Latest On Giants’ Managerial Opening
Before the Athletics’ season ended earlier this week, quality control coach Mark Kotsay made it known he’d be interested in managing a major league club in 2020. A few days later, at least one team is showing significant interest in Kotsay. He’s “a strong candidate” for the Bay Area rival Giants, per Jon Heyman of MLB Network.
Based on Heyman’s report, it seems Kotsay will be one of the six to eight external managerial candidates Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi interviews as he seeks a successor to outgoing potential Hall of Famer Bruce Bochy. The Giants have also been linked to former major league outfielder and current Dodgers special assistant Raul Ibanez, who’s believed to be close to the top of Zaidi’s list, Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports California writes.
Like Ibanez, Kotsay’s an ex-MLB outfielder with no managerial experience. But while Ibanez has no coaching experience in the bigs, the 43-year-old Kotsay has filled multiple roles on staffs since his playing career ended in 2013. Kotsay worked as a hitting coach with the Padres prior to joining the Athletics ahead of the 2016 season. He served as the A’s bench coach that year before eventually shifting to his current role in advance of the ’18 campaign.
Padres Could Pursue Joe Maddon
The Angels look like the front-runners to land coveted free-agent manager Joe Maddon, but the Padres are also considering a pursuit of the 65-year-old. They’re “doing background work on” Maddon, Jon Heyman of MLB Network tweets.
The well-respected Maddon, who has enjoyed outstanding runs atop the Rays and Cubs, looks like a logical target for the Padres on paper. The club did just wrap up a dismal 70-92 season, its 13th straight year without a playoff berth. However, the Padres plan on finally pushing to contend in 2020, and they’d reportedly prefer an experienced manager to replace the fired Andy Green. Furthermore, executive chairman Ron Fowler spoke out in disgust this week over the Padres’ results this year, which seems to indicate they’ll be active this offseason as they seek a return to relevance.
Whether the Padres end up hiring Maddon, fellow potential candidate Brad Ausmus or someone else, that individual will be joining a franchise with at least a few enviable building blocks on hand. The left side of the Padres’ infield is in great shape with shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr. and third baseman Manny Machado, while right-hander Chris Paddack is coming off a tremendous rookie season. The Padres also continue to boast one of the majors’ most loaded farm systems. At the same time, though, there are quite a few roster needs to address for a team that has resided at the bottom of the MLB standings for far too long.
MLBTR Poll: Edwin Encarnacion’s Option
The Yankees continued their long-running October dominance of the Twins on Friday, earning a 10-4 victory en route to a 1-0 advantage in the teams’ American League Division Series matchup. Designated hitter Edwin Encarnacion factored into the Yankees’ blowout win, collecting two doubles and a run batted in across five at-bats. The accomplished Encarnacion obviously hopes to pick up his first World Series ring in the next few weeks, but no matter how the team’s season ends, the Yankees will soon face an interesting decision in regards to his future.
Encarnacion, whom the Yankees stunningly acquired from the Mariners back in June, slashed .249/.325/.531 with 13 home runs in 197 plate appearances after donning the pinstripes. Between the two teams, the 36-year-old concluded his regular season with a .244/.344/.531 line and 34 HRs over 456 trips to the plate. It’s all the more laudable that Encarnacion smacked 30-plus homers for the eighth straight year despite missing extended time with injuries (a fractured wrist and a strained oblique).
Youth isn’t on his side, but it’s clear Encarnacion is still a formidable presence at the plate. Nevertheless, he’s far from a lock to remain with the Yankees in 2020. They do control Encarnacion through next season, though retaining him would be costly. Yankees general manager Brian Cashman will have to choose whether to exercise Encarnacion’s $20MM club option or buy him out for $5MM. For all we know, Encarnacion will go on a postseason rampage in the next few weeks, but that doesn’t mean it’ll influence Cashman’s thinking. He did, after all, allow aging stars Hideki Matsui and Johnny Damon to walk in free agency after the franchise’s most recent World Series title in 2009. Even Matsui’s MVP honors in the Fall Classic weren’t enough for the Yankees to re-sign him.
New York certainly has the financial might to keep Encarnacion around, but it also possesses several in-house options who could fill the DH role in a year. First basemen Luke Voit and Mike Ford figure to stay in the fold at league-minimum sums, while anyone in the Yankees’ outfield surplus could also see a fair amount of time at the spot. Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Hicks seem likely to return as the club’s top three outfielders in 2020, but Clint Frazier and Mike Tauchman might also figure prominently into its plans. And the Yankees may choose to re-sign pending free agent Brett Gardner, quietly one of the most productive outfielders in franchise history, to remain a member of a crowded alignment in the grass.
Beyond the Yankees’ group of outfielders, let’s not forget about the presence of third baseman Miguel Andujar, who may be best served as a DH. Andujar thrived at the plate as a rookie in 2018 before missing almost all of this season because of a shoulder injury, but he was often maligned for his defense at the hot corner last year. With the emergence of low-cost replacement Gio Urshela at third this season, the Yankees could envision plenty of DH at-bats for Andujar in 2020.
Aside from Judge and Stanton, nobody from the abovementioned collection of names packs the punch Encarnacion does. However, the Yankees wouldn’t be unrealistic in expecting quality offensive production from any of them, and letting Encarnacion go would open up spending room elsewhere (Astros co-ace/potential $200MM free agent Gerrit Cole looks like a fit on paper, for example). As of now, what do you expect to happen with Encarnacion in the offseason?
(Poll link for app users)
Predict Edwin Encarnacion's Future
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The Yankees will buy him out 72% (5,005)
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The Yankees will exercise his option 28% (1,949)
Total votes: 6,954
Buck Showalter Interested In Managing Mets
The Mets, currently on the heels of their third straight non-playoff season, are on the hunt for a new manager. In what could be fortunate news for the club, one of the most respected skippers of the past couple decades, Buck Showalter, has interest in the job.
In regards to the position, Showalter told Steve Somers of WFAN: “Yeah, I’d like to be talked about it, but I’m not going to campaign about it, and I’m real uncomfortable even talking about it with you now because there’s a lot of good people out there and they’re going to make a good decision. They’ll have reasons why and why not, and, you know, I respect that.”
The 63-year-old Showalter would give the Mets a proven manager, which is something they didn’t have in the just-fired Mickey Callaway, who came with no experience in the role when they hired him. Showalter has guided the Yankees, Diamondbacks, Rangers and Orioles for a combined 20 years, amassing a 1,551-1,517 regular-season record with five playoff berths and three Manager of the Year awards. He sat out this season after the Orioles, who were in the incipient stages of a full rebuild, ousted him in the wake of a 47-win showing in 2018.
The O’s were blowing it up when they got rid of Showalter, whereas the Mets are trying to ascend as quickly as possible. The team rebounded from a horrendous start this year to finish with 86 wins in 2019, though that wasn’t enough to save Callaway. Now, after turning to the neophyte Callaway in its previous managerial search two years ago, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see the Mets opt for an experienced hand to steer the ship this time. As of now, though, there’s no word on whether general manager Brodie Van Wagenen & Co. are interested in speaking with Showalter.
Each NL Playoff Team’s Most Valuable Signing Of Last Offseason
This is the second in a two-part series examining each playoff team’s most valuable free-agent signing of last offseason. We previously took a look at the American League, whose playoff qualifiers probably received more regular-season bang for their buck from their top signings than the NL’s five best teams did.
Dodgers: A.J. Pollock, OF (four years, $60MM)
- We’ll start with a debatable case. The uber-rich Dodgers signed just two players to guaranteed deals last winter, when they landed Pollock and reliever Joe Kelly, and neither lived up to expectations during the regular season. But Pollock was probably the better of the two, as the ex-Diamondback hit .266/.327/.468 with 15 home runs in 342 plate appearances during yet another injury-limited campaign. Those are solid offensive numbers, though Pollock did have a rough time in the outfield, where the normally plus defender totaled minus-10 DRS and a minus-7.2 UZR. Although he and Kelly haven’t exactly thrived this year, it hasn’t stopped juggernaut LA from logging the NL’s top record or a 1-0 lead in its NLDS matchup against Washington
Braves: Josh Donaldson, 3B (one year, $23MM)
- Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos elected to reunite with Donaldson, whom he know from their Toronto days, on a high-cost, short-term contract last offseason. Now, it’s fair to say Donaldson’s one of the main reasons the Braves won their division for the second year in a row. The 33-year-old recovered from two consecutive injury-marred seasons to hit .259/.379/.521 with 37 homers and 4.9 fWAR across 659 PA. As one of the top soon-to-be free agents in the game, Donaldson could leave Atlanta in the coming weeks via the open market (this time for far more money).
Cardinals: Andrew Miller, LHP (two years, $25MM)
- The 34-year-old Miller wins this honor by default – he was the lone player the Cardinals added on a major league contract during the offseason, and none of their minors signings stood out at the MLB level. Miller wasn’t exactly stellar in his own right, though, as the former bullpen force mustered an unattractive 4.45 ERA/5.19 FIP in 54 2/3 innings. While Miller continued to fan hitters at a high rate, striking out 11.52 per nine, he somewhat offset that figure with his highest BB/9 (4.45) since 2013. Miller was also susceptible to the home run ball during the regular season, when he yielded a personal-worst 1.81 per nine, perhaps thanks in part to his lowest average fastball velocity in years (92.5 mph).
Nationals: Patrick Corbin, LHP (six years, $140MM)
- Aside from the much-ballyhooed Bryce Harper–Manny Machado duo, no player received a bigger contract last offseason than Corbin. The ex-Diamondback enjoyed a career year in 2018, thus making a case for a massive payday, and he hasn’t disappointed since the Nationals gave him one. Corbin, 30, is fresh off an eminently successful regular season in which he recorded a 3.25 ERA/3.49 FIP with 10.6 K/9, 3.12 BB/9, a 49.5 percent groundball rate and 4.8 fWAR across 202 innings. He turned in another effective performance in Game 1 of the NLDS for the Nationals, holding the Dodgers to three hits and two runs (one earned) over six frames, though the Nats went on to lose.
Brewers: Yasmani Grandal, C (one year, $18.25MM)
- Grandal, who starred with the Dodgers from 2015-18, fell into the Brewers’ laps last January after rejecting a far more lucrative offer from the Mets. It proved to be a major break for the Brewers, with whom Grandal posted yet another strong regular season. The 30-year-old switch-hitter slashed .246/.380/.468 with 5.2 fWAR and a career-high 28 home runs in 632 PA. At the same time, Grandal continued his long run as one of the game’s most well-regarded defensive backstops. Unfortunately for the Brewers, whom the Nats eliminated in the wild-card round, it seems likely Grandal’s days in their uniform are over. He figures to turn down his half of a $16MM mutual option for 2020 in favor of another stab at free agency, where he’ll easily rank as the most coveted catcher available. If a bidding war for Grandal’s services occurs, the Brewers probably aren’t going to win it.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Each AL Playoff Team’s Most Valuable Signing Of Last Offseason
This is the first in a two-part series examining each playoff team’s most valuable free-agent signing of last offseason. We’ll start in the American League, which featured three 100-win clubs during the regular campaign. Interestingly, none of those teams (or the other two AL playoff qualifiers) broke the bank on their top free-agent additions of 2019. In fact, the five barely combine for a guaranteed $100MM over the life of their contracts.
Astros: Michael Brantley, OF (two years, $32MM)
- This was one of the richest contracts doled out last offseason, but it looks like a steal for the Astros halfway through. Brantley has long been a quality contributor in the majors, including in his final season with the Indians in 2018, but there was wariness over him after injuries wiped out the majority of his 2016-17 campaigns. But Brantley’s now coming off his second straight healthy regular season, in which he earned his fourth All-Star nod and slashed .311/.372/.503 with a personal-high 22 home runs and 4.2 fWAR in 637 plate appearances. Brantley logged a career-best .190 ISO in the process, though he didn’t sell out for more power at the expense of his strikeout rate. The 32-year-old fanned in a mere 10.4 percent of trips to the plate, continuing a career-long trend of avoiding strikeouts. Brantley was no slouch in the corner outfield either, posting eight Defensive Runs Saved and a plus-1.1 Ultimate Zone Rating.
Yankees: DJ LeMahieu, INF (two years, $24MM)
- There was plenty of speculation linking the Yankees to free agent Manny Machado early last offseason. The deep-pocketed Yankees needed infield help, after all, and Machado was the premier player available in that area. In the end, though, New York didn’t aggressively pursue Machado, who wound up signing a 10-year, $300MM contract with the Padres. Rather, the Yankees took a much cheaper route to address their infield, adding the ex-Rockie LeMahieu on a short-term pact. It has worked out unbelievably well thus far for the Yankees, who received much better production from LeMahieu than the Padres got from Machado. After a regular season in which he saw significant action at three infield spots (first, second and third) and hit a career-high .327/.375/.518 with a personal-best 26 home runs and 5.4 fWAR across 655 PA, LeMahieu could get some AL MVP votes.
Twins: Nelson Cruz, DH (one year, $14.3MM)
- Although he turned 39 years old during the summer, Cruz continued to prove that age is just a number (in his case at least). The longtime offensive force missed some time with injuries, yet he still led the Twins with 41 homers over 521 PA. That’s especially impressive considering Minnesota smashed an all-time record 307 dingers during a regular season in which the home run dominated MLB. Along with amassing 40-plus HRs for the fourth time in his career, Cruz notched a .311/.392/.639 line with 4.3 fWAR and trailed only MVP candidates Mike Trout, Christian Yelich and Alex Bregman in wRC+ (163). Whenever the Twins’ season ends, they’ll face a decision on whether to exercise a $12MM club option on Cruz for 2020. Picking it up for his age-40 season should be a no-brainer.
Rays: Charlie Morton, RHP (two years, $30MM):
- Tampa Bay didn’t exactly splurge on Morton, a Houston hero over the previous couple seasons, but the deal the club gave him is extremely expensive by the low-budget Rays’ standards. It’s been a tremendous investment so far for the Rays, with whom the late-blooming Morton rode his fastball/curve combination to his best regular season yet. The 35-year-old racked up 194 2/3 innings of 3.05 ERA/2.81 FIP pitching with a jaw-dropping 11.1 K.9, 2.64 BB/9 and a 48.2 percent groundball rate. That production was especially beneficial to a Tampa Bay team that lost fellow front-line starters Tyler Glasnow and Blake Snell for extended periods of time. And Morton, who finished sixth among all pitchers in fWAR (6.1), helped pitch the Rays to the ALDS with five innings of one-run ball in their wild-card win over the A’s.
Athletics: Brett Anderson, LHP (one year, $1.5MM):
- By far the least expensive and least exciting player on this list, Anderson was among a couple offseason signings who turned in quality results for the low-payroll Athletics. But the A’s probably got more bang from their buck out of Anderson than anyone else they signed, as he posted a 3.89 ERA with a 54.5 percent groundball rate and 2.51 walks per nine over 176 innings. The rest of Anderson’s numbers were decidedly less encouraging, and it seems likely the now-eliminated Athletics will move on from him, but you can’t argue with the bottom-line production the 31-year-old offered in 2019 for such a low cost.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Dick Williams On Reds’ Offseason Plans
Reds president of baseball operations Dick Williams has made it known that the club’s front office is entering the offseason focused on building a playoff-caliber team for 2020. The Reds have failed in that regard six straight times, but the team aims to bolster its playoff chances for next season by upping its payroll. Williams explained the Reds’ approach to the upcoming offseason in an expansive Q&A with C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic (subscription required). It’s worth reading in full, but we’ll touch on a few of the highlights here.
[RELATED – Three Needs: Cincinnati Reds]
Cincinnati made almost all of its notable additions on the trade market last winter, picking up several household names (including right-hander Sonny Gray, who was superb this season). That continued into the summer with their acquisition of righty Trevor Bauer, who will join Gray, Luis Castillo and Anthony DeSclafani as locks for next year’s rotation. The Reds remain open to bettering their roster via trades now, but it seems an ideal scenario for Williams would be for him and general manager Nick Krall to make most of their hay in free agency.
Williams told Rosecrans he expects Cincy will “be aggressive in trying to get some guys in free agency.” That’s a drastic change from last offseason, when the Reds’ lone guaranteed contract went to lefty reliever Zach Duke. That $2MM signing didn’t pan out, leading the Reds to release Duke in July.
While Duke struggled as part of the Reds’ bullpen, fellow relievers Raisel Iglesias, Amir Garrett, Michael Lorenzen, Robert Stephenson and Matt Bowman each gave he club respectable or better production. All five of those hurlers are slated to return in 2020, though the Reds still “want to make sure we’re doing everything we can to improve the bullpen,” according to Williams.
Upgrading starting depth, defense and team speed are also on the Reds’ to-do list, but there probably won’t be a bigger winter priority for the team than improving its offense. The Reds ended the year 25th in the majors in both runs scored (701) and wRC+ (87), and only third baseman Eugenio Suarez and the young outfield duo of Aristides Aquino and Jesse Winker provided well-above-average numbers over a sizable sample of plate appearances.
Aquino, 25, started his career on an offensive rampage after an Aug. 1 promotion. He was a home run threat just about every time he stepped to the plate for a few weeks, becoming the fastest player ever to ever hit 15 (he did so in 122 PA). Aquino wound up with a prolific 19 in 225 trips to the plate, though his overall output tailed off badly over the final couple weeks of the campaign. Perhaps as a result of that, the Reds don’t want to gift him a starting spot in right field for next season.
“He’s going to have to continue to earn it and improve and build and we will take the approach in the offseason that the outfield as a whole, you know, we will be trying to add,” said Williams.
The Reds’ outfield next year could also continue to include Nick Senzel, a high-end infield prospect who transferred to center this season. Cincy was impressed with Senzel’s work in his first outfield action in the bigs, but Williams values Senzel’s flexibility and doesn’t want to commit to a 2020 position for him just yet. Whether the Reds add a starting-level second baseman or pick up a No. 1-caliber center fielder figures to influence where Senzel will primarily line up in a year. Indeed, the Reds’ middle infield “needs to be figured out,” acknowledged Williams, who revealed the Reds will “look into” re-signing pending free-agent shortstop Jose Iglesias. The light-hitting, defensively adept Iglesias proved to be a shrewd minor league signing for the club going into this season, but his ceiling isn’t particularly high. With that in mind, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see the Reds let him walk and pursue better options than him and the controllable talent on hand (namely Freddy Galvis and Jose Peraza).
Between Suarez at the hot corner and Joey Votto at first, the rest of the team’s starting infield appears etched in stone going into 2020. Elsewhere, while Williams regards catchers Tucker Barnhart and Curt Casali as starting-caliber backstops, he admitted that “we could look to get more offensively out of the catching.” Big-hitting catcher Yasmani Grandal, a former Reds farmhand, headlines the class of backstops who are about to reach free agency. He has already been linked to the Reds in the rumor mill this week.
Regardless of whether the Reds try to reunite with Grandal, it appears they’re shaping up to have one of the league’s most active offseasons. There’s “a strong emphasis on trying to win now,” Williams declared. “And win in the short term. We believe we will build a postseason team for 2020.”
A’s Rumors: Treinen, Profar, Pending FAs
We’ve seen quite a bit of news on the Athletics since their season ended with Wednesday’s wild-card loss to the Rays. Here’s even more on the A’s, courtesy of Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle (links here):
- It’s “likely” the Athletics will non-tender or trade right-handed reliever Blake Treinen, according to Slusser, who also names second baseman Jurickson Profar as someone who’s in danger of winding up on the outs. Just a year ago at this time, Treinen was coming off perhaps one of the greatest seasons a reliever has ever posted. It would have unthinkable then that the A’s would be considering cutting the cord on him 12 months later, but it’s now understandable in light of his rough 2019. Injuries limited Treinen to 58 2/3 innings, and his numbers declined across the board when he was able to take the mound. Treinen recorded a 4.91 ERA/5.14 FIP with 9.05 K/9 and 5.68 BB/9 before his season ended in mid-September because of a stress reaction in his back. Although Treinen lost his job as the A’s closer this year, the saves he has amassed will help him in the arbitration process, where he’d be in line to collect a raise over the $6.4MM he earned in 2019. But the low-budget A’s could simply choose to walk away from the 31-year-old after his nightmarish campaign.
- Profar, like Treinen, entered the season as a player the A’s were counting on to successfully fill a big role. After acquiring the switch-hitter from the Rangers last winter, Oakland gave Profar ample opportunity to build on a career-best 2018 this season. Instead, Profar stumbled to an uninspiring .218/.301/.410 batting line in 518 plate appearances and earned negative grades at the keystone (minus-10 DRS, minus-1 UZR). The 26-year-old, who made $3.6MM in ’19, has one more season of arbitration eligibility remaining.
- The Athletics may have too many starters lined up for 2020 to justify re-signing pending free-agent left-hander Brett Anderson. The same likely goes for fellow soon-to-be FA starters Homer Bailey and Tanner Roark, Slusser suggests. The A’s acquired both righties over the summer, and the team ended up receiving surprisingly decent production from Bailey after years of struggles with multiple franchises. The 33-year-old Bailey, who told Slusser he “really enjoyed” his stint as an Athletic, pitched to a 4.30 ERA with 8.3 K/9 and 1.8 BB/9 across 73 1/3 innings in their uniform. Roark managed similar numbers in his 55 frames as a member of the club, with which he notched a 4.58 ERA and put up 8.2 K/9 and 2.1 BB/9.
- Lefty reliever Jake Diekman, yet another in-season trade pickup, could also depart in the next several weeks. However, the A’s at least figure to discuss retaining him, Slusser relays. He has a $5.75MM mutual option (or a $500K buyout) for next season. Diekman struggled mightily with his control as an Athletic this year, though, as he issued 16 walks, allowed 16 hits and yielded 10 earned runs in a 20 1/3-inning sample.
- This was a stunningly poor season for designated hitter Khris Davis, whom the team signed to a two-year, $33.5MM extension in April. At that point, Davis was coming off three consecutive 40-home run seasons and a remarkable four straight in which he batted .247. Both streaks came to an end this year, in which Davis hit .220/.293/.387 with 23 HRs in 533 trips to the plate as he dealt with injuries. But Davis “wasn’t injured at the end of the year,” said manager Bob Melvin, who expects a bounce-back performance from the slugger in 2020. Executive vice president Billy Beane shares Melvin’s optimism, saying he looks for a return to Davis’ “annual 40 homers, .247” next year.
NL Notes: Giants, Cole, Mets, Cone, Rockies
It’s up in the air whether the Giants are in for a big-spending offseason, though it appears arguably the game’s top soon-to-be free agent would be open to playing for them. Astros right-hander Gerrit Cole has interest in the Giants, Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle reports. While Cole’s brother-in-law, shortstop Brandon Crawford, plays for the Giants, Schulman notes he’s not the source of this information. A Cole signing, which could require a commitment in the neighborhood of $200MM, would give a San Francisco team that could lose pending free agent Madison Bumgarner a much-needed ace. Considering the cost, it would also be somewhat of an out-of-character transaction for Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi. Back when Zaidi was the general manager of the ultra-rich Dodgers, they never even inked anyone to a nine-figure guarantee. However, in Zaidi’s first offseason with the Giants last winter, they did make an effort to reel in free-agent outfielder Bryce Harper. The Giants reportedly discussed a decade-long pact with Harper before he signed a 13-year, $330MM contract with the Phillies.
Here’s more on a couple other NL teams…
- Retired right-hander and current YES Network announcer David Cone told Joel Sherman of the New York Post he’s interested in becoming a major league manager or pitching coach, though he’s not “actively campaigning” for a job. Specifically, Cone would like to take over for the fired Mickey Callaway as the manager of the Mets, with whom Cone starred from 1987-1992 and finished his playing career in 2003. “If someone asks you for an interview with the Yankees or Mets, it is simple, you say, ‘yes,’” said Cone, who did have a phone conversation with general manager Brian Cashman in regards to the Yankees’ then-vacant managerial position in 2017. That was not a formal interview, though, and the role ultimately went to Aaron Boone. Cone has since remained in the YES booth, where he regularly incorporates analytics into his work. The 56-year-old’s modern approach to the game could potentially put him on teams’ radars, though his lack of coaching and front office experience may give clubs pause. As of now, there’s no indication any team is considering Cone for one of his desired roles.
- Rockies reliever Bryan Shaw just wrapped up his second straight disappointing season, but there was “some deadline interest” in him over the summer, Thomas Harding of MLB.com writes. Just as no trade came together then, it seems doubtful to happen going forward. For one, Shaw has logged a brutal 5.61 ERA/5.07 FIP with 7.96 K/9 and 4.05 BB/9 in his two-season, 126 2/3-inning Rockies tenure. He’s owed another $9MM in 2020 on top of it, and there’s an incentive in his deal that could turn a $9MM club option for 2021 into a guarantee. That’ll happen if Shaw appears in 40 games next year and finishes the season healthy. The 31-year-old racked up 70 appearances in 2019, so it would take a drastic fall in usage to prevent his ’21 option from vesting.
Braves’ Chris Martin Likely Out For Rest Of Postseason
10:59pm: Atlanta’s “likely” to replace Martin with Teheran, per Bowman.
9:20pm: The Braves lost Game 1 after a bullpen implosion, and it appears they’ll have to go the rest of the playoffs without Martin. Expectations are he’s done for the postseason, David O’Brien of The Athletic tweets. It’s not known yet who will replace Martin on Atlanta’s roster.
7:22pm: As of this writing, Atlanta’s bullpen just blew a late lead over St. Louis in the first game of the National League Division Series. The two teams are heading to the bottom of the eighth inning tied at three. The Braves had a 3-1 advantage entering the top of the frame, which turned into a catastrophe for the club. It began when right-hander Chris Martin, whom the Braves initially called on to preserve the lead, exited with tightness in his left oblique, Mark Bowman of MLB.com was among those to report.
Martin left prior to throwing a pitch, leading the Braves to turn to righty Luke Jackson, who struggled over two-thirds of an inning before they pulled him. His replacement, Mark Melancon, also failed to get the job done.
Considering oblique injuries often require absences of at least a few weeks, it seems possible Martin won’t pitch again this season. That would be an awful development for the Braves, who acquired Martin in July with the hope he’d carry his impressive first few months with Texas to Atlanta. It turns out the 33-year-old hasn’t been quite as effective as a Brave, as his ERA has climbed a full run from 3.08 to 4.08, though he did end the regular season in excellent fashion. Martin threw 5 1/3 innings of two-hit ball with no walks and eight strikeouts in September.
Between his two teams this year, Martin posted a fantastic 65 strikeouts against five free passes over 55 2/3 innings. Martin will try to parlay that production into a nice payday when he reaches free agency after the season. In the meantime, the Braves can ill afford to lose him as they attempt to push for a World Series. If Martin is in for a lengthy absence, though, they may end up having to call on one of Julio Teheran, Anthony Swarzak, Jerry Blevins, Kyle Wright or Bryse Wilson – all of whom were left off their NLDS roster.