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MLBTR Podcast: Depleted Mets’ Pitching, The Pirates Are Open For Business, And More!

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Tim Dierkes of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

  • Griffin Canning’s injury dealing another blow to the Mets’ rotation (1:45)
  • Which playoff-caliber starters could be available at the deadline? (6:10)
  • What does Canning’s free agency look like with this injury? (12:55)
  • The Pirates reportedly having almost no one off the table at the deadline (15:10)

Plus, we answer your questions, including…

  • Could the Orioles be sellers at the deadline and then make a late-season run for a Wild Card berth? (28:35)
  • Should the Royals make Vinnie Pasquantino available at the deadline? (31:20)
  • Should the Cubs get Eugenio Suárez from the Diamondbacks? (35:30)
  • Should the Mariners get Josh Naylor of the Diamondbacks or Alex Bregman of the Red Sox? (40:10)
  • If the Reds are sellers, should they make TJ Friedl available? (44:20)
  • The constant tough question of when a small-market team should sell a star player (47:05)

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

Photo courtesy of Wendell Cruz, Imagn Images

D-Backs, Seth Brown Agree To Deal

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The Diamondbacks are in agreement with corner outfielder/first baseman Seth Brown, MLBTR has learned. He’d been released by the A’s last week.

Brown, 33 this month, had spent a decade with the A’s organization. The former 19th-round pick emerged as a productive platoon bat early in his MLB career. He reached 20 home runs in consecutive seasons in 2021 and ’22, combining to hit .234/.304/.483 against right-handed pitching. His numbers have dipped over the two and a half seasons since then, though he staved off what once seemed a likely non-tender by hitting well in the second half last year.

The A’s tendered Brown an arbitration contract at $2.7MM. That didn’t work out, as he stumbled to a .185/.303/.262 showing in 76 trips to the plate. The A’s briefly outrighted him off the 40-man roster, but he quickly hit his way back to the big leagues by mashing seven homers in nine Triple-A contests. Brown suffered a minor elbow injury not long after the A’s reselected his contract, however.

Once he was ready to return from the injured list last week, the team decided not to put him back on the active roster. Brown had surpassed five years of service in the meantime, giving him the right to refuse an outright assignment without forfeiting his salary, so the A’s released him.

Arizona already has lefty-hitting first base/designated hitter options in Josh Naylor and Pavin Smith. They’re operating with an all righty-hitting bench. If Brown cracks the MLB roster at any point, the Snakes would only owe him the prorated portion of the $760K league minimum. He’d be eligible for arbitration next offseason if he finishes the season in the big leagues, albeit as a non-tender candidate.

D-Backs GM Mike Hazen Discusses Deadline Possibilities

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The Diamondbacks remain one of the most pivotal bubble teams with July underway. They’re in fourth place in the NL West entering tonight’s game against San Francisco. They’ve won two in a row to climb back above .500 at 43-42.

On Monday, general manager Mike Hazen appeared on The Show podcast with Joel Sherman and Jon Heyman of The New York Post. Hazen reiterated much of what he told ESPN’s Jesse Rogers last week but provided a little more specificity in the front office’s approach to the deadline.

“I want this team to put us in a position to buy. I want this team to put us in a position to be right beneath where we need to be,” Hazen told The Show. “We don’t have to be all the way back in (playoff position) or ahead; we just need to be within a distance that we feel like we’re being responsible in adding to this team.”

The GM suggested the upcoming two weeks are likely to be the biggest factor. The D-Backs are amidst a four-game series with the Giants. They’ll host the Royals this weekend before kicking off a crucial four-game set in San Diego. They’ll play the Angels in their final series before the All-Star Break. Arizona hosts the Cardinals for three games in their first series out of the break.

Between now and July 20, the D-Backs will take on three of the four teams directly ahead of them in the Wild Card race. Hazen’s comments came before Monday’s series opener with San Francisco. They’ve already taken the first two games in that set, while each of the Reds, Giants, Cardinals, Padres and Mets are coming off losses. On Monday afternoon, they were five games behind St. Louis for the final Wild Card position. That’s down to 2.5 back (of both San Diego and St. Louis) a little more than 48 hours later.

That all serves to highlight how quickly the picture can change this time of year. That’s particularly true for Arizona given how many direct competitors they’re facing. That gives the roster an opportunity to cement their status as deadline buyers. “I want to buy really bad, but we have a responsibility to the organization too. I can’t just blindly go in there and hope,” Hazen said. “That’s the most dangerous word this time of year. We’ve been so up-and-down this year. We have a talented team, this team is capable of playing better. … We need to start ticking off some wins here though.”

The Snakes were already receiving exploratory calls last month from teams that hope to pry some players out of the desert. The Diamondbacks have the best collection of impending free agents among teams on the buy/sell line. Eugenio Suárez and Josh Naylor are two of the top rental bats. Merrill Kelly and Zac Gallen are quality starting pitchers, though the latter is having a down season. Relievers Shelby Miller and Jalen Beeks have performed very well on bargain salaries.

Hazen confirmed the majority of interest they’re receiving is in that group of rentals. “It’d be no surprise who everybody’s coming after. It’s fairly straightforward,” he noted. “Talking about players (under long-term contractual control) gets into a little deeper conversation that we really haven’t had yet. Most of the initial phone calls are on the players that would be expiring.”

If they play well enough to buy, their deadline outlook would be similarly straightforward. Arizona has had one of the best offenses in MLB two years running. The pitching staff has not held up. There’s still a solid rotation nucleus on paper with Kelly, Gallen and Eduardo Rodriguez. They could add a starter and consider optioning the scuffling Brandon Pfaadt, but the more obvious need is a deeper relief group.

“(Bullpen) would for sure be the biggest area of focus for us,” Hazen confirmed. Arizona lost their top two relievers, Justin Martinez and A.J. Puk, to season-ending elbow surgeries. Miller and Beeks have stepped up in bigger than anticipated roles. They’ve scrambled to try to fill out the middle relief group. John Curtiss, Anthony DeSclafani and Jake Woodford were all in Triple-A on minor league deals within the past three weeks. Kyle Backhus is a rookie with eight MLB appearances. Kevin Ginkel and Ryan Thompson have had inconsistent seasons.

Hazen suggested the priority as buyers would be on adding one or two late-game arms. He used the 2023 deadline acquisition of Paul Sewald as an example, noting that acquiring a closer and/or setup man would permit Torey Lovullo to use Miller and Beeks in leverage spots earlier in games. David Bednar and Kyle Finnegan are established closers on non-contenders who are likely to move. Bednar, who comes with another year of arbitration control and has been dominant for the past two months, may be the prize of the relief market. Aroldis Chapman should be available if the Red Sox fall out of contention. Miami’s Anthony Bender and Calvin Faucher are setup types who’d be attainable, while the Orioles are likely to field offers on Seranthony Domínguez and Gregory Soto.

Diamondbacks Designate Kyle Nelson For Assignment

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The Diamondbacks announced that left-hander Kyle Nelson has been designated for assignment. That’s the corresponding 40-man move for the signing of righty Jake Woodford, a move that was previously reported.

Nelson, now 28, has been with the Diamondbacks for years. He was claimed off waivers from the Guardians in the 2021-22 offseason. He showed some potential at times but required surgery to treat thoracic outlet syndrome in April of 2024 and his numbers since that procedure have been rough.

He missed the remainder of the 2024 campaign after going under the knife. Here in 2025, he has been on optional assignment, having tossed 17 Triple-A innings. He has allowed 16 earned runs in that time, leading to an 8.47 ERA. That’s a small sample of work but he also only has 12 strikeouts, a rate of 14.6% of batters faced. He has averaged just 89.9 miles per hour on his fastball.

There’s a big gap between that performance and what he was able to do a few years ago. In 2023, he logged 56 major league innings for the Snakes with a 4.18 ERA. He struck out 28% of batters faced while averaging 92 mph on his fastball.

Overcoming a thoracic outlet syndrome diagnosis is notoriously difficult. Pitchers like Matt Harvey and Chris Archer declined significantly later in their careers while Stephen Strasburg essentially had his career ended by the condition. On the other hand, Diamondbacks like Merrill Kelly and Ryan Thompson have each managed to engineer solid post-TOS seasons.

Nelson will now head into DFA limbo, which can last as long as a week. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so the Snakes could take five days to explore trade talks. Based on his injury absence and recent results, there may not be much interest.

If Nelson clears outright waivers, he will have the right to elect free agency but will probably decide to stay. Players with at least three years of big league service time have the right to reject an outright assignment, but those with less than five years have to forfeit their remaining salary in order to exercise that right. Nelson is in that three- to five-year window. He and the club avoided arbitration in the offseason by agreeing to a salary of $825K this year, a bit north of the $760K major league minimum.

Photo courtesy of Stan Szeto, Imagn Images

Diamondbacks To Sign Jake Woodford To Major League Deal

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The Diamondbacks are going to sign right-hander Jake Woodford to a major league deal, reports Nick Piecoro of The Arizona Republic. Fellow righty Juan Morillo will be optioned as the corresponding active roster move. The Snakes will also need to open a 40-man roster spot.

Woodford, 28, just opted out of a minor league deal with the Cubs earlier today. He had also opted out of a minor league deal with the Yankees earlier in the year, which led him to the Cubs. He was also with the Rockies on a minor league deal in spring training but opted out of that deal prior to the start of the season. Now the third opt-out will get him to the majors.

Between his time with the Yankees and the Cubs, Woodford threw 61 1/3 innings across ten starts and four relief appearances. He had a 4.55 earned run average, 21.8% strikeout rate, 7.4% walk rate and 47.8% ground ball rate.

He does have some major league experience on his track record. Over the previous five seasons, he logged 219 2/3 innings in the big leagues, mostly with the Cardinals. He has a 4.88 ERA, 15.2% strikeout rate, 7.5% walk rate and 45.1% ground ball rate.

The Diamondbacks probably want him to serve in a long relief role, since he is currently stretched out. They have a rotation consisting of Zac Gallen, Merrill Kelly, Brandon Pfaadt, Eduardo Rodríguez and Ryne Nelson. Their bullpen has been hit by a number of injuries. A.J. Puk and Justin Martínez were supposed to be the two top dogs back there but both required season-ending elbow surgeries. Christian Montes De Oca might also be done for the year due to back surgery. Kendall Graveman is on the shelf due to a hip impingement.

The bullpen got heavy usage during the three games from Saturday through Monday, with six out of eight relievers pitching twice in those contests. Gallen gave them a bit of a breather by going seven strong yesterday. Anthony DeSclafani, the only guy who didn’t pitch in the previous three games, soaked up the final two frames. On the whole, the group is pretty gassed, so Woodford will be on hand to potentially give them multiple innings, if needed. He is out of options and will therefore have to be removed from the 40-man if the Diamondbacks want to take him off the active roster at any point.

Photo courtesy of Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images

Trey Mancini Opts Out Of D-Backs Deal

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Veteran first baseman Trey Mancini has opted out of his minor league contract with the Diamondbacks, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Arizona evidently opted not to select him onto the MLB roster and he has returned to free agency. Utility infielder Nicky Lopez did the same this morning.

Mancini, 33, played three months with Triple-A Reno after signing an offseason non-roster deal. He’s had a nice season, batting .308/.373/.522 with 16 homers through 74 games. While that’s in a very hitter-friendly setting, Mancini has above-average numbers overall and had a particularly big showing in June.

The D-Backs have a first base/designated hitter tandem of Josh Naylor and Pavin Smith, leaving them without much room to accommodate Mancini. Smith has slumped since a scorching April, but he’s still carrying a .260/.369/.447 slash for the season. Arizona’s bench already skews right-handed, so Mancini would have been an imperfect fit as a bench bat.

Mancini will now look elsewhere for his first big league opportunity since 2023. He hasn’t been especially productive at the MLB level since being traded by the Orioles at the ’22 deadline. His numbers in Reno will at least allow him to find minor league interest elsewhere, presumably with a club that has a better path to first base playing time.

Nicky Lopez Opts Out Of Diamondbacks Deal

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Veteran infielder Nicky Lopez triggered an opt-out clause in his minor league deal with the D-backs, reports Robert Murray of FanSided. Teams typically have 48 hours to decide whether to add a player to the 40-man roster or grant him his release when the player triggers an out clause, but Murray adds that Lopez will hit the open market, so it seems Arizona has already made up its mind.

The 30-year-old Lopez hit just .267/.303/.317 through 109 turns at the plate in a supercharged offensive environment with Arizona’s Triple-A Reno affiliate. He continued showing strong contact skills, fanning in only 8.3% of his plate appearances, but Lopez showed no real power and walked at only a 4.6% clip. He went 1-for-24 in 19 games between the Cubs and Angels earlier this year while receiving sparse playing time as a glove-first option off the bench.

Lopez is a defensive-minded utility infielder who can handle either middle infield spot or third base. He’s made a few brief cameos in left field as well but has just 17 major league innings at the position. Back in 2021, he posted an out-of-nowhere .300/.365/.378 batting line with 22 steals (in 23 tries) and plus-plus defense at shortstop. Baseball-Reference valued that season at 4.4 wins above replacement, and FanGraphs credited him with an even gaudier 5.5 WAR. Since that time, Lopez has proven 2021’s offensive output to be an outlier; he’s slashed only .229/.300/.283 in 1215 subsequent plate appearances.

Tucker Barnhart To Retire

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Former Gold Glove catcher Tucker Barnhart is set to retire, as agent Steve Rath of the Ballengee Group tells Robert Murray of FanSided. Barnhart played for the Reds, Tigers, Cubs, Diamondbacks, and Rangers across his 12 seasons in the majors.

Born and raised in Indiana, Barnhart was drafted by the Reds in the tenth round of the 2009 draft out of Brownsburg High School, just two hours from Cincinnati. As a high school catcher, his path to the big leagues was a long one. Barnhart didn’t make his debut until 2014, and only appeared in 21 games when he did finally make it to the show. The 2015 season saw him take on a much larger role, however, as Devin Mesoraco was sidelined by injury. That left the catcher position to Brayan Pena and Barnhart, the latter of whom proved to be a strong defender but hit a fairly lackluster .252/.324/.326 in 81 games.

Despite that unimpressive offense, Barnhart’s work behind the plate was impressive enough that he became Cincinnati’s primary catcher starting in 2016. His offense trended upwards enough from 2016 to 2018 that he was more or less on par with the average catcher in the league (87 wRC+), and he won the first Gold Glove award of his career in 2017 amid a 3.6 bWAR season. That 2017 campaign was enough to convince the Reds to sign Barnhart to a $16MM extension, locking him in with the club for at least the next four seasons. His offense took a step backwards starting in 2019, as he hit just .235/.318/.375 (79 wRC+) over his final three seasons with the Reds, but he remained a stalwart defender and won his second career Gold Glove during the shortened 2020 season.

After parts of eight seasons in Cincinnati, Barnhart was traded to Detroit ahead of the 2022 season, giving the Tigers the opportunity to exercise a $7.5MM team option on his services for that year. Barnhart struggled in his lone season with the club, however, hitting just .221/.287/.267 (67 wRC+) while his defense behind the plate slipped somewhat. Barnhart was still able to secure a two-year, $6.5MM guarantee from the Cubs that offseason, but he posted just a 55 wRC+ in 43 games before being designated for assignment by the club. Since then, Barnhart has caught for the Diamondbacks and Rangers in the majors after signing minor league deals with both organizations and also spent a brief stint in the Dodgers’ farm system. He’s appeared in 39 MLB games over the past two seasons with a .181/.294/.213 that’s offset somewhat by his continually solid defense.

Barnhart was let go by the Rangers earlier this month but re-signed with the club on a minor league deal shortly thereafter. Evidently, he’s decided he’d rather call it a career than play out the season in the minors. He’ll finish his career with 920 games played in the majors, two Gold Glove awards, 6.9 bWAR/5.8 fWAR, 662 hits, and 53 home runs. He hit .241/.318/.351 overall during his time in the majors. MLBTR congratulations Barnhart on a fine career in the majors and wishes him all the best in whatever comes next.

Diamondbacks Designate Tayler Scott, Select John Curtiss

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The Diamondbacks announced that right-hander Tayler Scott has been designated for assignment.  Fellow righty John Curtiss will take Scott’s place on the active roster, as Arizona selected Curtiss’ contract from Triple-A.

This is the second time in a month and a half that Scott has entered DFA limbo, as his previous designation from the Astros led to Scott electing free agency (he had the right to reject an outright assignment) and then signing a minor league deal with Arizona.  The Snakes selected that minors contract to their active roster on June 10, but Scott’s struggles in Houston have continued with his new team.

Scott has an ominous 6.66 ERA over 25 2/3 total innings this season, breaking down as a 5.40 ERA in 16 2/3 frames with Houston and a 9.00 ERA in nine innings for Arizona.  That brief time with the D’Backs has already included three home runs allowed and four walks, adding to the control problems that have nagged at Scott throughout his five MLB seasons.

Scott somewhat came out of nowhere to post a 2.23 ERA in 68 2/3 innings with the Astros last season, as it seemed like he had finally found a foothold in the majors at age 32 after a journeyman career that includes stints in Japan and independent baseball.  Unfortunately, his lack of results this year may be sending him on another transactional carousel.  Because Scott has been outrighted in the past, he can again decline an outright assignment in favor of free agency if he clears waivers.

Curtiss signed a minors deal with the D’Backs in February, and he is now in line for his first big league action of the 2025 campaign.  Once Curtiss gets into a game, it will mark his eighth MLB season, and Arizona will be his eighth different team of a peripatetic career.  Curtiss has a 4.06 ERA, 22.7% strikeout rate, and 7% walk rate over 108 2/3 career innings, and his most recent action in the Show was three appearances (and a 15.43 ERA in 2 1/3 innings) with the Rockies in 2024.

Jordan Lawlar To Miss “Weeks” With Hamstring Strain

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The Triple-A Reno Aces placed Jordan Lawlar on their seven-day injured list on Thursday, and the infield prospect is facing another extended stint on the sidelines.  Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo told reporters (including Alex Wiener of Arizona Sports) that Lawlar is expected to miss “weeks” recovering from a Grade 1 hamstring strain.  For a more specific timeline, Sports Illustrated’s Jack Sommers heard from an unnamed D’Backs official that Lawlar will be out for at minimum one month.

Selected sixth overall by the D’Backs in the 2021 draft, Lawlar has had cups of coffee in the majors in both the 2023 and 2025 seasons, with only an .080/.179/.080 slash line to show from a sample size of 56 plate appearances against MLB pitching.  This includes an 0-for-19 stretch over 22 PA this season, as the Diamondbacks made the somewhat curious decision to promote Lawlar despite not really having a regular spot for him in the lineup.  Lawlar’s struggles made the situation somewhat moot, as he was optioned back to Triple-A at the end of May.

The nature of the injury is a little ominous, given that hamstring problems cost Lawlar a huge chunk of the 2024 season.  Between a thumb surgery that delayed his 2024 debut in Reno until late May, and then both an initial Grade 1 strain and then a re-aggravation of that same hamstring, Lawlar ended up playing in only 23 total games across three of Arizona’s minor league levels.  A Grade 1 strain is the least-serious level of injury, yet with last season certainly still lingering, the D’Backs figure to be particularly cautious with Lawlar’s recovery this time around.

Lawlar has been obliterating Triple-A pitching when healthy, and he is now hitting .334/.420/.590 in 388 plate appearances over parts of three seasons with Reno.  There seems to be little left for the 22-year-old to prove in the minors, though the rather extreme nature of his early struggles in the majors suggests some more seasoning is required.  That said, Lawlar would’ve surely gotten an extended look in the big leagues at this point if he played for a team with a less-productive mix of position players.  The Diamondbacks have been arguably baseball’s best offensive team over the last two seasons, particularly in the infield.

Losing Lawlar through at least July robs the D’Backs of their chief candidate for a call-up in the event of an infield injury.  (Perhaps in a case of “when it rains, it pours,” first baseman Josh Naylor left yesterday’s game with neck tightness and is expected to sit out this weekend’s action.)  Lawlar’s health could also impact any potential ideas Arizona had about moving third baseman Eugenio Suarez at the trade deadline, should the 41-40 Diamondbacks fall out of the race.  Suarez is a free agent after the season and is therefore a natural candidate to be moved in the event of a sell-off, and dealing Suarez would’ve naturally opened up third base.  It is entirely possible that the D’Backs plan to have Lawlar as their regular third baseman in 2026 if Suarez headed elsewhere in free agency, though a Suarez deadline trade would give Lawlar some steady playing time in the Show.

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