Giants Agree To Terms With First-Round Pick James Tibbs
The Giants are in agreement with first-round pick James Tibbs III on a $4.7475MM bonus, reports Jim Callis of MLB Pipeline (X link). That’s below the approximate $5.3MM slot value of the #13 pick.
Pre-draft scouting reports on Tibbs were generally aligned. He ranked between 11th and 15th at each of Baseball America, FanGraphs, Keith Law’s list at The Athletic and Kiley McDaniel’s ranking at ESPN. Tibbs is a lefty-hitting corner outfielder and first baseman from Florida State. While he doesn’t have the prototypical plus raw power associated with a corner position, he’s a well-rounded offensive player who had one of the top hit tools in the class. Law and BA each praise Tibbs’ ability to handle high-velocity offerings in particular.
The Atlanta native hit well over all three seasons at Florida State. He improved his strikeout and walk profile in each season, culminating in a .363/.488/.777 showing during his junior year. Tibbs walked 58 times against 37 strikeouts while hitting 28 home runs over 66 contests as a junior.
Reds Re-Sign Edwin Rios To Minor League Deal
The Reds brought back infielder Edwin Ríos on a minor league contract. He was assigned to Triple-A Louisville, where he’s in tonight’s starting lineup. Ríos had elected free agency on Monday after being designated for assignment.
He’ll again provide a non-roster bat from the left side. Ríos inked a minor league deal over the winter and has spent the bulk of the year in Louisville. He owns a .243/.340/.486 batting line with 11 homers and a robust 11.8% walk rate over 50 contests for the Bats, but he also struck nearly 29% of the time. The Reds gave him a brief look while Jake Fraley was unavailable. Ríos appeared in five games and went 1-9 with a walk.
A career .202/.290/.455 hitter over parts of six MLB seasons, Ríos is mostly limited to the corner infield. He has big power — 21 homers in 335 MLB plate appearances — that comes with an alarming whiff rate. The 30-year-old has fanned in more than a third of his trips to the plate at the major league level.
Giants Reinstate Robbie Ray, Option Luis Matos
Robbie Ray is officially back from the injured list. San Francisco reinstated the southpaw from the 60-day IL to take the ball tonight against the Dodgers. The Giants also added recent waiver claim Derek Hill to their active roster. San Francisco optioned Luis Matos and Randy Rodriguez to Triple-A Sacramento in corresponding moves. To open a spot on the 40-man roster for Ray, the Giants moved Keaton Winn to the 60-day IL.
Ray makes his team debut after being acquired from the Mariners over the winter. Seattle and San Francisco lined up on an out of nowhere swap of veterans on big contracts. The Giants shipped Anthony DeSclafani and Mitch Haniger to Seattle to take a flier on Ray, who was about halfway through his rehab from last May’s Tommy John procedure. The M’s flipped DeSclafani to the Twins, with whom he suffered a Spring Training injury and underwent season-ending surgery. Haniger has underperformed for a second straight year.
The Giants hope their end of the deal yields better results. Ray is more than 14 months removed from his most recent MLB pitch. He’s one of the higher-upside pitchers in baseball when healthy. He won the American League Cy Young award when he turned in a 2.84 ERA with an MLB-best 248 strikeouts for the Blue Jays in 2021. That led the Mariners to sign him to a five-year free agent pact. Ray posted good but not elite numbers in year one, working to a 3.71 earned run average through 189 innings. He made all of one start last season before suffering the injury that sent him under the knife.
If the Giants get even the ’22 version of Ray, that’d be a major boost to their rotation. He joins last year’s Cy Young winner Blake Snell as high-risk, high-reward lefties. Logan Webb is one of the game’s best starters, while Kyle Harrison and Jordan Hicks round out the group. Harrison has a 3.86 ERA over 17 starts in his first full MLB season. Hicks started the season very well but has seemingly shown signs of fatigue lately in his first extended look out of the rotation.
Winn was also part of the rotation early in the season. The ground-ball specialist took the ball 12 times but struggled to a 7.16 ERA across 55 1/3 frames. He has been out for about a month with elbow inflammation. Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area reported earlier this week that Winn is still feeling soreness and has been shut down from throwing (X link). He’s eligible to return at the end of August, but it now seems in doubt if he’ll make it back this season.
On the position player side, Hill steps into the outfield at Matos’ expense. They’re each righty hitters with the ability to play all three positions. Matos has struggled to a .217/.238/.333 slash over 40 games. He’s also had some defensive lapses that’ll lead the Giants to send him back to Triple-A. Matos is only 22 and rates as one of the better prospects in the system. He owns a .295/.358/.536 slash over 76 career Triple-A games.
Dodgers, Nick Ahmed Agree To Major League Deal
The Dodgers are signing shortstop Nick Ahmed to a big league deal and placing Miguel Rojas on the injured list, tweets Fabian Ardaya of the Athletic. David Vassegh of 570 Sports first noted (on X) that Ahmed was with the team. The veteran infielder is an Excel Sports Management client.
Ahmed continues his tour of the National League West. The longtime Diamondback signed a minor league deal with the Giants over the winter. He made the Opening Day roster and appeared in 52 games with San Francisco. Ahmed struggled to a .232/.278/.303 batting line over 172 trips to the plate and was released two weeks ago. He lingered on the open market before landing an immediate big league opportunity because of the Dodgers’ injury situation in the middle infield. Ahmed will only make the prorated portion of the MLB minimum salary for whatever time he spends on the L.A. roster. The Giants are still on the hook for the rest of his salary.
Los Angeles has been without Mookie Betts for more than five weeks. Betts was amidst another MVP-caliber season in his first year as an everyday shortstop before he broke his hand on a hit-by-pitch. That pushed Rojas from a glove-first utility role back into regular work at shortstop. He hasn’t provided much offensively, hitting .241/.282/.329 across 86 trips to the plate since the Betts injury. The Dodgers were mostly hoping he’d keep things afloat on defense, and Rojas has indeed posted above-average marks with the glove.
The Dodgers will rely on Ahmed to play a similar role. Rojas went down over the weekend with forearm tightness and hasn’t played since Sunday. Los Angeles was using Enrique Hernández as their fill-in shortstop, but he’s better suited for work at second or third base and around the outfield. While the Dodgers won’t expect much at the plate from Ahmed, he’s a two-time Gold Glove winner who remains a solid or better defensive shortstop.
Ahmed figures to play everyday until Rojas or Betts comes back. He starts tonight against his old Giants teammates and will take on Robbie Ray in the lefty’s season debut, tweets Juan Toribio of MLB.com. The Dodgers could theoretically look for middle infield help before next Tuesday’s deadline, although that hasn’t seemed to be a priority thus far. Betts is expected back sometime next month and should take shortstop back over headed into the postseason. The Dodgers seem more concerned with landing impact talent who could aid them in October rather than expending prospect capital for lower-ceiling players to bridge the gap in the regular season.
The Dodgers have a full 40-man roster, but they’re reportedly going to designate right-hander Ricky Vanasco for assignment. That was expected to be the corresponding move for Clayton Kershaw returning from the 60-day injured list tomorrow. The Dodgers could DFA Vanasco today and clear space for Kershaw tomorrow. Righty Kyle Hurt is undergoing Tommy John surgery and could be transferred to the 60-day injured list if the Dodgers don’t want to expose anyone to waivers.
MLB, MLBPA Agree To Redirect CBT Money To Teams Losing TV Revenue
MLB and the Players Association have agreed to a change to the collective bargaining agreement that’ll help teams whose television rights situations are uncertain. Evan Drellich of The Athletic reports that the league is now permitted to redirect its portion of competitive balance tax money to clubs that have lost TV revenue. Those teams can receive a maximum of $15MM or the necessary amount to compensate for their revenue drop.
Teams that exceed the competitive balance tax threshold are required to pay fees at the end of each season. The league and union split the money. The MLBPA’s portion funds its retirement accounts. That is unaffected by today’s agreement. The league now has the discretion to allocate some of its half of the money to clubs that have seen their TV revenues drop in either of the last two seasons. According to Drellich, the MLBPA projects the league’s half of the CBT payments to total around $150MM this year. Today’s agreement permits the commissioner’s office to distribute half that money to the teams affected by TV problems.
It’s a sensible arrangement for both parties. MLB gets more flexibility to support organizations that have lost some or all of a key revenue source in recent seasons. The union expects that’ll lead to a trickle-down benefit on player salaries. Last offseason, roughly a third of teams pointed to concerns about the long-term viability of their TV contracts as justification for limiting payroll raises or outright payroll cuts. Most of those organizations had contracts with Diamond Sports Group, which is trying to survive as it concludes a lengthy bankruptcy proceeding.
Diamond dropped its contracts with the Padres and Diamondbacks midway through last season. This spring, it renegotiated its deals with the Guardians, Twins and Rangers at lesser fees after threatening to abandon those contracts. Texas had a quieter offseason than expected for a defending World Series champion. Minnesota sliced payroll over the winter and its ownership is reportedly still reluctant to take on money via deadline deals. AT&T Sports dropped its local TV deals with the Rockies, Pirates, Mariners and Astros last offseason. Pittsburgh, Seattle and Houston found alternate broadcasting arrangements (likely with reduced revenues), while MLB stepped in to handle Rockies broadcasts within market.
A good number of teams remain skeptical about the long-term future of their regional sports networks. Diamond is carrying 12 teams on its networks at least through the end of this season. MLB has made no secret of its wariness about the broadcaster’s viability for ’25 and beyond.
Diamond’s ongoing conflict with Xfinity hasn’t done it any favors in that regard. A contract dispute between the broadcaster and the carrier has kept Xfinity customers from watching any games on Diamond networks since May. Blackout restrictions prevent MLB from stepping in to handle in-market broadcasts, leaving a subset of fans without the ability to watch their teams for a couple months.
There was a positive development on that front this morning. An attorney for Diamond said at today’s bankruptcy hearing that DSG and Xfinity had made progress in negotiations and expected to finalize a new contract “in the very near term” (link via Alden González of ESPN).
The A’s Difficult Deadline Decision
The A's are one of the few obvious sellers this summer. Oakland will certainly move some players by next Tuesday, but it's not clear if they'll dominate the trade market. The A's don't have anyone on significant long-term commitments that they'll be trying to offload. They could move a couple middle relievers and call it a deadline.
That's not all that interesting. Their bigger decisions will be whether to deal players under team control. They've reportedly set a massive demand on Mason Miller, whom they could stretch back into a rotation role next season. Miller has been the subject of a ton of trade speculation with good reason. There's been less chatter, at least publicly, about Brent Rooker.
The front office might have an even tougher call in the coming days regarding Rooker than they do with their star closer. Rooker has been one of the most productive offensive players in baseball over the past season and a half. He could be the best hitter traded. Yet his winding career arc makes him a tricky player to value -- potentially making it tough for the A's and other teams to align on an asking price.
Unlock Subscriber-Exclusive Articles Like This One With a Trade Rumors Front Office Subscription
- Access weekly subscriber-only articles by Tim Dierkes, Steve Adams, and Anthony Franco.
- Join exclusive weekly live chats with Anthony.
- Remove ads and support our writers.
- Access GM-caliber tools like our MLB Contract Tracker
KBO’s Doosan Bears Sign Jared Young
The Doosan Bears of the Korea Baseball Organization announced they’ve signed utilityman Jared Young (h/t to Jeeho Yoo of Yonhap News). The Old Dominion product had been playing in Triple-A with the Cardinals.
Young was a 15th round pick by the Cubs back in 2017. He reached the majors late in the 2022 season and appeared in 22 games over the next two years. The left-handed hitter ran a .210/.290/.435 line with a pair of home runs across 69 trips to the plate. Chicago placed Young on waivers at the start of last offseason. St. Louis nabbed him from their rival and successfully passed him through waivers during Spring Training.
Assigned to their top farm team in Memphis, Young was hitting .285/.411/.506. He connected on 11 homers and walked at a strong 14.3% clip against an 18.5% strikeout rate. The Cards never called him up, but his excellent work in the upper minors gets him a look in the KBO. That surely comes with a nice pay bump compared to his Triple-A salary.
KBO teams are only permitted to roster three foreign-born players. As a corresponding move for signing Young, they waived outfielder Henry Ramos. The 32-year-old signed with the Bears over the winter. He was hitting .306/.360/.482 in 80 games. That’s strong production, but Yoo notes (on X) that the Bears’ coaching staff has taken issue with Ramos’ defense and baserunning. A veteran of 12 minor league seasons, Ramos has logged brief MLB time with the Diamondbacks and Reds.
Royals Sign First-Round Pick Jac Caglianone
The Royals announced the signing of sixth overall pick Jac Caglianone. Caglianone receives a $7.5MM bonus, reports Jim Callis of MLB Pipeline (X link). The selection comes with a slot value of roughly $7.21MM.
Caglianone is a two-way player from the University of Florida. His higher upside professionally is as a position player. Caglianone topped 30 home runs in each of his final two seasons in Gainesville. He hit 35 longballs — second among Division I hitters behind #3 pick Charlie Condon’s 37 — with a .419/.544/.875 slash line as a junior. Caglianone walked at an 18.4% clip while striking out only 8.2% of the time. He has top-of-the-scale raw power that gives him the chance to hit in the middle of a lineup.
Nevertheless, pre-draft scouting reports raised some questions about his pure hitting ability. Baseball America and The Athletic’s Keith Law each pointed to concerns about Caglianone’s chase rate as well as a tendency to get pull-oriented in his swing. Caglianone is likely limited to first base defensively, so he’ll need to hit a lot to provide value.
He’s not as highly regarded as a pitching prospect. While he can run his fastball into the upper 90s, his subpar control points to a bullpen future. It seems likely the Royals will prioritize his offensive development in the hope that he moves quickly and establishes himself as a 30+ home run hitter.
Reds Likely To Trade From Bullpen Depth
The Reds are telling teams they plan to trade from their bullpen, report C. Trent Rosecrans and Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic. That is not yet a signal about their deadline direction, though. According to the report, Cincinnati anticipates having a bullpen surplus as they expect Emilio Pagán and Ian Gibaut to return from the injured list next month.
Cincinnati has somewhat quietly had one of the better bullpens in the league. Reds relievers rank seventh with a 3.52 earned run average and are eighth with a 24.5% strikeout rate. The relief group had been a recurring problem before turning into one of the team’s strengths this year. Swingman Nick Martinez has thrived when working from the ‘pen. Fernando Cruz has developed into one of the league’s better strikeout arms, while underrated lefty Sam Moll has continued to excel after coming over from the A’s at last year’s deadline.
The Reds don’t have a ton of maneuverability with their relief group. Cruz and Moll have locked down two spots with their performance. Closer Alexis Díaz has been inconsistent, but Cincinnati isn’t going to send him down. Justin Wilson, Buck Farmer and Lucas Sims all have the requisite service time to decline a minor league assignment. Cincinnati can’t option Tony Santillan back to the minors after selecting his contract two weeks ago.
That leaves one bullpen spot with a five-man rotation. Martinez is currently working from the starting five but could slide back to the ‘pen once Carson Spiers returns from the injured list. That’d essentially complete the bullpen without having any obvious candidates to bounce between Great American Ball Park and Triple-A Louisville.
If they needed a fresh arm at that point, the Reds could designate someone for assignment. While Farmer has a 2.80 ERA over 45 innings, his strikeout and walk profile is pedestrian. Santillan had spent virtually the entire season in Triple-A, but The Athletic writes that the Reds view him as a key piece and would not want to put him back on waivers. Cincinnati could get Gibaut, Pagán and lefty Brent Suter back from injury later in the season.
While they’ll likely deal with other injuries along the way, the Reds obviously won’t be able to make any trades after next Tuesday. It seems they’re preemptively trying to get something in return for at least one or two of their relievers rather than lose players via waivers in August. The most obvious candidates for such a move are their impending free agents: Sims, Farmer and Wilson.
None of that trio would bring back a significant return. Sims, who is playing on a $2.85MM arbitration salary, has the highest ceiling of that group. He misses bats and has worked in a high-leverage capacity for the last few seasons, but he issues too many walks to be an in-demand trade chip. Sims is handing out free passes at a 13% clip over 33 frames this year after walking more than 15% of batters faced last season.
Wilson missed virtually all of 2022-23 because of Tommy John surgery and a lat injury. He returned this year with his typical velocity and has fanned more than a quarter of opponents with a 5.2% walk rate. A .365 average on balls in play has led to an unimpressive 4.85 ERA, but the 36-year-old is a fine option for teams seeking another left-hander in middle relief. Wilson is making a $1.5MM base salary.
Martinez is making $14MM this year and has a $12MM player option for next season. He’s pitching well, turning in a 3.88 ERA with excellent control over 72 frames. The fairly lofty salary and ’25 player option could lead teams to look elsewhere, though. It’s also not clear if the Reds want to deal Martinez, whose versatility they could value if they still anticipate making a playoff push.
General manager Nick Krall told Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer yesterday that the front office had not decided on their overall deadline outlook. They’re five games under .500 and in last place in the NL Central, yet they’re within 4.5 games of a Wild Card spot in a wide open National League. Cincinnati’s game against the Braves tonight was rained out. They’ll make it up with a doubleheader on Wednesday. They play a weekend set in Tampa Bay and one game against the Cubs before the deadline.
Orioles To Select Chayce McDermott
The Orioles are calling up pitching prospect Chayce McDermott to start tomorrow’s game in Miami, manager Brandon Hyde informed the team’s beat (X link via Andy Kostka of the Baltimore Banner). The O’s need to add him to the 40-man roster.
It’s the first MLB call for McDermott, who turns 26 next month. The Astros took him in the fourth round of the 2021 draft out of Ball State. Houston shipped him to Baltimore as part of the three-team Trey Mancini deal the following summer. The 6’3″ righty has since developed into one of the O’s more talented minor league arms. Baseball America ranked him as the #6 prospect in the Baltimore system coming into this season.
McDermott had combined for a 3.10 ERA while striking out nearly 31% of batters faced at the top two minor league levels a year ago. He has spent all of this season with Triple-A Norfolk, working to a 3.96 earned run average across 20 outings. He easily leads all Triple-A pitchers with 129 strikeouts, fanning nearly a third of opponents.
BA credits McDermott with a mid-90s fastball that plays especially well at the top of the strike zone. That’s the best offering in a five-pitch mix. Whether McDermott sticks as a starter will be largely dependent on his command. He has had a hard time finding the strike zone this year, walking more than 13% of opponents. Free passes have been an issue throughout his minor league career and could point to an eventual bullpen role.
McDermott’s first look comes from the rotation, though it might not be more than a spot start. Baltimore could add a starter to slot in behind Corbin Burnes and Grayson Rodriguez before next Tuesday’s deadline. The O’s could then option McDermott back to Norfolk or give him an opportunity to carve out a bullpen role for the stretch run. They had needed to add him to the 40-man roster by next offseason to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft. Their 40-man is at capacity and they don’t have any candidates for a move to the 60-day injured list, so they’re likely to designate someone for assignment tomorrow.