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White Sox Sign Adrian Houser

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May 20: The Sox announced today that they have signed Houser to a one-year, $1.35MM deal. Assuming that’s prorated, Houser will get about $950K. James Fox of FutureSox previously reported that Houser was expected to start tonight’s game for the Sox, indicating it would be a big league deal. The Sox designated right-hander Yoendrys Gómez for assignment as the corresponding move.

May 19: The White Sox are nearing an agreement with free agent righty Adrian Houser, reports Robert Murray of FanSided. It’s not clear if he’ll jump right onto the big league roster or head to Triple-A Charlotte. Houser, a client of BBI Sports Group, was granted his release from a minor league contract with Texas last week.

Houser signed with the Rangers during the offseason. He has worked out of the rotation at Triple-A Round Rock, tallying 39 1/3 innings across nine appearances. While his 5.03 earned run average is pedestrian, that’s not all that uncommon in the Pacific Coast League. Houser has stronger peripherals. He struck out a decent 22.8% of opponents while running an excellent 57.3% grounder rate.

Ground balls are Houser’s speciality. He has gotten grounders at a near-52% clip over parts of eight seasons in the majors. That was up in the 58-59% range during his best seasons with Milwaukee but has been down to a more normal 46-48% mark over the past few years. That caught up to him last year, as he allowed 5.84 earned runs per nine across 69 1/3 frames with the Mets. Houser had begun the season in New York’s rotation but was kicked to the bullpen after seven starts. His results in relief were much better. He carried an ERA north of 8.00 as a starting pitcher but turned in a 3.28 mark across 35 2/3 relief innings.

Texas signed him as rotation depth, which seems likely to be his role in Chicago (assuming the deal is finalized). The rebuilding White Sox have baseball’s least experienced rotation. Bryse Wilson is the only member of the current starting staff who entered the season with even one year of MLB service. Wilson, who had begun the year in the bullpen, stepped into the starting five after Martín Pérez suffered a forearm injury. He has allowed a 6.62 ERA with nearly as many walks as strikeouts over four starts.

Rule 5 pick Shane Smith has been the team’s best pitcher, turning in a sterling 2.05 ERA with average strikeout and walk numbers over his first nine MLB starts. Davis Martin and Jonathan Cannon have each been a little worse than average. Opening Day starter Sean Burke has struggled, though he’d been better this month until giving up six runs to the Cubs on Saturday. If Houser jumps right onto the MLB roster, he could nudge Burke or Wilson from the rotation. Burke still has a full slate of minor league options. Wilson is out of options and would need to be designated for assignment for the Sox to take him off the big league roster.

Orioles Release Kyle Gibson

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The Orioles announced that right-hander Kyle Gibson has been released. That was the expected outcome after he was designated for assignment on the weekend. Assuming he’s already cleared release waivers, he’s free to sign with any club.

Gibson, 37, was a late signing of the O’s. He and the club agreed to a one-year, $5.25MM deal in the latter half of March. He had lingered unsigned throughout the winter while the Orioles had some concerns about their pitching depth due to some spring injuries.

Adding a stable veteran like Gibson made plenty of sense but it did not work out at all. He agreed to be optioned to the minors at the start of the season, effectively as a delayed spring training ramp-up. He was recalled to the big leagues in late April but was quickly shelled. His first start was against the Yankees, with Gibson allowing four home runs in the first inning. He would eventually log 3 2/3 innings on the day, allowing five homers in total.

His next three starts weren’t much better. On May 5th, he allowed three earned runs in four innings against the Royals. He squared off against the Angels on May 10th, allowing five earned runs in four frames. On Saturday, he didn’t make it out of the first, getting tagged for six earned runs in two thirds of an inning against the Nationals. Put it all together and Gibson has an ugly 16.78 ERA through 12 1/3 innings this year. The O’s clearly ran out of patience, cutting him from the roster on Sunday.

Given those poor results and his salary, no club was going to claim him and take on the remainder of his contract. As a veteran with years of experience, he has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment.

But as a free agent, he might generate interest. With the O’s on the hook for the remainder of his salary, another club would only have to pay him the prorated version of the major league minimum salary for any time spent on the roster. The recent results have obviously not been good but perhaps some teams will chalk that up to his unusual ramp-up period. Gibson has almost 2,000 big league innings and has generally been a serviceable back-end guy. As recently as last year, he posted a 4.24 ERA over 169 2/3 innings with the Cardinals.

Given his track record and the number of pitching injuries around the league, it wouldn’t be a surprise for him to secure a minor league deal from some club in need of experienced depth. That’s what recently played out with Kenta Maeda, who was released by the Tigers but then landed a minor league deal with the Cubs. If Gibson follows a similar path, he could perhaps get a chance to get in a nice groove in the minors and earn his way back to the big leagues.

It’s also possible that the O’s are the club to give him that minor league deal, as they still have rotation depth concerns with Grayson Rodriguez, Kyle Bradish, Tyler Wells and Albert Suárez all on the 60-day injured list.

Photo courtesy of Daniel Kucin Jr., Imagn Images

Astros Select Brandon Walter

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May 20: Per Chandler Rome of The Athletic, Walter has been selected and Wesneski transferred to the 60-day IL, as expected. Gordon has been optioned as the corresponding active roster move.

May 19: Left-hander Brandon Walter will start for the Astros tomorrow against Tampa Bay, manager Joe Espada told reporters (including Matt Kawahara of The Houston Chronicle). The Astros will need to add him to the 40-man roster. They can move Hayden Wesneski, who is ticketed for Tommy John surgery, to the 60-day injured list to create a 40-man spot. They’ll also need to make a corresponding active roster move involving a pitcher.

Walter signed a minor league contract with the Astros last August. It was apparently a two-year deal, as the southpaw spent last season on the injured list rehabbing a rotator cuff injury. Walter made his return to the mound during Spring Training, allowing four runs through seven innings.

He’s been working in a swing role at Triple-A Sugar Land, where he has started five of nine appearances. Walter owns a 2.27 ERA across 35 2/3 innings, backing that up with strong underlying marks. He’s getting grounders at a huge 60% rate, striking out upwards of a quarter of opponents, and has kept his walk rate to a minuscule 5.2% clip.

It has been a nice rebound effort for the 28-year-old lefty. Walter went from an unheralded 26th-round draft choice to one of the better pitching prospects in the Red Sox’s system a couple years ago. He was hit hard in his nine MLB appearances with the Sox, allowing a 6.26 ERA over 23 innings two seasons back. He owns a 4.19 ERA across parts of three Triple-A seasons. Walter isn’t going to overpower many hitters, as his four-seam and sinker each average 91 MPH. His five-pitch mix is headlined by his upper-70s sweeping slider.

Walter still has an option remaining, so the Astros can send him back to Sugar Land without putting him on waivers. For now, he joins rookie Ryan Gusto as swing options. Colton Gordon has taken Wesneski’s rotation spot, rounding out the starting five behind Hunter Brown, Framber Valdez, Ronel Blanco and Lance McCullers Jr. The Astros haven’t had an off day since May 8 and won’t be off until next Monday. They’ll likely use Walter and Gusto in some kind of tandem outing tomorrow to reduce the workload on the rest of the staff.

Alan Trejo Elects Free Agency

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The Rockies sent infielder Alan Trejo outright to Triple-A Albuquerque but he has exercised his right to elect free agency, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. That indicates he cleared waivers after being designated for assignment last week. The log also indicates that infielder Owen Miller was outrighted after last week’s DFA. He also has the right to free agency, but there’s no indication he has done so.

Trejo, 29 this month, got a brief run on Colorado’s roster. The Rockies acquired him from the Rangers in a cash deal at the end of April. He was sent to the plate 43 times but produced a dismal line of .175/.190/.225.

That’s an extreme low in a small sample but it continues his glove-first trajectory. He now has a .224/.269/.325 batting line and 49 wRC+ in 512 big league plate appearances. He has played the three infield positions to the left of first base, with at least 183 innings at each of those spots. His work at shortstop has been subpar but passable, while he’s been above average at both second and third base.

The Rockies acquired Trejo and selected Miller to fill in during a time when infielders Ezequiel Tovar, Tyler Freeman and Aaron Schunk were all on the IL, though all three were reinstated last week. Trejo and Miller are both out of options, leaving the Rockies little choice but to cut them from the 40-man entirely. As players with previous career outrights, they have the right to reject further outright assignments in favor of free agency.

Trejo’s entire big league career has been with the Rockies, though he has signed minor league deals with the Dodgers and Rangers. Perhaps he and the Rockies will reunite on a fresh minor league deal in the coming days but he will have the chance to talk to the other 29 clubs as well.

Miller was acquired from Milwaukee in a minor trade over the offseason. Colorado called him up despite a modest .244/.322/.372 slash line in Triple-A. He didn’t play much in the big leagues, going 2-14 while starting four games at second base. Assuming he doesn’t elect free agency, he’ll remain in the system as non-roster infield depth.

Photo courtesy of Eakin Howard, Imagn Images

Giants Designate David Villar For Assignment

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The Giants have reinstated infielder Casey Schmitt from the 10-day injured list. As a corresponding move, fellow infielder David Villar has been designated for assignment. The club’s 40-man roster count drops from 39 to 38. Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area was among those to pass along the transaction.

It’s the second DFA of the year for Villar. The first one came just prior to Opening Day. He came into the year out of options and without a firm hold on a roster spot. That got him bumped onto the waiver wire, but he passed through unclaimed and stuck in the Giants’ organization. About three weeks into the season, he was called back up when Schmitt landed on the IL with an oblique strain.

Villar hasn’t gotten much playing time since returning to the big leagues. In the one month since his contract was selected, he received just 26 plate appearances over nine games. He put up a .200/.360/.250 line in that time.

Now that Schmitt is back, Villar is likely destined for the waiver wire once again. He has shown some pop at the plate at times but has often been a strikeout victim, which likely led to him clearing waivers a couple of months ago. He has hit 15 home runs in 383 career big league plate appearances but has gone down on strikes at a 31.6% clip.

Given that he cleared waivers last time, there’s a decent chance he will do so again. If that comes to pass, he would be able to elect free agency this time around, as players with a previous career outright have that right.

It’s also possible that some team that passed on him last time will take a flier on him now, perhaps due to injuries changing their roster outlook. Villar has played the three non-shortstop infield positions, meaning he can provide a bit of defensive versatility.

He has shown some home run power in the majors, as mentioned, and has tremendous minor league numbers. He has taken 1,248 trips to the plate at the Triple-A level since the start of 2022. His 25.6% strikeout rate in that time is still a bit high but far more tolerable than his big league rate. He’s also drawn walks at a 13.4% clip and hit 61 home runs, helping him produce a .273/.381/.507 line and 130 wRC+.

Photo courtesy of D. Ross Cameron, Imagn Images

Rangers Claim Michael Helman, Designate Jonathan Ornelas

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The Rangers announced that they have claimed infielder Michael Helman off waivers from the Pirates and optioned him to Triple-A Round Rock. The Bucs designated him for assignment last week. To open a roster spot for Helman, the Rangers designated infielder Jonathan Ornelas for assignment.

It’s the second waiver claim in a week for Helman. The Pirates claimed him from the Cardinals on May 14th but designated him for assignment two days later when they called up Nick Solak. Perhaps the Bucs were hoping to pass Helman through waivers and keep him as non-roster depth, but the Rangers have swooped in to prevent that from happening.

Helman, who turns 29 on Friday, has a very limited big league track record. It consists of ten plate appearances with the Twins last year. He got three hits but also struck out three times. The Twins traded him to the Cardinals for cash in February.

The Rangers are presumably more interested in his minor league work, which naturally provides a larger data sample. Over 2023 and 2024, Helman stepped to the plate 480 times in the minors. He hit 21 home runs and hit a combined .282/.356/.507 for a 121 wRC+. In addition to that offense, Helman has played every position outside of the battery in his minor league career, meaning he provides lots of defensive versatility.

His 2025 hasn’t gone well so far. He produced a .185/.260/.292 line over 73 Triple-A plate appearances. Perhaps that’s why the Cards and Pirates each took a chance at trying to run him through waivers, but without success. The Rangers will send him to Round Rock and see if his bat can bounce back. He has a full slate of options, so they can theoretically afford to be patient with him if he continues hanging onto his 40-man spot.

Ornelas, who turns 25 next Monday, is in a different position. Though he’s far younger than Helman, he is in his final option year. The Rangers added him to their 40-man roster in November of 2022 to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft.

He had put up some decent numbers in the lower levels of the minors but hasn’t done much at the upper levels or in the majors. He has 54 big league plate appearances so far with a 37% strikeout rate, 5.6% walk rate and .184/.245/.224 batting line in those. Since the start of 2023, he has 1,006 Triple-A plate appearances with a .247/.348/.333 line and 78 wRC+.

Given that performance and the fact that he’ll be out of options next year, it was going to be hard for him to cling to a roster spot going forward, so the Rangers have swapped him out now for Helman. Ornelas will be in DFA limbo for a week at most. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so the Rangers could spend five days trying to trade him. He has stolen a few bases in the minors and bounced around the diamond. He has played the three infield positions to the left of first base and all three outfield spots.

Photo courtesy of Reinhold Matay, Imagn Images

Cubs Designate Nicky Lopez For Assignment

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Infielder Nicky Lopez has been designated for assignment by the Cubs, reports Maddie Lee of the Chicago Sun-Times. That was the expected corresponding move when it was reported earlier that Matt Shaw was coming back up to the big leagues. The Cubs’ 40-man roster count drops to 39.

Lopez, 30, has been bouncing in and out of the Cubs’ plans this year. He signed a minor league deal with them in the winter but opted out of that deal when he didn’t make the Opening Day roster. He then signed a big league deal with the Angels but was released by that club after a bit less than a month on the roster. At that time, Shaw had just been optioned to the minors after a sluggish start to the season, so the Cubs brought Lopez back and gave him a big league deal.

He didn’t get too much out of the opportunity, mostly getting plugged in as a defensive specialist. In almost a month with the Cubs, he got into 19 games but stepped to the plate just 28 times. He only hit .042/.179/.042 in those.

That’s a bit of an extreme microcosm of his whole career, as he has generally been a glove-first infielder. In 2,374 plate appearances, he has a .245/.310/.311 batting line and 72 wRC+. But he has generally received strong grades for his infield defense. He has spent most of his time at the middle infield positions but also has logged some work in the corners and in left field.

With Shaw coming back up, Lopez has been nudged from rarely-used bench piece into DFA limbo. He is likely to end up on waivers in the coming days. He has enough service time to reject an outright assignment and elect free agency, so he might be on the open market soon. He could perhaps garner interest from clubs looking for a bench infielder who’s good with the leather.

Photo courtesy of Benny Sieu, Imagn Images

Diamondbacks Release Garrett Hampson

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Infielder/outfielder Garrett Hampson has been released by the Diamondbacks, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. He had been designated for assignment by the Snakes a week ago. He’ll be a free agent once he clears release waivers, if he hasn’t already.

Hampson, 30, signed a minor league deal with Arizona in the offseason. They selected him to the Opening Day roster, preventing him from triggering an opt-out chance. That locked Hampson into a $1.5MM salary for this year. Hampson is a veteran with more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment and elect free agency while keeping that salary in place. It seems the Snakes have decided to skip that formality and send Hampson more directly to free agency.

As a free agent, any club could sign Hampson and would only have to pay him a prorated version of the $760K league minimum salary for any time spent on the roster. That amount would be subtracted from what the Diamondbacks are paying him.

It’s possible that some club may be interested in that arrangement. Hampson has never been a huge threat at the plate but has provided value in the field and on the basepaths. He has a career .239/.302/.358 batting line, production which translates to a wRC+ of 69. That indicates he’s been 31% worse than league average overall. His production with the D’Backs this year was shaped differently but worked out to be roughly the same value. In 41 plate appearances, he had nine walks but just five hits, leading to a humpbacked .167/.359/.167 line and 71 wRC+ in that small sample.

But Hampson has 66 steals in 82 attempts during his career. He has also played every position on the diamond except catcher. Most of that has been at second base and center field but the ability to bounce around is attractive in a bench player. Given the low cost, it’s possible some club brings Hampson aboard as a guy who can serve as a defensive replacement and/or a pinch runner.

Photo courtesy of Reggie Hildred, Imagn Images

Tyler Matzek Elects Free Agency

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Left-hander Tyler Matzek passed through waivers unclaimed and rejected an outright assignment to the minor leagues, the Yankees announced Monday. He’ll instead elect to become a free agent and explore new opportunities with other clubs (as well as a potential reunion with the Yankees on a new minor league deal).

Matzek, 34, pitched 6 1/3 innings with the Yankees before being designated for assignment last week. He held opponents to three runs but did so on a troubling 11 hits and five walks. The veteran southpaw fanned 20% of his opponents as well (seven of 35).

A former first-round pick and top prospect, Matzek has been frequently injured throughout his big league career. He had a terrific run with Atlanta in 2020-21, pitching 92 innings of 2.64 ERA ball for the Braves while punching out 31.2% of his opponents against a 12.2% walk rate. Shoulder and elbow troubles — including 2022 Tommy John surgery — have hampered him since that time.

Matzek averaged 94.5 mph with his heater in his brief time with the Yankees. That’s a bit down from his 96 mph peak in 2021 but also higher than at any point in 2022 or 2024. (He missed the 2023 season recovering from that Tommy John procedure.)

At his best, Matzek pairs a mid-90s heater with a mid-80s slider and offsets sub-par command with plus bat-missing ability. Beyond that previously mentioned 31% strikeout rate in 2020-21, Matzek notched a sharp 13.2% swinging-strike rate across those two seasons. He’s only logged an average ground-ball rate in his career (42.9%), but he’s nonetheless been hard to elevate with much authority. Matzek has averaged just 0.65 homers per nine innings in his career — and that’s despite calling Coors Field home for his first two MLB seasons with the Rockies.

Braves Release Garrett Cooper, Jordan Weems

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The Braves released a pair of veterans who’d been playing with their Triple-A affiliates on minor league contracts: first baseman/outfielder Garrett Cooper and right-handed reliever Jordan Weems. Both moves are reflected on the transaction log at MiLB.com.

Cooper, 34, is a veteran of eight big league seasons. He was a regular with the Marlins when healthy from 2019-22, quietly delivering a sharp .274/.350/.444 batting line in 1273 plate appearances over that stretch. Cooper was snakebit by injuries over that four-year period, however, spending time on the injured list due to wrist, hand, elbow and back injuries. He also missed time with a concussion and suffered a broken finger in the final days of the 2022 season.

Miami traded Cooper to San Diego at the ’23 deadline — a deal netting them lefty Ryan Weathers — and Cooper became a free agent at season’s end. He appeared in 36 big league games with the Cubs and Red Sox last year but hit just .206/.267/.299 in 116 plate appearances.

The early returns on Cooper’s minor league deal with Atlanta were good. He opened the season hitting .244/.426/.415 and drew 11 walks in his first 54 plate appearances (20.4%). He’s fallen into a slump since, slashing just .220/.238/.256 with two walks and only three extra-base hits (all doubles) in his 84 most recent plate appearances.

Cooper’s last full, productive season was in 2022, but he was a nearly average bat in 2023 and has a track record of some length in the majors. He’s a career .265/.333/.427 hitter overall, and his right-handed bat plays particularly well against lefties: .283/.333/.468. Teams looking for help at first base — such as Cooper’s old Red Sox club — or just a veteran bat on the bench could take a speculative look now that he’s a free agent.

Similarly, the 32-year-old Weems had a nice start in Gwinnett before falling into a rough patch. The former A’s and Nationals righty tossed 9 2/3 innings with a 2.79 ERA and 12-to-5 K/BB ratio in April but has now yielded runs in five of his past six outings. Since the calendar flipped to May, Weems has surrendered seven earned runs in eight frames and fanned just 15.4% of opponents (compared to 29.3% in April). He’s now sitting on a 5.09 ERA in 17 2/3 innings this year.

Weems has logged big league time in each of the past five seasons and was a consistent presence in the Nats’ bullpen from 2022-24. His year-to-year ERA marks were a rollercoaster that evened out with a combined 5.03 through 136 innings during his time in D.C. The righty fanned 23% of opponents against a 10.8% walk rate with Washington.

Weems’ best year both with the Nationals and in his major league career on the whole came in 2023, when he pitched 54 2/3 innings with a 3.62 earned run average, a 25.7% strikeout rate and a 12.4% walk rate. Manager Dave Martinez typically used Weems in lower-leverage middle relief situations throughout his time as a National.

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