Angels, Tigers Interested In Anthony Santander
Anthony Santander has been linked to multiple teams this winter, and Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free Press adds two new names to that list in the Angels and Tigers. Interestingly, Petzold describes the Angels and Blue Jays “as the frontrunners” to sign Santander, while the Tigers view the switch-hitting outfielder as something of a backup plan if they can’t sign Alex Bregman.
With Juan Soto and now Teoscar Hernandez off the market, Santander stands out as the top free agent option remaining for teams in need of outfield help. He was reportedly looking for a five-year contract even before Hernandez re-signed with the Dodgers, and with the Yankees and Red Sox joining the Blue Jays, Angels, and Tigers as known suitors, there might enough interest for Santander to land that longer commitment even though he’s entering his age-30 season.
Santander has hit .245/.312/.476 with 134 home runs in 2571 plate appearances since Opening Day 2020, translating to a 119 wRC+. Santander saved his most overall productive season (3.3 fWAR) for his walk year, as he hit a career-best 44 homers along with a .235/.308/.506 slash line in 665 PA for the Orioles. He had relatively even splits from both sides of the plate, and posted above-average numbers in terms of barrel, hard-hit ball, strikeout, and walk rates. This production earned Santander his first All-Star and Silver Slugger nods, and he even received a bit of down-ballot support in AL MVP voting.
There also some clear minuses, as Santander isn’t much of a defender or baserunner, and his offense is largely tied to his power production. That doesn’t necessarily bode well for hitting in such homer-suppressing ballparks as Angel Stadium or Comerica Park, which creates a Catch-22 for the Angels and Tigers as they seek out some much-needed pop for their lineups.
The Angels’ emergence as a possible favorite for Santander isn’t necessarily a surprise, given how the Halos have been aggressively scouring the market for hitting help. Los Angeles has already brought Jorge Soler to town in a trade with the Braves, and added the likes of Travis d’Arnaud, Scott Kingery, and Kevin Newman to the bench mix. On the pitching end, Yusei Kikuchi and Kyle Hendricks were signed to free agent deals.
Santander would require a bigger commitment than any of this group. MLB Trade Rumors ranked Santander ninth on our list of the offseason’s top 50 free agents, and projected him for a four-year, $80MM pact. RosterResource estimates the Angels’ 2025 payroll to sit at just under the $190MM mark, so a $20MM average annual value for Santander would still bring the Halos under their $214.7MM payroll for the 2023 season. This would fit with owner Arte Moreno’s claim from October that the Angels would be increasing spending this winter, if not in excess of their 2023 expenditures.
If Santander was signed to presumably take on his usual right field role, he’d join Mike Trout and Taylor Ward as the starting outfielders, with Jo Adell and Mickey Moniak moving to backup duty. There has been some reports that the Angels are exploring trading from this outfield group, which could perhaps subtract Adell or Moniak, or left field could be opened up if Ward was dealt. Trout could conceivably be shifted to left field as a way to reduce the wear-and-tear on his body as the Halos attempt to keep their star healthy. Since the Angels’ starting lineup is mostly full of right-handed hitters, Santander’s switch-hitting ability adds some balance.
Amusingly, Santander would also balance out a Tigers lineup that leans in the opposite direction. Detroit’s abundance of left-handed hitting has made the addition of at least one big righty bat a clear priority this winter. As Petzold observed, the signing of Gleyber Torres didn’t really address the lineup imbalance, as Torres will essentially replace another righty hitter in Spencer Torkelson (as Colt Keith will move to first base to accommodate Torres at second base).
In Detroit, Santander’s move into right field would shift Kerry Carpenter into DH duty against right-handed pitchers, with Torkelson or Matt Vierling then likely acting as the right-handed side of that DH platoon. Vierling might also serve as the regular third baseman in this scenario where the Tigers signed Santander and not Bregman, depending on how third base prospect Jace Jung adjusts to big league pitching in his first full MLB season.
The Tigers’ payroll situation is pretty clear over the long term, and signing a big bat like Santander to a long-term deal would be the type of win-now move many expected from Detroit after the team reached the ALDS last season. Conceivably, the team could sign both Bregman and Santander, yet it seems more likely that they’d just aim for one of the two players. Bregman’s expected contract is more than double what Santander is projected to receive, yet the Tigers may be more willing to pay his steeper price tag. While a gap remains between Detroit’s preferred offer and Bregman’s reported goal of a $200MM deal, Petzold writes that “the Tigers appear to be all-in on Bregman.”
Because the Tigers are a revenue-sharing recipient, they would pay a lesser penalty to sign a player like Santander who rejected the qualifying offer — Detroit would have to give up its third-highest pick in the 2025 draft. Since the Angels aren’t a revenue-sharing team and they didn’t cross the luxury tax line last season, they’d have to give up their second-highest pick in the 2025 draft as well as $500K in international bonus pool money.
The Blue Jays would pay the same penalty as the Angels, and Toronto might well have even more incentive than either the Halos or Tigers to splurge for a proven bat like Santander. The Jays have thus far come up short on all of their major free agent pursuits this offseason, and are sorely in need of offensive help for what might be Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette‘s last season in Toronto.
Blue Jays Showed “Strong Interest” In Gleyber Torres
The Blue Jays showed “strong interest” in second baseman Gleyber Torres early in his free agency, per a report from Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free Press. Petzold goes on to report that the Giants, Reds, and Guardians were among the teams to show interest in Torres before he signed with the Tigers. Alex Speier of the Boston Globe previously reported that the Red Sox showed interest in the infielder but never reached the point of making a formal offer, and Petzold confirms that interest.
The Blue Jays made plenty of sense as a speculative fit for Torres early in the winter, and he was even loosely connected to them earlier this winter. After losing Matt Chapman in free agency last winter and dealing away both Justin Turner and Isaiah Kiner-Falefa over the summer, the Jays entered the winter in need of infield help. In a thin market for infielders, Torres was among the better options not expected to command a long-term, nine-figure contract. In fact, Petzold notes that Torres emphasized to his agent this winter that he wasn’t interested in anything more than a strict one-year contract, even eschewing the possibility of a two-year deal with an opt-out clause.
Petzold adds that Torres took this stance in hopes of betting on himself and landing the aforementioned nine-figure deal he was sure to be locked out of this winter following an up-and-down platform season that saw him finish with a 104 wRC+ and just 1.7 fWAR. That desire for a one-year deal likely made him an especially attractive target for a Blue Jays team that not only faces plenty of uncertainty following the 2025 season thanks to the impending free agency of Vladimir Guerrero Jr. but also thanks to the club’s group of young infielders who could theoretically play their way into regular roles in the future.
It’s not clear if the Jays’ reported interest in Torres persisted even after they traded for second baseman Andrés Giménez earlier this winter. Even if it had, though, Torres apparent preference for remaining at second base likely would have created a major obstacle for the sides, likely leaving Toronto in a position where they’d need to deal shortstop Bo Bichette and move Giménez to short in order to open up the keystone for Torres. While Bichette is coming off an even more difficult season (71 wRC+, 0.3 fWAR) than Torres’s 2024 campaign, Bichette had been a consistent four-to-five win player throughout his career prior to getting bit by the injury bug last year and would be a difficult player for the Jays to part with unless they got a hefty package in return.
As for the other reported suitors for Torres’s services, the Guardians likely only became a fit for Torres after trading Giménez to Toronto. Juan Brito, Gabriel Arias, and Daniel Schneemann currently figure to split time at the keystone for Cleveland in Giménez’s absence, but a clear everyday player like Torres would be a definitive upgrade over that timeshare between youngsters. What’s more, moving on from Giménez and his hefty $106.5MM contract likely helped free up payroll that would make signing a player of Torres’s caliber possible even for the low-budget Guardians. With Torres now off the market and headed to a division rival, it’s entirely feasible that the Guardians could now pivot to another second base option available in free agency like Jorge Polanco or Whit Merrifield.
The Reds, by contrast, are a somewhat surprising suitor for Torres. The club has plenty of infield options available already, with Elly De La Cruz and Matt McLain currently locking up the middle infield while some combination of Noelvi Marte, Jeimer Candelario, and Christian Encarnacion-Strand handle the infield corners. Adding a pure second baseman who lacks positional versatility like Torres would’ve complicated matters, though it’s certainly possible to squeeze him in by shifting McLain over to the hot corner, utilizing Candelario at first base, and leaving Encarnacion-Strand and Marte to fight for plate appearances at DH or in a part-time role.
Given the club’s dreadful 87 wRC+ overall last year, even Torres’s diminished results from 2024 would provide the Reds with a substantial boost to their lineup. That boost may have made figuring out a way to squeeze Torres into the lineup worth doing, but the Reds appear to have already more or less maxed out their payroll and seem unlikely to have been able to match the $15MM salary Detroit offered the infielder. The Giants are another reported suitor whose interest in Torres comes with complications, particularly given the fact that the club landed shortstop Willy Adames on the eve of the Winter Meetings. It’s possible that San Francisco’s interest in Torres predated their deal with Adames, though it’s also feasible the club was willing to sign both players and push Tyler Fitzgerald into a utility role entering the season.
As for the Red Sox, the club certainly made sense as a fit for Torres given their wide open second base situation. Boston acquired Vaughn Grissom from the Braves last winter in hopes that he could lock up the position, but injuries and ineffectiveness led to something of a lost season in 2024. That leaves the position without a clear incumbent headed into 2025, with Grissom, David Hamilton, and top prospect Kristian Campbell among the internal options. Adding Torres to the mix would’ve eased the pressure on Campbell to perform immediately upon reaching the majors while providing an upgrade over Grissom and Hamilton who bats from the right side to help balance the club’s lefty-heavy lineup. Boston is also known to have some level of interest in top free agent infielder Alex Bregman, but it’s possible that their reported interest in Torres could signal a willingness to sign a hitter closer to the middle of the free agent market like Ha-Seong Kim.
Yankees Did Not Make Offer To Gleyber Torres In Free Agency
Second baseman Gleyber Torres saw his first foray into free agency come to a close yesterday when he landed a one-year, $15MM contract with the Tigers. According to a report from Chris McCosky of The Detroit News, however, Torres had multi-year offers on the table that he turned down in favor of signing with Detroit. McCosky goes on to note that Torres highlighted the Nationals and Angels as teams who made offers to him before he signed with the Tigers, while the incumbent Yankees did not make him an offer.
“I’ve got great friends there, great communication with the entire organization,” Torres said of his longtime club. “I feel proud of myself for being with the Yankees for seven years, but now I’m with Detroit and just really happy they gave me the opportunity to play next year. I think they have other priorities and I’m not on the list. I’m good.”
It’s not necessarily a major shock that the Yankees opted not to make an attempt to bring back Torres. The 28-year-old joined the club prior to his MLB debut as part of the trade that sent Aroldis Chapman to the Cubs at the 2016 trade deadline and debuted with the club back in 2018. After back-to-back All-Star seasons in 2018 and ’19, Torres’s production took a step backwards. He’s slashed just .261/.332/.411 (109 wRC+) while playing average to below average defense at second base. It’s solid enough production for a big league regular but a far cry from the numbers the Yankees surely hoped they were getting when their consensus top-5 prospect in baseball posted a 123 wRC+ in the first two seasons of his big league career.
Torres actually began to look something more like his early-career self in 2023, when he slashed a strong .273/.347/.453 (120 wRC+) and put up 3.6 fWAR. Unfortunately, though, he followed that up with a lackluster 2024 season that saw his wRC+ drop down to just 104, the second-lowest figure of his career. That weak overall number is thanks in large part to a slow start to the season, as Torres hit just .215/.289/.248 in his first 32 games of the season. From May 2 onward, however, he slashed a much more respectable .268/.341/.412 (115 wRC+), including an excellent .292/.361/.419 (124 wRC+) after the All-Star break.
That strong finish wasn’t enough to save his role with the Yankees, however, as the club had already traded for Jazz Chisholm Jr. at the trade deadline over the summer. While Chisholm shifted to third base in deference to Torres down the stretch, the Yankees have eyed potential third base additions such as Alex Bregman and Nolan Arenado rather than a reunion with Torres as they consider moving Chisholm back to his natural position. Even so, Torres’s excellent numbers late in the season grabbed the attention of a few clubs aside from the Tigers, with Torres himself highlighting the Nationals and Angels as teams who showed interest in him this winter.
Both clubs were previously reported to have interest in Torres this winter, so it’s hardly a shock that either club made him an offer. With that being said, Torres’s ability to remain at his natural position of second base with the Tigers may have made them a more attractive option than either D.C. or Anaheim. The Nationals were explicitly interested in Torres as a third baseman given the presence of Luis García Jr. at the keystone, while the Angels currently have Luis Rengifo penciled in as their everyday second baseman. It’s unclear whether Angels brass were hoping to move Torres to third base as well or if they’d have instead had Rengifo take up the super-utility role he’s handled often throughout his career, but the Tigers moving Colt Keith to first base in deference to Torres surely made it easy for the 28-year-old to feel comfortable that he would be able to put his best foot forward with the club this year before returning to free agency next winter.
With Torres now off the board, the Angels and Nationals will have to look elsewhere if they hope to upgrade their infield mix this winter. Washington already landed first baseman Nathaniel Lowe in trade with the Rangers earlier this week but could also stand to make an upgrade at the hot corner. The Angels, meanwhile, have been connected to several third base options ranging from known trade candidates like Nolan Arenado and Alec Bohm to more surprising options like Diamondbacks third baseman Eugenio Suarez. Aside from those trade market possibilities, the third base market in free agency is led by Bregman but also includes lower-tier options like Yoan Moncada and Josh Rojas.
Charlie Maxwell Passes Away
Two-time All-Star Charlie Maxwell has passed away, the Tigers announced today. The longtime Detroit outfielder was 97 years old.
A lifelong Michigan resident, Maxwell played college ball at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, working primarily as a pitcher during that time. He was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1945 and spent two years in the military before being discharged and joining the Red Sox minor league system as a pitcher, though he appeared in just ten games before converting to the outfield. Maxwell made his major league debut in 1950 with a three-game cup of coffee that saw him draw a walk and score a run but strike out three times without recording a hit in nine trips to the plate.
Maxwell bounced between the big league Red Sox and the club’s minor league system with lackluster results at the big league level for a number of years, hitting just .203/.289/.285 in parts of four seasons with the club while finding himself unable to secure a regular role. That all changed in 1955, when the Red Sox sold him to the Orioles. He made just four trips to the plate in Baltimore before being sold a second time, this time to his hometown Tigers. Maxwell’s career took off virtually from the moment he set foot in Detroit. Though he only appeared in 55 games for the club during the 1955 campaign, he made the most of every opportunity given to him with a solid .266/.325/.541 slash line that included 18 home runs in just 122 trips to the plate.
That substantial power earned Maxwell the Tigers’ starting left field job the following year, and he responded with the first All-Star appearance of his career. The slugger slashed an excellent .326/.414/.534 with 28 homers and more walks (79) than strikeouts (74). While standout performances from teammates Al Kaline and Frank Lary somewhat overshadowed Maxwell’s fantastic season, he nonetheless managed to earn some down-ballot consideration for the AL MVP award. The 1956 season was more of the same in many ways for Maxwell. While his numbers (.276/.377/.482 in 138 games) took a bit of a step back from his first season as a regular, Maxwell earned another All-Star appearance and some down-ballot AL MVP consideration despite being outmatched by fantastic seasons from teammates Kaline and Jim Bunning.
Those back-to-back All-Star campaigns were the strongest of Maxwell’s career, and he found himself comparing favorably with some of the league’s best players at the time. His 52 home runs across those two seasons were good for the 15th highest total in the majors, leaving him sandwiched between Hall of Famers Yogi Berra (54) and Kaline (50) on the league leaderboard. His 13.2% walk rate was the tenth-highest figure in the majors over those two seasons, and had more advanced metrics like wRC+ existed at the time Maxwell’s 140 figure for those two years would’ve put him just a hair behind the production of Hall of Famer Frank Robinson (141) over that same period.
Maxwell’s efforts over the remainder of his tenure in Detroit never quite resulted in a season that dominant again, but he still held his own at the plate with a solid .250/.348/.440 slash line with the Tigers from 1958 to 1961, a stretch which included a 31-homer campaign in 1959 and a third season where he garnered down-ballot MVP consideration in 1960. Maxwell’s tenure with the Tigers came to an end in 1962, however, as he hit just .194/.273/.269 in 30 games with the club before being traded to the White Sox.
Maxwell enjoyed something of a late-career resurgence upon arriving in Chicago and slashed a respectable .269/.382/.441 across three seasons as a part-time player for the club before hanging up the spikes two games into his age-37 season in Chicago. In all, Maxwell appeared in 1,133 games during his time in the majors while collecting 532 RBI, 148 home runs and 856 hits. He was a lifetime .264/.360/.451 hitter in 3,796 big league plate appearances. MLBTR sends our condolences to Maxwell’s family, friends, and loved ones.
Tigers Sign Gleyber Torres
The Tigers announced Friday that they’ve signed free agent infielder Gleyber Torres to a one-year, $15MM contract. Torres, an Octagon client, is expected to be Detroit’s regular second baseman in the upcoming season. The Tigers, one of the rare teams to publicly disclose contract terms themselves, added that Torres’ contract has a one-time, $500K assignment bonus (in the event that he’s traded to another club).
Torres, who turned 28 earlier this month, has spent his entire big league career to date in Yankee pinstripes. The once-vaunted top prospect looked like a breakout star in 2019 when he socked 38 home runs in just 144 games, but Torres wound up settling in as a solid regular at second base rather than the superstar shortstop he appeared to be on the cusp of becoming in ’19. Since that stellar 2019 campaign — which came in MLB’s juiced-ball season — Torres has slashed .261/.332/.411. That’s about 9% better than average, by measure of wRC+ (which weights for home park and league run-scoring environment in a given season).
The 2024 season was shaping up to be a career-worst showing for Torres at the halfway point. Through his first 80 games, he turned in an anemic .215/.294/.333 slash (81 wRC+) with a 23.9% strikeout rate that was well north of the 19.3% mark he’d posted over the prior five seasons. Torres righted the ship in late June, however, and rebounding to the tune of a .298/.365/.421 slash with a much-improved 17.3% strikeout rate down the stretch.
It’s perhaps possible that Torres could’ve landed a multi-year deal at a lower rate, but given his age and track record, it’s not a shock to see him take a pure one-year pillow deal. MLBTR predicted back in November that he’d ink a two-year deal with an opt-out, as the priority for him always seemed likely to be getting back to the market next winter. The demand seemingly wasn’t there to push to that range, however, and Torres will head to Comerica Park as an eminently reasonable one-year roll of the proverbial dice. With a strong enough showing, he’ll have the added benefit of being a potential qualifying offer candidate for the Tigers next offseason.
Torres steps into a Detroit infield that’s lacking in any real certainty. Colt Keith, who hit .285/.330/.429 in 445 plate appearances after a terrible start to his rookie season, appears to be the only other infield lock. He played second base in 2024 but has experience at the hot corner as well. Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free Press writes, however, that the organization prefers not to play Keith at third due to some injury concern regarding his right shoulder. Keith has taken reps at first base, and while he’s yet to play there in a professional game, he could get further work there this spring in the event of a potential position shift.
Meanwhile, Javier Baez is signed for three more seasons at $24MM per year, but he’s played himself out of a starting role and will eventually be a release candidate if he can’t rebound to at least some extent (though the Tigers have suggested this winter that they still see a role for Baez in ’25). Former top pick Spencer Torkelson belted 32 homers in 2023 but flailed through an ugly 2024 campaign and has yet to establish himself as a viable big league regular. Trey Sweeney showed a big league-ready glove at shortstop but didn’t hit in 36 big league games during last year’s second-half debut. Top prospect Jace Jung drew heaps of walks (16%) in 94 plate appearances late last season but is probably ticketed for Triple-A work or (speculatively speaking) some exposure to left field. Matt Vierling could factor in at the hot corner as well, though he can play in the outfield, too.
The glut of infield options, even with many of them unproven, gives the Tigers some flexibility with regard to how they handle the rest of the offseason. Young players like Sweeney and particularly Jung would command considerable trade interest. Torkelson stands as a viable change-of-scenery candidate, especially if the Tigers indeed plan to give Keith a prominent role at first base. Torkelson could still factor into the first base/DH mix, but he’s hardly a lock to do so after hitting .221/.300/.392 through his first 361 big league games.
The Tigers have been connected to free agent third baseman Alex Bregman, though that’d be a considerably larger signing than they’ve made at any point under current president of baseball operations Scott Harris. Some of the link there is surely due to the presence of former Astros skipper A.J. Hinch in the Detroit dugout. Petzold reported earlier in the week that Bregman has become more of a priority for the Tigers as the offseason has worn on, but the addition of Torres clouds the infield mix a bit more. A fit could still come together, particularly if the Tigers are keen on moving someone like Jung in a deal for rotation help.
In terms of payroll, there’s no reason to think the Tigers can’t make another prominent addition after adding Torres. They entered the offseason with only Baez, Keith and Kenta Maeda on guaranteed deals for the upcoming season. Torres and fellow free agent pickup Alex Cobb have pushed the team to a projected a $109MM payroll, per RosterResource’s projections. That’s nowhere near the team’s franchise-record $200MM payroll from 2017. And while that level of spending came under the ownership of the late Mike Ilitch, even Ilitch’s son, Chris, has authorized payrolls as high as $135MM in recent seasons (2022).
Jon Heyman of the New York Post first reported that Torres had agreed to a deal with the Tigers. ESPN’s Jesse Rogers first reported the terms and that Torres was expected to be the Tigers’ starting second baseman.
Tigers, Dietrich Enns Agree To Minor League Contract
The Tigers agreed to a minor league contract with left-hander Dietrich Enns. The 33-year-old southpaw announced the news on social media last week.
Enns is trying to work his way back to the majors for the first time since 2021. He tossed 22 1/3 innings across nine relief appearances for Tampa Bay that season. Enns turned in a 2.82 earned run average in that limited sample. That caught the attention of the Seibu Lions in Japan. Seibu finalized a deal to purchase his contract. Enns spent two seasons there, combining for a 3.62 ERA through 176 1/3 innings at the NPB level.
The Central Michigan product changed countries but stayed in Asia for the ’24 season. Enns signed with the Korea Baseball Organization’s LG Twins. He started 30 times and logged 167 1/3 frames of 4.19 ERA ball. Enns struck out 22% of opponents against a 7% walk rate. After the season, the Twins brought in Yonny Chirinos and re-signed Elieser Hernández to serve as their foreign-born pitchers for 2025.
Enns figures to open the season with Triple-A Toledo. He can start or work in long relief on a Detroit staff that’ll place a premium on flexibility. A.J. Hinch used plenty of openers and bulk relievers behind Tarik Skubal this past season. That’ll presumably continue in the final two rotation spots after Skubal, Reese Olson and Alex Cobb.
Tigers Moving Colt Keith To First Base
Tigers president of baseball operations Scott Harris met with reporters this afternoon, shortly after the team finalized its one-year deal with Gleyber Torres. The team provided video of the 16-minute media session.
Harris confirmed the Tigers will play Torres at second base. Colt Keith will move to first base. Harris indicated that Keith could return to the keystone in future years but noted that “for 2025, our best team has Gleyber at second base and Colt at first base.” Keith spent the entire ’24 campaign at second base, where he logged nearly 1100 innings as a rookie.
Keith’s defensive grades were mixed. Statcast rated him as a slightly above-average second baseman. Defensive Runs Saved was a lot less enthusiastic, estimating he was eight runs below par. Scouting reports on the 6’2″, 211-pound infielder have pegged him as a bat-first player. Keith may be a capable defender at the keystone but wasn’t likely to develop into a Gold Glove winner.
That was the youngster’s first full season as a second baseman. Keith was drafted as a third baseman and continued playing the hot corner until midway through the ’23 campaign. Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free-Press wrote this morning that the Tigers weren’t willing to move Keith back to third base because of concerns about a prior labrum injury in his throwing shoulder.
Keith’s bat guarantees him a spot in the starting lineup. The lefty hitter had a .260/.309/.380 slash with 13 homers. Those numbers are weighed down by a terrible first few weeks. Keith had a .154/.222/.165 showing through the end of April. He hit .282/.328/.426 in 457 plate appearances from the start of May onward. Keith managed solid production against pitchers of either handedness. He should be in the lineup against almost all right-handed pitchers. Skipper A.J. Hinch could shield him from a few lefties, but the Tigers are unlikely to relegate Keith to a strict platoon role.
If the Tigers aren’t willing to play Keith on the left side of the infield, the Torres deal essentially forced him to first base. Torres has been a full-time second baseman since the Yankees moved him off shortstop in 2022. The Nationals showed interest in moving him to third base. Jon Heyman of the New York Post reported last night — before Torres signed with Detroit — that the infielder rebuffed Washington because he didn’t want to change positions.
Between the infield shakeup and some early offseason chatter about the Tigers potentially pursuing a veteran first baseman, it’s fair to wonder if former first overall pick Spencer Torkelson still has a role on the roster. Unsurprisingly, Harris suggested publicly that remains the case. Detroit’s front office leader said he spoke with Torkelson before the Tigers announced the Torres signing. “My message to Tork was: ‘if you have a big offseason and a big spring training, there’s a role for you on this team.’ This team needs more right-handed power and we’ve seen Tork do that in the past,” Harris said.
The Tigers have sought right-handed hitting since the start of the offseason. Torres addresses that to some extent, though he’s more a solid hitter than a great one. His 38-homer showing from 2019 looks like a clear outlier. Torres respectively hit 24 and 25 homers in 2022 and ’23. That dropped to 15 round-trippers this year, in part because of an ice cold April in which he didn’t hit a single home run.
Torkelson connected on 31 homers with a .233/.313/.446 slash line in 2023. A strong second half provided optimism coming into this year. Instead, he stumbled to a .219/.295/.374 mark with 10 homers through 92 games — struggles that led the Tigers to option Torkelson to Triple-A Toledo for a stretch. A change-of-scenery trade still seems a distinct possibility.
Kerry Carpenter should get the bulk of playing time at designated hitter. The lefty-swinging Carpenter will be in the lineup at either DH or in the corner outfield against all righty pitching. He’ll probably be shielded from left-handers, but carrying Torkelson as a short-side platoon bat with limited defensive value isn’t a great use of a roster spot. Harris said today that the Tigers don’t view Torkelson as a candidate for any reps at third base or in the corner outfield, though he opined that “with the DH plate appearances and opportunity at first base, there are still plenty of plate appearances for him.”
Justyn-Henry Malloy, a righty hitter, is also in the DH/first base mix. Malloy has been a high-OBP bat in the minors. He hit just .203/.291/.366 with eight homers in 71 MLB games as a rookie. He still has a full slate of minor league options, but he’s another hitter without a clear defensive fit and a limited major league track record.
The Tigers are one of a handful of teams that has been recently linked to the top unsigned position player, Alex Bregman. While the Torres signing doesn’t directly impact third base, it deepens the infield more generally. Harris declined comment on Bregman, as the CBA prohibits team personnel from saying whether they’re in or out on specific free agents.
He indicated there’ll be more moves on the horizon while suggesting he’s encouraged by how the roster is shaping up. “The roster isn’t done yet. It’s not even 2025 yet. There’s still some time in the offseason to fully flesh out our roster. But when I stare at our group right now, this is the deepest we’ve ever been — on both sides of the ball,” Harris said.
Since signing Alex Cobb, the Tigers have downplayed their desire for another starting pitcher. The exception is their pursuit of NPB star Roki Sasaki, who’ll be limited to a signing bonus below $10MM because of his status as an international amateur. Harris said that the Tigers have presented an initial presentation to Sasaki’s representatives at Wasserman. He indicated that the Tigers are awaiting a response from Sasaki’s camp as to whether they’ll get an in-person meeting after the holidays.
Agent Joel Wolfe suggested at the Winter Meetings that Sasaki, who took preliminary meetings with a handful of teams last week, would begin narrowing the field after returning to Japan for the holiday. The Tigers don’t seem a likely landing spot for Sasaki, but they’d certainly welcome an opportunity to make a pitch to the 23-year-old righty.
Tigers Designate Bailey Horn For Assignment
The Tigers announced Friday that they’ve designated left-hander Bailey Horn for assignment. He’ll be the corresponding 40-man roster move for newly signed infielder Gleyber Torres, whose one-year, $15MM deal with the Tigers is now official.
Horn, 26, was claimed off waivers out of the Red Sox organization a month ago. He’ll now be traded to another club or claimed off waivers within the next week. He made his big league debut in Boston last season, pitching 18 innings and yielding 13 earned runs (6.50 ERA) on 22 hits and 10 walks with 13 strikeouts.
It wasn’t the best first impression in the majors, but Horn was sharper for Boston’s Triple-A club, rattling off 29 1/3 innings of 2.15 ERA ball with a 29.2% strikeout rate against a bloated 11.7% walk rate. Horn has missed bats in droves in the minors, fanning 29% of his career opponents, but he’s also walked nearly 13% of his opponents along the way. He’s a former fifth-round pick of the White Sox who’s been traded multiple times, most notably going from the Sox to the Cubs in exchange for Ryan Tepera back in 2021.
Horn’s ability to miss bats, coupled with a heater that averages 95 mph and a pair of minor league option years still remaining, could prompt another team to take a look.
Third Base Rumors: Bregman, Arenado, Yankees, Tigers, Astros
With the Yankees in need of infield help, both Alex Bregman and Nolan Arenado have been linked to the club this offseason, with the idea being that one would become New York’s new third baseman and Jazz Chisholm Jr. would become the full-time second baseman. However, during an edition of the YES Network’s “Yankees Hot Stove” show earlier this week, Jack Curry said that the Bronx Bombers weren’t in on either Bregman or Arenado, and pushed back on the idea that the Yankees ever had interest in trading for Arenado.
This runs counter to last week’s report (from MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand, John Denton, and Bryan Hoch) that the Yankees offered Marcus Stroman to the Cardinals as part of a trade package for Arenado, though St. Louis rejected the deal. As always with seemingly contradictory offseason reports, the truth could lie somewhere in the middle. Hypothetically, it could be that New York’s interest in Arenado was limited to this scenario that would’ve seen Stroman’s salary moved off the team’s books.
Whatever the depth of the Yankees’ interest in Arenado might be, it could be a moot point if Arenado himself isn’t interested in joining the team. The Yankees aren’t one of the six clubs (the Angels, Dodgers, Padres, Phillies, Mets, Red Sox) Arenado is reportedly willing to waive his no-trade protection to join, and Arenado has already vetoed a proposed deal to the Astros. There was speculation that New York’s deal with Paul Goldschmidt was made in part to entice Arenado to accept a trade to the Bronx to join his old teammate, yet Curry’s report seems to close the door on that possibility.
In addition to signing Goldschmidt and Max Fried, the Yankees have also traded for Cody Bellinger, Devin Williams, and Fernando Cruz, as GM Brian Cashman has aggressively reloaded the roster after Juan Soto left to sign with the Mets. Even with some holes left to be addressed, New York is projected (by RosterResource) for a luxury tax number of $303.2MM, and thus the team is already over the maximum penalty threshold of $301MM.
The Yankees could reduce their tax bill by trying to move Stroman or another unfavorable contract, yet the payroll situation might hint at why Arenado or Bregman aren’t (or no longer are) on the radar. Signing Bregman would require a far higher investment than taking most or all of Arenado’s contract in a trade, plus since Bregman rejected Houston’s qualifying offer, the Yankees would need to give up two draft picks and $1MM in international bonus pool money. Since the Bombers already paid that extra penalty to sign another qualified free agent in Fried, the club would very likely prefer to avoid further depleting its draft pool and bonus pool by adding Bregman.
If the Yankees are indeed out on Bregman, that leaves the Phillies, Blue Jays, Red Sox, Mets, and Tigers as teams known to have some level of interest in Bregman’s services this winter. Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free Press shed a little more light on the Tigers’ link in the latest edition of the Days of Roar podcast, noting that “there has been an increase in the Tigers’ prioritization of Bregman” as the offseason has developed, with “more dialogue, more conversation” between the club and Bregman’s camp.
Heading into the offseason, Detroit was viewed as a logical landing spot for Bregman for multiple reasons — his past history with manager A.J. Hinch, the lack of long-term money on the Tigers’ books, and the perception that the Tigers were going to be aggressive in the wake of their Cinderella run to the ALDS last season. The latter point hasn’t played out to date, as Alex Cobb‘s one-year, $15MM deal represents the Motown team’s only major investment of the winter.
Bregman’s reported asking price of at least $200MM appears to be the hold-up, as the Tigers aren’t willing to spend to that level. What remains unclear is if Detroit is willing to at least approach Bregman’s demands, or if the team is aiming lower overall. Most of the free agents or trade targets publicly linked to the Tigers in rumors this winter (i.e. Goldschmidt, Carlos Santana, Walker Buehler, Kirby Yates, Erick Fedde, Steven Matz, Andrew Heaney, Kyle Gibson) are either already under contract on short-term deals, or would likely require only one- or two-year investments. Apart from Bregman, Jack Flaherty and Ha-Seong Kim are the other free agents on the Tigers’ list of targets that would require bigger contracts, and even Kim’s situation is fluid due to the lingering uncertainty surrounding his shoulder surgery.
Bregman already turned down a reported six-year, $156MM offer from the Astros earlier this winter, which was the first step towards what now looks like the end of a reunion possibility between the third baseman and his longtime team. Acquiring corner infielder Isaac Paredes in the Kyle Tucker trade left open the possibility that Bregman could still be re-signed and Paredes could play first base in Houston, but the Astros’ three-year, $60MM deal with first baseman Christian Walker has now addressed the team’s needs in the corner infield.
While not officially stating that the Astros were now out on Bregman, GM Dana Brown left things pretty clear by stating “Paredes is going to play third and Walker is going to play first” when speaking with reporters (including the Houston Chronicle’s Matt Kawahara) earlier this week. Brown felt “the negotiations stalled” with Bregman’s camp, leaving the Astros in search of an alternative.
“I thought we made a really competitive offer and showed that we wanted [Bregman] back,” Brown said. “But we had to pursue other options, we couldn’t just sit there. We locked in Paredes early in that trade knowing that he could play third or first. And then when the opportunity to add another bat [Walker] came up, we just jumped on it.”
Gary Sutherland Passes Away
Former major league infielder Gary Sutherland passed away on December 16 at age 80. His obituary was provided by a Monrovia, California funeral home.
Sutherland was an L.A.-area native who attended USC. He signed with the Phillies out of college. The right-handed infielder debuted during his age-21 season. He appeared in parts of three seasons for Philadelphia. The Phils lost him to the Expos in the 1968 expansion draft. Sutherland was the everyday second baseman on the inaugural Montreal team. He played three years for the Expos, hitting .234/.287/.299 over 368 games.
Montreal dealt Sutherland to the Astros after the ’71 season. He barely played over two years in Houston before he was on the move again. The Tigers acquired him during the 1973-74 offseason. Sutherland took a career-high 672 plate appearances during his first season in Detroit. He hit 20 doubles with a .254/.282/.313 showing. He played three years in Detroit. Sutherland finished his playing career with brief stints between Milwaukee, San Diego and St. Louis.
Over a 13-year playing career, Sutherland picked up 754 hits with a .243/.291/.308 batting line. He appeared in more than 1000 major league games between seven teams. Sutherland remained in the game after his playing days as a scout and worked as a special assistant in the Angels’ front office into the 2010s. MLBTR sends condolences to his family, loved ones and friends.