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AL Notes: Biggio, Red Sox, Boyd, Angels

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We’ll round up a few stories and notes from around the American League on this Christmas afternoon.

  • Cavan Biggio could be in line to bounce around the diamond next season for the Blue Jays. The 24-year-old has no problem donning different gloves, he tells Kaitlyn McGrath of the Athletic. Biggio came up as a second baseman, although questions about his defense there dogged him consistently as a prospect. Last year, Biggio logged MLB starts at first base, second base, left field, and right field, although most of his work indeed came at the keystone. Now, he’d be amenable to logging time at third base and/or in center field next season, too. General Manager Ross Atkins has previously floated Biggio as a possibility to help solidify the Jays’ questionable center field mix, McGrath notes. Manager Charlie Montoyo will surely be looking for ways to get Biggio’s potent bat into the lineup. Thanks to elite plate discipline, Biggio compiled a strong .234/.364/.429 line (114 wRC+) as a rookie.
  • First-year Red Sox pitching coach Dave Bush sat down for a Q&A with Jen McCaffrey of the Athletic. He explains that the organization reached out to him to replace Dana LeVangie, rather than his ardently pursuing the position. That should ensure some continuity on the pitching side, as Bush has spent the past three seasons in Boston’s player development department. The longtime Brewer reiterated that Chris Sale is back on a normal offseason program and praised new signee Martín Pérez’s reliability. He also hinted that the organization could further tinker with Pérez’s pitch mix in hopes of unlocking some upside. A new cutter helped Pérez jump off to a fast start in 2019 with the Twins, but a brutal second half led Minnesota to decline his team option.
  • The Tigers aren’t actively looking to move staff ace Matthew Boyd, who still has three years of team control remaining. With the free agent market for starting pitching drying up, however, it’s natural to wonder if the teams who lost out on the top hurlers could reengage the Tigers on one of baseball’s prime trade candidates. One such team is the Angels, who have added Dylan Bundy and Julio Teheran to their rotation, but still have room to upgrade. The club is monitoring the trade market, Jon Paul Morosi of MLB.com tweeted Monday, but the Angels and Tigers haven’t had any recent discussions on Boyd. Of course, there’s ample time for the sides to recommence talks regarding the 28-year-old, who ranked 11th among starters (minimum 100 innings) in strikeout minus walk rate in 2019.

Blue Jays Showing Interest In David Price

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The Blue Jays and Red Sox are discussing a deal that would send veteran starter David Price to Toronto, according to The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal. While Rosenthal is quick to note that an official move isn’t close yet, it’s nonetheless notable that Price is in play for a Blue Jays team that has made abundantly clear its desire to upgrade the starting rotation.

The progress of the teams’ negotiations will hinge on Boston’s willingness to cover some portion of the remaining three years and $96MM on Price’s contract. It’s been no secret that the Red Sox, aiming to duck beneath the luxury tax threshold for 2020, are seeking a taker for Price, Nathan Eovaldi, or both. However, the team has simultaneously expressed its disinclination to include a promising piece simply to facilitate a trade. While that would strengthen the return for Price, and likely decrease the amount of cash needed to move him, it would either detract further from the big league roster or eat into an already-thin farm system.

Furthermore, attaching a more attractive player to Price likely isn’t necessary: the Red Sox, for their part, are said to be investigating other options for Price, who has garnered interest from other teams, including the Padres, Cardinals, and Reds, among others. He’s a valuable pitcher, albeit one who hasn’t lived up to the expectations that came with his $217MM price tag. So it makes sense that pitching-needy teams should explore whether they Price can be had for, say, $20MM annually.

From Boston’s point of view, it’s worth nothing that even offloading $20MM of Price’s yearly salary won’t be enough to get them under the tax line. As Rosenthal states, Roster Resource pegs the Sox’ current luxury tax obligations at nearly $238MM, meaning that almost all of Price’s salary would have to come off the books if they are to sneak under the $208MM luxury tax threshold. Of course, that’s part of why Eovaldi and Mookie Betts have also been named as candidates to be traded this winter.

Price, of course, made brief stint with Toronto in 2015, when he was acquired from the Tigers at the trade deadline. To be sure, remnants from that 2015 team are few and far between, with a new front office and manager in place, as well as a completely refreshed core of youthful position players.

The Jays have been frequently linked to free-agent southpaw Hyun-Jin Ryu, who looks like the last remaining top-flight starter on the market. However, with Bob Nightengale of USA Today reporting that as many as seven teams are in the running for Ryu’s services, there’s a very real possibility that Toronto will strike out on that front and be forced to pivot to alternate means of improving the rotation. They’ve already added Tanner Roark and Chase Anderson, but lack a real number one after trading Marcus Stroman last year.

Red Sox Claim Chris Mazza

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The Red Sox have claimed righty Chris Mazza off waivers from the Mets, as MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand first reported (via Twitter). Mazza had recently been designated for assignment.

Though Mazza is already thirty years of age and has made just nine appearances in the majors, he obviously did something to catch the eye of the Boston front office. He allowed ten earned runs with a ho-hum 11:5 K/BB ratio in his first 16 1/3 frames in the majors, hitting four of the 74 batters he faced with errant pitches along the way.

While the early showing didn’t necessarily inspire confidence, the Red Sox were surely more favorably impressed by Mazza’s work at Triple-A. Through 76 innings in the tough International League, he worked to a 3.67 ERA with 7.3 K/9, 2.1 BB/9, and a 58.0% groundball rate. Mazza has always generated a good number of worm burners. He has also long been relatively hard to take out of the park — a particularly notable statistical history in this day and age. In 2019, Mazza allowed 0.71 home runs per nine at Triple-A and didn’t surrender a single dinger in the majors.

Red Sox Announce Eight Minor League Signings

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The Red Sox on Friday announced an octet of minor league signings, revealing that they’ve added catcher Jett Bandy; outfielder John Andreoli; left-hander Mike Kickham; corner infielder Jantzen Witte; first baseman/outfielder Nick Longhi; and right-handers R.J. Alvarez, Domingo Tapia and Robinson Leyer as non-roster invitees to Spring Training. Each of Bandy, Andreoli, Kickham and Alvarez has some MLB experience.

Bandy, 30 in March, was once viewed as a potential long-term option behind the dish for the Angels but hasn’t panned out as such. He’s logged 156 games in the big leagues between Anaheim and Milwaukee, posting a .218/.282/.365 batting line through 492 plate appearances. He’s adept at shutting down the running game (32 percent career caught-stealing rate) but has drawn more questionable marks for his framing efforts.

Andreoli, 29, has only collected 67 plate appearances at the MLB level but has been an on-base machine in Triple-A, where he’s put together a .262/.375/.416 batting line across parts of five seasons (2465 plate appearances). The right-handed-hitting veteran has seen ample time at all three outfield spots since being selected in the 17th round of the 2011 draft by the Cubs.

The 31-year-old Kickham hasn’t pitched in the Majors since 2013-14 with the Giants and has allowed more runs than he has completed innings pitched in his short MLB career (37 runs, 30 2/3 innings). But Kickham has displayed strong control and pitched reasonably well in a tough pitchers’ environment with the Marlins’ Triple-A club in each of the past three seasons in addition to a strong winter ball showing in Mexico (1.96 ERA in 41 1/3 innings). He’ll give the club some depth that has experience working as both a starter and a reliever.

Alvarez, 28, hasn’t pitched in the big leagues since 2015 and was also with Miami’s Triple-A affiliate in 2019. His bottom-line results in parts of five Triple-A seasons don’t immediately jump out, but he’s averaged nearly 12 strikeouts per nine innings pitched throughout his minor league career. Control has been an issue as well, however, evidenced by the fact that he’s yielded nearly five walks per nine frames en route to his lifetime 4.22 ERA in Triple-A.

Red Sox Sign Martin Perez

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TODAY: The Red Sox have officially announced the signing.

DEC.12: The Red Sox have reached a one-year, $6MM agreement with free-agent left-hander Martin Perez, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports. The deal includes a $6.25MM club option for 2021. The buyout on that option checks in at $500K, according to Alex Speier of the Boston Globe. Perez is a client of OL Baseball Group LLC.

The agreement with Perez comes at a time when the Red Sox look to be shopping a much more prominent and far more expensive southpaw in David Price. As of now, though, the soon-to-be 29-year-old Perez is slated to join Price, Chris Sale, Eduardo Rodriguez and Nathan Eovaldi in a lefty-heavy Red Sox rotation.

Once a standout prospect with the Rangers, Perez is now amid a second straight offseason in which a team has turned down his club option for the following year. The Rangers cut Perez loose a winter ago on the heels of a horrid season for the hurler, while the Twins – who then inked him to a $3.5MM guarantee – did the same last month. Had the Twins retained Perez, he’d have earned $7.5MM. He’ll take home a bit less as a member of the Red Sox, but this still looks like a respectable payday in light of Perez’s showing in Minnesota.

While Perez did turn in 165 1/3 innings and 32 appearances (29 starts) as a Twin, he wound up with fairly pedestrian numbers. Despite career-high four-seam velocity (94.1 mph), the addition of a cutter to his repertoire and excellent hard-hit and exit velocity marks from Statcast, Perez finished with a 5.12 ERA and just 7.35 K/9 against 3.65 BB/9. ERA estimators such as FIP (4.66), xFIP (4.69) and SIERA (5.01) weren’t enamored of his work, though Perez did begin the year well. He owned a 4.26 ERA/3.71 FIP at the All-Star break, but the wheels came off during the second half of the season, in which Perez more closely resembled the pitcher the Rangers gave up on and notched a 6.27 ERA/5.94 FIP.

For the Chaim Bloom-led Red Sox, the agreement with Perez is the second one-year contract they’ve handed out Thursday. They previously inked infielder Jose Peraza to a $3MM guarantee. Both are modest signings in what most expect to be a low-key offseason for Boston, at least in terms of spending.

Photo courtesy of USA Sports Today Images.

Trade Rumblings: Lindor, Padres, Dodgers, Betts, Yanks, Schwarber

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The Padres have at least kicked around the idea of attempting to swing a deal for Indians shortstop Francisco Lindor, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports (subscription link). However, Rosenthal cautions that the superstar probably won’t end up in San Diego, which already has an enviable left side of the infield between shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr. and third baseman Manny Machado. In the unlikely event the Padres do wind up with Lindor, it seems they’d try to turn Tatis into a multi-position player (primarily a center fielder), though Rosenthal notes doing so could displease the 20-year-old and would likely receive pushback from his representatives. That’s important considering San Diego’s desire to extend the phenom.

On the plus side, in addition to picking up an elite player in Lindor, the Padres would keep him away from the division-rival Dodgers, who have been connected to him this winter. But the Lindor-related talks between LA and Cleveland have only been “preliminary” to this point, per Buster Olney of ESPN (subscription). The Indians, for their part, aren’t necessarily under pressure to trade Lindor right now – he still has two years’ control left and remains the best player on a team that has been a consistent playoff contender in recent seasons. That said, the Indians don’t appear to have much of a chance to extend Lindor, so perhaps they’ll be open to parting with him this winter.

Let’s check in on a couple more of baseball’s highest-profile trade candidates…

  • Bob Nightengale of USA Today reported earlier this week that the Red Sox and Dodgers have had “exploratory trade talks” in regards to Boston outfielder Mookie Betts. The Dodgers have even included shortstop Corey Seager in discussions centering on Lindor and Betts, Nightengale relays. However, even though Betts only has a year of control left (in which he should make almost $30MM via arbitration), and even though the Red Sox are working to get under the $208MM luxury tax, it doesn’t look as if there’s any hurry to part with the former AL MVP. Instead, it seems the Red Sox’s preference is to trade from their starting staff, tweets the Boston Globe’s Alex Speier, who hears that they and the Dodgers “had virtually no engagement” in regards to Betts at last week’s Winter Meetings.
  • More from Rosenthal, who writes that the Yankees’ years-long interest in Cubs outfielder Kyle Schwarber has continued. Nevertheless, there’s no momentum toward a deal as of now, Rosenthal adds. Schwarber has been a favorite of the Cubs’ front office, though trading him could be part of an offseason shakeup for a club that fell apart late in 2019. The 26-year-old slugger still has two seasons of arbitration eligibility remaining, and he’s coming off a pair of above-average campaigns, so he’d likely be difficult for the Yankees or anyone else to acquire.

Details On Luxury Tax Bills For Red Sox, Cubs, Yankees

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The luxury tax bills for the Red Sox, Cubs and Yankees – the three teams that exceeded the $206MM threshold in 2019 – are now public knowledge. The Red Sox owe $13.4MM, the Cubs will pay $7.6MM and the Yankees must surrender $6.7MM, according to Ronald Blum of The Associated Press. As far as actual payrolls go, Boston checked in at $228MM, the Yankees put a $226MM roster on the field and the Cubs spent $220MM, Blum notes.

Neither the Red Sox nor the Cubs made the playoffs in 2019 despite their elite-level spending, while the Yankees lost to the Astros in the ALCS. Now, with the exception of the Yankees (who’ve already made history this offseason with the nine-year, $324MM contract they awarded right-hander Gerrit Cole), those clubs look as if they’re in salary-cutting mode. The tax limit will climb to $208MM next season, and the Yankees will blow past it in the wake of the Cole signing. Moreover, there’s a decent chance the Yankees will outspend the $208MM mark by $40MM or more, which would lead to a 42.5 percent overage tax next year and would cause their highest draft pick to drop 10 spots.

It seems the Red Sox and Cubs would like to avoid the tax, but it remains to be seen whether either will pull off that feat. As things stand, next year’s Red Sox are projected to go beyond $208MM by almost $30MM, while the Cubs will do so by about $6MM, per Jason Martinez of Roster Resource.

It will be easier for Boston and Chicago to duck the tax 12 months from now if they sell off an expensive star or two, which seems possible. The clubs have former MVPs (outfielder Mookie Betts for the Red Sox and third baseman/outfielder Kris Bryant for the Cubs) who have come up in trade rumors. Betts and Bryant aside, there are other well-compensated potential trade chips in both cases. Left-hander David Price and center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr. come to the fore for the Red Sox, while righty Yu Darvish and first baseman Anthony Rizzo join Bryant among high-priced Cubs who may not be untouchable.

Quick Hits: Brewers, Garcia, Phillies, Bumgarner, Red Sox, Price

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The Brewers are “trying hard” to bring Avisail Garcia to Milwaukee, tweets The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal. Earlier, Jose F. Rivera of ESPN Deportes put the Brewers close to a deal with the Mato Sports Management client. Garcia would figure to be a good fit to share time in the outfield with the lefty-hitting Ben Gamel. Garcia has played mostly right field in his career, a few spot starts in left notwithstanding. If indeed he does sign with the Brewers, it could mean moving Christian Yelich back to left. Ryan Braun is also an option for the outfield, though as of right now he’s penciled in for the lion’s share of starts at first base.

  • Having nabbed a couple of former New York athletes in Zack Wheeler and Didi Gregorius, the Phillies are near their spending limit for 2019. Together, Wheeler and Gregorius add $37.6MM to Philly’s luxury tax ledger for 2019. Estimates put the Phillies right up against the $208MM tax threshold, putting some added emphasis to any further moves made this winter. Still, execs from around the league believe they are open to further spending, per MLB Network’s Jon Heyman. The Phillies will continue to look for “opportunistic” signings. It’s unlikely, then, that the Phillies would be in on Madison Bumgarner, given the league-wide interest in the lefty and the hefty contract he is likely to secure.
  • Sneaking under the luxury tax remains a “realistic” goal for the Red Sox, per The Athletic’s Chad Jennings. The new regime led by Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom took a more egalitarian approach to the winter meetings than in recent years. Boston took the time to gauge the lay of the land rather than strike hard for a specific target. Moving all or most of the three-years, $96MM owed to David Price is still the quickest path to ducking the tax, but Bloom is resistant to making Price’s contract more palatable by attaching prospects. They are, however, willing to pay down Price’s contract to get it closer to $20MM per year rather than the current $32MM. Until Price does get moved, expect more of the same as the Red Sox will continue to work around the margins to tweak the roster.

Red Sox Sign Jose Peraza

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DECEMBER 13: The Sox have announced the signing.

DECEMBER 12: The Red Sox are in agreement with free-agent infielder Jose Peraza on a contract for the 2020 season, Robert Murray reports (via Twitter). The ISE Baseball client will take home a one-year deal worth close to $3MM, MLB Network’s Jon Heyman tweets. He can boost his salary via incentives.

Peraza, still just 25, was once considered to be among the game’s premier prospects but struggled considerably in two of his three full Major League seasons before being non-tendered by the Reds earlier this month. That includes a 2019 season in which he managed only a bleak .239/.285/.346 batting line through 376 trips to the plate while seeing time at second base, shortstop, third base, left field and center field.

While the 2019 and 2017 seasons weren’t kind to Peraza, he posted solid seasons with the bat in a half-season effort in 2016 (.324/.352/.411) and a full season in 2018 (.288/.326/.416). He’s an above-average runner although perhaps not to the extent some may expect from his prospect days; Peraza posted a 28.8 ft/sec average sprint speed each year from 2016-18, per Statcast, but saw that mark drop to 28.0 this past season. And while that might not sound like a notable drop, it’s enough to drop him from the 92nd percentile to the 75th percentile in the game. Peraza’s stolen-base efficiency, perhaps correspondingly, took a hit. He was caught six times in 13 attempts last year after going 70-for-94 in seasons prior.

In Peraza, the Red Sox now have a potential replacement for free agent Swiss army knife Brock Holt, who remains unsigned to this point in the offseason. Peraza can play virtually any position on the diamond outside of pitcher or catcher, and at roughly $3MM and 25 years of age, he’s both a younger and more affordable alternative — if he can round back into form, that is.

Regardless of the outcome, it’s a fairly sensible low-cost flier for Boston — one that could pay dividends across multiple years. Peraza has three years, 141 days of Major League service time, meaning if he does indeed bounce back, he’ll be controllable via arbitration all the way through the 2022 season

Latest On David Price Trade Talks

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It seems more and more plausible that the Red Sox will end up working out a deal involving lefty David Price, MLB.com’s Mark Feisand reports. The Padres, Cardinals, White Sox, Reds, and Angels have all shown varying degrees of interest in the 34-year-old, per the report.

Price is still owed $32MM a year for the next three seasons. That’s a big chunk of change for a 34-year-old who has made just 63 starts over the past three seasons — including 22 starts in a 2019 campaign that was cut short by elbow and wrist issues. Price was the embodiment of durability from 2010-16, pacing the Major Leagues with 1529 1/3 innings over that seven-year stretch, but he’s totaled just 358 frames over the past three seasons.

When on the field, of course, Price remains an effective pitcher — albeit one whose weighty annual salary no longer aligns with his rate of compensation. Dating back to 2017, Price owns a 3.75 ERA and 3.82 FIP. The 2019 season resulted in one of the worst ERAs of Price’s career (4.28), but he did give some reason for optimism with a career-high 10.7 K/9 and 28 percent strikeout rate. Price’s control remained solid (2.7 BB/9, seven percent walk rate), and his 21.0 K-BB% was the second-best of his career. Stranding runners was an issue, and a career-high .336 average on balls in play against him assuredly did Price no favors. Ultimately, though, Red Sox ownership’s desire to drop back below the luxury tax line is the driving factor in moving Price, whose seven-year, $217MM contract comes with a $31MM annual luxury hit.

Feinsand notes that the Red Sox have no desire to attach a desirable young player such as Andrew Benintendi to Price in order to simply shed the remainder of his contract. The Athletic’s Chad Jennings offers a similar sentiment (subscription required). “I don’t think we’d ever want to rule anything out,” chief baseball office Chaim Bloom of parting with prospects to help facilitate a Price trade (quote via Jennings). “But so much of what we’re always going to be trying to accomplish, but certainly now, is to make sure we have as strong a farm system as possible.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean that the Sox would be forced to simply include cash along with Price in a trade. The Boston organization could certainly acquire another unpalatable contract in return, thus helping to . The Padres have discussed the possibility of including Wil Myers in a deal, for instance, although there’s no indication that such talks gained any traction. Myers himself is owed a regrettable $61MM over the next three seasons and just wrapped up an ugly .239/.321/.418 effort, striking out in 34.2 percent of his plate appearances along the way.

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