Headlines

Go To Pro Hockey Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

Rangers Rumors

Rangers Acquire Welington Castillo

By | at

The Rangers have acquired catcher Welington Castillo and international draft bonus pool money from the White Sox in exchange for minor league outfielder and corner infielder Jonah McReynolds, as per Rangers executive VP of communications John Blake (Twitter link).  Texas has also outrighted left-hander Jesse Biddle and outfielder Zack Granite to Triple-A, with Biddle first being reinstated from the 60-day injured list.

The Rangers will get $250K in international bonus funds, as per Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News (Twitter link), which seems to have been the team’s real incentive for the trade.  Texas is expected to decline Castillo’s $8MM club option and instead pay him a $500K buyout.

In essence, the White Sox decided to save that $500K of Major League payroll in favor of giving up $250K in international money.  It could be that the Sox also simply decided McReynolds was of more interest to them than any other prospects who might arise on the international market.

Castillo became expendable in Chicago after he hit only .209/.267/.417 over 251 PA in 2019, losing playing time to James McCann in the process.  This comes on the heels of a 2018 season that saw Castillo post some respectable numbers (94 OPS+, 96 wRC+) for a catcher over 181 PA, though that year was marred by an 80-game PED suspension.

While the $8MM salary was too rich for the Rangers’ liking, it wouldn’t be a total surprise to see the team have an interest in Castillo at a lower price.  While Castillo struggled at the plate last year, his numbers still represent an improvement over what the current Texas catching corps (Jeff Mathis, Jose Trevino, Isiah Kiner-Falefa) produced in 2019.  Then again, the Rangers could also choose to stand pat at catcher since they have several other areas to address this winter.

McReynolds, who turns 24 in December, was a 13th-round pick for the Rangers in the 2016 draft.  He has a .217/.285/.322 slash line over 637 PA in his first four pro seasons, the last three of which have been spent at low A-ball.  He has played all over the diamond as a professional, though spent much of 2019 focused on third base and first base.

AL Notes: Vogelbach, Rangers, Red Sox, A’s

By | at

With the 2019 MLB season officially wrapping up in a matter of hours, much of the league is fully turned toward the upcoming offseason. We’ll track some American League news here.

  • Daniel Vogelbach started 49 games at first base for the Mariners in 2019, but that’s not likely to happen again, reports Corey Brock of the Athletic. Never regarded as an especially strong defender, some in the Mariners’ organization believe Vogelbach’s offensive downturn in the season’s second half (71 wRC+, compared to a 136 wRC+ in the first half) was related to his playing the field more than was ideal. With Vogelbach looking like a pure DH, the Mariners could again turn first base over to Austin Nola, a 29 year-old rookie who slashed .269/.342/.454 in 267 plate appearances down the stretch. Nola’s capable of bouncing all around the diamond, including catching, and is probably best served as a multi-positional piece. Fortunately, top first base prospect Evan White is on the doorstep of the majors and has a chance to win the job early, perhaps even out of spring training, Brock adds.
  • The Red Sox could be facing payroll constraints and have a number of high-priced but effective starting pitchers. With that in mind, Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News hears that the Rangers have internally kicked around the idea of pursuing one of those arms in trade. Texas is planning to increase payroll in 2020, after all. While much of that attention has focused on a potential pursuit of Gerrit Cole or Anthony Rendon in free agency, that flexibility can certainly be put to use in trade as well. Grant speculates that any of Chris Sale, David Price, or Nathan Eovaldi could be targets. Of course, given the caliber of players (particularly Sale and Price) and amount of money involved, any trade scenario would be extremely complex.
  • Speaking of the Red Sox, Alex Speier of the Boston Globe takes a fascinating look at the career of Brian O’Halloran. Part of the four-person interim front office crew (alongside Raquel Ferreira, Eddie Romero and Zack Scott) who ran baseball operations between the departure of Dave Dombrowski and the hiring of chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom, O’Halloran was promoted to general manager at the time of Bloom’s hiring. Speier’s piece, certainly worth reading in full, is rife with quotes from O’Halloran’s colleagues lauding his work ethic and aptitude and details his rise from volunteer to jack-of-all-trades within the organization.
  • The A’s have an uncertain mix at second base, and three young players have a chance to stake their claim to the job next spring, reports Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle. Sheldon Neuse, Franklin Barreto and Jorge Mateo should all have a shot at earning the job, assuming none are traded in the coming months. Jurickson Profar may, too, Slusser notes, although it’s possible he’ll end up elsewhere following a disappointing season with a projected $5.8MM arbitration salary. Slusser doesn’t foreclose the possibility of an outside addition, something explored by MLBTR’s Connor Byrne in his A’s offseason outlook, but it’s nonetheless notable to hear the organization continues to have faith in its young infield options.

Offseason Outlook: Texas Rangers

By | at

The Rangers didn’t need a new ballpark, but they got one. They will have to improve in several parts of the roster if they’re to win in the first season at the just-built facility.

Guaranteed Contracts

Arbitration-Eligible Players (service time in parentheses; projections via MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz)

Options

Free Agents

[Texas Rangers depth chart | Texas Rangers payroll outlook]

The Rangers have sat in an uncomfortable middle ground for the past three seasons, with a pair of 78-84 campaigns wrapped around a 67-95 dud. Payroll has moved south, but still topped $160MM by the end of the 2018 season and sat at $118MM on Opening Day in 2019.

Unsurprisingly, the roster construction efforts have mirrored the broader situation. The Rangers have spent some money and hit on a few free agents. Mike Minor and Lance Lynn succeeded beyond the wildest expectations on three-year deals while last year’s crop of low-cost talent delivered significant contributions from Hunter Pence, Danny Santana, and Logan Forsythe. But the club has also whiffed on others. Jeff Mathis, Asdrubal Cabrera, Shawn Kelley, Shelby Miller, and Zach McAllister absorbed a decent amount of payroll without delivering much in return. While Joey Gallo has emerged as a star-level performer, the results haven’t been as promising for Rougned Odor and Nomar Mazara.

It’s frankly difficult to see this club vaulting into serious contention in 2020 without some enormous strides from existing players and major additions from outside. The organization seems to have preferred a few years of fairly expensive mediocrity and foregone top draft picks as the price for avoiding a full-throated rebuild. There’s some honor in that. But it’s also time to get things moving forward.

There’s an argument to be made that president of baseball operations Jon Daniels ought to press ownership for a big payroll to launch the Rangers forward. The publicly funded stadium bonanza surely supports that concept. But it may not be wise to put the pedal all the way to the floor just yet, even accepting the premise that the organization can and should unleash the full potential of its pocketbook over the next several seasons. The Rangers have a whole host of needs and are separated by a yawning gap from the cross-state, division-rival Astros. Over-committing to too many veterans now, when the Rangers’ would-be core remains ill-defined, carries long-term roster-management risks. This winter demands careful navigation.

Gallo is a walking gap-filler on defense; he could slot in at any outfield spot or in the corner infield, though he hasn’t played third in some time and didn’t grade as well there. That flexibility will be important. The Rangers could move him around a la Cody Bellinger or let Gallo settle into whatever spot most needs it.

Otherwise, questions predominate. You could argue for a whole new outfield outside of Gallo. Shin-Soo probably should be limited all but exclusively to DH duties, where he’s a good-enough but hardly elite bat. Mazara hasn’t broken out of his league-average-ish hitting malaise; the Rangers will have to decide whether they can get him going or are better served letting another team have the shot. Delino DeShields Jr. runs like the wind but just hasn’t hit in the majors; he looks to be a reserve piece at most. And though Willie Calhoun has shown some promise with the bat, he’s anything but settled defensively.

Perhaps the Rangers would be best served shifting Calhoun in to first base rather than lining up Gallo on the dirt. The club may not be ready to give up entirely on Ronald Guzman, but it’d be awfully hard to hand over the first bagging duties to him after a .219/.308/.414 season. Across the way at the hot corner, the team still hasn’t settled on a permanent replacement for Adrian Beltre. Super-sub Danny Santana can help cover there, or just about anywhere else on the diamond, though it’s dubious whether he’ll repeat his high-BABIP, high-strikeout, power-surging 2019 success story. What of Nick Solak? The bat is intriguing, but there are questions surrounding the glove.

Let’s pause here to consider the scale of the challenge — and the volume of possible solutions. The Rangers could justifiably add something like three or four high-quality players to the corner infield/outfield mix, particularly if they find a deal they like for Mazara. Doing quite that much seems like a stretch, but the Rangers have picked up quite a few lower-cost veterans in recent years and surely will do so again. Given their positive experience with Beltre, perhaps a late-career fling with Josh Donaldson would make sense. Texas native Anthony Rendon is a bit of a dream scenario, but it’s quite possible to imagine at least some level of pursuit. There are loads of lower-cost vets that can slot in at either corner infield slot, with Mike Moustakas and Todd Frazier among the more prominent names. It isn’t hard to imagine a first bagger such as Justin Smoak, Yonder Alonso, or old friend Mitch Moreland finding his way to Texas. Likewise, the corner outfield market is full of possibilities that probably won’t break the bank. Even Marcell Ozuna may struggle to get a monster deal given the relative lack of urgent demand around the game. Nicholas Castellanos, Avisail Garcia, and Corey Dickerson are all reasonably youthful options.

That’s not all the Rangers must consider, however, even on the position-player side of the coin. We touched briefly upon the center field situation. That could be solved by planting Gallo out there every day, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Rangers prefer to ease the burden by also lining him up at first base. DeShields has historically been better against left-handed pitching, so perhaps he could handle center when southpaw starters oppose the Rangers. If Gallo is deployed elsewhere entirely, a center field platoon might include a veteran such as Jon Jay, Jarrod Dyson, or (another) old friend Leonys Martin. Should the club go looking for everyday options, it’ll need to get creative. Pirates star Starling Marte would obviously fit quite nicely, but that’ll take quite a bit of creativity for Daniels, especially with so many other teams likely to have interest in Marte given the meager open-market alternatives. More realistic, perhaps, is Japanese star Shogo Akiyama. He seems to have fixed his gaze on the majors; Daniels has always kept a close watch over the top Asian leagues. Perhaps they’ll make eye contact.

Oh, and it’s not as if the other up-the-middle spots are locked and loaded. Elvis Andrus is not going to opt out and it’d be tough to move enough of Odor’s contract to make it worth dealing him now, so the double-play combo is intact. But that underwhelming unit needs to step up big-time and the club can’t presume that’ll occur. At the same time, it’s hard to see how it can give up on the duo given their contracts. Santana and Solak factor here, though the former hasn’t been trusted much at short and the latter hasn’t played there at all. Having them to work in makes it less likely that the Rangers will spend on a sturdy veteran that can handle some time at second, though a move for a Forsythe type can’t be ruled out — particularly with a laundry list of useful names floating around free agency.

The catching situation is at least as big of an issue, albeit one that may not be susceptible of much near-term change. Mathis had an unfathomably bad season with the bat (.158/.209/.224) and understudy Jose Trevino hardly shined (.258/.272/.383 with just three walks in 126 plate appearances). It’s nice that Isiah Kiner-Falefa can play behind the dish or elsewhere on the diamond, but he also lacks promise with the bat. You can swallow some poor offensive output from defensively exceptional backstops, but it’s rough to have a black hole in the lineup.

What the Rangers can hope is that Mathis and Trevino will squeeze value out of a largely uninspiring pitching staff. Lynn and Minor were stunningly valuable in 2019 — they accounted for 11 of the club’s net 14.2 pitching fWAR — but it seems fair to presume at least a bit of regression for each. A group of youthful southpaws — Kolby Allard, Brock Burke, Joe Palumbo, and (if healthy) Taylor Hearn — will battle for opportunities despite poor results in their earliest MLB showings. There are a few other depth arms and rising prospects, but several of the team’s better-regarded farmhands are still a ways off. It’d be disappointing to see Ariel Jurado and Adrian Sampson occupy more than 120 frames apiece once again (unless the club can find a way to put one or both into another gear, at least). Pending supplementation, it’s tough to see this rotation mix as contention-worthy.

There’s some room for improvement in the bullpen. Jose Leclerc still has an electric arm. The Rangers will continue trying to help him find consistency and an appropriate role after dabbling with him as a closer and opener in 2019. It’ll be interesting to see fireballer Emmanuel Clase in his sophomore effort. Rafael Montero was a way-post-hype revelation and should occupy a prominent role. Jesse Chavez will try to bounce back and provide stability. Some of the aforementioned starter candidates could end up in the pen, while the Rangers may hope to get a worthwhile contribution from Ian Gibaut, Jeffrey Springs, or others.

So, what’s the path to improving the pitching? After hitting on two against-the-grain pitching contracts — going to the third year to land Minor and Lynn — the club could seek another opportunity of that ilk. Michael Pineda might represent an under-the-radar candidate for a relatively longer, lower-AAV outlay. The Rangers could also look at the highest reaches of the market. Gerrit Cole and Stephen Strasburg may or may not be legitimate targets, but the Texas org could certainly afford to spend in the next tiers (Zack Wheeler, Madison Bumgarner, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Jake Odorizzi, Dallas Keuchel). And this year’s market has quite a few steady veteran types that ought to be available on cheaper, one-year deals. It wouldn’t be surprising to see the Rangers end up with Ivan Nova or Brett Anderson. The team could also roll the dice on Michael Wacha or Alex Wood.

Free agency also obviously offers some relief solutions. A big move for a closer feels unlikely, but there’s a typical smattering of useful veterans kicking around. If the Rangers prefer a hurler with some closing experience, they could look to someone on the order of Steve Cishek. Perhaps a reunion with the under-the-radar excellent Chris Martin — an Arlington native who the Rangers brought back from Japan — would make sense for all sides.

Needless to say, options abound. It’ll also be interesting to see whether the Rangers can gain any traction in trade talks involving pitching. This club isn’t exactly overburdened with top prospects knocking down the door to the majors and won’t be anxious to move its best farm pieces. But the Rangers do have an interesting asset to market in the form of Mazara’s contract rights. He could be of interest to a variety of teams that would like a crack at his upside; packaged with other young talent, Mazara might help deliver a useful arm back to Texas. It’s even possible that Minor or Lynn could still pop up in trade talks if there’s an avenue for the Rangers to improve their mid-term outlook by kicking the contention can down the road a bit further, though the fact that a deal hasn’t yet occurred is a good indication that the Texas org values those contracts quite a bit.

One way or another, we’re likely to see quite a few fresh names on the backs of Rangers jerseys in 2020. Daniels and co. will need to be clever to make strides in the standings while also setting the team up for a much-anticipated return to glory.

AL Notes: Rangers, Choo, Red Sox, Bloom, Espada

By | at

As presently constructed, the 2020 Rangers project to roster four left-handed corner outfield options in Nomar Mazara, Joey Gallo, Willie Calhoun, and Shin-Soo Choo. That Choo underwent a surgical debridement last week is bad news from the perspective of The Athletic’s Levi Weaver, who opines that the soon-to-be-38-year-old Choo would have made for the club’s most obvious trade chip, had he not undergone the knife (link). While Choo projects to be fully healthy for Opening Day, Weaver still describes the outfield/DH option as “damaged goods” which other teams might be disinclined to deal for.

While Weaver’s concern over an aging player undergoing a shoulder procedure is justified, it’s far from certain that Choo’s minor operation would be the straw that broke the camel’s back in a trade negotiation. With one season and $21MM left on his deal and limited defensive value (-16 DRS and -9.0 UZR in 2019), it stands to reason that other clubs would simply prefer the Rangers other, younger, cheaper outfield options–with Mazara standing out as a player that both the Padres and White Sox checked in on this summer.

More items of interest from around the American League…

  • As a means of welcoming Chaim Bloom to his new city, Boston Globe beat writer Peter Abraham gifts the new Red Sox GM with a letter prescribing first orders of offseason business (link). Abraham describes the club’s difficulty in discovering and developing starting pitching as their “greatest concern”, pointing out that the Sox have not drafted or signed an amateur pitcher of great import since the days of Jon Lester, Clay Buchholz, and Justin Masterson (current Boston starter Eduardo Rodriguez was a signee of the Orioles). Abraham’s reasoning is hard to argue with, although it is worth mentioning that the club drafted starter Michael Kopech in 2014, later trading the young righty (along with Yoan Moncada) in the Chris Sale deal. Otherwise, the club’s decision to draft Jay Groome in 2016 (with arms like Forrest Whitley, Eric Lauer, and Dakota Hudson still on the board) does loom as one developmental misstep of Bloom’s predecessor, Dave Dombrowski. Earlier today, our own TC Zencka took a look at some routes available to the former Rays executive as he seeks to bolster the club’s pitching for 2020.
  • Astros coach Joe Espada was passed over for the Cubs manager job in favor of David Ross, but it doesn’t sound as if the coach is harboring any resentment toward the club, judging by quotes presented in a piece from Ken Davidoff of the New York Post (link). “I go in there and I present myself, and I provide a vision, my goals, and I show them my style and my personality and why I think I’m the right guy for the job,” Espada said on Friday. “And I made a strong case for myself [with the Cubs], and that’s all you could ask for.” In assessing the recent movements on the managerial market, Davidoff opines that Espada represents something of a middle-ground between the experience (Joe Maddon, Joe Girardi) and fresh perspective (Jayce Tingler, David Ross) that clubs have been opting for in their recent hires. Espada reportedly remains a candidate in both the Giants and Pirates manager searches.

Shin-Soo Choo Undergoes Shoulder Surgery

By | at

Rangers designated hitter Shin-Soo Choo revealed in an appearance on a talk show in his native South Korea that he underwent a minor surgery on his left shoulder (hat tip: Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News). Choo was wearing a sling during the appearance but said the procedure came with a rough recovery timeline of six to eight weeks. That should put him on track for a normal Spring Training, barring any setbacks.

Now 37 years old, Choo has spent the past six seasons with the Rangers after signing a seven-year, $130MM deal as a free agent in the 2013-14 offseason. He’s had three solid years and three forgettable ones thus far into that lengthy pact, with each of his two most recent seasons standing out as a productive efforts. Dating back to Opening Day 2018, Choo has batted a combined .264/.374/.444 with 45 home runs, 61 doubles and three triples. He’s played in 297 games and tallied 1325 plate appearances across those two seasons while serving as the club’s primary designated hitter.

Choo is owed $21MM in 2020 — the final season of his current contract. Texas has explored trading him in the past and could look to trade a left-handed-hitting outfielder this winter, though Choo’s contract, lack of defensive value and this surgery won’t make him easy to move. Choo did log 668 innings in the outfield this year but was rated poorly by Defensive Runs Saved (-16), Ultimate Zone Rating (-9.0) and Outs Above Average (-12). Meanwhile, most American League clubs already have a set DH or multiple players they plan to rotate through that DH slot and other positions, making it even more difficult to see Choo being moved. Nomar Mazara, on the other hand, could be a more plausible candidate to change hands with Texas likely to commit two outfield spots to fellow lefty hitters Willie Calhoun and Joey Gallo.

AL West Notes: Mariners, Maddon, Newhan, Andrus

By | at

The Mariners will be looking for veteran pitching this winter, The Athletic’s Corey Brock writes, though they’ll be focusing on relatively inexpensive hurlers on one-year deals as the rebuilding team will give priority to its younger arms.  Tanner Roark, Andrew Cashner, or Tyson Ross are suggested as the types of pitcher (if not those names directly) the M’s could target as they look for experience and the ability to eat innings.

Evaluating how any pitcher will perform on a year-to-year basis is always an inexact science, of course, though Brock also notes that the Mariners and other teams will face an added wrinkle in this year’s offseason market — not knowing how the official MLB baseball could be adjusted in the wake of the home run onslaught that was the 2019 season.  Only three teams allowed more homers in 2019 than the Mariners, despite playing their home games in a relatively pitcher-friendly ballpark.

Here’s more from around the AL West…

  • The Angels officially introduced new manager Joe Maddon at a press conference today, with the veteran skipper telling reporters (including MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger) that he hopes to remain with the club beyond the length of his current three-year contract.  That deal, a three-year/$12MM pact, also includes a bonus clause that will be unlocked if the Angels win the World Series under Maddon’s watch, MLB Network’s Jon Heyman reports (Twitter link).  Should the Halos win a title, Maddon will earn an extra $1MM in each subsequent year of the deal.
  • David Newhan, manager of the Angels’ Double-A affiliate, isn’t expected return to the organization in 2020, Mike DiGiovanna of the Los Angeles Times reports (Twitter link).  Newhan spent the last three years working for the Angels, working as the minor league infield coordinator in 2017-18 before serving as Double-A Mobile’s skipper last season.
  • In regards to a reader question about potentially using Elvis Andrus to fill the Rangers’ hole at third base, MLB.com’s T.R. Sullivan highly doubts the team would consider such a move.  For one, moving Andrus would simply create another vacancy at shortstop, and there doesn’t seem to be any reason to move Andrus when he is still a defensive plus at his current position.  Though 2019 was Andrus’ first negative year (-6) in Defensive Runs Saved since 2016, he has long been considered an above-average fielder by the UZR/150 metric, including a 2.2 UZR/150 last season.

Pitchers Recently Electing Free Agency

By | at

Since the conclusion of the regular season, a number of players have elected free agency. That right accrues to certain players who are outrighted off of a 40-man roster during or after the season — namely, those that have at least three years of MLB service and/or have previously been outrighted. Such players that accepted outright assignments during the season have the right to elect free agency instead at season’s end, provided they aren’t added back to the 40-man in the meantime.

We already rounded up the position players. Now, here are the pitchers that have recently taken to the open market, along with their now-former teams (via the International League and PCL transactions pages):

AL Notes: Pressly, Tanaka, Gallo

By | at

Astros relief ace Ryan Pressly was removed from tonight’s Game Six action after apparently re-aggravating his balky right knee while fielding a ball in the third inning. It was enough surely to make the Houston faithful hold their collective breath, since Pressly missed several weeks after having that same knee surgically repaired in August. For the time being, MLB.com’s Brian McTaggart relays that the righty is day-to-day with “right knee discomfort” (link).

With tonight’s game still hanging in the balance, it’s tough to know whether that “day-to-day” designation might be a moot point, as a win this evening would allow the reliever a few days to heal in advance of the World Series’ first game on Tuesday. Placement on the injured list, however, would likely force the team to turn to Wade Miley for their Fall Classic roster, who was left off the team’s ALCS roster after giving up two earned runs in a 2.2 IP appearance in the ALDS. The superlative Pressly pitched to a 2.32 ERA (2.66 FIP) in 54.1 innings in the 2019 regular season.

More notes from around the American League…

  • In other ALCS-related news, Yankees manager Aaron Boone indicated that Masahiro Tanaka should be available for a potential Game 7 scenario, according to Bob Nightengale of USA Today (link). Tanaka, much-hyped heading into Game 4 due to his impressive postseason resume to that point, ground through a five-inning, three-run performance on Thursday night.
  • How much is a home run worth, really? That’s a question that has become du jour in modern baseball, as the prevalence of longballs has seemed to diminish the on-field value–and off-field earning power–of power hitters like Joey Gallo of the Rangers. But, as Levi Weaver of The Athletic points out, Gallo is a player for whom it would be particularly difficult to draw up a contract extension. Gallo, the only player in MLB history to hit his 100th career homer before his 100th career single, presents a vexing extension case: he’s still young (26 on Opening Day 2020), unconventionally productive (recording a 144 wRC+ in 2019 despite a 38.4% strikeout rate), and he’s dealt with injury concerns (missing 92 games this past season with wrist issues). Perhaps, more than anything, Gallo’s meaty home run totals project to make him an expensive year-over-year arbitration case, further fueling the incentive to get a long-term deal done on the Rangers side of the negotiating table. In a courageous effort to pinpoint Gallo’s value, Weaver proposes a five-year, $85MM extension, perhaps with a sixth team option year valued at $25MM. For what it’s worth, the slugger is projected to earn $4.0MM in his first pass through arb this offseason, according to MLBTR’s projected arbitration models.

Elvis Andrus Won’t Exercise Opt-Out Clause

By | at

Rangers shortstop Elvis Andrus will not exercise the remaining opt-out clause in his eight-year, $120MM contract, tweets MLB Network’s Jon Heyman. It’s hardly a surprising decision, given that Andrus has three years and $43MM remaining on said contract and struggled through a second straight down year at the plate in 2019.

Andrus, 31, was mostly healthy this season after missing a substantial chunk of the 2018 campaign with a fractured elbow (suffered when he was hit by a pitch). Andrus scuffled mightily at the plate upon returning last year, and while this season’s .275/.313/.393 batting line in 147 games/648 plate appearances was an improvement over his post-injury form in 2018, it was still well south of the league average (76 wRC+, 78 OPS+).

This was the second and final chance that Andrus had to opt out of the eight-year extension he signed with the Rangers. He also had the opportunity to walk away from the final four years and $58MM on his contract last offseason but opted not to do so after the aforementioned struggles upon his return from injury. He’ll now earn salaries of $15MM in 2020, $14MM in 2021 and $14MM in 2022. The contract also has a vesting option that would guarantee Andrus a $15MM salary in 2023 if he totals 550 plate appearances in 2022 or a combined 1100 plate appearances in 2021-22. Those are highly attainable plate appearance totals — particularly for Andrus, who has only fallen shy of 550 PAs in a season twice before (last year, due to the broken elbow, and during his rookie campaign in 2009).

Clearly, the remainder of the contract isn’t a bargain for the Rangers, but Andrus remains a well-regarded defender and an above-average baserunner. If he can restore some combination of his 2016 levels of plate discipline (8.3 percent walk rate) and 2017 levels of power (20 home runs, .176 ISO), a return to average or slightly above-average offensive output is possible. It’s worth noting, too, that Andrus was sporting a hearty .303/.339/.453 slash at the All-Star break, although that was mostly the result of an absolute sizzling month of April. Also of note is that Andrus, who just wrapped up his 11th season with the Rangers, secured full 10-and-5 rights prior upon completion of the 2018 season, meaning he has full veto power over any trade scenario.

Coaching Notes: Giants, A’s, Bucs, Rangers, Mets

By | at

The Giants interviewed Athletics quality control coach Mark Kotsay for their vacant managerial position Monday, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle relays (Jon Heyman of MLB Network reported the Giants’ interest in Kotsay last week). Although Kotsay’s the only known outside candidate the Giants have interviewed thus far — it appears bench coach Hensley Meulens has already had a sit-down — president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi has indicated they’ll likely speak with to six eight individuals in their search to replace Bruce Bochy. Kotsay and Zaidi entered the process with at least some familiarity, as the latter was a member of the A’s front office when the former was an outfielder with the club from 2004-07.

  • Little is known about where the Pirates stand in their hunt for a manager, but they are at least “wide open” in their approach, according to Heyman. Pirates special assistant of baseball operations Jeff Banister and Twins bench coach Derek Shelton have been connected to the job more than any other potential candidates, Heyman notes. However, it’s unclear whether the Bucs have interviewed either of them or anyone else since they fired Clint Hurdle on Sept. 29.
  • The Rangers are set to hire Cody Atkinson as their new minor league hitting coordinator, Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News reports. He’ll take over for Josue Perez, who filled the role for five years and will likely move to a different position with the Rangers, per Grant. Atkinson is just 30 years old, though he does bring an impressive resume to the table. He operates a Seattle-based hitting academy, worked as the Reds’ run production and hitting assessment coach for the past year, and comes with a background in kinesiology. His hiring is an example of the Rangers putting “more emphasis on retooling hitters’ swings using technology and biomechanics as aides,” Grant writes.
  • The Mets and minor league field coordinator Kevin Morgan are parting ways, Matt Ehalt of Yahoo Sports tweets. New York offered to reassign Morgan, but he made the decision to exit, according to Ehalt. It was a long run with the Mets for Morgan, a minor league infielder with the organization from 1994-97 who began working in front office and coaching roles for the club in ’98.
Show all

MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com

Do not Sell or Share My Personal Information

hide arrows scroll to top