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Nick Solak Elects Free Agency

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Infielder/outfielder Nick Solak has elected free agency, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. He was outrighted by the Pirates yesterday but has the right to reject that assignment since he has a previous career outright.

Solak, 30, will now head to the open market in search of his next opportunity. He settled for a minor league deal with the Pirates coming into the year and then got out to a great start. In 32 Triple-A contests, he put up a massive .393/.452/.625 batting line. That was partly due to an unsustainable .422 batting average on balls in play but Solak also hit six home runs while drawing walks at a 9.5% clip and only striking out 13.5% of the time.

That was enough to get him to the big leagues but he didn’t get much playing time in Pittsburgh. In almost three weeks on the roster, he only received 11 plate appearances in four games, recording just one single and no extra-base hits.

The Bucs nudged him off the roster when Nick Gonzales came off the injured list. Solak is out of options and therefore had to be removed from the 40-man entirely. The 29 other clubs all passed on the chance to grab him off waivers, so he’ll presumably be looking for another minor league deal in the coming days.

Broadly speaking, he has generally hit well in the minors but not the majors. He has a .250/.325/.369 line and 91 wRC+ in the big leagues. That includes a hot start when he was first promoted in 2019. Since then, he has a .243/.314/.350 line and 86 wRC+. Dating back to that same 2019 season, he has a .291/.379/.472 line and 118 wRC+ down on the farm.

Defensively, he’s played almost every position on the diamond but he’s not considered a strong fielder. In recent years, he’s mostly been limited to the outfield corners, first base and occasionally appearances at second base.

Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images

White Sox Claim Ryan Cusick

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The White Sox announced that they have claimed right-hander Ryan Cusick off waivers from the Tigers and optioned him to Triple-A Charlotte. Detroit designated Cusick for assignment earlier this week. Righty Miguel Castro has been transferred to the 60-day injured list to open a 40-man spot. Castro suffered a season-ending knee injury last week.

Cusick, 25, is a former first-round pick but he hasn’t yet been able to live up to that potential in the minor leagues. That’s why he’s been riding the transaction carousel lately. The A’s designated him for assignment just over a week ago. The Tigers claimed him but gave him the DFA treatment a few days later, which made him available to the White Sox today.

In the summer of 2021, Atlanta selected Cusick with the 24th overall pick and gave him a $2.7MM signing bonus. His time with that organization turned out to be brief, as Cusick was included in the March 2022 Matt Olson trade.

With the A’s, he didn’t pan out as a starter, both due to some injuries and his struggles to develop a changeup as a third offering. He had a 5.60 earned run average in 143 innings over the 2022 and 2023 seasons. The A’s moved him to the bullpen midway through 2024 and he showed promise there. He ended last year with a 1.73 ERA in 26 innings. His 11.8% walk rate was a bit high but he also punched out 28.2% of opponents.

The A’s put him on their 40-man roster in November to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft but he couldn’t keep that momentum going in 2025. He began this year with a 6.75 ERA in 14 2/3 innings. His 19.4% walk rate was actually higher than his 16.4% strikeout rate in that time. After the Tigers claimed him, he was able to add one scoreless inning before his second DFA of the year.

Cusick is clearly still a project but the Sox are a sensible landing spot for him. They are deep in rebuilding mode, having lost 121 games last year. They’re not quite as bad this year but they’re still the worst team in the American League. Most of their pitchers are young and inexperienced. If Cusick can get in a good groove with Charlotte, there’s a path to big league playing time. He has a full slate of options and can be kept in the minors for quite a while, though it’s also possible he gets nudged off the 40-man roster yet again if his struggles continue.

Photo courtesy of Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images

Yankees Outright Carlos Carrasco

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The Yankees announced that right-hander Carlos Carrasco, who was designated for assignment yesterday, has been sent outright to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. The waiver process takes 48 hours but players can be put on the wire while still on the 40-man and that was reported to be the case with Carrasco on Monday.

Carrasco, 38, is a veteran with over a decade in the majors. That means he has the right to reject this outright assignment and elect free agency. The Yankees didn’t give any indication whether or not he would exercise that right. He also accepted an outright assignment with the club last month, so perhaps he’ll do so again.

Though he has a long list of accolades in his career, Carrasco is mostly a depth arm at this point. He posted an earned run average of 6.80 in 90 innings for the Mets in 2023. Last year, he logged 103 2/3 innings for the Guardians and got his ERA down to 5.64, though that’s obviously still not an amazing number.

He had to settle for a minor league deal with the Yankees coming into 2025. Thanks to a number of injuries, he got a spot on the Opening Day roster. He made six starts and two relief appearances with a 5.91 ERA. He was designated for assignment in early May but, as mentioned, cleared waivers and accepted an outright assignment.

He pitched in Triple-A for a while and was called back to the majors this weekend after the Yanks got roughed up by the Dodgers on Saturday. He wasn’t needed in Sunday’s game and got put right back on waivers after. Assuming Carrasco reports to the RailRiders, he’ll get some innings in for that club and await his next big league opportunity.

Photo courtesy of Nathan Ray Seebeck, Imagn Images

Travis Jankowski Elects Free Agency

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Outfielder Travis Jankowski has cleared waivers and elected free agency, reports Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times. There wasn’t any indication the Rays removed him from their 40-man roster but it appears they quietly put him on waivers recently. This drops their 40-man roster count from 39 to 38.

Jankowski, 34 later this month, was acquired from the White Sox at the end of April. Tampa had a number of outfielders on the injured list and grabbed Jankowski as a veteran fill-in. Unfortunately, Jankowski himself hit the IL a couple of weeks later, landing there on May 15th due to a left groin strain. He started a rehab assignment a few days ago but it seems the Rays didn’t want to put him back on the roster, so they put him on waivers instead.

That’s likely due to their outfield getting healthier in recent weeks. Josh Lowe and Jake Mangum were both on the IL at the time Jankowski was acquired but each of them is now back on the active roster. Those two have slotted next to Kameron Misner in the club’s regular outfield mix with Christopher Morel also factoring in. The Rays considered that group strong enough that they optioned Chandler Simpson last week and don’t have room for Jankowski either.

Unlike Simpson, Jankowski is a veteran with over eight years of big league service time. That means he can’t be optioned to the minors without his consent. It also means he has the right to reject an outright assignment and elect free agency. Those factors have led him to the open market today.

He will now look for his next opportunity, presumably with a club that has a better path to playing time in its outfield. Jankowski has been a strong defender throughout his career. In 3,597 innings on the grass, he has accrued 29 Defensive Runs Saved and 33 Outs Above Average. He can also rack up double-digit steals if given regular playing time in a season.

The offense has been more mercurial. He was around league average with the Rangers in 2023, helping that club surge to a World Series championship. However, he was below average before that and has dropped down again since. On the whole, he has a career batting line of .236/.318/.305. That translates to a wRC+ of 76, indicating he’s been 24% below league average for his career. Since he cleared waivers, he’ll probably have to settle for a minor league deal.

Photo courtesy of Vincent Carchietta, Imagn Images

Giants Designate LaMonte Wade Jr., Sign Dominic Smith

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The Giants are shaking up their struggling offense. The team announced Wednesday that first baseman LaMonte Wade Jr. and backup catcher Sam Huff have been designated for assignment. Veteran first baseman Dominic Smith, who recently opted out of a minor league deal with the Yankees, has been signed to a one-year, major league contract. San Francisco also selected the contracts of outfielder Daniel Johnson and catcher Andrew Knizner from Triple-A and optioned infielder Christian Koss.

After a hot start to the season, the Giants have dropped 14 of their past 23 games. The offense has been the primary culprit, particularly over the past two weeks. Over the past 14 days, Giants hitters have posted a combined .209/.297/.306 batting line. They haven’t scored more than four runs in a game since May 16 and have been shut out or held to one run seven times in that span.

Wade’s struggles have been a major component of the team’s offensive drought, but unlike many of his teammates, the 31-year-old veteran has simply never gotten going in 2025. Wade was hitless in his first 18 trips to the plate this season and hasn’t pulled himself out of that funk. He’s batting .167/.275/.271 on the season and is currently in the midst of a 3-for-22 skid.

It’s been a swift and fairly shocking decline for Wade, who was a solidly above-average bat for San Francisco from 2021-24. He’s been the Giants’ primary first baseman in that stretch, and while he’s never been a huge power threat, he’s been an on-base machine. Wade was one of the best acquisitions of the Farhan Zaidi era in San Francisco, coming over from the Twins in a Feb. 2021 trade that sent righty Shaun Anderson to Minnesota. The swap drew minimal attention at the time, but Wade went on to bat .248/.352/.415 in his first four years as a Giant.

As recently as last season, Wade slashed .260/.380/.381 with a massive 15.5% walk rate. He’s been heavily platooned in his career, taking just 12% of his plate appearances against lefties and slashing .193/.288/.250 in that time, but Wade has been consistently productive against righties until 2025.

Wade’s 2025 struggles seem to stem from a loss of bat speed and, accordingly, pronounced troubles against velocity. He punished four-seamers from ’21-’24 but is hitting just .164 with a .262 slugging percentage against them in 2025. Statcast measured Wade’s bat speed at 73.8 mph in 2023 and 72.4 mph in 2024; he’s down to 69.7 mph in 2025, which places him in the 18th percentile of big league hitters.

Wade is still drawing walks at an outstanding 12.4% clip, and his 18.1% chase rate on pitches off the plate is the sixth-lowest among the 220 MLB hitters with at least 150 plate appearances this season. It’s clear that he has excellent pitch recognition and is still making good swing decisions — he’s just not doing any damage when he does make those correct choices.

In Wade’s defense, his .211 average on balls in play is more than 70 points shy of league-average. That can’t be entirely explained by bad luck, however, as he’s currently sporting a career-high 47.3% fly-ball rate. Fly-balls that stay in the yard are easier to convert into outs than grounders and especially line-drives, so even there’s unquestionably been some bad luck at play, Wade’s current batted-ball profile shouldn’t portend a rebound all the way back to his career .279 BABIP. That’s especially true given that he’s already hit more harmless infield pop-ups (six) through 169 plate appearances than he did in all of 2024 (four) in 401 trips to the plate.

Wade is being paid $5MM and is a free agent at season’s end. There’s still about $3.12MM of that sum that’s yet to be paid out. That figure could make it hard to find a trade partner, though the Giants could pay down a portion of the salary if another team has some interest.

The remaining money on Wade’s contract might be steep enough to allow him to pass through waivers if the Giants go that route, as any team that claimed him would take on that full $3.12MM (or a bit less, depending on the date he’s actually placed on waivers). If Wade were to clear, he has enough service time to reject a minor league assignment and retain the rest of that guaranteed money. In that scenario, any club that signs him would only need to pay him the prorated league minimum. That’d be subtracted from what the Giants owe him, but San Francisco would still be on the hook for the rest of his salary.

For at least the time being, Wade will be replaced by Smith. The former first-round pick is a veteran of eight big league seasons but has seen his offense drop after a huge 2019-20 showing wherein he batted .299/.366/.571 in 396 plate appearances with the Mets. Smith has begun to slip into journeyman status; the Giants are his seventh organization since 2022.

However, even though Smith has bounced around the league, he’s managed to deliver passable, if unspectacular offense in each of the past two seasons. Over 893 plate appearances between the Nationals, Red Sox and Reds, he’s slashed a combined .247/.321/.370. That’s about 8% worse than average, by measure of wRC+, but is still miles better than what Wade has produced so far in 2025. Smith was hitting decently with the Yankees’ Triple-A affiliate in Scranton, slashing .255/.333/.448 with eight homers in 189 turns at the plate.

In all likelihood, Smith will be a placeholder at first base. Top prospect Bryce Eldridge was promoted from Double-A to Triple-A yesterday and shouldn’t be too far from getting a look in the majors. The 2023 first-rounder is still only 20 years old, but you wouldn’t know it when taking a look at the .280/.350/.512 line (147 wRC+) he produced against older, more experienced competition in Double-A this year. Eldridge is widely regarded as one of baseball’s 25 best prospects, and once he gets a call to the majors, he’ll get everyday at-bats at first base. Smith could hang around in a bench role if he’s hitting well enough, but Eldridge is considered San Francisco’s first baseman of the future and shouldn’t be long for the minors.

Huff, 27, has appeared in 20 games this year and only tallied one multi-hit effort. In 58 plate appearances, he’s turned in a .208/.259/.340 batting line with a huge 43.1% strikeout rate. The former Rangers top prospect has struggled to make contact throughout his limited run in the majors over the years. Huff entered 2025 with a career 33.6% strikeout rate in 214 plate appearances at the MLB level.

Patrick Bailey is entrenched as the Giants’ starter behind the plate and is among the sport’s best defenders at any position, but he’s struggling with the bat as well (.191/.254/.276). Bailey is so good defensively that the Giants aren’t going to make any changes there, but with their catcher batting an MLB-worst .191/.253/.291, they’ll shuffle things up on the reserve side and hope for a bit more offense from Knizner.

Knizner, 30, isn’t a great hitter himself. He’s a career .210/.279/.317 hitter in 887 major league plate appearances. That said, his career 23% strikeout rate is markedly lower than that of Huff. Knizner isn’t as well regarded from a pitch-framing standpoint, but Statcast gives him much better grades than Huff when it comes to blocking balls in the dirt.

Knizner has also had a massive showing in Triple-A this year, batting a combined .378/.512/.520 with more walks than strikeouts in 129 plate appearances between the top affiliates for the Nationals and the Giants. No one would realistically expect him to maintain even 75% of that pace in the majors, but given Huff’s struggles and the broader-reaching difficulties incurred by the Giants’ lineup as a whole, it’s not a surprise that Knizner’s eye-popping numbers earned him a bump to the big leagues.

Rounding out today’s influx of new bats in the Giants clubhouse is Johnson, whom they signed out of the Mexican League earlier this season. As was the case with Jerar Encarnacion in 2024, Johnson posted video game numbers in Mexico (.429/.512/.943) and caught the eye of Giants scouts. He’s been quite good since signing back on May 2, hitting .272/.312/.534 with six homers and five steals in 109 plate appearances. He’s seen brief MLB time with the Guardians and Orioles but has only 95 big league plate appearances to his credit. Johnson has a solid Triple-A track record, having slashed .257/.323/.452 in parts of six seasons.

Reds Sign Wade Miley, Place Hunter Greene On Injured List

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9:35am: Miley’s deal pays him a prorated $2.5MM salary in the majors and comes with an additional $1.5MM available via incentives, Mark Sheldon of MLB.com reports.

8:57am: The Reds announced Wednesday that they’ve signed left-hander Wade Miley to a one-year, major league contract. The O’Connell Sports client recently opted out of a minor league deal with Cincinnati and briefly became a free agent, but he’s back in the fold and on the major league roster. To make room on the active roster, the Reds placed top starter Hunter Greene on the 15-day IL due to a groin strain. Top prospect Rhett Lowder, who’s been on the injured list all season due to a forearm strain, moves from the 15-day IL to the 60-day IL to clear a spot on the 40-man roster.

Miley, 38, will return to the majors after a 14-month absence. The veteran southpaw made two starts for the Brewers last year but suffered a torn UCL during the second of those two outings. He openly contemplated retirement but wound up opting to undergo Tommy John surgery and give it one more go in the majors. He inked a minor league deal to return for a second stint with Cincinnati, where he pitched from 2020-21.

Miley’s 2025 season has been spent rehabbing from that UCL surgery. He’s had a rough stretch in the minors, though a disproportionate amount of the damage done against him came in his first game, when he yielded six runs in just 2 1/3 innings with the Reds’ High-A club. Some early rust is understandable, and while Miley hasn’t exactly dominated since that time, he’s pitched more effectively as he shakes off the rust. He’s lasted five innings in two of his past three starts, allowing two runs in one and keeping his opponents scoreless in the other. That pair of solid outings was encouraging, but they also bookended an ugly May 25 outing in which he allowed four runs and didn’t escape the first inning.

Overall, Miley has an 8.84 ERA on his rehab stint, but he’s been more good than bad recently. Clearly, the Reds felt his stuff looked good enough to place him onto the major league roster. They could’ve gone with top prospect Chase Petty or journeyman Aaron Wilkerson — both of whom are pitching well in Triple-A this season. Petty is already on the 40-man roster and has made a brief MLB debut already. Instead, Reds brass was encouraged enough by the work Miley has put in that they feel he merits a look in the majors.

Time will tell if Miley can still pitch effectively in the big leagues. He didn’t get much of a chance to do so in 2024 prior to that elbow injury, but from 2021-23, Miley logged a tidy 3.26 ERA across 320 1/3 innings between a trio of NL Central rivals: the Reds, Cubs and Brewers.

Getting back to that level is a tough ask for a 38-year-old coming off Tommy John surgery, but Cincinnati doesn’t need Miley to pitch like an ace. The Reds have received outstanding work from each of Greene (2.72 ERA in 59 2/3 innings), Andrew Abbott (1.51 ERA in 47 2/3 innings), Nick Lodolo (3.10 ERA in 69 2/3 innings) and Nick Martinez (3.89 ERA in 69 1/3 innings). If Miley can simply hold down the fort during Greene’s absence and pitch like a competent back-of-the-rotation arm, the Reds’ rotation would still be among the best in the sport.

Turning to the 25-year-old Greene, this will be his second IL stint of the season due to a groin injury. He missed two weeks in mid-May due to a similar injury. Greene was lifted from his most recent start due to recurring tightness, and he’ll now sit back down for at least another two weeks. He’s been among the best pitchers in the National League dating back to last year — combined 210 innings, 2.74 ERA, 28.5% strikeout rate, 8.4% walk rate — making his recovery a particularly notable one for the Reds. He’s in the third season of a six-year, $53MM contract extension signed in April 2023.

As for Lowder, his move to the 60-day IL is largely procedural. He’s already spent more than 60 days on the injured list, and the shift from the 15-day IL to the 60-day IL does not reset his eligibility for a return. The 2023 No. 7 overall pick went out on a rehab stint from the forearm injury that’s plagued him in mid-May and looked to be trending toward a return before he suffered an oblique strain during one of his rehab starts. The Reds have since shut him back down from throwing. It’s notable that Lowder’s arm appears to be healthy again, but he’ll need to let that oblique strain mend for at least another couple weeks before starting from scratch on a new minor league rehab stint.

Giants Release Jake Lamb, Move Bryce Eldridge To Triple-A

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The Giants released veteran first baseman Jake Lamb from his minor league deal on Monday, according to the MLB.com transaction tracker. That’s tied to a move for their top prospect, as Bryce Eldridge has been bumped up to Triple-A Sacramento. Susan Slusser of The San Francisco Chronicle first reported the Eldridge move.

Lamb, 34, signed an offseason minor league contract. He hit .240/.352/.353 across 176 plate appearances. He walked at a strong 11.9% clip while striking out a quarter of the time. The lefty-hitting Lamb has accrued over eight years of MLB service and owns a .235/.326/.427 slash line in nearly 2700 big league plate appearances. His most recent MLB experience consisted of 19 games for the Angels in 2023.

Eldridge is a 20-year-old first baseman who was the Giants’ first-round pick out of high school two seasons ago. He made an eight-game cameo in Triple-A at the end of last year, a time when all of the organization’s lower level affiliates had already finished playing. There wasn’t any consideration to an MLB promotion at the time. A call in the coming weeks is much more realistic. After beginning this season on the shelf with a left wrist injury, Eldridge crushed Double-A pitching at a .280/.350/.512 clip in 34 games. He’s now back in Sacramento for a longer run than he got last season — unless the Giants feel compelled to call him to Oracle Park even more quickly.

President of baseball operations Buster Posey left the door open to Eldridge forcing their hand if he hits the ground running in Triple-A. “I think all of these decisions and conversations are fluid,” Posey said (link via Shayna Rubin of The San Francisco Chronicle). “Things can change. For Bryce, it’s best to get reps, but things change. So we’ll continue to have conversations and watch his progress.”

The Giants have had the worst first base production of any contender. They entered play tonight with .183/.291/.312 line out of the position. They’re last in batting average and slugging while ranking 21st in on-base percentage. Only the Pirates, Marlins and White Sox have received a lower OPS.

That mostly falls on LaMonte Wade Jr., who has a dismal .167/.275/.271 line after posting consecutive seasons with an OBP above .370 in 2023-24. Right-handed platoon partner Casey Schmitt hasn’t provided much either. Wade is day-to-day after being hit on the right hand by a Stephen Kolek pitch last night. Schmitt is starting against San Diego righty Ryan Bergert this evening.

Dodgers Sign José Ureña

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8:03pm: Los Angeles officially announced the Ureña deal and reported DFA of Chuckie Robinson. They optioned Will Klein to Triple-A in a corresponding active roster move.

11:38am: The Dodgers are signing right-hander José Ureña, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post. He’s expected to be in Los Angeles tonight to join their staff against the Mets, for whom he pitched earlier this year (albeit just one appearance). That suggests Ureña, a client of Premier Talent Sports & Entertainment, has agreed to a major league contract. Ureña is indeed getting a major league contract, per Alden González of ESPN.

Ureña, 33, just elected free agency yesterday. He’d been with the Blue Jays since early May and pitched reasonably well for Toronto but was cut loose when the Jays needed a fresh arm. He’ll at least temporarily join an injury-plagued Dodger bullpen that has seen significant turnover amid injuries to Evan Phillips, Kirby Yates, Blake Treinen and Luis García, among others.

Though Ureña’s time with the Jays resulted in a solid 3.65 ERA through 12 1/3 frames, he coupled that with an ugly 5-to-3 K/BB ratio and also served up three home runs. His 9.5% swinging-strike rate is noticeably south of the 11.3% league-average mark for a reliever, and opponents made contact on 88.8% of his pitches within the zone — a good bit higher than the 85% league average. Those red flags and the fact that he was on a minimal contract after signing under similar circumstances to the ones seen here with the Dodgers, made Toronto comfortable moving on.

Ureña throws hard but has a spotty track record in the big leagues. He was a solid starting pitcher with the Marlins early in his career, posting a 3.90 ERA in 343 2/3 innings from 2017-18. Declines in his command and his ability to keep the ball in the park plagued him for several years thereafter and caused him to begin to bounce around the league; from 2019-23, Ureña pitched a very similar number of innings to that ’17-’18 run  (350 1/3) but did so with a bleak 5.50 ERA while suiting up for five different clubs.

A 2024 stint with the Rangers revitalized Ureña’s career to an extent. He was a valuable swingman in Texas last season, piling up 109 innings with a 3.80 ERA and a much-improved 8.4% walk rate — albeit in conjunction with a 15.4% strikeout rate that ranked near the bottom of the league.

The Dodgers’ bullpen is in shambles, with Phillips recently learning he’ll require season-ending Tommy John surgery. That’s the most notable but hardly the only injury. Yates has missed more than two weeks with a hamstring strain. García hit the injured list over the weekend due to a groin strain. Treinen has been out since April due to a forearm strain. Michael Kopech and Brusdar Graterol haven’t pitched at all in 2025 — the former due to an offseason forearm strain and the latter due to offseason shoulder surgery.

With the relief corps reeling, the Dodgers have recently brought in a fresh wave of arms. Lou Trivino, like Ureña, was signed after being cut loose by another club (the division-rival Giants, in Trivino’s case). He’s been excellent in 8 1/3 innings. Righty Ryan Loutos was acquired from the Cardinals in exchange for cash after being designated for assignment. Another righty, Will Klein, joined the team just yesterday after the Dodgers and Mariners swapped minor league arms; Seattle picked up lefty Joe Jacques from L.A. in that deal. Chris Stratton briefly signed in L.A. after his release in Kansas City but has since been designated for assignment. Former Reds closer Alexis Diaz was also added in a recent trade, though he’s in Triple-A Oklahoma City at the moment.

The Dodgers will need to open a 40-man spot for Ureña. They’re currently at capacity in that regard, and while they’ve had a mountain of injuries pile up they’re currently without a clear candidate to move to the 60-day IL. If the Dodgers think Diaz’s salary will allow him to pass through waivers, they could designate him for assignment and try to stash him in Triple-A that way. Loutos struggled in his lone MLB inning but has been sharp in Triple-A since his acquisition. Righty Noah Davis, a depth pickup back in March, has struggled both in OKC and in the majors, which could put him at risk as well.

Orioles Re-Sign Chadwick Tromp To Minor League Deal

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The Orioles announced to reporters, including Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com, that catcher Chadwick Tromp has been re-signed to a minor league deal. He is with the club in Seattle and on the taxi squad.

Tromp, 30, was on the O’s roster for a few days recently. Adley Rutschman got a concussion scare, so the O’s added Tromp in order to have another backstop on the roster alongside Maverick Handley. Rutschman felt better a few days later, which led to the out-of-options Tromp being designated for assignment. He went hitless in four plate appearances during that brief stint as an Oriole. He elected free agency just a few hours ago but he and the club have worked out a new pact.

There hasn’t been anything to suggest that there’s anything currently wrong with Rutschman or Handley, so it’s possible Tromp is just around on the taxi squad for logistical reasons. The Orioles are in Seattle for three games and then play three against the Athletics in West Sacramento. The Triple-A Norfolk Tides are in Louisville, Kentucky this week, so it would take some time to get a fresh body to the West Coast if an injury did pop up. Tromp’s presence gives them someone on hand who can be added to the roster on short notice.

The O’s go back home next week after facing the A’s, at which point Tromp could perhaps join the Tides. He hasn’t hit much in his big league career, with a .219/.229/.375 line in part-time play over six seasons, but he has a solid defensive reputation and better offense in the minors. He has a combined .256/.337/.427 line and 102 wRC+ in 872 Triple-A plate appearances dating back to the start of the 2022 season.

Photo courtesy of Brett Davis, Imagn Images.

Cardinals Sign Tyler Matzek To Minor League Deal

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The Cardinals announced that they have signed left-hander Tyler Matzek to a minor league deal. He has been assigned to Triple-A Memphis and will provide the club with some non-roster bullpen depth.

Matzek, 34, started the year with the Yankees on a minor league deal. He was called up to the big leagues on April 22nd and lasted almost a month before being designated for assignment on May 16th. He tossed 6 1/3 innings over seven appearances, striking out seven opponents while giving out five walks and allowing 11 hits, which resulted in three earned runs. After being bumped from the roster, he cleared waivers and elected free agency. After a couple of weeks on the open market, he has landed with a new organization.

The lefty has some good seasons on his track record but hasn’t been able to do much in recent years. From 2020 to 2022, he logged 135 2/3 innings with Atlanta, posting a 2.92 earned run average in that time. His 13.4% walk rate was quite high but he also struck out 27.4% of batters faced. He earned one save and 33 holds over that span.

In October of 2022, he required Tommy John surgery. That put him on ice through the entire 2023 season. He was back in the mix last year but it turned out to be another challenging season. By early May, he allowed 11 earned runs in 10 innings for Atlanta. He then landed on the IL due to elbow inflammation. While still on the IL, he was traded to the Giants as salary ballast in the Jorge Soler deal. The Giants released him in August and he returned to Atlanta on a minor league deal but didn’t get back to the majors.

Put it all together and Matzek has only 16 1/3 big league innings since the end of the 2022 season. Regardless, he has some past major league success and there’s no harm for the Cards in adding some non-roster depth. They currently have Steven Matz, JoJo Romero and John King as the left-handed contingent of their big league bullpen but pitching injuries are fairly inevitable for all teams. The Cards will get a close-up look at Matzek in Memphis as he tries to earn his way back to the majors.

Photo courtesy of Vincent Carchietta, Imagn Images

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