cherington’s front office with around $25MM or less to work with as they try to build an offensive nucleus that can support Paul Skenes and the rest of the team’s young pitchers.

It’s not a lot to work with in a market where the majority of above-average regulars command eight figure salaries. With those constraints, it seems likely that Cherington will have to lean on the club’s highly-rated farm system to execute trades and bring in big league talent without having to dip into free agency in a substantial way. That’s how the club acquired its top bat of 2025, as Spencer Horwitz came to the Pirates in a trade where they surrendered right-hander Luis Ortiz and posted a strong 119 wRC+ in 108 games as the team’s everyday first baseman. Another successful trade or two like that could go a long way to creating the offense needed to get the Pirates back into playoff contention, though that of course will surely be easier said than done.

MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com

Do not Sell or Share My Personal Information

hide arrows scroll to top