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Padres Claim Jordan Humphreys From Giants

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The Padres claimed Jordan Humphreys off waivers from the Giants and will add him to the 40-man roster, per the team. To make room on the 40-man, Jose Castillo was placed on the 60-day injured list. Castillo will soon undergo Tommy John surgery.

Humphreys was an 18th round draft choice of the Mets in the 2015 June draft. He missed all of the 2018 season after undergoing Tommy John surgery, returning to make just a handful of appearances in the minors for the Mets in 2019. The Mets traded the right-hander to the Giants in August for Billy Hamilton. That would turn out to be Humphreys’ initiation into baseball’s nomad class. There are always a couple of players who get caught in the waiver wire carousel each winter, and Humphreys is one of this year’s contestants.

He was designated for assignment in November, at which point the Indians claimed him. When the Indians claimed Harold Ramirez, Humphreys was DFA’ed again. The Giants brought him back, claiming the 24-year-old from Cleveland. Presumably to make room for the José Álvarez signing, the Giants waived Humphreys again. Humphreys has now twice been a member of the Giants’ organization without ever suiting up for San Francisco in a game. Given the depth in San Diego, it will be a little surprising if Humphreys finds his ultimate home in San Diego, but at least for now, he will become the 40th man on the Padres’ 40-man roster.

Giants Sign Jose Alvarez

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MARCH 6: The Giants announced the signing of Álvarez to a one-year, $1.15MM contract with a $1.5MM club option for 2022, per MLB.com’s Maria I. Guardado (via Twitter). The option comes with a $100K buyout, adds John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle (via Twitter). That bonus will count towards the luxury tax, though the option year will not. Therefore, Álvarez’s deal should count $1.16MM against the luxury tax payroll this season.

MARCH 2: Free-agent reliever Jose Alvarez is nearing a deal with the Giants, Jon Heyman of MLB Network tweets. It’s unclear whether it will be a major league contract.

The left-handed Alvarez, who will turn 32 in May, debuted with the Tigers in 2013 and has since pitched for the Angels and Phillies. Alvarez struggled to keep runs off the board as a Tiger, but he did well in Anaheim and Philadelphia. Overall, despite a subpar strikeout percentage (20.8), Alvarez has logged a respectable 3.59 ERA/3.85 SIERA in 340 2/3 major league innings. He has thrown 50-plus innings in a season on four occasions, though he only tossed 6 1/3 frames last year as a result of a groin injury.

If his agreement with San Francisco does go through, Alvarez could be part of a bullpen that has no shortage of southpaws. Jake McGee has been their relief corps’ biggest free-agent acquisition, but Jarlin Garcia, Sam Selman, Wandy Peralta and Caleb Baragar are also on the Giants’ 40-man roster.

Giants Sign Justin Bour

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7:35pm: Bour will not be in MLB camp, Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area tweets. He’ll report to minor league camp April 1.

5:03pm: The Giants have agreed to a contract with Justin Bour, the first baseman himself posted in his Instagram profile. It’s a minor-league contract, reports Andrew Baggarly of the Athletic (Twitter link).

Bour is probably best known for a solid four-year run with the Marlins. He peaked in 2017, when he hit a robust .289/.366/.536 with 25 home runs in just 429 plate appearances. Bour’s offensive production tailed off in 2018, though, particularly after an August trade to the Phillies. He couldn’t right the ship in 2019, where he slumped to a .172/.259/.364 mark after signing with the Angels.

After being outrighted off Los Angeles’ 40-man roster, Bour signed a one-year contract with the Hanshin Tigers of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball. While there had been some hope he’d rediscover his power stroke in NPB, Bour slashed an unspectacular .243/.338/.422 with 17 homers across 379 plate appearances.

It has now been three years since we’ve seen Bour at peak form, but there’s no risk for San Francisco in bringing him in as depth. First base is sure to belong to Brandon Belt when he’s healthy, but the longtime Giant underwent heel surgery last October and might not be ready for Opening Day. Each of Wilmer Flores, Darin Ruf and Jason Vosler is on the 40-man roster as a potential replacement if Belt can’t go at the start of the season. Among them, only Vosler (who has yet to make his MLB debut at age 27) hits left-handed, so Bour’s lefty bat helps balance the group.

Giants, Scott Kazmir Agree To Minor League Deal

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FEB 27: Kazmir’s deal is official and he will report to spring training, per Kerry Crowley of the Bay Area News Group (via Twitter).

FEB 23: Comeback season is upon us, it seems. The Giants have agreed to a minor league contract with left-hander Scott Kazmir, reports ESPN’s Buster Olney. He’ll be invited to Major League Spring Training. Kazmir will earn a $600K base salary if he makes the Giants, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle tweets. His deal doesn’t include any opt-out dates.

It’s been nearly five years since Kazmir, now 37, pitched in the Majors with the Dodgers. Current San Francisco president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi was serving as general manager under president Andrew Friedman in Los Angeles at that point, and he was also an assistant GM in the Athletics’ front office in 2013 when Oakland inked Kazmir to a two-year deal.

There’s some obvious history between Zaidi and Kazmir, who at one point was one of the game’s brightest young starters. Kazmir broke out with the Rays in 2005, drawing Rookie of the Year votes that season and going on to make a pair of All-Star teams with Tampa Bay, where he posted a 3.51 ERA and a 25.1 percent strikeout rate from 2005-2008 (back when the league-average strikeout percentage was just 17 percent).

Injuries looked to have derailed Kazmir’s career after a disastrous stint with the Angels. He recorded just five outs in the Majors from 2011-12 and looked to be in danger of washing out entirely before even celebrating his 30th birthday. But Kazmir parlayed a minor league deal with the Indians — not unlike the one he’s now signing with the Giants — into a strong rebound campaign in 2013. He rewarded the A’s with an All-Star season in ’14 and a strong first half in ’15 before being traded to the Astros. Injuries again waylaid Kazmir in the second and third seasons of his three-year pact with the Dodgers, and he hasn’t been on a big league mound since Sept. 2016.

Overall, Kazmir owns a lifetime 4.01 ERA that, remarkably, is an exact match with both his FIP and his SIERA. He’s fanned 22.2 percent of his opponents at the MLB level against a 9.4 percent walk rate. Those numbers come across as that of a third or fourth starter, but Kazmir has shown on multiple occasions that when he’s at his best, he’s a good deal better than that.

Whether he has anything left in the tank remains to be seen, but Olney notes that Kazmir hit 92-93 mph in recent bullpen sessions. He’s never been a particularly hard thrower, so that velocity aligns nicely with Kazmir’s peak years. Even during his All-Star campaigns in 2006, 2008 and 2014, Kazmir averaged just north of 91 mph on his heater.

There’s no harm in the Giants taking a look this spring to see if Kazmir has another rebound in him — even if this comeback seems all the more improbable given his age and his considerably longer layoff from pitching in the Majors. He’ll add another intriguing, high-upside arm to a Giants staff that has rolled the dice on Aaron Sanchez, Alex Wood and Anthony DeSclafani on Major League deals.

Giants Claim Jordan Humphreys

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The Giants have claimed right-hander Jordan Humphreys off waivers from Cleveland, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle tweets. The Indians designated Humphreys for assignment Wednesday. In a corresponding move, the Giants placed righty Tyler Beede on the 60-day injured list as he continues to recover from March 2020 Tommy John surgery.

This will be the second go-around with San Francisco for Humphreys, whom the team first acquired from the Mets for outfielder Billy Hamilton last August. Humphreys never made an appearance with the Giants, though, and they designated him in November. The Indians quickly claimed Humphreys, who only lasted about three months with the organization.

An 18th-round pick of the Mets in 2015, Humphreys has yet to get past the High-A level, owing in part to the Tommy John procedure he underwent in 2017. The 24-year-old has performed well in the minors, however, with a 2.60 ERA and a 26.1 percent strikeout rate against a minuscule 4.4 percent walk rate over 169 2/3 innings.

Giants Outright Trevor Gott

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  • Giants right-hander Trevor Gott cleared waivers and was outrighted to Triple-A Sacramento on Friday, per Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic. He’ll remain in the organization as depth after it designated him for assignment last week. The hard-throwing Gott, 28, had a difficult 11 2/3-inning season in 2020, when he issued an equal number of strikeouts and walks (eight) and gave up 13 earned runs on 13 hits. The home run ball was one of the main culprits for Gott’s struggles, as he surrendered seven during that short period.

Giants Sign Jeremy Walker

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The Giants have signed right-hander Jeremy Walker, he announced Wednesday on Instagram (h/t: Mark W. Sanchez of KNBR). It’s presumably a minor league contract for Walker, whom the Braves released Feb. 12.

Walker was a 2016 fifth-round pick of the Braves who made his major league debut with the team in 2019, when he put up 9 1/3 innings of two-run ball with six strikeouts, four walks and a 57.1 percent groundball rate. He wasn’t able to follow up on that solid performance last year, though, owing in part to a shoulder impingement that sidelined him for 2020.

At the minor league level, Walker has also kept runs off the board while inducing plenty of grounders and limiting walks. In 2019, for instance, he recorded a 2.88 ERA with more than a strikeout per inning and a little over one walk per nine across 81 1/3 frames between Double-A and Triple-A ball. Based on Walker’s production as a pro, he seems like a worthwhile buy-low addition for the Giants.

Giants To Sign Jake McGee

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FEB. 22: It’s a two-year, $5MM guarantee for McGee, according to Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle. McGee will earn a $2MM salary this year and $2.5MM in 2022, when he could also make $2MM in performance bonuses. There’s a $4.5MM club option or a $500K buyout for 2023.

FEB. 9: The Giants are signing free-agent reliever Jake McGee, Robert Murray of Fansided reports. It’s a two-year deal worth $7MM for the Wasserman client, per Jon Heyman of MLB Network.

San Francisco will be the third National League West stop for the left-handed McGee, a 34-year-old who divided the previous five seasons between the Rockies and Dodgers. McGee was not particularly successful in Colorado, which acquired the ex-Ray before 2016 and then re-signed him to a three-year, $27MM guarantee in the ensuing offseason. As a result of his struggles as a Rockie, McGee had to settle for a low-paying deal with the Dodgers last summer.

The McGee signing worked out brilliantly for the Dodgers, who ran roughshod over the competition during the regular season and then earned a World Series title. While McGee was hardly the most instrumental part of the team’s run, he did give Los Angeles an excellent 2.66 ERA/1.81 SIERA over 20 1/3 innings.

The Dodgers’ version of McGee went to an almost all-fastball approach and averaged 95 mph on his heater – his best since 2014 – while posting eye-popping strikeout and walk percentages of 41.8 and 3.8, respectively. His K-BB percentage (38.0) ranked second among relievers behind Brewers Rookie of the Year winner Devin Williams. McGee also finished toward the top of the majors in such Statcast categories as expected batting average against, expected weighted on-base average against and expected ERA. On the other hand, he was near the bottom in exit velocity and hard-hit rate.

Now that he’s heading to the division-rival Giants, McGee will be the most established southpaw in their bullpen. The team does have other options, however, including Jarlin Garcia (who, like McGee, kept runs off the board at a great clip in 2020) and Sam Selman.

Giants Consider Shun Yamaguchi A Starting Pitcher

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  • Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi discussed the team’s newest addition to the pitching staff this afternoon (via Andrew Baggarly of the Athletic). Right-hander Shun Yamaguchi, who worked exclusively out of the bullpen last season for the Blue Jays, will come to camp as a starting pitcher. The 33-year-old can opt out of his minor-league deal at the end of spring training if he doesn’t make the team, Zaidi said. That’s a rather typical feature for non-roster arrangements.

Giants Designate Trevor Gott For Assignment

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The Giants have designated reliever Trevor Gott for assignment, per Kerry Crowley of the Bay Area News Group (Twitter link). The move clears space on the 40-man roster for the signing of Aaron Sanchez, whose one-year deal has been made official.

Gott is a bit of a surprising cut after San Francisco signed him to a $700K contract to avoid arbitration last November. Acquired from the Nationals in a minor trade before 2019, Gott looked like a potential long-term bullpen piece after his first season in the Bay Area. He tossed 52.2 innings of 4.44 ERA/3.73 SIERA ball with better than average strikeout (26.6%) and walk (7.9%) rates in 2019. Unfortunately, the wheels fell off last season, with Gott coughing up 13 runs (including a staggering seven homers) over 11.2 innings with eight strikeouts and walks apiece.

The Giants will now have a week to trade Gott, release him or place him on outright waivers. Brutal 2020 notwithstanding, it’s plausible he could attract interest from another club. In addition to his solid performance in 2019, Gott averaged a strong 95.4 MPH on his fastball last season. As a player with three-plus years of MLB service, a potential acquiring team would pick up three seasons of team control via arbitration.

If no other team acquires Gott, he’d be entitled to thirty days’ termination pay (roughly $112K) as a player cut within the first half of spring training. Unlike the vast majority of MLB contracts, most arbitration deals aren’t fully guaranteed until Opening Day.

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