Pirates Claim Trey Cabbage From Astros
The Pirates are claiming first baseman/corner outfielder Trey Cabbage from the Astros, reports Ari Alexander of KPRC 2 (X link). Neither team has officially announced the move.
Houston had not previously designated Cabbage for assignment. They evidently placed him on waivers in recent days to take him off the 40-man roster. He would’ve qualified for minor league free agency had he gone unclaimed, but Pittsburgh saw enough to give him a 40-man spot.
Cabbage, 27, has played in 67 big league contests over the last two years. He made 22 appearances for the Angels two seasons ago and got into 45 contests with Houston this year. He hasn’t done much offensively, limping to a .209/.245/.331 slash line while striking out 60 times in 147 plate appearances (a 40.8% rate). The swing-and-miss is nothing new, as Cabbage has fanned in more than 30% of his Triple-A plate appearances. He has shown big power and surprising athleticism in his minor league career, though, including a 30-30 showing in the Halos’ system back in 2023.
Pittsburgh hasn’t been able to find an answer at first base in recent seasons. Cabbage isn’t a long-term solution, but he’s a depth flier who still has a minor league option remaining. If the Bucs carry him on the 40-man all winter, they can keep him in Triple-A for another season.
Giants Outright Donovan Walton
The Giants outrighted infielder Donovan Walton off their 40-man roster, tweets Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area. The utilityman has multiple career outrights and has the right to elect free agency.
San Francisco called Walton up as a stopgap utility player in September. He appeared in nine games, hitting .136 with one homer. The left-handed hitter has been a depth option in San Francisco for three seasons. The Giants initially acquired Walton in a small trade with Seattle in May 2022. They’ve shuttled him through waivers and continued to bring him back on minor league contracts over that stretch.
A former 5th-round pick by the Mariners, Walton has 70 MLB appearances over parts of five seasons. He’s a .174/.227/.305 hitter over 205 career plate appearances. Walton had a nice year in Triple-A Sacramento, running a .306/.380/.441 slash with nearly as many walks as strikeouts over 99 games. He has a solid offensive track record in parts of four Triple-A campaigns. Walton can play throughout the infield and should find another minor league contract if he elects free agency.
Guardians Outright Myles Straw
The Guardians sent outfielder Myles Straw outright to Triple-A Columbus, according to the MLB.com transaction log. Cleveland successfully ran him through waivers once the offseason got underway, removing him from the 40-man roster.
Straw was a lock to go unclaimed because of his contract. A team would’ve needed to assume the remaining $14.75MM in guaranteed money. Straw has cleared waivers twice this year. Cleveland outrighted him just before Opening Day. He spent almost the entire season in Triple-A. The Guards reselected his contract in mid-September but presumably always planned to take him back off the roster at year’s end.
Cleveland inked Straw to that deal early in the 2022 season. He’d posted a solid year in ’21, hitting .271/.349/.348 while stealing 30 bases and playing plus defense in center field. The Guardians reasoned that his speed and glove gave him a solid floor despite minimal power. His bat completely cratered over the next two seasons. Straw combined for only one home run with a .229/.296/.284 line from 2022-23. He didn’t hit in Triple-A this year, either, running a .240/.321/.329 mark against upper minors pitching.
As a player with less than five years of major league service, Straw would forfeit his contract to test free agency. He’s obviously not going to do that, so the Guards can keep him in Triple-A as a depth option. He only made seven MLB appearances this year, collecting one hit in four at-bats. He stole two bases in as many attempts.
D-Backs To Exercise Option On Eugenio Suarez
The Diamondbacks are picking up their $15MM option on Eugenio Suárez, reports Jesse Rogers of ESPN (on X). The deal would have come with a $2MM buyout, effectively rendering it a $13MM decision.
Just a few months ago, the Diamondbacks wouldn’t have envisioned making this decision. Suárez got out to a terrible start to the season, his first in the desert after an offseason trade with the Mariners. He went into the All-Star Break with a .216/.302/.366 slash while striking out in nearly 29% of his plate appearances. Arizona considered bumping him out of the starting lineup in deference to rookie infielder Blaze Alexander.
A monster second half not only salvaged his starting job but locked in that extra $13MM. Suárez was one of the game’s hottest hitters after the Break. He mashed at a .307/.341/.602 clip with 20 homers in his final 65 games. He cut his strikeout rate by a few percentage points while running a three-month power barrage. By the end of the season, he’d pushed his numbers to a .256/.319/.469 line with 30 homers across 640 plate appearances. After accounting for the difference in his home park, that’s not far off the cumulative .234/.327/.423 showing he posted over his final two seasons in Seattle.
Suárez essentially played at the level Arizona expected, albeit in extremely streaky fashion. It would’ve been surprising for the Diamondbacks to cut him loose on the heels of that monster finish. He’s a potential offseason trade candidate, though. Bringing Suárez back blocks the clearest path to playing time for top prospect Jordan Lawlar. The Snakes have Geraldo Perdomo and Ketel Marte locked into the middle infield.
The 22-year-old Lawlar lost most of this year to injury. He only appeared in 23 minor league games and didn’t see any MLB action despite making his big league debut late in the ’23 season. Lawlar still has minor league options remaining, so the Snakes could keep him in Triple-A for another year. If they feel he’ll be ready for an extended audition early next season, shopping Suárez could allow them to reallocate salary while recouping value they wouldn’t have received if they’d bought out the option.
Option decisions on Jordan Montgomery and Suárez push Arizona’s projected payroll to roughly $137MM, as calculated by RosterResource. An easy option call to retain Merrill Kelly will add another $6MM. Arizona opened this past season with a franchise-record payroll in the $163MM range. If they’re willing to replicate that, they’ll have some leeway to replace free agents Christian Walker and Joc Pederson. Trades of Montgomery and/or Suárez could clear a good bit more money if ownership doesn’t want to match this year’s spending. They won’t find a taker for the entirety of Montgomery’s $22.5MM deal, but teams like the Yankees, Blue Jays or Astros could be willing to give up talent while taking Suárez’s salary off the books.
Image courtesy of USA TODAY Network.
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MLB Tenders Status Check On KBO Infielder Hyeseong Kim
The Korea Baseball Organization announced last night that MLB has tendered status checks on two players: second baseman Hyeseong Kim and first baseman/catcher Baek-Ho Kang (h/t to Dan Kurtz of MyKBO.net). That indicates both players are on the radar of at least one MLB team, though only Kim seems likely to make the jump this offseason.
A status check is the process used when an MLB team shows interest in a Korean player. MLB does not reveal the identity of the team or teams that requested the check. It is not an official opening of the posting process, which begins a 30-day window for a KBO player to negotiate with big league clubs.
The status check doesn’t mean that a player is going to come to MLB, though it’s a necessary first step for any player who eventually does so. Last offseason, status checks presaged postings and MLB deals for Jung Hoo Lee and Woo-Suk Go. MLB also conducted a status check on free agent reliever Deok Ju Ham, but he elected to re-sign with his KBO team a few weeks later.
Regarding Kim, the status check is a formality. The lefty-hitting infielder (not to be confused with MLB free agent Ha-Seong Kim) has prepared for a move to MLB since last winter. Kim has played parts of eight KBO seasons with the Nexen/Kiwoom Heroes. The Heroes announced in January that they would make him available to major league clubs during the 2024-25 offseason via the posting system. Kim hired CAA as his representation in June.
The 25-year-old hit .326/.383/.458 across 567 plate appearances this year. He’s a career .304/.364/.403 hitter. KBO pitching is much weaker than it is at the major league level. Scouting reports generally suggest Kim profiles as a utility player. MLB teams enamored with his glove could view him as a low-end regular at second base. He doesn’t have a ton of power upside, as this year’s 11 home runs represent a career high. Kim will very likely be posted later in the offseason. Last year, the Heroes waited until early December to post Lee. The LG Twins did the same with Go.
Kang, who plays for the KT Wiz, is reportedly not interested in pursuing an MLB opportunity at this time. Kurtz points to a Korean-language report from Sports Kyunghang in which team officials say that they confirmed with Kang that he intends to remain with the Wiz despite the status check. (The status check is only an indication that an MLB team is interested in the player, not the other way around.) Kang hit 26 home runs with a .289/.360/.480 batting line this season. FanGraphs wrote last offseason that Kang had plus power but projected as a first baseman with questions about his pure hitting ability as an MLB prospect.
Mets Among Roughly 11 Teams To Reach Out To Soto
Day One of the offseason means the Juan Soto pursuits are underway. Until Monday, only the Yankees are allowed to discuss salary figures. However, other teams can touch base with his camp to broadly express interest and pitch their organizations now that the World Series is finished.
The top free agent has gotten no shortage of attention. Jon Heyman of the New York Post writes that 11 teams were in contact with Soto’s camp by Thursday morning. The Post’s Mike Puma relays that the Mets — widely perceived as the top challenger to the incumbent Yankees — were among them.
Soto getting attention from more than a third of the league isn’t surprising. There isn’t a single front office that wouldn’t love to add him. The number of legitimately plausible suitors is much smaller. Soto’s contract demands figure to be prohibitive for all but a handful of teams, though Heyman writes that two unidentified small-market franchises were among the initial eleven. Still, it’s hard to envision Soto landing with a team that isn’t a traditional behemoth.
To that end, Heyman floats the possibility of Soto’s camp looking to top $700MM without any deferred money. While Shohei Ohtani hit that mark before adjusting for the deferrals, the deal’s net present value was well south of $500MM. MLB calculates the Ohtani deal just shy of $461MM for luxury tax purposes, while the Players Association puts it around $438MM. Either number still represents an all-time record. The Ohtani contract is the only one in MLB history to top $400MM.
There’s not much doubt that Soto is going to beat both versions of the NPV of the Ohtani deal. Doing so on a contract with a present value of $700MM is a massive ask. It’d require breaking the guarantee record by upwards of $240MM. Getting there would require at least $50MM annually over a 14-year term. Ohtani’s deferral-adjusted $46.06MM average annual value is the only AAV north of $44MM.
No free agent has signed for 14 years. Fernando Tatis Jr. is the only player to sign a 14-year contract, though his $340MM deal was an extension signed before his age-22 season. Bryce Harper got to 13 years as a free agent going into his age-26 season, as Soto is now. Harper took a relatively diminished $25.38MM annual salary, and while Soto is certainly going to beat that, shattering the AAV record and signing the longest free agent contract of all time would be an ambitious ask.
Of course, Soto is going to start free agency with extremely high expectations. The process seems likely to carry well into the offseason, perhaps beyond December’s Winter Meetings. Every high-payroll franchise figures to be linked to Soto in some capacity. The general expectation is that there’ll be a huge bidding war between Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner and Mets owner Steve Cohen, in particular. Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns has already stated that the organization has the payroll flexibility to consider a run at “pretty much the entirety of the player universe.”
Puma notes that while the Mets may shy away from signing players who require draft compensation, they’re unsurprisingly willing to make an exception in Soto’s case. He’ll decline a qualifying offer, so the Mets would forfeit their second- and fifth-highest draft choices and $1MM in international bonus pool space to sign him.
That’s a non-issue for a player of Soto’s caliber. If the Mets are reluctant to surrender draft compensation, that could be a factor for their other free agent pursuits. They’ll be heavily involved on free agent pitchers. Corbin Burnes and Max Fried will get QOs, but Blake Snell and Jack Flaherty are ineligible. Borderline QO candidates include Michael Wacha, Nick Martinez and Nick Pivetta. As with Soto, they could consider Burnes and Fried to be exceptional free agents for whom they’re willing to take a hit to their farm system. That’ll be a subplot in what should be a fascinating offseason in the Big Apple.
Cubs To Hire Quintin Berry As Third Base Coach
The Cubs plan to hire Quintin Berry as third base coach, report Will Sammon, Sahadev Sharma and Patrick Mooney of the Athletic. The 39-year-old has spent the past six seasons on the Brewers’ staff, the last four of which have come as first base coach.
Craig Counsell managed in Milwaukee for the first five years of Berry’s coaching tenure. After one season working under Pat Murphy, Berry rejoins Counsell on the North Side. The Cubs moved on from previous third base coach Willie Harris a few weeks ago. Milwaukee has not announced a replacement.
Berry had a 13-year professional playing career and got to the big leagues in parts of five seasons. He was known for his speed and ability to steal bases. That included a perfect 21-21 showing for the Tigers in 2012. That was the only season in which he logged significant MLB playing time, but he bounced around as a quintessential September player. The expanded rosters — teams could carry up to 40 players in September at that time — afforded the flexibility to use him as a designated pinch runner.
Berry won the 2013 World Series with the Red Sox while working in that capacity. He played the same role with the Cubs in 2015. He’ll make a return to Wrigley Field a decade later.
Hunter Renfroe, Chris Stratton Exercise Player Options
Outfielder Hunter Renfroe and reliever Chris Stratton triggered player options in their deals with the Royals, reports Mark Feinsand of MLB.com (X links). Kansas City declined its end of a mutual option on infielder Adam Frazier, per Feinsand. In other Royals’ news, lefty reliever Josh Taylor elected free agency, according to the MLB.com transaction log. Kansas City evidently ran him through outright waivers instead of reinstating him from the 60-day injured list.
All three option decisions went as expected. Renfroe, Stratton and Frazier each signed as free agents last winter. None had a particularly good season. That made it a straightforward call for the players who could return to pass on their chances to retest the market, while the front office had a similarly easy call to move on from Frazier.
Renfroe returns on a $7.5MM salary. He’ll look to improve on this year’s middling .229/.297/.392 slash line. Renfroe hit 15 homers but reached base at less than a .300 clip for a second consecutive season. It was a replacement level performance altogether. He’ll be penciled back in as the starting right fielder for the moment, but the corner outfield is a clear area for the front office to try to upgrade.
Stratton secures a $4.5MM salary. His deal contained a $500K buyout, so that was a $4MM call. The veteran right-hander would probably be limited to minor league offers if he were a free agent. He struggled to a 5.55 earned run average through 58 1/3 innings this past season. It’s not a guarantee that the Royals keep him on the roster all winter. If they do bring him back, they’ll hope to get something closer to the 82 2/3 innings of 3.92 ball that he provided the Cardinals and Rangers in 2023.
Frazier gets a $2.5MM buyout instead of an $8.5MM salary. The former All-Star second baseman hasn’t hit much since being traded from Pittsburgh to San Diego in 2021. That continued during what looks like it’ll be his lone season in Kansas City. Frazier hit .202/.282/.294 while appearing in 104 games. Michael Massey outplayed him to take the second base job. Frazier might need to settle for a minor league deal with a Spring Training invite this winter.
As for Taylor, this effectively serves as an early non-tender. He was eligible for arbitration for a final time. While he was projected for a modest $1.1MM salary, the Royals didn’t want to create a 40-man roster spot after he missed the entire 2024 season. Taylor lost this year to a biceps injury and has also struggled with back issues in recent years.
Jordan Montgomery Exercises Player Option With D-Backs
Jordan Montgomery exercised his $22.5MM player option with the Diamondbacks, reports Mark Feinsand of MLB.com (X link). There was never much doubt on this decision, though Montgomery stands as one of the top trade candidates of the winter.
Montgomery’s first season in the desert was a nightmare. The veteran southpaw signed late on a $25MM pillow contract after his market failed to materialize. He changed his representation shortly into the season and has publicly expressed dissatisfaction with how former agent Scott Boras handled negotiations. Montgomery surely hoped to retest the market after one season, but he didn’t pitch well enough to give himself that opportunity.
Opponents teed off for a 6.23 ERA in 117 innings. Arizona pushed him out of the rotation after 21 starts, the first time in his career that he lost a starting job. The only silver lining was that Montgomery made enough starts to vest the option that he eventually pushed to a $22.5MM value.
Owner Ken Kendrick pulled no punches after the season. “If anyone wants to blame anyone for Jordan Montgomery being a Diamondback, you’re talking to the guy that should be blamed,” the owner said after the team narrowly missed the playoffs. “Because I brought it to (the front office’s) attention. I pushed for it. They agreed to it. It wasn’t in our game plan. … And looking back, in hindsight, a horrible decision to have invested that money in a guy that performed as poorly as he did. It’s our biggest mistake this season from a talent standpoint. And I’m the perpetrator of that.”
There was some chatter that Kendrick went public hoping to alienate Montgomery so the pitcher would pass on the option. If that was the intent, it never stood much chance. Montgomery would have been leaving millions on the table if he returned to free agency. He’d likely have been looking at a one-year contract in the $8-12MM range in that case. Even if Montgomery wants a fresh start, that’s too much to bypass. Arizona will probably look for ways to offload a portion of the deal in an offseason trade, though they wouldn’t be able to shed the entire salary without taking back an undesirable contract in their own right.