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White Sox Sign John Brebbia

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9:41AM: Brebbia will earn $5.5MM in guaranteed money, as The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal (links to X) has the breakdown of terms.  Brebbia earns a $4MM base salary for 2024, and there is a $6MM mutual option for 2025 that includes a $1.5MM buyout.  Up to $1MM in incentive bonuses are also available each season, and Brebbia can start unlocking those bonuses if and when he hits the 45-appearance threshold.

8:58AM: The White Sox have signed right-hander John Brebbia, MLB Network’s Jon Morosi reports (via X).  Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times adds that Brebbia inked a one-year deal.  Brebbia is represented by Icon Sports Management.

Newly-hired White Sox senior pitching advisor Brian Bannister undoubtedly had some influence in the signing, as Bannister spent the previous four seasons as the Giants’ director of pitching and oversaw Brebbia’s usage as a versatile bullpen weapon.  Brebbia worked as an opener, middle reliever, and setup man in San Francisco, posting a 3.83 ERA over 134 appearances and 124 2/3 innings while also delivering a solid 6.7% walk rate and 23% strikeout rate.

That latter statistic is perhaps a little misleading, as Brebbia had only a 18.8% strikeout rate during his 68 innings in 2022, sandwiched between much higher K% rates in the smaller sample sizes of his other two seasons.  Brebbia tossed only 18 1/3 innings in 2021 since he was recovering from a June 2020 Tommy John surgery, and he also missed over 2.5 months of last season due to a lat strain.

A 30th-round pick for the Yankees in the 2011 draft, Brebbia was a bit of a late bloomer who didn’t make his MLB debut until when he was just shy of his 27th birthday, as a member of the 2017 Cardinals.  Brebbia pitched well out of the Cards’ bullpen in his first three big league seasons, but in the wake of his TJ surgery, St. Louis opted to non-tender him following the 2020 season.  For his career, the 33-year-old Brebbia has a 3.42 ERA over 299 2/3 innings with St. Louis and San Francisco.

The White Sox had a lot of holes to fill in both the rotation and their bullpen this winter, and GM Chris Getz has been busy on that front in acquiring the likes of Erick Fedde, Chris Flexen, Michael Soroka, and Tim Hill, in addition to a number of other pitchers with MLB experience on minor league deals.  Since Aaron Bummer was traded to the Braves, Brebbia might step into the setup role that Bummer previously held in Chicago, even if it isn’t a perfect one-to-one match since Bummer is a southpaw.

It also stands to reason that Brebbia could be deployed as he was in San Francisco, rather than strictly in a setup capacity.  Since Gregory Santos is recovering from elbow inflammation and might not be ready for the start of Spring Training, Brebbia might even nab a few save opportunities if Santos hits any delays or if the White Sox simply decide to take it easy with their prospective closer.

Latest On Dylan Cease’s Trade Candidacy

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Few players have found their names in more trade rumors this winter than Dylan Cease. It has been widely expected the White Sox would move him. He’s down to his final two years of arbitration control and first-year GM Chris Getz has expressed a willingness to reshape the roster.

At the same time, Getz and his front office have set a high goal in trade discussions. Reports have suggested they’re seeking a return built around multiple top prospects. Teams like the Reds, Yankees, Dodgers and Braves were involved in Cease discussions but have pivoted to other free agent/trade targets after balking at Chicago’s ask.

Cease remains with the Sox less than a month from the opening of Spring Training. That has led to increasing speculation that Chicago could hold him into the season. One rival executive cast doubt on a Cease trade to Mark Feinsand of MLB.com yesterday, suggesting the White Sox aren’t showing any interest in backing off their asking price.

That’s a sentiment echoed by a few other reports. ESPN’s Buster Olney tweeted this morning that a pair of executives outside the organization believe Chicago will hold Cease until the deadline. Robert Murray of FanSided writes that the Sox don’t appear close to any deal, while Jon Heyman of the New York Post suggests there’s a “growing belief” within the industry that Cease stays in Chicago until the summer.

None of that is a guarantee Cease won’t move in the coming weeks. There’s nothing to suggest the White Sox plan to cut off trade dialogue even as they hold firm to a lofty ask. Chicago believed they’d have increased leverage in talks once Yoshinobu Yamamoto came off the board. Yamamoto’s signing didn’t spur a deal, but it’s possible they’re taking a similar stance with regards to Blake Snell and Jordan Montgomery.

The Orioles, Red Sox and Mets have, to varying degrees, been linked to Cease this offseason. The Angels, Padres and Pirates haven’t been directly tied to the righty but are generally known to be looking for starting pitching. Baltimore has perhaps been the subject of the most speculation, a reflection of their loaded minor league pipeline and the benefit of adding a high-octane arm to last year’s 101-win club. Heyman reports that the O’s are reluctant to part with 24-year-old infielder Jordan Westburg, in whom the Sox are apparently showing interest. The former first-round pick hit .260/.311/.404 through his first 68 MLB games and has six years of club control.

Cease agreed to an $8MM salary for his second-to-last season of arbitration. He’s looking to rebound from a somewhat disappointing 2023 campaign in which he posted a 4.58 ERA over 177 innings. Cease still throws exceptionally hard and punched out 27.3% of opposing hitters a year ago. If the Sox do hold him into next season, he has the upside to be the most in-demand starter at the deadline.

José Berríos, Luis Castillo and Tyler Mahle have all returned multiple highly-regarded prospects in summer deals with a year and a half of control. Yet the Sox would also assume the risk of Cease suffering an injury or regression if they hold him for another few months.

It’s the biggest decision for Getz in his first offseason leading baseball operations. He pulled the trigger on a deal sending reliever Aaron Bummer to the Braves for a five-player return at the start of the offseason. Getz and his staff have otherwise slow-played things thus far, supplementing the roster on the margins with fairly low-cost free agent pickups (i.e. Erick Fedde, Martín Maldonado, Chris Flexen, Tim Hill, Paul DeJong).

White Sox Discussing New Stadium In Chicago’s South Loop

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The White Sox have had “serious” discussions with a developer about the potential for building a new stadium in Chicago’s South Loop on a parcel of land known as “The 78,” per a report from Fran Spielman, Tim Novak and David Roeder of the Chicago Sun-Times. The team’s current lease at Guaranteed Rate Field runs through the 2029 season. None of the involved parties would offer on-record comments to the Sun-Times; Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf and Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson responded to inquiries with a joint statement:

“We met to discuss the historic partnership between the team and Chicago and the team’s ideas for remaining competitive in Chicago in perpetuity.”

It’s been more than 30 years since the current stadium — originally referred to as Comiskey Park and then U.S. Cellular Field before adopting its current moniker following the 2016 season — opened back in 1991. “New” Comiskey was built across the street from “Old” Comiskey park after a last-minute agreement on funding halted the team’s expected to move to Florida (St. Petersburg, specifically, where the Rays currently play). Renovations to the new facility have occurred over the years and focused on a variety of elements both within and around the stadium: adding new HD video boards, expanding (and later subtracting from) seating capacity, modernizing the concourse, expanding concessions and installing a new nearby metro station are among the myriad projects covered under those renovations.

Speculation regarding a potential new stadium for the White Sox began back in August. At the time, Sox vice president of communications Scott Reifert told MLB.com’s Scott Merkin: “We have not had any conversations about our lease situation, but with six years remaining, it is naturally nearing a time where discussions should begin to take place. The conversations would be with the city, ISFA [Illinois Sports Facilities Authority] and the state and most likely would be about vision, opportunities and the future.”

Notably, ISFA chief executive officer Frank Bilecki told the Sun-Times that his organization has not yet been part of the talks. It also seems there’s a possibility of the Sox sharing a portion of the 62-acre site with the University of Illinois, as there are already plans to construct a tech research center on a portion of the parcel in question. Sox fans curious to learn more about the specific logistics of the potential site would be well-served to read the Sun-Times column in full; Spielman, Novak and Roeder spoke extensively with a stadium consultant about how the land could be allotted between the White Sox and the University of Illinois, and the Sun-Times trio also delves into the various means by which public transit could connect to the site (including a possible water taxi service, given the parcel’s proximity to the river).

A new stadium for the White Sox could have ramifications for some of Chicago’s other professional sports teams as well. Major League Soccer’s Chicago Fire, who currently share Soldier Field with the NFL’s Bears, could potentially move into Guaranteed Rate Field if the Sox indeed construct a new home at The 78, per the report. The Fire’s lease with Soldier Field lasts two more years but could be extended another five years. The Bears, meanwhile, have been exploring a potential new stadium themselves but are focused on other sites, as reported by Spielman and colleague Patrick Finley last month.

White Sox Sign Joe Barlow To Minor League Deal

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The White Sox have signed right-hander Joe Barlow to a minor league deal, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. He’s been assigned to Triple-A Charlotte for now but will presumably receive an invitation to major league Spring Training.

Barlow, 28, is coming off a rough year but is not too far removed from being a big league closer. He debuted with the Rangers in 2021 with 31 appearances, posting an earned run average of 1.55 in those. A tiny .143 batting average on balls in play surely helped him out that year and his 10.8% walk rate was a bit on the high side, but he also struck out 24.3% of opponents and racked up 11 saves. In 2022, the ERA normalized to 3.86 as he saved another 13 games for the club. He dropped his walk rate to 8.9% but he only punched out 19.2% of opponents.

But in 2023, the Rangers signed Will Smith to fortify their bullpen prior to the season, then later traded for Aroldis Chapman and Chris Stratton at the deadline. Those moves coincided with a drop-off from Barlow, who only tossed 9 2/3 innings for the Rangers last year with an ERA of 4.66 in that time. He spent most of the year on optional assignment in Triple-A and then went to the Royals in August via a waiver claim. Between those two clubs, he threw 44 innings at the Triple-A level with a 5.52 ERA. The Royals outrighted him off their roster in September and he was able to elect free agency at the end of the season.

It was obviously not a great year for the righty but he’s a sensible gamble for the White Sox to take. The club itself was also facing plenty of struggles in 2023 and ended up moving significant pieces at the deadline, and then into the current offseason as well. In the past six months, they have traded relievers Kendall Graveman, Reynaldo López, Aaron Bummer, Keynan Middleton and Joe Kelly out of the organization. Also, Garrett Crochet is planning to get stretched out as a starter going into the spring, potentially subtracting another arm from the relief corps.

That should leave plenty of opportunities available for a reliever or two to step forward. That could be an internal option like Gregory Santos, a major league signee like Tim Hill or Rule 5 pick Shane Drohan. As for Barlow, he was getting big league saves not too long ago and would be a nice pickup if he could make steps to get back into that form. If he is added to the roster at any point, he still has two option seasons and less than two years of service time, meaning the club could retain him well into the future if the results justify such a path.

Dylan Cease Discusses Trade Rumors

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The Guardians have hired Dan Puente for an unspecified role on their major league coaching staff, per a report from The Athletic’s Sahadev Sharma. Puente, 42, was a 12th-round pick in the 2004 draft by the Orioles and played in the minor leagues for two seasons, though he didn’t make it past the Single-A level before retiring from professional baseball. During his post-playing career, Puente took roles in the Astros and White Sox organizations before eventually landing a hitting coach gig in the Cubs’ minor league system prior to the 2020 campaign. He’s remained with the Cubs as a minor league hitting coach ever since, most recently coaching at High-A South Bend this past season.

  • White Sox right-hander Dylan Cease has been the topic of plenty of trade talks throughout the offseason, and WEII’s Rob Bradford recently spoke to the hurler about the barrage of rumors about his future this winter. Cease told Bradford that he takes most rumors “with a grain of salt” and noted that he hasn’t spoken with the club’s front office about the possibility of a trade, though he did acknowledge that “Publicly saying it’s an option is like an indirect way of letting me know.” Cease added that whether or not he’s traded has no impact on his offseason work, saying that “At the end of the day, it really isn’t my job… My job is to perform wherever I go and be a good player.” The 28-year-old righty is coming off a down season where he pitched to a 4.58 ERA over 33 starts put finished as the runner-up for the AL Cy Young award just one year prior after posting a 2.20 ERA in 184 innings of work back in 2022.

Dylan Cease Rumors: Dodgers, Busch, Orioles, Yankees

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Considering the Dodgers’ need for pitching, it isn’t surprising that L.A. was linked to White Sox righty Dylan Cease in trade rumors on multiple occasions this winter.  There hasn’t been much in the way of new reporting on the Dodgers’ interest in Cease for over a month, however, and The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal writes that a trade may be less likely because the Dodgers have since fortified their rotation with other arms.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s twelve-year, $325MM contract was the big free agent strike, and Los Angeles swung a big trade with the Rays to land Tyler Glasnow and outfielder Manuel Margot.  Yamamoto, Glasnow, and Walker Buehler now project as the top three starters in the L.A. rotation, with Bobby Miller as the fourth, and a collection of candidates (Ryan Yarbrough, Emmet Sheehan, Gavin Stone, Michael Grove) battling for the fifth starter job.  Dustin May is expected to make a midseason return from elbow surgery, and a reunion with Clayton Kershaw remains a possibility even if Kershaw will also be sidelined until around the middle of the year as he recovers from shoulder surgery.

There’s still some room here for the Dodgers to further solidify things beyond a potential new contract with Kershaw, so a Cease trade can’t be entirely ruled out, even if may be less likely.  It’s safe to assume that the Dodgers will continue to monitor the market for any bigger-name possibilities, yet Rosenthal writes that Los Angeles might now be “looking for future value” in any further trades, such as Thursday’s swap with the Cubs that saw the Dodgers acquire two teenage prospects in exchange for Michael Busch and Yency Almonte.

In one particularly novel scenario, Rosenthal reports that the Dodgers even considered acquiring Cease from the White Sox and then flipping him to a third team.  The specifics of this arrangement aren’t clear, yet it would’ve been a fascinating way for both the Dodgers and White Sox to obtain some high-level young talent for Cease, in a mix-and-match of prospects each team might’ve had their eye on in the Dodgers’ organization or within the pipeline of whoever the third club involved might’ve been.

Busch was also part of some of the Dodgers’ offers for Cease, Rosenthal writes, so the young infielder might’ve found himself on the south side of Chicago rather than landing in Wrigleyville.  Without knowing what the rest of this trade package to the White Sox might have included, it makes sense why the Sox might have not been too enthralled with Busch as a key piece.  While Busch has been crushing minor league pitching, his defense is considered a weak point — if first base ends up being his ultimate position, the White Sox already have Andrew Vaughn in place.

It isn’t any secret that the White Sox have put a very high price tag on Cease, so while Busch is a top-100 type of prospect, the Sox might’ve viewed him as a secondary or even tertiary piece in an acceptable trade package.  Several highly-regarded prospects have been reportedly on Chicago’s radar in trade talks, and USA Today’s Bob Nightengale adds Yankees pitching prospect Chase Hampton and Orioles outfielders Heston Kjerstad and Colton Cowser to the list of young players drawing interest from the Southsiders.

Since the Yankees just signed Marcus Stroman this week, they could perhaps be out on Cease, since naturally New York isn’t keen on the idea of moving Hampton or slugger Spencer Jones, who is also reportedly of interest to the White Sox in a Cease trade.  Considering how the Yankees already dealt a lot of their younger pitching depth to the Padres to obtain Juan Soto, moving Hampton in particular might be something of a non-starter.

Kjerstad (the second overall pick of the 2020 draft) and Cowser (fifth overall in 2021) are two of the many up-and-comers in Baltimore’s loaded farm system, and both players made their Major League debuts this past season, though with only 110 combined plate appearances.  The duo might well be lined up as the Orioles’ corner outfielders of the future, and it wouldn’t be a shock to see pending free agent Anthony Santander dealt at some point this season if either Kjertsad or Cowser prove themselves capable of being MLB regulars right away.

Of course, it’s not out of the question that the O’s might deal from their deep minor league pipeline at some point this offseason, perhaps to obtain a front-of-the-rotation pitcher like Cease.  Baltimore might be more willing to come closer to Chicago’s asking price due to the sheer number of quality prospects the O’s have on hand, yet considering how many of those youngsters have barely reached the majors or even Triple-A, the Orioles might want more time to evaluate their options before deciding on who might be trade bait.

White Sox Sign Rafael Ortega To Minor League Deal

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The White Sox signed Rafael Ortega to a minor league contract last week, as reflected on the MLB.com transaction log and the outfielder’s Instagram page. It’s likely he’ll be in MLB camp as a non-roster invitee to Spring Training.

Ortega is looking to get back to the majors for a fourth straight season and an eighth campaign overall. The left-handed hitter has appeared for six different teams. The only time he spanned multiple seasons with the same club came on the other side of Chicago. Ortega was a Cub between 2021-22, operating as their starting center fielder and leadoff hitter for a time.

Those years on the North Side have been Ortega’s most productive to date. He combined for a solid .265/.344/.408 batting line in just over 700 plate appearances. That made it moderately surprising both that the Cubs non-tendered him last offseason and that he was forced to settle for a minor league deal with the Yankees.

Ortega didn’t secure an outfield spot in the Bronx, kicking off a nomadic 2023. He was granted his release from the Yankees. A minor league pact with the Rangers also didn’t get Ortega back to the majors. He signed another non-roster pact, this time with the Mets, in mid-June. After New York fell out of contention and traded Mark Canha and Tommy Pham at the deadline, they brought Ortega to the majors.

He didn’t hit at the level he had with the Cubs. Ortega reached base at a solid .341 clip but only hit one home run over 136 plate appearances. His .213/.341/.272 slash was well below average. New York outrighted him off the 40-man roster at the end of the year, the equivalent of an early non-tender.

For the second straight spring, Ortega will try to secure a roster spot in Spring Training. The 32-year-old can play all three outfield spots but is a better fit in a corner than in center field. Chicago has Luis Robert Jr. locked into center and Andrew Benintendi set for a bounceback opportunity in left. Right field, where the Sox got a .219/.271/.344 showing last year, is wide open. As thing stand, Óscar Colás and Gavin Sheets project to split time.

General manager Chris Getz acknowledged on Tuesday the front office could add a more established option. Ortega shouldn’t stand in the way of that pursuit. The transaction tracker indicates his deal was signed on January 5, even if it wasn’t officially logged until yesterday. Getz was surely aware Ortega was part of the organization before Tuesday’s comments about a potential right field acquisition. Brett Phillips, Wynton Bernard and Mark Payton are also in the organization as non-roster players.

Yankees Have Made Offer To Blake Snell

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The Yankees have made an opening contract offer to free agent starter Blake Snell, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post. Terms of the proposal aren’t clear, but Heyman adds the team and Snell’s representatives at the Boras Corporation remain “far apart” in talks.

New York is one of the teams that has been most frequently connected to Snell in recent weeks. That’s at least in part because they’re seemingly involved on most or all of the big-name pitchers available. They’ve been linked to old friend Jordan Montgomery and right-hander Marcus Stroman in free agency. On the trade front, reports have tied the Yankees to the likes of Dylan Cease, Jesús Luzardo and Shane Bieber.

It doesn’t seem they’re all that close on any of those players. Heyman reports the Yankees have thus far balked at Chicago’s asking price on Cease, which he adds involves a prospect package centered around 2022 first-round pick Spencer Jones. Baseball America recently ranked Jones, who hit .268/.337/.450 with 13 homers in High-A last year, as the #2 talent in the New York farm system. That’s consistent with various reports that Chicago wants multiple high-end prospects for Cease.

Meanwhile, Heyman notes there’s been “no traction” between the Yankees and Miami on talks involving Luzardo or righty Edward Cabrera. It’s unclear whether rentals like Bieber or Corbin Burnes will move this offseason. If New York doesn’t pick up steam on any of their trade conversations — they’ve surely discussed possibilities beyond what has been publicly reported — that could increase their urgency to add a top-of-the-rotation starter via free agency.

Snell and Montgomery are the clear top two options available. The incumbent Rangers have been linked to Montgomery throughout the offseason. Teams like the Angels, Giants, Phillies and Red Sox have been tied to both left-handers. The Giants and Halos have been more frequently linked to Snell than have the latter two clubs.

The Yankees are the first team known to have an offer on the table (although that’s certainly not to say there aren’t others that were unreported). Snell is coming off his second career Cy Young campaign. He worked to an MLB-best 2.25 ERA over 180 innings. He fanned over 31% of batters faced and was utterly dominant down the stretch, posting a 1.23 ERA from June 1 onward. His command is erratic, but few pitchers are as difficult to hit when they’re on.

A pursuit of Snell is fairly reminiscent of last winter’s run at Carlos Rodón, another left-hander with huge stuff coming off an excellent platform year despite some career inconsistency. Rodón’s six-year, $162MM deal looked disastrous in year one. While one could argue that should make the Yankees gun-shy about pursuing a similar pitcher, it also increases the need for another high-end starter. Neither Rodón nor Nestor Cortes looked like top-of-the-rotation arms last season. That leaves New York looking for another star to pitch behind Gerrit Cole and reduce some of the pressure on Rodón and Cortes.

MLBTR predicted a seven-year, $200MM deal for Snell, who turned 31 last month. A signing team would also forfeit draft compensation because he rejected a qualifying offer from the Padres. For a team that paid the luxury tax like the Yankees, that’d be their second- and fifth-highest selections next year and $1MM in international signing bonus space. New York’s luxury tax payroll sits around $291MM, according to Roster Resource. They’re taxed at a 95% rate on spending up to the $297MM mark and will pay a 110% tax on every dollar beyond that figure.

White Sox, Dylan Cease Avoid Arbitration

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The White Sox avoided arbitration with righty Dylan Cease by agreeing to an $8MM deal, according to Robert Murray of FanSided.

Cease, a client of the Boras Corporation, fell short of our projection in agreeing to a $2.3MM raise over last year’s salary.  As a player with four years of Major League service time, Cease will be eligible for arbitration once more for 2025 before reaching free agency.

Cease, who recently turned 28, had an off-year results-wise in 2023 with his ERA climbing to 4.58.  Still, his 97 starts over the last three seasons leads all of MLB, and he finished second in the 2022 AL Cy Young voting coming off a 2.20 ERA.  Cease averages about 96 miles per hour on his fastball and misses plenty of bats, though he also issues a lot of free passes.

Cease remains one of the top remaining trade candidates of the 2023-24 offseason.  New White Sox GM Chris Getz has been fielding inquiries, and there’s likely at least a half-dozen suitors.  You can read up on the latest Cease rumors here.

At present, though, Cease leads a projected White Sox rotation that also includes new additions Erick Fedde, Mike Soroka, and Chris Flexen, as well as holdover Michael Kopech.

Latest On Dylan Cease

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Dylan Cease remains atop the list of potential trade candidates for teams seeking rotation upgrades this offseason, but White Sox general manager Chris Getz isn’t backing off on his asking price in a trade, writes ESPN’s Jesse Rogers. Other clubs who’ve spoken to the Sox about Cease tell Rogers that the ask has been “multiple” top prospects with additional lower-end talent; the Sox aren’t open to dealing two affordable years of control over their top starter for a package centered around just one top-tier prospect.

That generally aligns with prior reporting that the White Sox asked the Reds for last year’s first-round pick, Rhett Lowder, and top prospects Edwin Arroyo and Connor Phillips in exchange for Cease. Other teams have similarly balked at the idea of parting with so much talent from the top end of their system.

Rogers reports that the Braves approached the Sox and dangled infielder Vaughn Grissom, among others, but were rebuffed. Grissom instead went to the Red Sox in the Chris Sale trade. The Yankees, despite having known interest in Cease, aren’t likely to further deplete their farm after already acquiring Juan Soto (and Alex Verdugo) this offseason, per Rogers — at least not at the current asking price. Outfield prospect Spencer Jones, in particular, seems highly unlikely to be included in any potential deal, he adds. Meanwhile, Jim Bowden of The Athletic writes in his latest mailbag that talks between the Red Sox and White Sox never gained traction, thanks to Chicago’s steep ask.

Despite the lack of traction in talks thus far, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic said in a Tuesday appearance on Foul Territory that he expects Cease to be moved prior to the season. The demand for starting pitching, as Rosenthal rightly observes, clearly outpaces the supply that’s available in free agency. Beyond that, the asking price on some other pitchers rumored to be available — Jesus Luzardo, in particular — would likely be even greater than the ask for Cease. Luzardo has three years of club control as compared to Cease’s two.

Each of the Red Sox, Orioles, Yankees, Rangers, Angels, Giants, Dodgers and Padres, at the very least, could still use some degree of rotation upgrade. The Cardinals signed three free agents early in the offseason (Sonny Gray, Lance Lynn, Kyle Gibson) but were reported to have interest in Cease even after making that trio of additions.

Getz, unsurprisingly, kept things close to the vest in his public comments yesterday. The newly minted general manager rattled off a series of familiar choruses, noting that Cease would only be moved for the right deal, that there was no urgency to make a swap given his remaining club control, and specifying that the majority of the league has shown at least some level of interest in the right-hander.

Cease is coming off a down season that saw him post a 4.58 ERA with a slightly diminished 27.3% strikeout rate. That’s down only by his lofty standards; he punched out 30.1% of his opponents a year prior while pitching to a sparkling 2.20 ERA that netted him a runner-up finish in American League Cy Young voting.

While last year’s ERA was unsightly, Cease still missed bats at a high level, sat just under 96 mph in terms of average fastball velocity, and notched a well above-average 13.6% swinging-strike rate. He’s also made a full slate of starts in each of the past four seasons, leading the Majors with 109 games started since 2020. Add in that Cease is projected for an eminently affordable $8.8MM salary in arbitration this winter (courtesy of MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz) and is controllable through the 2025 season, and his appeal becomes even more apparent.

Any team to acquire Cease would surely view him as a prime rebound candidate whom they can control for two seasons before recouping some prospect value in the form of a qualifying offer. An extension with Cease always remains a possibility, albeit perhaps a faint one. Clients of the Boras Corporation tend to test the open market, though there are plenty of examples of Boras clients who have instead signed extensions (e.g. Xander Bogaerts, Jose Altuve, Stephen Strasburg, Carlos Gonzalez — among others).

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