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Player Pool Additions: Giants, Mets, Rays, Nats

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Teams have been tinkering with their 60-man player pools throughout the 2020 season, at times cutting veterans to make room for prospects and at times cutting bait on some lower-tier organizational pieces in order to make room for more experienced additions (be they via waiver claim, free-agent signing, etc.). There have been several clubs to announce additions to their player pools already Friday, and while such moves seem innocuous, it’s of course worth pointing out that adding a player to the 60-man pool makes him eligible to be traded.

That doesn’t mean all of the players added to pools today are on the trading block — far from it. We’ve also already seen the Marlins (in the Richard Bleier trade) and the Blue Jays (in the Taijuan Walker trade) take advantage of using players to be named later to get around the rule that only players in a 60-man pool are eligible to be traded. Both sent a PTBNL to their trade partner, each of whom is expected to be a non-60-man player that will be announced after the season.

So while not all of today’s additions will change hands, it’s still notable that some of these players now could change hands without needing to be listed as a PTBNL. In that scenario, a new club could get a look at said player at its alternate training site and, if close enough to the Majors, perhaps even promote them in September.

Here’s a quick rundown…

  • The Giants announced that first baseman/outfielder Chris Shaw and righty Melvin Adon were added to the 60-man player pool. Shaw, 26, was San Francisco’s first-round pick (No. 31 overall) back in 2015 and rated among the club’s best prospects for several years. His shine has worn off, however, after some shaky showings in the upper minors and the Majors. Shaw carries a .280/.328/.538 slash in 1092 Triple-A plate appearances but has struck out at a 30 percent clip there. He’s hit .153/.244/.222 in 82 big league PAs. Speculatively, he seems like a change-of-scenery candidate. Adon, also 26, received an 80 grade on his heater at FanGraphs this offseason and was called the hardest thrower in the minors by Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel. However, they also gave him just 30 command on the 20-80 scale and called his chances of realizing his ceiling low due to his inability to locate. Adon walked 34 batters, hit another and threw 11 wild pitches in 55 1/3 innings last year.
  • The Mets added third baseman Brett Baty, tweets Anthony DiComo of MLB.com. Baty, 20, was the No. 12 pick in the 2019 draft and is considered to be among the organization’s top prospects. He divided last year between rookie and Low-A ball, where he batted .234/.368/.452 with seven home runs in 228 plate appearances. Now that Baty’s in the fold, the Mets have all of their top five prospects in the player pool — including Andres Gimenez in the Majors — as DiComo points out.
  • Right-hander Brent Honeywell has been added to the Rays’ pool and reported to their alternate site in Port Charlotte, tweets MLB.com’s Juan Toribio. The highly touted Honeywell underwent Tommy John surgery in February 2018, hasn’t pitched since and may not take the mound for the Rays this season. By adding Honeywell to their pool, though, the Rays will give the 25-year-old an opportunity to rehab while facing professional hitters, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times notes. For now, though, “there are still plenty of boxes” for Honeywell to check before he makes his MLB debut, according to manager Kevin Cash.
  • The Nationals already added righty Sterling Sharp and outfielder Jeremy De La Rosa earlier today (as covered here), and this afternoon they announced two more additions: infielders Jackson Cluff and Drew Mendoza. Both have reported to the alternate site in Fredricksburg. Cluff was a 2019 sixth-rounder who spent his first pro season in Single-A, where he batted .229/.320/.367 with five homers and 11 steals in 280 trips to the plate. The 23-year-old is now generally regarded as one of the Nationals’ top 20 prospects. Mendoza, another 2019 draft choice (third round, No. 94), hovers around Washington’s top 10 farmhands at multiple outlets. The 22-year-old also spent 2019 at Single-A, slashing .264/.377/.383 with four HRs and three steals in 239 plate appearances.

Brewers Designate Justin Grimm; Manny Pina To Undergo Knee Surgery

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5:32pm: Not so fast on Pina, who says he’ll require at least four weeks to recover from surgery and is hoping he’ll return if the Brewers make the playoffs (via Haudricourt).

4:21pm: Pina will undergo season-ending surgery, manager Craig Counsell told Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and other reporters.

3:31pm: The Brewers announced that they’ve designated right-hander Justin Grimm for assignment and placed catcher Manny Pina on the 10-day injured list due to a torn meniscus in his right knee. Pina sustained the injury on a pickoff play last night, MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy tweets. Catcher Jacob Nottingham has been recalled from the alternate training site to replace Pina on the active roster.

Grimm, 32, has appeared in four games for the Brewers this year but surrendered multiple runs in three of those appearances. He’s been tagged for nine runs on nine hits (four homers) and four walks with six punchouts in 4 2/3 frames. Although he was once a quality relief option with the division-rival Cubs — 3.36 ERA and 3.20 FIP in 171 innings from 2014-16 — Grimm has seen his results decline precipitously since that stretch. He’s logged 77 1/3 innings in the Majors over the past four seasons and struggled to an alarming 7.33 ERA.

As for Pina, it’s a tough blow for the Brewers and the 33-year-old backstop alike. He’s out to a .231/.333/.410 slash to begin the season — solid production for any catcher, let alone a backup — but will now likely miss the remainder of the year. Even speedy recoveries from a meniscus tear can take a month, and for a catcher, any knee issue carries additional difficulty. Pina has been the Brewers’ backup catcher dating back to 2017, providing solid glovework and respectable OBP skills and pop for a reserve catcher. Since 2017, he’s a .257/.317/.411 hitter.

Nottingham has gotten brief looks in each of the past two seasons — nine games apiece — and will now step in as the primary backup to Omar Narvaez. He’s a .231/.355/.385 hitter in 31 MLB plate appearances and a .250/.326/.421 hitter in 528 PAs at the Triple-A level.

Mets Claim Guillermo Heredia

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The Mets have claimed outfielder Guillermo Heredia off waivers from the Pirates, tweets Tim Healey of Newsday. Pittsburgh designated Heredia for assignment earlier this week when they claimed Carson Fulmer off waivers from the Tigers. Heredia has been optioned to the Mets’ alternate training site in Brooklyn.

Heredia inked a one-year deal, $1MM contract with the Pirates in the offseason but played in just eight games and took 18 plate appearances before the Bucs optioned him to their own alternate site. Because the Mets are claiming Heredia, they’ll be on the hook for the remainder of his prorated salary — a total of about $172K between now and season’s end.

Heredia has appeared in 390 Major League games, mostly with the Mariners, and posted a combined .239/.317/.339 batting line. As a solid outfield defender with a bit of speed and a career .275/.338/.400 batting line against lefties, he can be a useful bench piece when he’s at his best. The Mets just cut Juan Lagares — a player with a comparable skill set — loose earlier today when they designated him for assignment when Jake Marisnick was activated from the injured list. Unlike Heredia, however, Lagares couldn’t be optioned to the alternate site without his consent, given that he has more than five years of big league service.

Yankees Release Luis Avilan, Select Jordy Mercer

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The Yankees have released left-hander Luis Avilan in order to open a spot on the 40-man roster for infielder Jordy Mercer, whose contract has been selected from the alternate training site, manager Aaron Boone told reporters at today’s media session (Twitter link via ESPN’s Marly Rivera). The club hopes to re-sign Avilan but felt the move was the best course of action amid a roster crunch.

Avilan, 31, just landed on the IL earlier this week due to inflammation in his left shoulder. He’d been quite effective for the Yanks before coughing up two runs in one-third of an inning in his final appearance prior to going on the IL. Overall, Avilan has a 4.32 ERA with nine strikeouts and five walks in 8 1/3 frames.

The addition of Mercer was necessitated in large part by injuries to both DJ LeMahieu and Gleyber Torres. Thairo Estrada and Tyler Wade are starting up the middle for the Yankees right now, but Mercer could factor into the middle-infield mix while the club’s regulars mend on the IL. LeMahieu, in particular, could return this weekend, Boone said today.

Mercer, 34, spent six seasons as the Pirates’ primary shortstop from 2013-18, hitting .257/.317/.383 in 779 games along the way. He spent the 2019 season in Detroit, and while he struggled immensely early before going on the injured list for much of the year, Mercer returned to close out the season with a torrid .312/.343/.512 slash in his final 48 games. He returned to the Tigers in 2020 but was cut loose early in the year when they opted to give younger talent a look as their rebuild progresses. Mercer latched on with New York shortly thereafter and will now head back to the big leagues to provide some infield depth for an ailing Yankees club.

Yordan Alvarez Undergoes Surgery On Both Knees

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It’s been known for more than a week that Astros slugger Yordan Alvarez would undergo surgery to repair a torn patellar tendon in his right knee, but the Astros on Friday announced that the reigning Rookie of the Year also underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left knee as well. That procedure is being termed by the Astros as a “routine cleanup.” The club’s press release indicates that the expectation is for Alvarez to “be ready to play prior to the start of Spring Training” next year.

Knee problems have plagued Alvarez, 23, throughout his professional career — even prior to his big league debut in 2019. On the one hand, it’s discouraging to hear of a dual knee procedure for such a young player, but on the other, the organization surely hopes that these operations will alleviate what has been a longstanding issue for a player who burst onto the scene as one of MLB’s best young hitters.

Alvarez didn’t make his Major League debut until June 9, 2019, but he still launched 27 home runs, ripped 26 doubles and plated 78 runs in just over half a season’s worth of games. Alvarez played in 87 contests last year and batted .313/.412/.655 over the life of 369 plate appearances. He won’t be eligible for arbitration until the 2022-23 offseason and can be controlled via that arbitration system all the way through the 2025 campaign.

Aaron Judge Headed Back To Injured List

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The Yankees are placing Aaron Judge back on the injured list with a similar low-grade calf strain to the one that shelved him earlier this month, manager Aaron Boone tells reporters (Twitter link via James Wagner of the New York Times). Judge only just came off the injured list this week, but he exited his first game back with tightness in his problematic calf muscle.

There’s little doubt that Judge is among the game’s best all-around offensive performers when he’s healthy enough to take the field. He’s batting a ridiculous .292/.343/.738 with nine homers through 18 games and 71 plate appearances so far in 2020 and owns a career .274/.392/.556 line. But injuries have continually hampered Judge since his incredible rookie season in 2017.

The fractured wrist that Judge suffered upon being hit by a pitch back in 2018 can be chalked up as a fluke, of course, and the same could perhaps be said about the cracked rib and subsequent punctured lung he sustained on a bid for a diving catch last September. However, Judge has also now had multiple IL stints for oblique and calf injuries alike. In all, he missed 50 games in 2018, 60 games in 2019 and will now be sidelined for a yet-to-be-determined period in 2020 (already having missed 15 days with the first calf injury).

As has become typical in recent years, a resilient Yankees club has found a way to weather the storm in light of injuries to Judge and several other key players (Luis Severino, James Paxton, Giancarlo Stanton, DJ LeMahieu, Gleyber Torres). Still, it’s a staggering amount of talent to be shelved simultaneously, and the Yankees are beginning to show the effects; they’ve dropped five straight games and now trail the Rays by two and a half games in the AL East. At the moment, they’re closer in the standings to the third-place Blue Jays than to Tampa Bay.

Mets Designate Juan Lagares For Assignment

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The Mets announced a series of roster moves to reporters Friday, designating outfielder Juan Lagares for assignment and reinstating righty Michael Wacha, shortstop Andres Gimenez and outfielder Jake Marisnick from the injured list (Twitter link via Deesha Thosar of the New York Daily News). The team also placed righty Corey Oswalt on the 10-day IL due to biceps tendinitis, optioned right-hander Drew Smith to the alternate training site in Brooklyn and added catcher Patrick Mazeika as the 29th man for today’s doubleheader.

Lagares, 31, was a mainstay on the Mets’ roster from 2013-19 before his 2020 club option was declined at the beginning of this past offseason. He eventually inked a minor league contract with the Padres but elected free agency when the team didn’t include him in its player pool. Lagares wound up returning to the Mets organization and getting called up this week, but he appeared in just two games without taking a plate appearance prior to this DFA. The return of Marisnick, who had been on the injured list since July 28, likely made Marisnick expendable. Both are right-handed-hitting, glove-first outfielders.

White Sox Designate Nicky Delmonico For Assignment

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The White Sox have designated outfielder Nicky Delmonico for assignment, per a team announcement. His spot will go to outfielder Jarrod Dyson, whose previously reported acquisition from the Pirates has now been formally announced. Chicago also announced that second baseman Nick Madrigal has been reinstated from the injured list, with catcher Zack Collins and outfielder Luis Gonzalez both being optioned to the alternate training site in a corresponding move.

Delmonico, 28, was released by the ChiSox last year but found his way back to the club on a minor league pact over the winter. He appeared in six games this year, going 3-for-20 with two walks and two strikeouts. The former Orioles prospect has spent time with the South Siders in each of the past for seasons, hitting at a combined .224/.312/.384 clip. However, since a terrific rookie showing at the plate in 2017, Delmonico has mustered only a .210/.287/.326 slash.

Sox fans will surely be thrilled to welcome Madrigal back into the fold. The 2018 No. 4 overall pick and top prospect debuted earlier this season but separated his shoulder while diving into a base. He’s 5-for-17 to begin his big league career, but the Sox hope that Madrigal, who slashed .311/.377/.414 with 35 steals and a minuscule 3.0 percent strikeout rate across three minor league levels in 2019, will cement himself as their second baseman of the future.

White Sox To Acquire Jarrod Dyson

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9:51am: The White Sox are sending their remaining $243,300 of international bonus space to the Pirates in the deal, tweets MLB.com’s Adam Berry. International space typically must be sent in chunks of $250K but are able to trade the remainder of their entire pool as one block if they have under $250K remaining. That’s what happened in this instance.

That pool space will be added to the Pirates’ 2019-20 signing pool. While the international signing period typically runs from July 2 in one year to June 15 the next, the 2019-20 signing period was extended into October while the forthcoming signing period was pushed back into January. Those changes, much like the shortened 2020 Draft, were agreed upon by the league and union as owners sought means of offsetting some of their revenue losses from the pandemic-altered season.

8:58am: The White Sox are set to acquire speedy center fielder Jarrod Dyson from the Pirates, ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports (via Twitter). The White Sox are expected to send international bonus pool space to Pittsburgh to complete the deal, tweets MLB Network’s Jon Heyman.

Jarrod Dyson | Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports

Dyson, 36, inked a one-year, $2MM deal with the Pirates this winter and is still owed $333K of his prorated $720K salary. That makes him an affordable late-inning defensive upgrade and pinch-running option for the ChiSox, who currently are tied with the Indians for second place in the AL Central and just a half game behind the division-leading Twins.

Dyson is out to a miserable start at the plate, hitting .157/.218/.157 in a tiny sample of 57 plate appearances, but he’s an all-world defender and elite baserunner. Dating back to 2012, Dyson is sixth in the Majors in stolen bases (234), and his 84.7 percent success rate is remarkably efficient. He’s also eighth among MLB outfielders with +79 Defensive Runs Saved in that time despite having played thousands of innings fewer in the field than all but one player (Juan Lagares) ahead of him due to his status as a part-time player.

The White Sox have a full outfield with Eloy Jimenez in left, Luis Robert in center and Nomar Mazara in right. They also have fellow speedster Adam Engel on hand to back up at all three positions, but between Jimenez and Mazara, the corners could both stand to use a defensive upgrade in late, close games. Dyson’s left-handed bat also complements Engel’s righty bat, allowing manager Rick Renteria to optimize his late-inning outfield options based on platoon matchups.

As for the Pirates, they’ll add some additional international funds in exchange for the final month or so of Dyson’s contract. Dealing him also opens up additional reps for the Bucs to take a look at shortstop Cole Tucker in the outfield — an experiment the team has been exploring under the new front office/coaching regime. Dyson was a free agent at season’s end anyhow and clearly not going to receive a qualifying offer, so cashing him in for even a relatively minimal return makes perfect sense for Pittsburgh.

Nationals Add Sterling Sharp, Jeremy De La Rosa To Player Pool

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9:45am: The Nats are adding Sharp and outfield prospect Jeremy De La Rosa to their 60-man player pool, Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post reports (via Twitter). Both will head to the team’s alternate training site in Fredricksburg. De La Rosa, 18, ranks 15th among Nats farmhands at MLB.com and at FanGraphs. He’ll be able to get some developmental reps with the club’s staff now, although being added to the 60-man pool also makes him eligible to be directly included in a trade to another club (as opposed to being shipped off as a PTBNL).

8:50am: The Marlins have returned right-hander Sterling Sharp, their pick in last year’s Rule 5 Draft, to the Nationals, per a team announcement from the Nats. Miami designated Sharp for assignment earlier this week, and the fact that he was returned indicates he went unclaimed on outright waivers.

Sharp, 25, appeared in four games with the Fish but struggled in his final two outings. Overall, he was tagged for seven runs (six earned) on seven hits, five walks and a hit batter with three strikeouts in 5 1/3 frames. Sharp’s heavy sinker helped him keep the ball on the ground at a 65 percent clip in his brief time with the Marlins. However, the Marlins were forced to make a broad-reaching series of moves in the wake of their team-wide Covid-19 outbreak, one of which was to designate Sharp for assignment. It’s eminently possible that this outcome would’ve occurred eventually anyhow, particularly in light of his struggles.

Regardless, Sharp now returns to the Nats and gives them a relatively near-term option for their pitching staff. He’s not on the 40-man roster but could emerge as a candidate for a big league call up before long. Sharp logged 49 2/3 frames in Double-A last year, pitching to a 3.99 ERA and 2.59 FIP with 8.2 K/9, 2.5 BB/9, 0.18 HR/9 and a whopping 63.3 percent ground-ball rate.

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