Molina: 2022 “Will Be My Final Season”
If there was any doubt after yesterday’s one-year contract extension, Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina confirmed in a press conference today that he plans to retire after the 2022 season. “Yes, yes it will be my final season,” Molina plainly stated (Twitter link via Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch).
That was the expectation the moment the deal was finalized, as president of baseball operations John Mozeliak even called the 2022 campaign Molina’s final season in the team’s press release announcing the extension. Still, it’s notable to hear the player himself publicly confirm as much.
Molina, 39, is well past his peak production but is still delivering offense that falls roughly in line with that of a league-average catcher. He’s batting .259/.304/.375 with eight homers and 16 doubles so far in 2021, walking at a 5.7 percent clip and still striking out at a 15.7 percent rate that is well south of the league average. His 43 percent caught-stealing rate behind the dish is among the best in the game.
It was strange this past offseason to consider the possibility of Molina playing somewhere other than St. Louis, but he reached the free-agent market for the first time in his illustrious career and unsurprisingly drew interest from several clubs. He’ll avoid any speculation of playing for a new club this time around, cementing himself as a lifelong Cardinal with the extension and today’s announcement.
Notably, as Cardinals fans now turn their attention to Adam Wainwright, Molina touched on the subject of his longtime teammate’s future (Twitter link via Zachary Silver of MLB.com). Molina noted that Wainwright lobbied heavily for him to return to St. Louis last offseason. “Now, it’s my turn,” Molina said in reference to Wainwright, adding that he’d “love to finish my career with him.”
Wainwright is also playing the 2021 season on a one-year contract, and he’s said in the past that he’ll need to discuss the matter with his family before determining whether he’ll continue his own career into the 2022 campaign. Through 162 2/3 innings, Wainwright has a 3.10 ERA, three complete games and a shutout. He’ll turn 40 next Monday.
Cardinals Place Jack Flaherty On Injured List
10:38am: The Cardinals have formally placed Flaherty on the 10-day injured list and recalled right-handed reliever Junior Fernandez from Triple-A Memphis in a corresponding move.
10:12am: The Cardinals are placing right-hander Jack Flaherty back on the 10-day injured list, manager Mike Shildt announced to reporters during today’s pregame session (Twitter link via Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat). Flaherty, who only just returned from a two-month absence due to a severe oblique strain, has now been diagnosed with a strain in his right shoulder. Shildt indicated that imaging was “mostly negative,” suggesting that there’s no major structural issue in the shoulder.
There’s no timeline on Flaherty’s return just yet, but Shildt indicated that the club can’t firmly rule out the possibility that the talented young right-hander’s season is over. There are just under six weeks remaining on the regular-season calendar, and Flaherty will need some form of down period to allow the strain to heal before he can resume throwing and build back up.
Flaherty made just three starts between IL stints, and his velocity was down noticeably last night before departing the game. He told reporters after the contest that he began feeling “less comfortable as the game went on” and voiced frustration over having another start shortened by a physical ailment (link via Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch).
With Flaherty now back on the shelf for a yet-to-be-determined period of time, the Cards are again operating at less than full strength in the rotation — just as they have throughout the entire summer. Kwang Hyun Kim recently returned from the injured list but was slated to work out of the bullpen; it’s at least possible that they’ll shift him back into a starting role now that Flaherty is out. Elsewhere in the rotation, the Cards have Adam Wainwright, Miles Mikolas, J.A. Happ and Jon Lester. For now, that group will lead the charge as the Cards attempt to close a 4.5-game deficit in the NL Wild Card standings. The division is effectively out of reach, as Milwaukee has a commanding 13-game advantage over St. Louis (and an 8.5-game lead over second-place Cincinnati).
Flaherty has been excellent when healthy this season, as one would expect. The 25-year-old carries a 3.08 ERA, a 26.1 percent strikeout rate, a 7.7 percent walk rate and a 38.6 percent ground-ball rate through 76 innings thus far.
Yankees Place Zack Britton On 10-Day Injured List
AUGUST 24: Britton is going for a second opinion, manager Aaron Boone told reporters (including Lindsey Adler of the Athletic). Some form of surgery is apparently on the table as a potential outcome.
AUGUST 23: The Yankees announced Monday that they’ve placed lefty Zack Britton on the 10-day injured list with a left elbow sprain, recalled outfielder Jonathan Davis from Triple-A Scranton and reinstated righty Clay Holmes from the Covid-19-related injured list. Additionally, the Yankees paused Miguel Andujar‘s minor league rehab assignment and transferred him to the 60-day injured list.
Last October, the Yankees picked up Britton’s $14MM option for 2022, as declining it would have allowed the lefty to become a free agent. In a sense, the club made a $27MM commitment for 2021-22. In March of this year, it became apparent that Britton would require arthroscopic surgery to remove a bone chip in his left elbow. This delayed his season debut until June 12th. Not long after, he returned to the IL with a hamstring strain. Never a control pitcher, Britton saw his walk rate this year balloon to 17.1% in 22 appearances. His typically ridiculous groundball rate has remained, but Britton also lost his seeming ability to repress batting average on balls in play (.230 from 2018-20). The result has been heavy traffic on the bases and a 5.89 ERA, perhaps related to a drop in fastball velocity exceeding two miles per hour.
Britton had already tumbled down the Yankees’ bullpen depth chart, with the team’s highest-leverage work this month going to Jonathan Loaisiga, Wandy Peralta, and Chad Green. Another pricey reliever, Aroldis Chapman, returned from an IL stint for elbow inflammation on August 18th.
Andujar has been on the 10-day injured list since July 10 due to a left wrist sprain, so since his 60-day clock is retroactive to that date, he now isn’t eligible to return until well into September. There hasn’t been any specific word on a setback, though since Andujar hasn’t played in any minor league rehab games since last Wednesday, something certainly appears to be amiss. Andujar only began his rehab assignment last Tuesday, appearing in two games.
Between this injury and his prior status of getting shuttled back and forth between Triple-A and the Yankees’ roster, 2021 is shaping up as another lost season for Andujar, who has hit .253/.284/.383 in 162 plate appearances over 45 games this year. Since finishing second in AL Rookie Of The Year voting in 2018, Andujar has managed only a .588 OPS over 276 PA at the big league level, due to both injuries and the fact that the Yankees seem to have largely moved on. Gio Urshela‘s emergence in 2019 covered Andujar’s old spot at third base, and recent attempts to convert him to an outfielder also haven’t yielded any additional playing time.
MLBTR Chat Transcript
Click here to read a transcript of Tuesday’s chat with MLBTR’s Steve Adams.
Red Sox Option Jarren Duran
The Red Sox have optioned outfielder Jarren Duran to Triple-A Worcester, Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com reports. Righty Tanner Houck will take his spot on the active roster. The Red Sox have yet to formally announce this and any other roster moves that will be made this afternoon.
Duran, 24, is regarded as one of the top all-around prospects in baseball but did not hit the ground running upon his initial call-up from Worcester last month. The 2018 seventh-rounder was plugged in as the everyday center fielder in Boston upon his debut but has struggled to adjust to big league pitching. Through 89 plate appearances, Duran has posted a .221/.236/.372 slash. He’s drawn just two walks in that time and struck out at a whopping 37.1 percent clip to begin his big league career.
The Red Sox surely still view Duran as a key piece to their future. However, with deadline acquisition Kyle Schwarber now in the fold as an option in left field — Alex Verdugo is capable of manning center — the Sox can send Duran back to Worcester for further refinement in a lower-pressure setting. The fact that Boston has slid down the AL East standings in rapid fashion due both to the Sox’ own poor play and the Yankees’ 10-game winning streak surely also adds some pressure to get better immediate results on the field.
Duran appeared in 46 games with Worcester earlier this season and fared quite well, batting .270/.365/.561 with vastly better walk and strikeout percentages — 11.0 and 23.7, respectively — than he showed in the Majors. He’ll need to spend 10 days in the minors unless he’s recalled as the corresponding move in an injury. Rosters can expand from 26 to 28 players beginning Sept. 1, so he could very well get another opportunity in the Majors before too long.
The decision to option Duran today won’t impact his path to free agency or his arbitration schedule. Based on the July 17 date of Duran’s initial promotion to the big leagues, the maximum amount of service time he could’ve accrued in 2021 was 79 days — well shy of a full year of service (172 days). He’s controllable through at least the 2027 season as it stands and would reach arbitration in the 2024-25 offseason. Even if Duran stays in Triple-A for the remainder of the current season, that free agency timeline would remain intact so long as he accrues at least 134 days of service time next season. The Sox would need to keep him in Worcester through late May next year to change that timeline, which seems unlikely.
Young: Rangers Expect To Be “Very Active” In Free Agency
The Rangers had a quiet 2020-21 offseason, at least in terms of free agency, as the club focused on creating opportunities for younger players to prove themselves at the Major League level. Lance Lynn, Elvis Andrus, Rafael Montero and Rougned Odor were traded away. Nate Lowe, Dane Dunning and Jonah Heim were acquired and dropped right into the big league mix. Even the team’s limited free-agent activity was focused on younger names with multiple seasons of control: David Dahl, Mike Foltynewicz, Kohei Arihara.
The 2021-22 offseason could be a bit more active for the Rangers, however, as general manager Chris Young told reporters this week that he expects his club to be active in free agency this coming winter (link via Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News).
“With the financial flexibility we have moving into the offseason, I expect us to be very active in the free agent market, targeting players who fit kind of our next few years and what we’re trying to accomplish,” Young said.
[Related: 2021-22 MLB Free Agent List]
The mention of “financial flexibility” is something of an understatement. The only two guaranteed salaries on the Rangers’ books for the 2022 season are those of Jose Leclerc ($4.75MM) and the aforementioned Arihara ($2.6MM). Looking solely at guaranteed contracts can be misleading when gauging a team’s payroll at times, as many clubs have large arbitration crops that will inflate that number further, but that’s not the case in Texas. Only Mike Foltynewicz, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, Matt Bush, Ronald Guzman and Willie Calhoun are up for arbitration this winter. Foltynewicz and Bush are non-tender candidates. Kiner-Falefa will be getting a raise on a $2MM salary. Guzman and Calhoun are first-time players whose platform seasons have been disrupted by serious injuries; neither will be costly.
The Rangers do still owe the Yankees about $12MM for the remainder of the Odor contract next season, and they’ll pay nearly $7MM to the Athletics as part of last offseason’s Elvis Andrus/Khris Davis swap. Even with arbitration raises and dead money owed from previous trades, however, the Rangers shouldn’t expect to pay any more than $30-35MM for the current roster. Considering this is a team that just opened a brand new park and trotted out an Opening Day payroll of $165MM as recently as four years ago, that level of bare-bones payroll commitments should leave them open to just about anything this winter.
That doesn’t mean that the Rangers will necessarily go wild and sign multiple players to $100MM-plus contracts this winter, of course. The current club is more than just a handful of free agents from competing, but it sounds as though the Rangers are willing to begin spending to augment the roster as they await the arrival of more prospects on the MLB scene. The Rangers’ farm isn’t necessarily elite, but Baseball America listed their system 11th on last week’s midseason farm rankings.
The upcoming class of free agents will be one of the deepest in recent memory. Much has understandably been made of the star-studded crop of free-agent shortstops — Carlos Correa, Corey Seager, Trevor Story, Marcus Semien, Javier Baez — but the market will also be deep in outfielders (Nick Castellanos, Starling Marte, Kyle Schwarber, Michael Conforto and more) and in starting pitching (Max Scherzer, Kevin Gausman, Marcus Stroman, Zack Greinke, Robbie Ray and Justin Verlander, among others). The looming collective bargaining talks between the league and players association could give some teams pause, but those that are motivated to spend will have ample high-quality targets to pursue.
Diamondbacks Release Ryan Buchter
The D-backs released veteran left-handed reliever Ryan Buchter over the weekend, per an announcement from their Triple-A club in Reno. He can now sign with any club for the final few weeks of the season.
Buchter, 34, was tagged for a dozen earned runs in 16 1/3 innings with Arizona’s big league club in 2021, but he held opponents to six runs on 13 hits and seven walks with 20 strikeouts in 16 Triple-A frames (3.38 ERA). And while he didn’t fare particularly well in his short MLB run with the D-backs this season, he has a track record of quality results at the MLB level. Buchter tossed just six innings with the Angels in 2020 but posted a sub-3.00 ERA each season from 2016-19 while averaging 53 innings per year along the way.
Overall, Buchter carries a career 3.16 ERA (4.18 SIERA) through 236 1/3 innings as a big leaguer. He’s turned in a strong 26.3 percent strikeout rate but an elevated 11.7 percent walk rate during that time and is an extreme fly-ball pitcher (26.1 percent ground-ball rate). There could be some concern about his velocity, which dipped to 90.4 mph in 2021 after averaging exactly 92.6 mph in each of the prior three seasons. Still, Buchter pitched quite well in Triple-A this season and has a lengthy track record of run prevention in the Majors. Given the number of clubs seeking bullpen depth following the trade deadline, he’d figure to have a good chance at latching on with another team that could use some left-handed insurance in the upper minors.
Padres Fire Pitching Coach Larry Rothschild
The Padres announced Monday that they’ve fired pitching coach Larry Rothschild. Bullpen coach Ben Fritz will step up as the pitching coach for the remainder of the 2021 season.
“Larry has been a tremendous asset for our organization over the last two seasons, and we appreciate the experience, hard work and dedication that he brought to the position,” Padres manager Jayce Tingler said in a statement within today’s press release. “We wish him nothing but the best in the future.”
Rothschild’s ouster comes after a weekend in which the Padres were overtaken by the Reds for the second Wild Card spot in the National League. San Diego has been in a freefall in the standings, losing nine of the past 11 games due in no small part to woeful performances from a pitching staff that has not lived up to expectations in 2021. The Padres have yielded an average of 5.91 runs per contest across that 11-game swoon.
Even beyond their recent slide, the Padres’ pitching staff simply hasn’t been as dominant as many would’ve hoped on the heels of an active winter. Joe Musgrove has taken his game to new heights and Yu Darvish has performed well, but San Diego starters rank 17th overall with a 4.37 ERA this season.
Left-hander Blake Snell, a marquee offseason acquisition, has had the roughest season of his career, recording career-worst marks in ERA (4.82), expected ERA (5.62) and walk rate (13.7 percent). Rookie Ryan Weathers has been hit extremely hard of late and is sitting on a 5.83 ERA. Young Chris Paddack, meanwhile, had a brilliant debut in 2019 but has struggled since Rothschild’s hiring prior to the 2020 season. Paddack posted a 3.33 ERA in 140 2/3 innings as a rookie but has a 4.97 mark in 152 innings since. That certainly can’t all be pinned on Rothschild alone, but the timing couldn’t have helped Rothschild’s cause.
Fritz will hold things down for the remainder of the season, but Rothschild’s dismissal means there will be a search for at least one spot on the coaching staff this winter. The fate of others on the field staff could well be tied to how the team performs in the coming weeks. It’s unlikely that there will be major turnover at the top of the baseball operations department, however — not after A.J. Preller was promoted to president of baseball operations and extended through the 2026 season back in February.
Orioles To Designate Maikel Franco For Assignment, Claim Conner Greene From Dodgers
2:10pm: The Orioles announced that Jones has been recalled, Greene has been claimed, Martin has been optioned and Franco has been designated for assignment. Kubatko now tweets that the Gutierrez move won’t become official until tomorrow, so it seems there’s some additional roster tweaking on the horizon.
1:30pm: The Orioles have also reclaimed right-hander Conner Greene off waivers from the Dodgers, tweets Dan Connolly of The Athletic. The O’s lost him to the Dodgers on waivers earlier this month but have now claimed him back after the Dodgers designated him for assignment themselves.
12:38pm: The Orioles will announce multiple roster moves today, reports Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com (Twitter link). Baltimore is set to designate third baseman Maikel Franco for assignment and option infielder Richie Martin to Triple-A Norfolk, per Kubatko. They’ll recall second baseman Jahmai Jones and third baseman Kelvin Gutierrez in their place.
Franco, who’ll turn 29 this week, has never really found his footing with the O’s after signing well into Spring Training. He’s been Baltimore’s primary third baseman this season, appearing in 104 games and totaling 403 plate appearances, but he’s mustered only a .210/.253/.355 slash with 11 home runs and 22 doubles in that time.
The O’s were surely hoping for something closer to Franco’s 2020 production, when he appeared in all 60 games for the Royals and batted .278/.321/.457 with eight homers and 16 doubles in 243 plate appearances. Kansas City still non-tendered Franco last winter rather than pay him a raise in arbitration — his second non-tender in as many years — and he lingered in free agency into Spring Training before finally settling on a one-year, $800K deal with Baltimore.
In an ideal setting, the Orioles probably would’ve enjoyed a few reasonably productive months out of Franco and subsequently flipped him at the deadline for whatever return they could get. His minimal salary would’ve made him an affordable addition even as a bench bat with a contending club. His general lack of production this season understandably dried up any real interest on the trade market.
The Orioles will now place Franco on either outright waivers or release waivers in the coming days. He’s unlikely to be claimed, as doing so would mean picking up the remainder of his salary, which recently jumped from $800K to $1MM when he recorded his 400th plate appearance of the season. Once he clears waivers, he can become a free agent and sign with any club for the prorated portion of the league minimum from that point through season’s end.
Jones, 24, was acquired in the offseason trade that sent righty Alex Cobb and cash to the Angels. The former second-round pick was once considered one of the best prospects in the Halos’ system and one of the top 100 prospects in all of baseball, but his stock had dipped in recent seasons.
After a hot start to the 2021 campaign, Jones has seen his bat tail off considerably in Norfolk. He posted a .311/.435/.516 line through his first 30 games with the Tides but has batted just .201/.257/.370 in 42 games since that time. Jones posted a .349 average on balls in play during the 30-game stretch to open the year and saw that mark fall to .242 over his next 42 games, but a climbing strikeout rate has also been a primary reason for his downturn in performance. Jones walked 22 times (16.8 percent) against 20 strikeouts (15.3 percent) over those first 30 games, but in his past 42 contests he’s fanned at a 29.2 percent rate against a greatly diminished 6.5 percent walk rate.
Recent slump notwithstanding, Jones ranks in the middle tier of the Orioles’ top prospects and will use the remainder of the 2021 campaign as an addition for a larger role next season. The Orioles’ infield is largely unsettled beyond first baseman Trey Mancini, so there should be plenty of opportunity for younger players to stake a claim to some more playing time. Jones does have some experience in center and in left as well. However, the O’s have used him primarily as a second baseman in 2021 and have a much more settled group on the outfield grass than the infield dirt.
Reds Designate Michael Feliz For Assignment
The Reds have designated right-handed reliever Michael Feliz for assignment, tweets C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic. He’d been on a minor league rehab assignment that had drawn to a close, and the Reds opted against adding him back to the MLB roster. Cincinnati now has 38 players on its 40-man roster.
Feliz, 28, was a May waiver claim by the Reds out of the Pirates organization and appeared in nine games before landing on the injured list with a sprained right elbow. He yielded a dozen runs on 13 hits and four walks with nine strikeouts during his brief time in the organization.
The elbow injury ultimately sidelined Feliz for more than two months, but he recently wrapped up a rehab assignment and is apparently healthy now. The Reds determined their current bullpen group to be sufficient, clearly, and because Feliz is out of minor league options, he’ll now be exposed to outright waivers or released.
Feliz posted an impressive 30.5 percent strikeout rate and a 3.99 ERA in 56 1/3 innings with Pittsburgh back in 2019, but command problems and arm injuries have hindered him throughout his big league career. He’s missed time with shoulder and forearm injuries prior to this year’s elbow troubles. In 241 MLB innings between Houston, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, the hard-throwing Feliz owns a 5.38 ERA with a 30 percent strikeout rate and a 9.9 percent walk rate.