Marlins Designate Kyle Tyler For Assignment
The Marlins announced Friday that they’ve designated right-hander Kyle Tyler for assignment. His spot on the roster will go to lefty Kent Emanuel, whose contract has again been selected from Triple-A Jacksonville. Miami also optioned righties Darren McCaughan and Emmanuel Ramirez to Jacksonville and added recent waiver claims Brett de Geus and John McMillon to the active roster. Isaac Azout of Fish On First reported earlier today that McMillon, de Geus and Emanuel would be joining the Marlins’ big league roster.
Tyler, 27, has pitched 31 2/3 innings for the Fish this season and limped to a 5.40 ERA. His 17.6% strikeout rate is nearly five percentage points shy of average, and he’s walked an unpalatable 12.7% of his opponents as well. It’s the third season of big league experience for Tyler, a 17th-round pick of the Angels back in 2018. He’s also suited up more briefly for both the Halos and Padres. In 48 career innings, he has a 4.31 ERA, 15.9% strikeout rate and 12% walk rate. The right-hander sits in the low 90s with a four-seamer and cutter, and he also works in a roughly 82 mph slider and 77 mph curveball to round out his arsenal.
While Tyler hasn’t pitched well in the big leagues, he sports a decent Triple-A track record and has been doing his best work at that level in 2024. He’s tossed 50 innings with Jacksonville and logged a 3.06 earned run average with a 21.6% strikeout rate and 10.3% walk rate. The Oklahoma native is in the second of three minor league option years and has experience working as both a starter and reliever. He’s been starting recently for the Marlins and is stretched out to the point where he tossed 84 pitches in his last outing and has recently climbed as high as 94 pitches. A team seeking rotation depth could place a claim. The Marlins will place him on outright waivers or release him by next week.
As for Emanuel, this will be the fifth time Miami has selected the left-hander’s contract in 2024 alone. He’s been designated for assignment and outrighted a remarkable four times already this season but has accepted the assignment to Jacksonville each time.
Emanuel signed a minor league deal over the winter and in four previous stints this season has combined to allow seven earned runs in 9 1/3 innings. He’s struggled in Triple-A as well, working to a 6.15 ERA in 45 1/3 innings. Given the Marlins’ prior usage of the lefty, it could very well be another brief stay on the roster. It’s probably not the way he’d have preferred to go about it, but Emanuel has picked up more than three weeks of big league service time and big league pay this year while ping-ponging back and forth between Jacksonville and Miami.
Cubs, Josh Staumont Agree To Deal
The Cubs have agreed to a deal with free-agent righty Josh Staumont, reports Darren Wolfson of KSTP and SKOR North Radio. The Twins released Staumont recently after designating him for assignment. He’s headed to the Cubs’ Triple-A affiliate in Iowa.
Staumont, 30, pitched to a solid 3.70 ERA in 24 1/3 frames with Minnesota prior to being cut loose, but his velocity was down considerably from peak levels and he managed that run-prevention mark in spite of a rough strikeout and walk rates. The now-former Twins and Royals right-hander fanned just 17.6% of his opponents — well below league-average and well below the 26.2% mark he carried into the season. The dip in strikeouts didn’t come with improved command, either. Staumont, who walked 13% of his opponents with the Royals between 2019-23, issued a free pass to 13.7% of his opponents with the Twins. His 5.06 SIERA casts a far less encouraging picture than his baseline ERA.
Even with sub-par command, Staumont at one point looked to be breaking out as a solid member of the Kansas City bullpen in 2020-21. The 2015 second-rounder pitched 91 1/3 innings out of the Royals’ bullpen between those two seasons and turned in a sharp 2.76 ERA with an impressive 29% strikeout rate and 11.4% walk rate. Staumont averaged better than 98 mph in 2020 and just shy of 97 mph in 2021. Injuries have since taken their toll, however. He’s missed time with biceps, knee, calf and a pair of neck injuries all since 2021, and his 2023 season ended when he underwent thoracic outlet surgery last summer.
The Twins inked Staumont to a one-year, $950K contract in free agency over the winter. They’re on the hook for the remainder of that sum, minus the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the Cubs’ big league roster (which would be paid by Chicago). If Staumont makes it up to the majors with the Cubs and impresses them, he’ll be eligible for arbitration once more this winter and could thus be retained through the 2025 season.
Marlins Claim Xzavion Curry, Designate Shaun Anderson
The Marlins have claimed right-hander Xzavion Curry off waivers from the Guardians, the teams announced Friday. Cleveland designated Curry for assignment earlier in the week. In order to open space on the 40-man roster, Miami designated righty Shaun Anderson for assignment.
Curry, who recently turned 26, was the organization’s seventh-round pick back in 2019. He made his big league debut in 2022 and has ranked as highly as No. 22 in the Guardians’ farm system on Baseball America’s prospect rankings. Despite that, however, he’s yet to find much success in the majors. He’s logged 129 innings and yielded a 4.53 ERA, including a particularly tough 5.84 mark in this year’s 24 2/3 innings. Curry has a strong 7.3% walk rate in the majors but a lackluster 15.2% strikeout rate. He’s seen both his 92-93 mph fastball and his curveball hit hard by big leaguers — particularly the latter (.321/.355/.607).
He hasn’t fared particularly well in Triple-A either, but Curry had solid numbers up through Double-A, has good command of the strike zone and is in the second of three minor league option years. He’ll give Miami some length in the bullpen or an option to step into a rotation that’s been depleted by myriad injuries and the deadline trade of southpaw Trevor Rogers.
Miami acquired the 29-year-old Anderson in a cash swap with the Rangers back in May. He’s been up and down a couple times with the Fish but been tagged for an ugly 13 runs in just 10 2/3 innings. The well-traveled righty has fared far better in Triple-A this season, with a 2.42 ERA and 45-to-11 K/BB ratio in 48 1/3 frames. The Marlins are Anderson’s seventh big league club. He’s pitched 149 2/3 innings in the majors but struggled to a 6.19 ERA in that time. Anderson has a nice Triple-A track record (3.66 ERA, 20.7 K%, 7.4 BB% in six seasons) but hasn’t managed to carry that over to the big leagues yet.
Now that the trade deadline has passed, Anderson will be placed on outright waivers or release waivers by next week.
Yankees Acquire Cam Eden From Blue Jays
The Yankees announced Friday that they’ve acquired outfielder Cam Eden in a trade sending cash back to the Blue Jays. He’s been assigned to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre for the time being.
Eden, 26, was Toronto’s sixth-round pick back in 2019. He briefly made his big league debut late last season, appearing in five games and going 1-for-6 with a pair of strikeouts. The Jays removed him from the 40-man roster after the season, outrighting him to Triple-A Buffalo. Because Eden was not on the Jays’ 40-man roster at any point this season, he’s eligible to be traded even after the major league trade deadline.
[Related: How to Acquire Players After the MLB Trade Deadline]
While Eden isn’t likely to factor heavily into the Yankees’ plans down the stretch, he’s a Triple-A piece at a time when Everson Pereira is out for the season and Jasson Dominguez could soon get a call to the big leagues. Eden is also a potential bench/pinch-running option in September or even in the postseason, if the Yankees choose to dedicate a roster spot to someone with that type of specialized skill set. He’s hitting just .198/.299/.322 with a 27.4% strikeout rate this season, but he’s also swiped 26 bags in 33 tries. This is his second run through the Triple-A level; Eden hit .257/.354/.333 there last year and stole 53 bases in 57 attempts.
Eden has played all three outfield spots in his pro career. The Cal product has spent the bulk of his time in center field. FanGraphs Eric Longenhagen ranked him at the back of the Jays’ top-34 prospects back in 2022, touting Eden’s plus speed, quick first step in center and baserunning acumen — while also noting that lack of offensive upside that limits his ceiling.
Joe Ryan Diagnosed With Grade 2 Teres Major Strain
The Twins received bad news following right-hander Joe Ryan‘s MRI, as he’s been diagnosed with a Grade 2 teres major strain that’ll threaten the remainder of his season, manager Rocco Baldelli announced to the Twins beat this morning (X link via Do-Hyoung Park of MLB.com). It’s a more serious injury than the Twins initially anticipated, and while Baldelli didn’t entirely rule Ryan out for the remainder of the season, he acknowledged that it’ll take “weeks to months” for the right-hander to recover.
Ryan is headed to the 15-day IL for now, and the Twins have also selected the contract of right-hander Scott Blewett from Triple-A St. Paul in his place. Right-hander Brock Stewart, who is headed for season-ending shoulder surgery, was placed on the 60-day IL to open a spot for Blewett. Minnesota also reinstated infielder Kyle Farmer from the injured list, placed infielder Brooks Lee on the 15-day IL due to biceps tendinitis, and called up right-hander Louie Varland as the 27th man for their pivotal doubleheader against the division-leading Guardians.
The injury for Ryan is a gut-punch to a Twins club that was unable to acquire a starting pitcher prior to the trade deadline and has already seen its rotation depth stretched thin. The 28-year-old Ryan has been perhaps their steadiest starter in 2024, logging 135 innings of 3.60 ERA ball with a strong 27.3% strikeout rate against an outstanding 4.3% walk rate. He’s been a fixture in the Twins’ rotation since being acquired from the Rays in exchange for Nelson Cruz at the 2021 trade deadline, making 84 starts with a 3.92 ERA and consistently strong strikeout and walk rates.
With Ryan joining Chris Paddack and Anthony DeSclafani — who required season-ending surgery back in spring training — on the injured list, Minnesota will be forced to lean on a rookie-heavy rotation while trying to overtake Cleveland and fight off Kansas City in the AL Central race. Pablo Lopez and Bailey Ober provide plenty of big league experience, but they’ll be followed by Simeon Woods Richardson, David Festa and likely Varland in the season’s final seven weeks or so. Right-hander Zebby Matthews, who has rocketed up prospect rankings in 2024 while dominating High-A and Double-A, could be called to the big leagues sooner than he otherwise would have with a healthier staff. Veteran righty Adam Plutko is also in Triple-A with the Twins and has pitched to a respectable 4.35 ERA there — including a 3.38 mark over his past seven starts.
Given the increased level of strain on the pitching depth, it wouldn’t be all that surprising to see the Twins pursue some additional depth. Their avenues to doing so are limited now that the deadline has passed, but they still have some options. Rich Hill, who pitched for the Twins in 2020, is planning to sign for the stretch run and showcased for teams just today. Some depth options like Xzavion Curry (Guardians) and Jackson Wolf (Padres) were designated for assignment within the past week and could hold appeal — if they make it to the Twins on waivers. As MLBTR’s Darragh McDonald recently laid out for MLBTR Front Office subscribers, we could see a handful of notable veterans hit waivers later this month if their teams falter, although the Twins slashed payroll considerably this past offseason and ownership might balk at the notion of absorbing additional payroll for the stretch run.
In the short-term, the Twins will give Varland the first start and slot Blewett, who pitched for the 2020-21 Royals, into the bullpen. Varland opened the season in the rotation after an encouraging run late last year, but the Twin Cities native was hit hard early this season, optioned to Triple-A and eventually leapfrogged by Woods Richardson and Festa on the depth chart. He’s struggled in Triple-A overall but had rattled off a 1.48 ERA with 35 strikeouts and 14 walks in his past six starts there (30 1/3 innings).
As for Blewett, he inked a minor league deal in the offseason. The 28-year-old righty was a second-round pick by the Royals back in 2014 and has bounced around pro ball, also spending time in the White Sox and Braves systems in addition to a nice stint with the Uni-President Lions in Taiwan’s Chinese Professional Baseball League last year. He’s pitched 56 1/3 innings for the Saints this season and notched a solid 3.66 ERA with a 23.2% strikeout rate and 7.6% walk rate in that time.
The injury to Lee, 23, will open the door for Farmer’s return. Lee was the No. 8 overall pick in 2022 and currently stands as a consensus top-50 prospect in the sport. He missed the beginning of the season with a stress reaction in his back but returned to light fire to Triple-A pitching, hitting opponents at a .329/.394/.635 clip with seven homers in just 94 plate appearances before being summoned to the majors amid other injuries in Minnesota’s infield. He’ll head to the shelf himself now, leaving the Twins with Farmer and Willi Castro at second and short, Royce Lewis at third base and Carlos Santana at first base (in addition to Jose Miranda mixing in at the infield corners).
Guardians Place Carlos Carrasco On Injured List
The Guardians placed right-hander Carlos Carrasco on the 15-day injured list Friday with a left hip strain and optioned infielder/outfielder Angel Martinez to Triple-A Columbus, per a team announcement. In their places, Cleveland recalled outfielder Will Brennan and reliever Peter Strzelecki from Columbus. The Guards also called up left-hander Joey Cantillo as the 27th man for today’s doubleheader against the Twins.
Cantillo will start Game 1 of today’s twin bill. Zack Meisel of The Athletic tweets that righty Alex Cobb, acquired from the Giants at the trade deadline, will start Game 2 for Cleveland. He’s on the 60-day injured list, so they’ll need to make a corresponding 40-man roster move between games one and two today.
It’s the second IL stint of the season for Carrasco, who opened the year on the 15-day injured list due to neck spasms. He signed a minor league deal to return to Cleveland over the winter, made the rotation in spring training, and is currently second on the team in games started, trailing only right-hander Tanner Bibee.
While Carrasco has been a consistent presence in Cleveland’s rotation this year, his results have paled in comparison to his peak years. The now-37-year-old righty has eaten up 103 2/3 innings but been clobbered for a 5.64 ERA. His 19.9% strikeout rate is a couple percentage points shy of league-average, while his 7.4% walk rate is better than average. However, Carrasco is working with a career-worst 91.8 mph average fastball velocity and has been extremely homer prone, yielding an average of 1.65 long balls per nine frames. A bloated 17% of the fly-balls he yields have left the park. He’s hit a particularly rough patch of late, surrendering 17 runs (on the strength of five homers) in his past 17 2/3 innings.
Carrasco clearly isn’t performing well at the moment, but his placement on the IL further tests the depth for a Guardians club that lost Shane Bieber for the season (Tommy John surgery) back in April and has seen young pitchers Logan Allen and Triston McKenzie struggle to the point that they’ve been optioned to Columbus. The Guards acquired Cobb prior to the deadline and signed veteran left-hander Matthew Boyd to a big league deal as he wrapped up his rehab from 2023 Tommy John surgery. Cobb will make his Guardians debut tonight, and Boyd isn’t expected to be too far behind him.
That could potentially give Cleveland a rotation of Bibee, Cobb, Boyd, Gavin Williams and journeyman Ben Lively down the stretch. There’s potential for a solid group there, but it’s anyone’s guess right now how Cobb will perform coming off hip surgery and how Boyd will perform on the back of last season’s ligament replacement procedure. It’s not the dominant Cleveland rotation we’re used to seeing, but the Guardians boast one of the best bullpens in baseball, which helps to offset some of the uncertainty.
As for Cantillo, today will mark his third big league start. He’s been tagged for six runs in 7 1/3 innings thus far and will face a tough task in squaring off against a Twins team that has thrived against left-handed pitching this year. A former third-round pick, Cantillo has ranked among the Guardians’ more promising young arms since being acquired from the Padres back in the 2020 Mike Clevinger trade. He’s had some command troubles in the upper minors and missed a significant portion of the current season on the injured list, but Cantillo has a 4.21 ERA and 27.1% strikeout rate in 124 career Triple-A frames — albeit against a 13.4% walk rate that’ll need to improve if he’s to sustain success in the majors.
Twins’ Brock Stewart To Undergo Shoulder Surgery
Twins right-hander Brock Stewart is headed for season-ending arthroscopic surgery to clean up his right shoulder, he tells Bally’s Audra Martin (X link). There’s no significant structural damage, and Stewart says he’s anticipating he’ll be ready for spring training after a projected rehab period of five to six months.
It’s a frustrating development for Stewart, who was away from major league baseball from 2020-22 due to the canceled minor league season in 2020 and a pair of elbow surgeries (Tommy John surgery and a procedure to remove a bone spur). Stewart signed a minor league deal with the Twins and not only made it back to the majors on the heels of that pair of surgeries but emerged as a lights-out option in manager Rocco Baldelli‘s bullpen.
While this year’s 5.17 earned run average is an eyesore, that’s skewed entirely by his recent struggles coming back from a monthslong stint on the injured list due to pain in his balky shoulder. Stewart allowed one run with a 17-to-6 K/BB ratio in 13 1/3 innings to begin the season, hit the injured list for nearly three months, and clearly wasn’t at full strength when he returned. He was rocked for eight runs in 2 1/3 innings while working with a fastball and cutter that were both down nearly three miles per hour.
From the time Stewart’s contract was originally selected by the Twins in April 2023 to the time he first hit the injured list this past May, he was a legitimately overpowering force. An elbow issue sent him to the shelf for part of last summer, but Stewart pitched 41 innings for the Twins in that stretch and logged an incredible 0.66 ERA with a 34.8% strikeout rate and 10.6% walk rate. Most of the command troubles he encountered came early, too. For the better part of a year, he was a shutdown option thanks to a heater averaging nearly 98 mph and a cutter and slider that both missed bats in droves.
While the latest injury setback is surely a tough pill for Stewart to swallow, given his earlier elbow problems, this time around he’ll go under the knife knowing that he’s cemented himself in a big league team’s plans. The Twins control Stewart, 32, for another three seasons via arbitration. He’ll get a salary bump north of $1MM in his first season of arb eligibility this winter, but given the dominance he showed prior to this year’s shoulder problem and the remaining long-term control, it’ll be an easy call for the Twins to tender him a contract.
White Sox Fire Pedro Grifol, Three Coaches; Grady Sizemore To Serve As Interim Manager
11:45am: The White Sox expect to hire someone not currently in the organization as Grifol’s replacement, Getz announced to the Sox beat (X link via James Fegan of Sox Machine).
11:20am: A disastrous White Sox season reached a boiling point Thursday morning, as the team announced that manager Pedro Grifol, bench coach Charlie Montoyo, third base coach Eddie Rodriguez and assistant hitting coach Mike Tosar have all been fired. Former big league outfielder Grady Sizemore, who joined the staff this past offseason with the broad and generic title of “major league coach,” will take over as interim manager through season’s end. The White Sox said their search for a full-time managerial replacement will begin immediately, and a decision will not be made until after the season.
Minor league field coordinator Doug Sisson, who’s previously served as a first base coach with the Royals (2011-12), will serve as Sizemore’s bench coach for the remainder of the season. Justin Jirschele, who’s been managing the White Sox’ Triple-A affiliate in Charlotte, will step in as third base coach. Mike Gellinger, who has been a hitting coach with the Sox’ Rookie-level affiliate in the Arizona Complex League, will be the assistant hitting coach in place of Tosar.
“As we all recognize, our team’s performance this season has been disappointing on many levels,” general manager Chris Getz said in a statement within this morning’s press release. “Despite the on-field struggles and lack of success, we appreciate the effort and professionalism Pedro and the staff brought to the ballpark every day. These two seasons have been very challenging. Unfortunately, the results were not there, and a change is necessary as we look to our future and the development of a new energy around the team.”
In his own statement, shared with Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times, Grifol said: “Grateful to Jerry, Rick and Kenny for the opportunity. I have health and a loving family. I have a spiritual foundation that gives me incredible strength, peace and freedom. This won’t break me. As a matter of fact it only motivates me. The next thing I do in my life, I will do it for the love and passion I have for this game and for the sole purpose of serving others.”
Hired in the 2022-23 offseason, Grifol had a long track record as the bench coach for the division-rival Royals. He’d been a part of several managerial searches prior to landing the job in Chicago, and the expectation was that he’d bring a fresh, younger voice after the Sox’ short-lived reunion with Tony La Russa lasted less than two seasons.
Grifol indeed brought a new perspective, but it’s fair to say things didn’t work out at all as planned. After a 93-win season in 2021 and a .500 finish in 2022, the Sox entered the 2023 season hoping to compete for the AL Central title. Instead, by midseason the team’s results had been so miserable that GM Rick Hahn and executive vice president Ken Williams were both fired — the first real baseball operations turnover on Chicago’s South Side in more than two decades. Assistant GM Chris Getz was elevated to the GM’s chair and began on a teardown of a top-heavy roster full of injured and/or underperforming veterans.
The points about the GM shuffle and rebuild are worth emphasizing, because it’s only fair to point out that no manager could’ve realistically taken the product Grifol has been handed — particularly in 2024 — and turn out anything resembling a competitive team. That said, Grifol’s White Sox just endured an astonishing 21-game losing streak — tied for the second-longest in MLB history — and there’s been plenty of evidence that things weren’t running smoothly even before that almost unfathomable swoon.
Even last season, right-hander Keynan Middleton outwardly slammed the White Sox’ clubhouse culture after being traded to the Yankees, lamenting that there were “no rules” and “no consequences” despite claiming that there’d been “rookies sleeping in the bullpen during games” and other players missing team meetings and fielding drills. That doesn’t appear to be sour grapes from one player, either; veteran righty Lance Lynn was asked that same day about Middleton’s comments, and though he didn’t delve into specifics Lynn noted that he’d been with the Sox even longer and that Middleton was “not wrong” in his critiques of how things were run.
Matt Spiegel and Shane Riordan of 670 The Score in Chicago reported around the time of the trade deadline that the White Sox had a “fractured” clubhouse (video link). Spiegel indicated that an attempt from Grifol to motivate the players by emphasizing that they’d be remembered as being responsible for producing the worst team in MLB history was not well-received, with a few veterans talking to Grifol and raising issue with his messaging. Riordan heard similar stories and added that someone in the clubhouse told him: “It’s been really tough in there. Pedro is a really good guy, just not the man for the job.”
In his two seasons with the White Sox, Grifol has an 89-190 record. As Jon Greenberg of The Athletic observed prior to the trade deadline, Grifol was on pace to finish the season with the third-worst winning percentage in history among managers who’ve led at least 315 games (which Baseball-Reference deems a “qualified” manager to sit in the all-time record books). He’ll fall shy of that 315-game minimum, but Grifol’s .319 winning percentage would indeed sit as the third-lowest mark for any qualified skipper. The Sox have seen a losing streak hit 14 games on a two occasions this season, and their current 28-89 record has them on pace to break the 1962 Mets’ modern record of 120 losses in a single season.
ESPN’s Jesse Rogers first reported that Montoyo had been fired. Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times first reported that Rodriguez was being let go and that Sizemore was the interim manager.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images
Jesus Luzardo Won’t Pitch Again In 2024
Aug. 8: Luzardo tells Daniel Alvarez Montes of El Extra Base that he is indeed done for the 2024 season and has already set his sights on rehabbing and preparing for a full season in 2025.
Luzardo acknowledged some frustration and disappointment with how the 2024 season has progressed for him. He’s still riding a bike and performing various exercises to keep in shape, but there’s simply not enough time left on the calendar for him to get back on the mound this year.
Aug. 6: Marlins lefty Jesus Luzardo hasn’t pitched since June 16 due to a stress reaction in his lower back. The team never announced a formal timeline for his return, but Luzardo was moved to the 60-day injured list just a week after his initial IL placement, suggesting he’d be down for at least two months. It now seems his absence will extend even further, as the Marlins revealed yesterday that Luzardo’s no-throw period is expected to last another six weeks (X link via Isaac Azout of Fish On First).
Miami hasn’t said as much officially, but a six-week timeline simply to resume throwing all but eliminates the possibility of Luzardo making it back to the mound before the end of the season. Six weeks from yesterday would put Luzardo on about Sept. 16 before he even picks up a ball. The regular season ends just 13 days later, on Sept. 29.
If the back injury indeed proves season-ending, it’ll close the book on a frustrating year for the talented but inconsistent Luzardo. The 26-year-old southpaw pitched to a flat 5.00 ERA in a dozen starts spanning 66 2/3 innings. He missed time early with elbow tightness that led to concerns of another major arm injury — Luzardo had Tommy John surgery in high school — but he returned strong, posting a 3.98 ERA in 40 2/3 innings between IL stints. Half the damage against him (nine of his 18 earned runs in this stretch) came in one brutal June 4 outing against the Rays. His other six starts ranged from good to excellent.
The injury complicates the outlook of a pitcher who earlier this year looked like a surefire trade candidate. Even if Luzardo had been able to come back healthy for four to five starts late in the season, that might’ve been enough to showcase his health to potential offseason suitors. It’d hardly have been an ideal platform year, but other clubs could’ve felt reasonably confident they’d be getting a healthy version of the pitcher who from 2022-23 pitched 279 innings of 3.48 ERA ball while punching out nearly 29% of his opponents with a walk rate that sat a bit better than average.
Instead, teams eyeing Luzardo will have to factor in not only the early elbow issue but also the back injury that torpedoed his season. That previously referenced 2022-23 production is still alluring, as are the remaining two years of club control over Luzardo, but the health risk will be just as great a focus (if not greater).
Marlins president of baseball ops Peter Bendix and his staff will need to weigh offers this winter against what they think they could theoretically receive in a midseason deal. It’s possible, if not likely, that a healthy version of Luzardo in June/July could command more than the offseason version with significant health concerns — even though in the offseason Miami would be peddling two full seasons of club control as opposed to 1.5 seasons next summer. The Tigers went down a similar path with fellow lefty Matthew Boyd several years ago, fielding offers at multiple deadlines and through multiple offseasons while injuries continued to impact his stock. They ultimately wound up non-tendering Boyd in 2021 and losing the left-hander for nothing.
Holding Luzardo into the 2025 season could carry similar risk, but the front office also surely wants to avoid taking what’s perceived as a light package — only to see Luzardo bounce back with a healthy first half in 2025. It’s a fine line to walk and will be one of the most complex decisions for the Miami baseball operations staff this winter.
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