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Twins Claim Joey Wentz

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The Twins announced that they have claimed left-hander Joey Wentz off waivers from the Pirates. The latter club designated him for assignment a few days ago. Wentz is out of options, so the Twins will need to make a corresponding active roster move when he reports to the team. To open a 40-man spot for Wentz, the Twins have transferred righty Pablo López to the 60-day injured list. It was reported last week that López is expected to miss eight to twelve weeks due to a teres major strain.

Wentz, 27, is in his fourth major league season. He was primarily a starting pitcher in 2022 and 2023 but didn’t quite establish himself as a bonafide big league rotation member. At the end of the 2023 season, he had a 5.99 earned run average and had exhausted his final option season.

That pushed him to the bullpen, a role in which he has shown some potential. He tossed 55 1/3 innings out of Detroit’s bullpen last year. The 5.37 ERA wasn’t great, nor was his 10.6% walk rate, but his 23.6% strikeout rate and 42% ground ball rate were pretty close to average. That got him bumped off the roster at the end of August last year.

The Pirates put in a claim and got some encouraging results from Wentz to end the season. He posted a 1.50 ERA in 12 frames after that claim. His walk rate ticked up to 12% but he also struck out 26% of batters faced.

He stuck on Pittsburgh’s roster through the winter and into 2025 with some mixed results so far. His 9.6% walk rate is still a bit high but an improvement for him. He’s also tamped down his home runs, with only 6.5% of fly balls leaving the yard compared to 11.3% last year. His 41.8% ground ball rate is still close to league par but his strikeout rate has dipped to 19.1%.

That got him bumped off Pittsburgh’s roster but the Twins will take a shot on him. Minnesota currently has Danny Coulombe as its only lefty reliever on the active roster, with Kody Funderburk on optional assignment. Wentz will give manager Rocco Baldelli a second southpaw in the relief corps alongside Coulombe, at least for the time being. Given his out-of-options status, Wentz will likely have a tenuous hold on a roster spot unless he takes a step forward.

Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images

Blue Jays Select Will Robertson, Place Nathan Lukes On Injured List

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June 11: The Jays will place Lukes on the 7-day concussion list as the corresponding move to bring Robertson to the majors, manager John Schneider announced today (via MLB.com’s Keegan Matheson).

June 10: The Blue Jays are promoting outfielder Will Robertson to the majors, according to a report from Trevor Hahn of News Tribune Sports. Toronto has space on their 40-man roster, so the only corresponding move needed to bring Robertson into the fold will be one to clear room on the active roster.

Robertson, 27, was Toronto’s fourth-round pick back in 2019. After getting a taste of pro ball in Low-A during his draft year, Robertson’s career was delayed slightly by the canceled minor league season in 2020 and when he returned in 2021 he struggled somewhat across 56 games at the High-A level with a wRC+ of just 94 as he hit .235/.310/.385. He once again put up relatively middling numbers the following year, this time slashing .215/.291/.401 (89 wRC+) across 90 games in his first taste of the Double-A level. Overall, Robertson’s approach came with a hefty dose of strikeouts and somewhat limited power that made it difficult for him to put up even average results early in his professional career.

Things began to change during a repeat of the Double-A level in 2023, however. That year, Robertson hit .245/.323/.488 with a wRC+ of 118. He pushed his walk rate up to 9.7%, the best it had been since his draft year, cut his strikeout rate by two points, and slugged 19 homers in 103 games. That sort of strong performance is to be expected of a 25-year-old making his second trip through Double-A, but it was still enough to get him promoted to Triple-A Buffalo for the first time in his career. While Robertson’s increased walk rate and power remained from the year prior, his strikeout rate jumped to 31.3% in 2024 as he struggled against Triple-A pitching an ultimately slashed just .226/.319/.429 with a wRC+ of 95.

Robertson’s 2024 performance may have seemed to indicate he didn’t have much of path to the big leagues, but he’s changed that narrative with a brilliant season in 2025 so far. In 51 games for the club’s Buffalo affiliate, Robertson has crushed the ball to the tune of a .288/.410/.582 slash line. He has 12 home runs in just 188 plate appearances, he’s walking a whopping 17.0% of the time, and he’s striking out less than he has since 2019 with a 23.9% clip. Taken together, it leaves him with a 159 wRC+ that’s good for fourth in the International League this year. Robertson isn’t considered much of a prospect, as he isn’t even ranked on MLB.com’s Top 30 Blue Jays prospects list. Regardless of a player’s prospect status, however, Robertson’s numbers are the type that will get you attention from the big league club.

That’s especially true for a Blue Jays club that is running a bit thin on outfield depth after losing both Anthony Santander and Daulton Varsho to the injured list. Alan Roden, Myles Straw, Jonatan Clase, Addison Barger, and Nathan Lukes have been mixing and matching in the outfield for the Jays in recent weeks alongside veteran right fielder George Springer, and Ben Nicholson Smith of Sportsnet was among those to relay this afternoon that Lukes had been scratched from today’s lineup due to neck discomfort. Perhaps Robertson’s call-up is a sign that Lukes’ neck issue is serious enough to require a stint on the injured list, though it’s also possible Robertson’s phenomenal play to this point in the year has simply forced the issue in the eyes of Blue Jays brass.

Giants, Scott Alexander Agree To Minor League Deal

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The Giants have agreed to a minor league deal with veteran left-handed reliever Scott Alexander, per the team’s transaction log at MLB.com. The Apex Baseball client will head to Triple-A for the time being.

Alexander, 36 next month, signed a one-year deal with the Rockies over the winter. That pact, which paid him a guaranteed $2MM, didn’t work out for either party. In 16 1/3 innings as a Rockie, Alexander was shredded for a 6.06 earned run average. He allowed 11 runs on 20 hits — four of them homers — and seven walks. He’s never been a big strikeout arm, but Alexander punched out only six of 72 opponents (8.3%) against a 9.7% walk rate. Colorado designated him for assignment on May 23 and released him a few days later.

Ugly as that short run in Denver was, Alexander has a nice track record in the majors overall. He carries a career 3.34 ERA, 17.5% strikeout rate and 8.8% walk rate in 325 2/3 innings — all accompanied by a gargantuan 66.6% ground-ball rate. As recently as last season, the southpaw tossed 38 2/3 innings of 2.56 ERA ball for the A’s.

Giants fans should be plenty familiar with Alexander, who pitched in San Francisco in 2022-23. He tallied 65 2/3 innings with a 3.70 ERA, a 15.1% strikeout rate, a 4.4% walk rate and a 63.8% grounder rate in his two seasons calling Oracle Park home.

At present, Erik Miller is the only left-hander in manager Bob Melvin’s bullpen. The only other southpaws on the 40-man roster at all are starters Robbie Ray and Kyle Harrison, both of whom are currently in the Giants’ excellent rotation. Alexander will join Joey Lucchesi as an experienced non-roster lefty in the Giants’ bullpen with their Triple-A club in Sacramento.

Casey Lawrence Elects Free Agency

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Right-hander Casey Lawrence has elected free agency after being outrighted to Triple-A Tacoma by the Mariners, according to the transactions log on his MLB.com profile page.

Lawrence, 37, was DFA’d over the weekend in what has become an extremely familiar pattern for him and the Mariners. He’s been shuttled between Tacoma and Seattle all throughout the 2025 campaign so far with multiple trips to the waiver wire in between stints, utilized effectively as a 41st member of the 40-man roster who can be called upon when the Mariners need an extra arm before being cut loose and placed on waivers once he’s provided some length out of the bullpen.

It’s an unusual role, but he’s done fairly well in it this year. Lawrence has a 4.08 ERA and 4.09 FIP across 17 2/3 innings of work, almost all of which came as a member of the Mariners save one short stint with the Blue Jays where he allowed three runs on six hits in 2 2/3 innings of long relief work. The arrangement has allowed Lawrence to find his first big league opportunities since 2023, when he struggled to a 6.59 ERA in 27 innings of work for the Cardinals out of the bullpen.

That was the only time in his career he donned a major league uniform other than those of the Blue Jays and Mariners, but his 96 2/3 innings in the majors prior to that time in St. Louis were largely more of the same as he pitched to a 6.80 ERA and 5.31 FIP in 44 appearances between 2017 and 2022. A stint with Nippon Professional Baseball’s Hiroshima Carp in 2019 wasn’t especially fruitful either, as he allowed six runs in five innings during his lone Central League appearance and mostly posted middling numbers for the Carp’s Western League team, the NPB equivalent of a minor league club.

While Lawrence’s results have improved substantially this year, it’s anyone’s guess whether that league average production is sustainable for the right-hander. His 8.8% strikeout rate is nothing short of microscopic, but he’s walked just 1.3% of his opponents and has a fairly solid 40.8% ground ball rate. If anything Lawrence’s .348 BABIP and 51.6% strand rate suggest he may be getting slightly unlucky when it comes to batted ball luck and sequencing, although an 8.0% home run to fly ball ratio seems unlikely to be sustainable. Lawrence’s 4.54 SIERA paints him as an average to slightly below average pitcher overall this year, and given Lawrence’s status as the team’s extra arm over the first few months of the season the Mariners are likely to be quite satisfied with that level of production.

Lawrence is now a free agent and able to sign with any of the league’s 30 clubs, though it wouldn’t be a surprise if he finds himself re-signing with the Mariners on a fresh minor league deal within the next few days to restart the cycle between Triple-A and the majors Seattle brass seem content to continue pushing him through. It’s an unequivocal win for Lawrence, who collects big league service time and salary even when he’s in DFA limbo or on the waiver wire. That means this process has allowed him to collect a healthy portion of the league minimum salary to this point in the season and more than a month of big league service time.

Diamondbacks Outright Aramis Garcia; Scott McGough Elects Free Agency

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The Diamondbacks announced a pair of roster moves this evening, as right-hander Scott McGough elected free agency while catcher Aramis Garcia cleared waivers and was assigned outright to Triple-A. Both players had been designated for assignment by the club last week.

McGough, 35, was a fifth-round pick by the Dodgers back in 2011 but didn’t make his big league debut until 2015 when he made six ill-fated outings as a member of the Marlins. He surrendered seven runs on twelve hits and four walks while striking out four across 6 2/3 innings of work for Miami and did not appear in the majors again for quite some time. After spending the next few years bouncing around the Marlins’, Orioles’, and Rockies’ minor league systems McGough caught on overseas with Nippon Professional Baseball’s Yakult Swallows. McGough ultimately spent four seasons in Japan and pitched quite well out of the bullpen there with a 26.0% strikeout rate and a 2.94 ERA across his 236 Central League appearances.

That work was enough to catch the attention of the Diamondbacks, who signed him to a deal worth $6.25MM guaranteed over two years ahead of the 2023 campaign. That signing did not go over well. McGough was a below average reliever by the numbers in 2023, with a 4.76 ERA (93 ERA+) in 70 1/3 innings, but some peripherals like his 25.6% strikeout rate and 3.49 SIERA suggested he had more to offer. Unfortunately, those underlying numbers collapsed in 2024 as he posted a 7.44 ERA and a 6.04 FIP across his 26 appearances while striking out just 16.7% of his opponents against a 14% walk rate. The Diamondbacks made the easy decision to decline a 2025 club option on his services last winter, though they eventually re-signed him to a minor league deal in February. When added to the roster back in April, McGough posted a 6.43 ERA in seven innings of work while walking (six) more batters than he struck out (five). He now returns to free agency in the midst of his age-35 season in search for a change of scenery as he looks to try and salvage his season.

As for Garcia, the 32-year-old was a second-rounder by the Giants in 2014 who made his big league debut during the 2018 season, when he helped fill the void when Buster Posey’s season came to an abrupt end due to hip surgery. Garcia hit .286/.302/.492 (117 wRC+) across 19 games in his first taste of major league action, but he hasn’t hit a lick since. Garcia’s appeared in the majors for five different clubs since the start of the 2019 season, and in that time he’s hit just .192/.233/.282 with a 39 wRC+. Of course, that slash line comes across a sample of just 101 plate appearances in the big leagues as Garcia has been used primarily as a third-string catcher throughout his time as a big league option. Even so, there’s been very little over the years to suggest that he’s more than a depth option behind the plate for a big league club. That’s exactly how the Diamondbacks figure to use him going forward, as his outright means he can serve as non-roster depth behind the club’s primary catching tandem of Gabriel Moreno and Jose Herrera.

Pirates Re-Sign Tanner Rainey To Minor League Deal

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Right-hander Tanner Rainey has reunited with the Pirates on a minor league deal and will report to Triple-A Indianapolis, as relayed by Alex Stumpf of MLB.com. He was designated for assignment by the Bucs just over a week ago but had cleared waivers and elected free agency, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com.

Rainey, 32, signed a minor league deal with the Pirates in the offseason. He was selected to their roster in early May and spent almost a month on the roster. In that time, he struggled mightily through 11 appearances where he surrendered nine runs on seven hits and six walks while striking out six across 7 2/3 innings of work. A look under the hood reveals that eight of those appearances were actually scoreless, as he allowed all nine runs across the other three outings while combining to record just two outs in those appearances.

Meltdowns like that are sure to balloon a pitcher’s ERA, but Rainey retained the peripherals of a perfectly decent middle reliever. He struck out 24.3% of his opponents, and while his 16.2% walk rate was definitely alarming his ability to keep the ball on the ground and miss barrels was enough to allow him to maintain a solid 3.46 FIP and a decent 4.32 SIERA. Those numbers would be a marked improvement over last year, when he pitched to a 4.76 ERA and 5.42 FIP in 51 frames for the Nationals while walking 12.6% of his opponents and striking out just 19.0%.

Of course, the Pirates were surely hoping to help Rainey discover the form he flashed earlier in his Nationals career when they initially signed him. From 2019 to 2023, Rainey posted a 4.39 ERA with a 4.54 FIP in his 140 appearances for the club. That includes one major outlier season, however, as 2021 saw him torched to the tune of a 7.39 ERA in 31 2/3 innings of work. Rainey’s ERA was under 4.00 in the other four years of that stretch, and he even got some high-leverage work in during the 2022 campaign when he collected 12 saves.

If Rainey can get right, it wouldn’t be a shock to see him get another opportunity for a beleaguered Pirates team that could certainly use some help in the bullpen. Their 4.22 ERA ranks 20th in baseball, and key pieces like Tim Mayza and Justin Lawrence are currently on the shelf. Dennis Santana, David Bednar, and Caleb Ferguson are a decent late-inning trio, but Pittsburgh could use more solid middle relief options than Ryan Borucki and Kyle Nicolas. Of course, Rainey will need to compete with other non-roster veterans like Yohan Ramirez and Ryder Ryan to capitalize on those opportunities.

Photo courtesy of Charles LeClaire, Imagn Images

Giants Place Matt Chapman On 10-Day Injured List

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The Giants announced today that they’ve placed third baseman Matt Chapman on the 10-day injured list with a sprained right hand. Infielder Christian Koss was recalled to the club’s roster to replace Chapman. The infielder spoke at length Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle and Maria Guardado of MLB.com about his injury, noting that he’s certain to miss more than the minimum ten days after injuring his hand while diving towards third base in the eighth inning of the club’s game on Sunday.

Chapman indicated that he’s suffering from sprains in three of the fingers on his right hand, and each of those three fingers also has a bone bruise. The third baseman’s exact timeline for return is not yet clear, but he said he hopes to be back in action before the end of the first half. That suggests he hopes to return at some point before the All-Star break begins on July 14, although Slusser adds that Chapman is set to meet with hand specialist Dr. Steven Shin in Los Angeles on Friday and that the team will know more about his exact timeline for return after that meeting.

Even a few weeks without Chapman would be a frustrating bump in the road for a Giants team that has managed to outperform expectations in a big way this year, as they currently sit just 1.5 games back of the Dodgers in the NL West and firmly entrenched in the Wild Card mix. Chapman’s been a major part of that success so far, as he’s slashed an excellent .243/.360/.452 with a wRC+ of 134 while playing his typical excellent defense at the hot corner. That package has been enough to generate 2.5 fWAR in just 65 games, a figure that just nine players in the NL have managed to top so far this season. On top of his excellent season-long production, the veteran was also in the midst of a particularly hot stretch as he had been hitting .322/.429/.610 with a wRC+ of 194 over his past 17 games.

Replacing Chapman on the roster is Koss, who made his big league debut for San Francisco earlier this year. He hasn’t hit much in the majors yet, with a career slash line of just .219/.275/.266 (57 wRC+) across 29 games. Koss is an impressive and versatile defender, however, and he’ll likely slide into the utility role Casey Schmitt was previously getting used in while Schmitt takes over for Chapman at the hot corner. The 26-year-old seemed to enjoy something of a breakout last year when he posted a 109 wRC+ in 40 games, but this year he’s hit just .180/.281/.240 across 20 games despite fairly strong peripheral numbers. Perhaps sliding into an everyday role while Chapman is out of commission will give Schmitt the opportunities he needs to play closer to his peripheral numbers, which suggest he can be an average-to-above average hitter in the majors if he can turn that underlying performance into on-field production.

Diamondbacks Place Justin Martínez On IL With UCL Sprain

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The Diamondbacks announced a series of roster moves today. Right-handers Kevin Ginkel and Bryce Jarvis have been recalled from Triple-A Reno and the club has also selected the contract of right-hander Tayler Scott. To open spots for those three, righty Jeff Brigham has been optioned to Reno while righties Justin Martínez and Christian Montes De Oca have both been placed on the 15-day injured list. Martínez has a sprained right ulnar collateral ligament while Montes De Oca has right elbow inflammation. To open a 40-man spot for Scott, righty Cristian Mena has been transferred to the 60-day IL.

The news on Martínez is ominous. The righty called the training staff to the mound during last night’s appearance. It was later relayed to reporters that he was experiencing elbow tightness. A sprain, by definition, involves some stretching or tearing of the ligament. Per Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic, manager Torey Lovullo says Martínez is now set for a second opinion on his injury.

Whenever a pitcher’s elbow is injured, it raises alarm bells about a possible surgery and those concerns certainly appear to be warranted here. It should be pointed out that not all sprains necessarily lead to a operation. To pick one recent example, Mason Miller was diagnosed with a mild UCL sprain in May of 2023 and ultimately did not head to the surgeon’s table. However, it took him four months to get back on the mound, as he wasn’t reinstated from the IL until September of that year.

It may take a few more days to determine the prognosis with Martínez but it seems like it will be an unfortunate development regardless. The righty seemed to break out as one of the best relievers in the sport last year. He tossed 72 2/3 innings for the Diamondbacks with a 2.48 earned run average. His 11.7% walk rate was certainly high but he struck out 29.5% of opponents and got grounders on 58.9% of balls in play.

The Diamondbacks believed in that breakout enough to lock up Martínez for the long term. He and the club agreed to a five-year extension in March that guarantees him $18MM, with two club options as well. Unfortunately, the first season of that deal has been a bit of a bust so far. Martínez already missed about three weeks due to some shoulder inflammation and is now back on the IL again with an even scarier diagnosis. He has only been able to throw 15 1/3 innings with a 4.11 ERA this year.

Martínez and A.J. Puk were supposed to be the two big weapons in the Arizona bullpen this year. Puk made just eight appearances before landing on the IL in mid-April due to elbow inflammation. He was later diagnosed with a flexor strain and transferred to the 60-day IL. His return timeline is unclear. Now it seems possible the Snakes may have to proceed without either of those hurlers for a while. They also put Kendall Graveman on the 15-day IL yesterday due to a hip impingement.

It’s the latest punch in what has been a bruising season for the Diamondbacks. They have lost starters Corbin Burnes and Jordan Montgomery to Tommy John surgery. Their bullpen has taken a number of hits. Some of their healthy pitchers have been underperforming. Though the Snakes came into the season with high hopes, they are now fourth in the National League West and 5.5 games back in the Wild Card race, a less than ideal time to be hemorrhaging key players.

If Martínez does have a serious injury, there would be one silver lining for the Diamondbacks in the long term. His extension has a conditional club option for 2032, valued at just $3MM. That would be triggered if he requires surgery or missed a certain number of days on the IL during the course of the deal.

While the club awaits for information there, they have to proceed with the business of the games on the schedule. They have added a number of arms to the active roster, which includes adding Scott to the 40-man. The 33-year-old Scott elected free agency last month after being designated for assignment by the Astros, which led to a minor league deal with the Diamondbacks.

He seemed to have a nice late-bloomer breakout with Houston last year, posting a 2.23 ERA over 68 2/3 innings. He struck out 25.2% of batters faced, though also gave out walks at a 12.4% pace. There was likely a bit of luck in that ERA, as his .230 batting average on balls in play and 84.9% strand rate were both to the fortunate side. ERA estimators like his 4.13 FIP and 4.04 SIERA pointed to some regression though still suggested he could be a capable big league arm.

The pendulum swing ended up being quite strong. He posted a 5.40 ERA through 16 2/3 innings to start this year. His .313 BABIP and 65.2% strand rate went to the other side of average as his strikeout rate fell to 20.5% and his walk rate climbed to 15.4%.

Since he’s out of options, that got him bumped off the roster and to free agency. Since landing with the D’Backs, he has thrown 3 1/3 scoreless innings for Reno. He may have a tenuous grasp on a roster spot, given his out-of-options status, but he, Ginkel and Jarvis will give the club three fresh arms after they used eight different pitchers to get through yesterday’s 11-inning game against the Mariners.

As for Mena, he just landed on the IL a few days ago with a shoulder strain. Lovullo said his absence would be measured in “weeks, not days.” Given today’s IL transfer, he will be ineligible for reinstatement until early August.

Photo courtesy of Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images

Orioles Select Luis Vázquez

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The Orioles announced that they have selected the contract of infielder Luis Vázquez. He’ll take the active roster spot of infielder/outfielder Jorge Mateo, who has been placed on the 10-day injured list due to left elbow inflammation, retroactive to June 7th. The 40-man roster count climbs from 38 to 39. The O’s added that right-hander Matt Bowman, who was recently designated for assignment, has cleared waivers and accepted an outright assignment to Triple-A Norfolk.

Vazquez, 25, was acquired from the Cubs in a minor trade back in January. The infielder was a 14th-round pick by Chicago back in 2017 but made it to the majors for the first time just last year with an 11-game stint on the North Side. Vazquez split time between shortstop, third base, and second base during his brief call-up and looked competent at all three of those positions defensively, but hit just .083 with six strikeouts in 14 plate appearances during that brief call-up to the majors. Other than that, he spent the entire year at Triple-A Iowa, where he hit a solid but unspectacular .263/.347/.432 in 64 games, which in terms of wRC+ sat right around league average with a figure of 98.

During the offseason, the Cubs committed to a complete overhaul of their third base and bench mixes. Aside from promoting top prospect Matt Shaw, they brought in Jon Berti, Vidal Brujan, and Justin Turner to round out the bench mix while parting ways with not only starting third baseman Isaac Paredes but also longtime bench pieces like Patrick Wisdom, Nick Madrigal, and David Bote. Vazquez found himself let go as part of that purge and was designated for assignment to make room for the addition of Berti to the 40-man roster, which ultimately facilitated his trade to the Orioles organization. The infielder didn’t last long on the Orioles’ own 40-man roster and was outrighted to the minors just a week after the club acquired him. He received some consideration for an Opening Day roster spot but ultimately began the season at Triple-A Norfolk, where he’s slashed .280/.345/.447 with a 114 wRC+ in 37 games this year.

Vazquez is now set to take over for Mateo on the Orioles’ bench. Mateo’s dealing with discomfort in his surgically repaired elbow after undergoing Tommy John surgery last year, so while MLB.com notes that Mateo underwent an MRI that revealed no structural damage it’s hardly a surprise that Baltimore has decided to be cautious with their utility man. Mateo is presently in the midst of his worst season as an Oriole with a 44 wRC+ and a 35.4% strikeout rate, so it’s possible that the time off could give him some time to reset as well. The soon to be 30-year-old remains a useful bench piece despite his paltry offense this year thanks to his elite baserunning (14 steals in 15 attempts this year as a part-time player) and his versatility to handle virtually every spot on the diamond as needed. Vazquez, Ramon Urias, and Dylan Carlson will all be tasked with helping to pick up the slack while Mateo is on the shelf.

As for Bowman, the right-hander made his debut back in 2016 and spent a few years as a solid middle reliever for the Reds and Cardinals before falling off the map for a few years due to injuries. He resurfaced in 2023 and has bounced between the Yankees, Twins, Diamondbacks, Mariners, and Orioles over the past three years while putting together a 4.79 ERA and 4.91 FIP in 56 1/3 innings. He’ll now head to Triple-A to serve as non-roster relief depth for Baltimore going forward.

Rangers To Sign Craig Kimbrel To Minor League Deal

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The Rangers are signing right-hander Craig Kimbrel to a minor league deal, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. The righty elected free agency yesterday after Atlanta passed him through waivers unclaimed.

Kimbrel, 37, signed a minor league deal with Atlanta in the middle of March. He reported to Triple-A Gwinnett and logged 18 innings with an earned run average of 2.00. His 12.9% walk rate was a bit high but he also struck out 32.9% of batters faced. Atlanta called him up a few days ago but designated him for assignment after just one appearance. He tossed one scoreless inning against the Giants, allowing one hit and surrendering one walk while striking out one opponent.

As a veteran with years of big league experience, Kimbrel has the right to reject an outright assignment and elect free agency. He did exactly that and has quickly secured this minor league deal with the Rangers.

Kimbrel’s track record is well known. He has been one of the most dominant relievers in the sport at times and is currently fifth on the all-time saves list. The bigger question is whether he can still be an effective big leaguer, as his recent track record is shaky. He had an ERA north of 5.00 in both 2019 and 2020. He got that down to more reasonable levels for the 2021-23 seasons but struggled again last year. He had a 2.80 ERA in the first half with the Orioles but was lit up for a 10.59 ERA in the second half, getting released before the season ended.

This year, any club could have given him a big league shot. It was reported that his minor league deal with Atlanta had a “rolling opt-out” that essentially allowed any club to offer him a major league role at any time. If any had done so, Atlanta would have needed to decide whether to call him up themselves. As far as we know, no club took advantage of that contract provision. Atlanta did call him up but for literally one day.

That has left him to settle for another minor league deal. He will presumably report to Triple-A Round Rock shortly and will get some work for that club as he tries to get another chance in the majors.

For the Rangers, they have been looking for cheap bullpen solutions for a long time. In the offseason, they clearly wanted to upgrade the group but also wanted to avoid the competitive balance tax. They signed Chris Martin, Hoby Milner, Luke Jackson, Jacob Webb, Shawn Armstrong and Luis Curvelo to major league deals, none of them worth more than $5.5MM. They also acquired Robert Garcia, who has not yet qualified for arbitration, in the deal that sent Nathaniel Lowe to the Nationals.

They are currently running a four-man rotation with Nathan Eovaldi on the injured list and Kumar Rocker recently optioned to the minors. They can have Tyler Mahle, Jack Leiter, Patrick Corbin and Jacob deGrom start the next four games but might need to do something creative by Saturday. Perhaps they will do a bullpen game or call up a minor leaguer for a spot start. Perhaps a fresh arm will be needed in the next week and Kimbrel could be that guy.

Photo courtesy of Robert Edwards, Imagn Images

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