Injury Notes: Cain, Segura, Hand, Betts, Upton
The latest on several notable injury situations from around the league…
- Lorenzo Cain was forced out of the Brewers‘ game Thursday afternoon due to left ankle discomfort, the team announced. Cain hit a solo homer in the bottom of the fourth, but was replaced by Trent Grisham in center field in the top of the fifth. Injuries have plagued Cain all season, as thumb, wrist, and oblique problems have contributed to his career-worst 76 wRC+ (from a .251/.316/.357 slash line and 10 homers) over 592 plate appearances. He’s “greatly wobbled,” per Tom Haudricourt of the Miilwaukee Journal, who adds that Cain could undergo more tests.
- Phillies shortstop Jean Segura exited the team’s loss to Atlanta with a left hamstring cramp, Matt Gelb of The Athletic relays. The severity’s unknown as of now, Gelb notes. One of many big-ticket offseason acquisitions for the Phillies, Segura has produced a respectable 2.6 fWAR in 593 plate appearances, but he hasn’t been as effective as he was with the Diamondbacks and Mariners from 2016-18.
- Indians closer Brad Hand threw a “really good” bullpen session Wednesday, manager Terry Francona said, though it’s still unclear when he’ll be able to return (via Mandy Bell of MLB.com). It was the first bullpen for Hand during his absence from a fatigued arm, which dates back to Sept. 8. Things have gone well to this point for the Hand-less Indians, as they’ve gone 7-2 since he last pitched and only needed saves in two of those wins (one apiece from Adam Cimber and Oliver Perez).
- There’s nothing meaningful left to play for this year for the Red Sox, though banged up right fielder Mookie Betts still doesn’t plan to shut it down, Alex Speier of the Boston Globe writes. The reigning AL MVP, who hasn’t played since Sept. 12 on account of left foot inflammation, is aiming to come back during a four-game series in Tampa Bay that begins Friday. Betts wouldn’t line up in the field during that set, though, as the Red Sox don’t want to risk running him out there on turf. Meanwhile, reliever Heath Hembree is progressing from elbow problems and could come off the IL next week. Hembree’s balky elbow has forced him to the shelf twice this year and stopped him from pitching since Aug. 1.
- Angels left fielder Justin Upton will undergo a platelet-rich plasma injection Friday, per Bill Ladson of MLB.com. The hope is that it’ll aid Upton in overcoming the pain in his right knee – a joint that has bothered him since spring training. The eliminated Angels shut Upton down for the season last week after injuries helped limit the normally terrific hitter to a .215/.309/.416 line with 12 home runs in 256 plate appearances.
East Notes: Red Sox, La Russa, Mets, Callaway, Bichette
Set to miss the playoffs for the first time since 2015, the Red Sox have already made a few changes to their front office. They let go of president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski on Sept. 8, and then followed his firing with the dismissals of senior VP of baseball ops Frank Wren and special assignment scout Eddie Bane on Thursday. VP/special assistant Tony La Russa won’t walk the plank with them, though, as Jon Heyman of MLB Network first reported the Red Sox planned to retain the former big league manager. He’ll indeed come back for at at least another year, according to Alex Speier of the Boston Globe. La Russa, soon to turn 75 years old, was a Dombrowski hire back in November 2017.
More from the East Coast…
- Don’t expect the Mets to trade outfielder Brandon Nimmo during the offseason, Mike Puma of the New York Post tweets. After looking like a breakout star in 2018, Nimmo got off to a rough start this season before sitting out from late May until the start of this month because of neck problems. However, his torrid numbers over the past couple weeks have allayed any concerns Mets brass had over him earlier in the campaign, according to Puma. The 26-year-old has posted a video game-like September 1.183 OPS that has helped him to a .222/.377/.407 line in 213 plate appearances this season.
- While Nimmo looks like a good bet to stick with the Mets in 2020, the same might not be true for oft-maligned manager Mickey Callaway. The Mets won’t decide on whether to keep Callaway until after their season ends, multiple organizational sources have suggested to Puma. The club has rallied from an awful start to log a respectable 79-73 record; however, the Mets are still 3 1/2 games back of a wild-card spot, and they’re likely to fall short of the expectations the front office placed on the roster entering the year, Puma notes. That could lead to the firing of Callaway, who’s in his second year on the job and whose teams have gone 156-158.
- Standout Blue Jays rookie Bo Bichette left the team’s game against Baltimore on Thursday after getting hit in the helmet with a pitch. The Blue Jays removed Bichette for precautionary concussion testing, per Sportsnet’s Arash Madani, who adds that the club will reevaluate the 21-year-old shortstop Friday. Bichette has burst on the scene since his late-July promotion, having slashed .311/.358/.571 with 11 home runs in his first 212 major league PA. The Jays are way out of contention, but Bichette’s among the reasons they could return to relevance soon, so they’re certain to proceed with caution in regards to his health.
Rusney Castillo Won’t Opt Out Of Red Sox Contract
Caught in one of the more unusual contractual situations in recent baseball history, Rusney Castillo will remain with the Red Sox in 2020, as he tells Stephanie Apstein of Sports Illustrated that he won’t exercise his opt-out clause for the final year of his contract. As per the terms of that original seven-year, $72.5MM deal, Castillo has the ability to become a free agent after this season, though in declining the opt-out, he’ll earn the final $13.5MM owed to him in salary.
There was no expectation that Castillo would opt out, given that he hasn’t appeared in a Major League game since June 16, 2016. “You’re not going to cancel something when you don’t have anything else,” Castillo told Apstein. It’s hard to argue with the 32-year-old outfielder’s logic, as he would surely have to settle for a minor league contract if he did opt out, even if such a non-guaranteed deal might be the only realistic way he plays in a big league game in 2020. Still, Castillo has continued to live in a Boston apartment, Apstein writes, out of a belief that he will eventually return to the Red Sox and the majors, and he makes a daily commute to Rhode Island for every home game for the Triple-A Pawtucket Red Sox.
Castillo was outrighted off Boston’s 40-man roster in June 2016, and under the terms of the current collective bargaining agreement (signed in the 2016-17 offseason), putting him back onto the 40-man at any point would have made his contract once again eligible to be counted for luxury tax calculations. This would have added an extra $10.357MM (the average annual value of Castillo’s deal) onto Boston’s tax bill for the remainder of Castillo’s contract, regardless of whether or not the Sox outrighted him again. As Apstein notes, even trading Castillo would have some luxury tax repercussions for the Red Sox, not that teams were exactly lining up to acquire Castillo and add his contract to their own books.
The end result is that Castillo has become a fixture at Triple-A Pawtucket, appearing in 389 games for the PawSox since being outrighted. He has continued to hit decently well (17 homers and a .278/.321/.448 slash line over 493 PA in 2019), but even with spectacular numbers, it’s unlikely Castillo would have been an option for a Red Sox club that was both facing major luxury tax concerns and also didn’t really have a need in the outfield with Mookie Betts, Andrew Benintendi, and Jackie Bradley Jr. forming one of the game’s best trios on the grass.
Given that the new CBA also changed the nature of international signings, Castillo’s $72.5MM deal has remained the largest deal ever given to a player who defected from Cuba. Castillo arrived onto the MLB scene with a great deal of hype, though ultimately hit only .262/.301/.379 over 337 plate appearances with the Red Sox from 2014-16.
Red Sox Part Ways With Frank Wren, Eddie Bane
4:45pm: Wren was fired and Bane’s contract wasn’t renewed, according to Alex Speier of the Boston Globe (Twitter link).
4:31pm: In the wake of Dave Dombrowski’s firing as general manager, the Red Sox continue to make moves in their front office, as MLB Network’s Jon Heyman (Twitter links) reports that senior VP of baseball operations Frank Wren and special assignment scout Eddie Bane were among the names who are no longer in the organization. “Many more changes are expected” to come, Heyman writes, including “some reshuffling in the amateur department.”
Such moves as par for the course whenever a GM is replaced, and it wouldn’t be surprising if more new faces are brought in should the Sox hire a new general manager from outside the organization. The changes in the amateur department could reflect particular dissatisfaction with some of Boston’s recent drafts. While the Sox have enjoyed great contributions from homegrown players in recent years, almost all of those players were already in the system before Dombrowski was hired in August 2015. Mike Shawaryn is the only player on Boston’s current big league roster was drafted by Dombrowski’s front office, though naturally, it’s far too soon to judge the 2016-19 draft classes this early.
Wren wasn’t expected to continue in his role, given his longstanding ties to Dombrowski. Hired for the senior VP/player personnel role soon after Dombrowski was hired, it was the third time Wren had worked with Dombrowski, as the two were also members of the Expos and Marlins front offices when Dombrowski served as general manager of those franchises. Wren is best known for being a GM himself, overseeing the Braves’ front office from 2007-2014 and also serving a single year as the Orioles’ GM in 1999.
As Heyman notes, Bane’s chief claim to fame is his tenure as the Angels’ scouting director from 2004-10, specifically his work related to the 2009 draft. That was the year that saw Mike Trout selected 25th overall, which alone would’ve been a huge achievement for Bane and his staff, yet the Halos also drafted several other players (Randal Grichuk, Tyler Skaggs, Garrett Richards, Patrick Corbin) who went onto prominent MLB careers. Bane has worked in a variety of different front office and scouting roles for the last 35+ years, and was first hired by the Red Sox in October 2012.
Red Sox Notes: Betts, Price, J.D., Chavis
Red Sox right fielder Mookie Betts underwent an MRI on Monday that revealed left foot inflammation, according to Jason Mastrodonato of the Boston Herald. The issue has kept Betts out since Sept. 12, and with the Red Sox’s playoff hopes all but dead, he doesn’t seem like a lock to return in 2019. As you’d expect, though, Betts is hopeful he’ll see action again this year, Mastrodonato writes. The reigning AL MVP hasn’t been quite as otherworldly as he was during Boston’s championship-winning 2018, but that’s hardly a knock on his performance this season. Betts has still batted a fantastic .293/.391/.527 with 28 home runs and 15 stolen bases in 680 plate appearances, and his 6.3 fWAR ranks eighth among AL position players.
- One of Betts’ injured teammates, left-hander David Price, doesn’t seem likely to pitch again this season. Price’s ailing left wrist continues to stop him from throwing anything but fastballs, per Mastrodonato. Red Sox brass plans to discuss a potential surgery with Price, though it doesn’t seem as if it would be a major procedure. Price’s wrist has troubled him dating back to last season, and the cortisone shot he underwent on it in early August hasn’t produced the type of results he or Boston hoped for at the time. The 34-year-old has made only two starts and totaled 4 2/3 innings since July ended. His most recent outing came Sept. 1.
- Designated hitter J.D. Martinez is day-to-day after exiting the Red Sox’s marathon game against the Giants on Tuesday with left groin tightness, Christopher Smith of MassLive.com reports. It’s conceivable the big-hitting Martinez is in his final days as a Red Sox, as he could decide after the season to opt out of the guaranteed three years and $62.5MM left on the contract he signed going into the 2018 campaign. The 32-year-old Martinez would be taking an enormous gamble in leaving the rest of that deal on the table, but he has arguably made a case to do so by putting up yet another huge season at the plate (albeit nowhere near as impactful as his 2017-18 showings).
- As of two weeks ago, infielder Michael Chavis looked like a candidate to miss the rest of the season after suffering a setback in his recovery from an oblique strain. It now appears the rookie will play again this year, though, with Mastrodonato noting he could be healthy enough to return over the weekend. Chavis, who hasn’t played since Aug. 11, got off to a sizzling start this season before his production tailed off during the summer.
Quick Hits: Free Agency, Dodgers, General Managers
Who is this offseason’s top free agent? MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand posed that question to a handful of executives, who came back pretty well split between Gerrit Cole and Anthony Rendon. Those who pointed to Cole as the likely recipient of the winter’s biggest deal pointed to Rendon’s lengthy injury history and the leaguewide scarcity of ace-level starting pitching. On the other hand, Rendon’s backers pointed out that the highest ceilings in free agency belong to star-level position players, who are generally viewed as less risky from a health perspective than pitchers are.
- Which organizations pursue each player will no doubt dictate their respective market values in the coming months. To that end, ESPN’s Buster Olney (subscription link) is hearing chatter the Dodgers figure to be in the Rendon market. The idea, per Olney, would be move Justin Turner to first base to split time with Max Muncy while deploying Cody Bellinger solely on the grass. Whether the Dodgers would be best-served beating what is sure to be a robust market for Rendon when their internal options are already formidable is debatable, but Olney notes that the Dodgers’ collection of cheap young stars gives the team ample financial flexibility to make a splash in free agency. Further, he argues that Rendon is the Dodgers’ ideal hitter- patient, with contact and power skills- although of course LA wouldn’t be the only organization to appreciate a player with Rendon’s superstar track record.
- In the wake of the Red Sox parting ways with Dave Dombrowski, WEEI’s Rob Bradford sat down with Giants’ special advisor (and former Blue Jays’ GM) J.P. Ricciardi to discuss how the position has changed in recent seasons. Ricciardi pointed to a number of differences in heading a front office now versus the 2000’s, when he was running things north of the border. Perhaps most interestingly, Ricciardi opined that front offices in 2019 have become extremely averse to trading young players, which he attributes partially to fear of being second-guessed with fans and media more attuned to the transactional landscape. Ricciardi’s thoughts are worth checking out in full for fans interested in how the role of MLB executive has changed over the past decade.
- One person who won’t be taking over for Dombrowski is former Red Sox GM Ben Cherington, reports Jason Mastrodonato of the Boston Herald. Cherington and the organization parted ways after Dombrowski was brought aboard in August 2015. Nevertheless, as Mastrodonato explores in detail, Cherington deserves some credit for the Sox’s 2018 World Series roster, which certainly had the imprints of the vaunted farm system he and his staff had put together before his exit.
AL Notes: Miggy, Ortiz Shooting, M’s Record
The Tigers pulled out an 8-4 victory today over the equally troubled Orioles, but the win didn’t come without a fair share of bummer news. Baseball legend Miguel Cabrera was lifted for a pinch hitter in the seventh inning, and the club announced after the game that the former Triple Crown winner is dealing with right knee soreness; as veteran reporter Chris McCosky of the Detroit News was quick to note, Cabrera has been dealing with chronic pain in that knee all season (link).
Across 1200 plate appearances since the beginning of the 2017 season, Cabrera owns a .273/.347/.405 batting line; his wRC+ of an even 100 indicates that he has been the perfect exemplar of a league-average hitter over that time frame. Of course, it is without the slightest bit of schadenfreude that one would point out how far those marks have fallen since Cabrera’s heyday. Miggy garnered MVP votes in every season ranging from 2003-2016; in that same span, he made ten All-Star games, won two MVP awards, and took home seven Silver Slugger trophies. Jason Beck of MLB.com indicates that Cabrera is considered “day-to-day” for the time being (link).
More notes from around the American League…
- Bob Hohler of The Boston Globe had the privilege of interfacing this week with retired Red Sox slugger David Ortiz, who made his first public comments to an English-language publication since being shot in a near-fatal June 9 incident in the Dominican Republic. “People need to understand, this isn’t a movie where you get shot in the street and you’re back two minutes later,’’ Ortiz said in the wide-ranging piece, which covers the events of that fateful night and his ensuing recovery process. “I got shot and almost died. I only have one life to live. I can’t just go to the pharmacy and buy another one.’’ As Hohler’s piece goes on to delineate, justice has still been hard to come by for the future Hall of Famer, as detectives in the DR are still yet to pinpoint a motive behind the attack that seems coherent to Ortiz; the former Boston great has since hired former Boston police commissioner Ed Davis to investigate the case.
- The Mariners have set something of an ignoble record in 2019, as Cut4’s Jake Mintz & Jordan Shusterman point out that Seattle has given playing time to an all-time-high 67 players this season (link). While many around baseball are giving attention to the litany of home run records being broken this year, manager Scott Servais and GM Jerry Dipoto have arguably accomplished a much more impressive feat in managing such a revolving door of a clubhouse.
AL East Notes: Rays, Yanks, Red Sox, Hazen, Mayza
The latest on four of the American League East’s five teams…
- As of three weeks ago, the Rays expected injured infielder Brandon Lowe to miss the rest of the regular season. That might not happen, though, as manager Kevin Cash suggested Friday that Lowe and right-hander Yonny Chirinos could return, Juan Toribio of MLB.com tweets. Lowe was amid one of the league’s best rookie seasons when he went down July 3 with a shin injury, while Chirinos was among the Rays’ top starters before landing on the shelf Aug. 5 with a finger injury. Despite their ongoing absences, Tampa Bay continues to hold an American League wild-card spot, albeit by the thinnest of margins. The Rays are a half-game up on the Indians for the league’s No. 5 seed.
- It’s in question how much more the injury-plagued Yankees will get from catcher Gary Sanchez and designated hitter/first baseman Edwin Encarnacion this season. Sanchez suffered a strained groin Thursday, per Kristie Ackert of the New York Daily News. The Yankees are “hopeful” he’ll come back this year, Ackert writes. Meanwhile, Encarnacion incurred a mild internal oblique strain Thursday, though it’s not yet clear how much time Encarnacion will miss. The 36-year-old already sat out almost all of August because of a fractured right wrist.
- Diamondbacks general manager Mike Hazen was a speculative target for the Red Sox after they fired president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski on Sunday. But Hazen, who worked under Dombrowski in Boston before going to Arizona in 2016, is officially out of the picture after signing an extension Friday. Even before Hazen agreed to that deal, the Red Sox didn’t reach out to the Diamondbacks to request an interview, Alex Speier of the Boston Globe reports. Extension or not, Hazen was already under contract with the D-backs, so they could have shot down the Red Sox had they approached the Snakes with interest in talking to him.
- Reliever Tim Mayza left the Blue Jays’ win over the Yankees on Friday with a left elbow injury, the team announced. It was an ugly scene: Mayza threw a pitch way behind New York shortstop Didi Gregorius, went to the ground clutching his forearm and looked to be in tears (video via Keegan Matheson of MLB.com). Mayza will undergo an MRI to determine the severity of the injury, Shi Davidi of Sportsnet relays, but it won’t be a surprise if his wayward pitch to Gregorius goes down as his last of 2019. At this point, Mayza and the Jays are surely hoping the issue doesn’t prove severe enough to shelve him for any portion of next season.
AL East Notes: Alford, Orioles, Chacin
Longtime Blue Jays prospect Anthony Alford will be out of options next spring, increasing his urgency to make an impression with the club, Laura Armstrong of the Toronto Star writes. That said, opportunities in a crowded Toronto outfield aren’t necessarily easy to come by. Manager Charlie Montoyo said this week that he plans to “try to play him just like anybody else,” Armstrong notes, but the sheer volume of outfielders will inherently limit Alford’s time on the field.
The Jays also have Teoscar Hernandez, Derek Fisher, Billy McKinney and Jonathan Davis vying for playing time in addition to Randal Grichuk, who signed a five-year contract earlier this year. Furthermore, Lourdes Gurriel Jr. could soon return the injured list. Alford has seen time in parts of three seasons but still has just 24 games in the Majors to his credit — during which he has not been productive. The former two-sport star also slashed a rather lackluster .259/.343/.411 in Triple-A this season. Injuries and his time in football have played a role in limiting Alford’s development, who indeed needs to make a favorable impression at the MLB level sooner rather than later.
More from the AL East…
- The Orioles, too, are trying to evaluate their long-term outfield mix by getting as looks at Austin Hays, DJ Stewart and Mason Williams this month, as explored by MASNsports.com’s Roch Kubatko. The club views Hays as a potential opening day center field candidate next season, Kubatko notes. Hays made his MLB debut as a 21-year-old in 2017 but played only about a half season’s worth of games in 2018 and 2019, thanks in part to a fractured ankle that required surgery. Prior to his debut, Hays was one of the fastest-rising prospects in all of baseball, and it seems the organization hasn’t soured on him even after a regime change in the front office. Kubatko adds that the Orioles would like to keep Williams, a former top prospect with the Yankees, in the organization this offseason, so it seems he’ll have a chance to stick on the 40-man roster. Stewart, meanwhile, posted big numbers in Triple-A but was also limited by ankle and concussion issues. Beyond that, GM Mike Elias spoke to Kubatko about the difficulty of evaluating players based on Triple-A results at a time when changes to the baseball have clearly skewed the offensive environment.
- Jhoulys Chacin has thrown well with the Red Sox since signing a minor league deal there, writes Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe, who wonders if the righty could be making a case for a job next season. The Red Sox’ lack of pitching depth proved to be a significant flaw in 2019, and Chacin would represent a low-cost option who has fit in well with his new teammates. Abraham recounts the story of how Chacin came to be with the Sox, outlining a pressure-filled bullpen session that served as an audition for the veteran righty. “They wanted to see me pitch and said maybe they would give me an opportunity,” Chacin recalls. “I had 30 pitches to show them what I could do.” Since passing that test and landing a roster spot, Chacin has tossed 5 2/3 shutout innings with two hits, three walks and seven strikeouts.
East Notes: Phillies, Red Sox, Nationals
This doesn’t exactly rate as a surprise, but third baseman Maikel Franco‘s time with the Phillies is nearing an end, Matt Breen of the Philadelphia Inquirer observes. Although Franco has had a stranglehold on the third base position in Philly since his career began in earnest in 2015, the former high-end prospect has clearly fallen out of favor this year. The club demoted him to Triple-A earlier in the season, and though he has since returned, Franco hasn’t gotten his job back. With the Phillies in a heated battle for a playoff spot, they’ve mostly turned to Scott Kingery, Brad Miller and Sean Rodriguez at the hot corner over the past several weeks. It’s understandable the team has all but given up on Franco, who simply hasn’t provided much value since he burst on the scene as a rookie. The 27-year-old has posted minus-0.3 fWAR in 392 plate appearances this season, thanks in no small part to a weak .239/.301/.419 batting line. Franco figures to earn more than his current $5.2MM salary in arbitration over the winter, so it seems quite possible the Phillies will non-tender him.
More from Philadelphia and a couple other East Coast cities…
- After firing president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski on Sunday, the Red Sox are in the market for a new leader of that department. However, it’s not a lock Dombrowski’s successor will have the same title, Rob Bradford of WEEI.com reports. Dombrowski was the first executive in franchise history to earn president of baseball ops honors, and the club might not be as eager to go that route again this time. The Red Sox could instead name a general manager and have that person report to team president Sam Kennedy, Bradford notes.
- Injured Nationals catcher Kurt Suzuki hasn’t been in the club’s lineup since Sept. 5, and that’s not going to change “for at least a few more days,” Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post tweets. Manager Dave Martinez said Thursday that Suzuki, who has been dealing with right elbow inflammation, still hasn’t returned to throwing. Yan Gomes has caught every game in Suzuki’s absence, but the untested Raudy Read will draw into the lineup sometime over the weekend, per Dougherty. Between Gomes and Suzuki, the former has been the better defender this year. On the other hand, Suzuki (.260/.319/.473 in 301 PA) has outhit Gomes (.210/.310/.352 over 306 PA) by a significant margin.
- An MRI revealed that Phillies outfielder Corey Dickerson suffered a bruised navicular bone in his left foot Wednesday, Scott Lauber of the Philadelphia Inquirer relays. That may sound worse than it is, as the Phillies don’t believe Dickerson would be at risk of doing further damage to his foot by playing. It’ll be a “pain management issue” for the rest of the season, though, according to manager Gabe Kapler. Dickerson’s both a key member of the playoff-contending Phillies’ offense and a pending free agent, meaning it would behoove both parties to make sure he’s healthy enough to take the field. The 30-year-old has enjoyed a strong platform season between Pittsburgh and Philly, having batted .304/.341/.565 with a dozen homers in 279 PA.