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Luis Torrens

Mets Expect To Activate Francisco Alvarez, Jeff McNeil On Friday

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The Mets are planning to reinstate catcher Francisco Alvarez and infielder/outfielder Jeff McNeil from the 10-day injured list on Friday, manager Carlos Mendoza announced to reporters (video link via SNY). Both players will be making their 2025 debuts. Each will play in one final rehab game today.

Alvarez, 23, has appeared in nine rehab games thus far and taken 40 plate appearances. He’s out to a middling start, but the nature of his injury — a fractured hamate bone that required surgery — has a tendency to dull offensive performance early on when hitters return. The slugging backstop has been the Mets’ primary catcher over the past two seasons, hitting a combined .222/.294/.422 with 36 home runs in 765 plate appearances. Alvarez has also emerged as a top-tier pitch framer, though his blocking and throwing abilities lag behind.

So far in 2025, the Mets have gone with journeyman Luis Torrens as their starter and homegrown 28-year-old Hayden Senger as their backup. Torrens hit quite well through his first 11 games but has fallen into a deep slump. The 28-year-old is just 3-for-27 over his past nine games, making Alvarez’s expected return all the more timely. It’s likely that Torrens will continue on as the backup in order to preserve catching depth; he’s out of minor league options, whereas Senger has a full slate of option years left and can be sent directly to Triple-A Syracuse without first needing to clear waivers.

McNeil has been out all year due to an oblique strain. The Mets have gotten him some looks in center field during this rehab stint, although he’s not likely to play the position regularly. Still, with Jose Siri sidelined for upwards of 10 weeks due to a fracture in his leg, the Mets took advantage of McNeil’s rehab stint and versatile defensive profile to get him a start in center.

In all likelihood, McNeil will return and see time at second base, at designated hitter and perhaps in an outfield corner. The Mets opened the year with Luisangel Acuña and Brett Baty sharing time at second base. Acuña has handled things well, hitting .275/.351/.373 and contributing solid glovework.

Baty, after a torrid spring performance, had a brutal two-week stretch to begin the season but has begun to turn things around. The 25-year-old former first rounder crushed a second-deck homer off Zack Wheeler in the Mets’ currently ongoing game against the Phillies and entered play today on a .280/.357/.440 heater over his past eight contests. He’s still hitting just .204/.246/.354, but it’ll take some time to recover from the .111/.111/.148 line he totaled through his first 27 trips to the plate.

Mets Outright Joe Hudson

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June 27: Hudson cleared outright waivers and has been assigned to Triple-A Syracuse, tweets Anthony DiComo of MLB.com.

June 24: The Mets have designated catcher Joe Hudson for assignment, per a team announcement. His spot on the roster will go to fellow backstop Luis Torrens, who has been reinstated from the paternity list.

The journeyman Hudson was selected to the Mets’ roster earlier this month in advance of the team’s London showdown against the Phillies. He only wound up appearing in one major league game, however, and he did not take an appearance at the plate.

This brief stint was the 33-year-old Hudson’s first appearance on a major league roster since 2020. He’s tallied 18 games in the majors over the course of a 13-year pro career, picking up 33 plate appearances in that short time. Hudson is 5-for-30 with a double, two walks and six strikeouts in the majors. The former sixth-rounder is a career .229/.333/.398 hitter in six Triple-A seasons — including a .237/.392/.441 showing in 21 games with the Mets’ Syracuse affiliate this year.

The Mets will have a week to attempt to pass Hudson through outright waivers, trade him or release him.

Mets To Designate Omar Narvaez, Acquire Luis Torrens, Option Brett Baty, Christian Scott

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10:20am: The Mets are sending cash to the Yankees in the deal for Torrens, tweets Sherman. Specifically, it’ll be a $100K return for the Yankees.

9:50am: The Mets are shaking up the roster with a broad-reaching set of roster moves. Catcher Omar Narvaez is being designated for assignment, reports SNY’s Andy Martino. His spot on the roster will go to catcher Luis Torrens, who is being acquired from the Yankees and selected to the MLB roster, according to Daniel Alvarez Montes of El Extra Base. Meanwhile, third baseman Brett Baty and righty Christian Scott will be optioned to Triple-A Syracuse, ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports. They’ll be replaced on the roster by infielder Jose Iglesias, whose contract will be selected from Syracuse, and righty Dedniel Nunez, who’ll be recalled from Syracuse, Joel Sherman of the New York Post reports.

It’s a significant slate of roster moves that’ll see the Mets jettison the veteran Narvaez, option two of their top prospects to Triple-A for more seasoning, and thus clear a full runway for Mark Vientos to get an opportunity as the everyday third baseman.

Narvaez, 32, inked a two-year deal worth a guaranteed $15MM in the 2022-23 offseason — the second season of which was a player option. After a lackluster debut campaign in Queens that saw him hit just .211/.283/.297, Narvaez unsurprisingly opted into the second season of his contract. This year’s production has been even more feeble, however. In 69 trips to the plate, Narvaez has managed only a .154/.191/.185 batting line with a dismal 22.2% hard-hit rate.

Prior to his time with the Mets, Narvaez was a quality regular with the White Sox, Mariners and Brewers from 2018-22 — even making an All-Star team with Milwaukee in 2021. That five-year span saw Narvaez bat .254/.337/.397. He was inconsistent with the bat on a year-to-year basis but wound up producing at a roughly league-average level overall during that half-decade run. On top of that, the Brewers — who have a reputation for improving catcher defense — revamped Narvaez’s skill set behind the plate. He rated as one of the game’s worst defenders in 2018-19 with Chicago and Seattle but posted seven Defensive Runs Saved and was worth an even more impressive 19 runs behind the plate in Statcast’s eyes — thanks largely to massive improvements in his framing.

The injury to Francisco Alvarez appeared to create an opportunity for Narvaez to get back to that previous form, but he’s been outhit by the defensively superior Tomas Nido, who returned to the big leagues after being outrighted to Syracuse last season. Nido hasn’t been great at the plate himself — his .233/.260/.370 batting line is well below par — but has handily outperformed his fellow backstop. That’ll allow Nido to stick around in what’ll likely be the lead catching role until Alvarez’s return.

Alvarez suited up for Double-A Binghamton yesterday, kicking off a 20-day window for his minor league rehab assignment. That could make for a short-lived stay on the roster for the newly acquired Torrens. The Mets will choose between him and Nido once Alvarez is ready for activation. In 124 Triple-A plate appearances with the Yankees, the journeyman Torrens hit .279/.339/.469 with five homers and six doubles.

Once a well-regarded catching prospect with the Padres and Mariners, the now-28-year-old Torrens is a career .227/.289/.354 hitter in 807 MLB plate appearances. He has a knack for hard contact, but too many of those well-struck balls are of the grounder variety. A hefty 49.9% of Torrens’ career batted balls in the majors have been on the ground, which is clearly suboptimal for a plodding catcher who ranked in the 24th percentile of big league players in sprint speed from 2022-23, per Statcast.

In Baty and Scott, the Mets are sending two of the organization’s most touted prospects back to the minors. Baty, 24, has now seen MLB action in three straight seasons but has yet to cement himself as the everyday third baseman — or even as a viable big league bat. This year’s .225/.304/.325 batting line is 12% worse than average, by measure of wRC+, but nonetheless stands as his most productive season in the big leagues. Since making his debut late in the 2022 season, Baty carries a .214/.281/.325 line in exactly 600 plate appearances.

Baty, the No. 12 pick in the 2019 draft, has been particularly cold of late, tallying just six hits in his past 54 trips to the plate. He’s considered a superior defender to the also-24-year-old Vientos, but Vientos’ bat has been too loud for the Mets to ignore. Also long considered one of the organization’s better prospects, Vientos is hitting .295/.354/.591 with three homers in just 48 plate appearances. The former No. 59 overall pick’s performance emphatically warrants greater playing time. With Baty sent to Triple-A, he’ll receive that chance and could well establish himself as a long-term corner option for the Mets with a strong showing.

Scott, who’ll turn 25 in a couple weeks, has pitched well through his first five MLB starts. In 27 2/3 frames, he’s worked to a 3.90 ERA with a 22.3% strikeout rate and excellent 5.4% walk rate. However, the right-hander was a reliever in college whom the Mets have moved into a rotation role since turning pro. He’s thus never worked a full starter’s workload, with last year’s 87 2/3 frames standing as a career-high. The Mets have multiple off-days on the schedule in the near future, lessening the need for rotation arms. As such, they’ll send Scott to Syracuse, where they can more easily manage his innings and simultaneously afford the big league club an extra reliever.

Passan does note that Scott is expected to return to the big leagues before long. His promotion to date certainly warrants that. And if the Mets continue on their current trajectory, it wouldn’t at all be surprising to see other members of the rotation dangled in trade scenarios. For now, Luis Severino, Sean Manaea, Jose Quintana, Tylor Megill and David Peterson are lined up to make the next five starts. Severino is on a one-year deal, while Manaea has a opt-out at season’s end and Quintana is in the second season of a two-year contract.

In place of Baty, the Mets will turn to the veteran Iglesias. He’s carved out a reputation as a plus defensive shortstop with good contact skills but minimal impact when he does put bat to ball. Iglesias didn’t play in the majors last season but is a career .279/.319/.382 batter in more than 4000 plate appearances. He’s come to the plate 175 times in Syracuse this season and turned in a .273/.309/.442 slash.

Iglesias will give the Mets a true backup shortstop to Francisco Lindor, something they previously lacked, and is plenty capable of spelling Vientos at the hot corner or stepping in for Jeff McNeil at second base even if the overwhelming majority of his career has been spent at shortstop.

As for Nunez, this will mark his third stint with the Mets already this year. He was up earlier this week as the 27th man for a doubleheader and also had a four-game run earlier in the season. He’s pitched 8 1/3 innings over five appearances, holding opponents to three runs on seven hits and three walks with 13 strikeouts.

Yankees, Luis Torrens Agree To Minor League Deal

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The Yankees have agreed to a minor league contract with catcher Luis Torrens, per the team’s transaction log at MLB.com. Presumably, he’ll be in camp as a non-roster invitee this spring.

Torrens, 27, has spent time in the big leagues in each of the past five seasons, suiting up for the Mariners, Padres and Cubs in that time. He had a solid run with the ’21 Mariners, popping 15 home runs and hitting .243/.299/.431 over a career-high 378 plate appearances, but he’s generally struggled at the plate since. In 196 trips to the plate over the past two MLB seasons, Torrens carries just a .229/.286/.307 slash.

The Yankees are plenty familiar with Torrens, as they’re the organization that originally signed him as an amateur free agent out of Venezuela back in 2012. The Padres plucked Torrens out of the Yankees’ system in the 2016 Rule 5 Draft even though he’d never played above A-ball. A then-rebuilding San Diego club succeeded on keeping Torrens on its Major League roster all season, thus acquiring his long-term rights. He spent nearly all of the 2018-19 seasons in the minors, hitting quite in well in Double-A, but was traded to the Mariners alongside Ty France, Andres Munoz and Taylor Trammell in the 2020 swap that sent Austin Nola and Dan Altavilla to the Padres.

Overall, Torrens is a career .227/.289/.354 hitter in the bigs and a .246/.311/.486 hitter in Triple-A. He has at times shown the ability to be an above-average hitter relative to his position, and at his best he draws interesting ratings from Statcast in terms of his batted-ball profile. From 2020-22, Torrens averaged a hearty 91 mph off the bat and saw a sizable 45.7% of his batted balls travel at velocities of 95 mph or greater. But he’s also been too strikeout prone, sports a below-average walk rate and puts the ball on the ground far too often (49.9%) for someone who’s ranked in the 26th percentile of MLB players in terms of sprint speed (per Statcast). Defensively, Torrens has some encouraging traits and also some red flags. He’s thwarted a huge 37% of stolen base attempts against him in his professional career but also consistently delivered negative marks for framing.

It’s not a surprise to see the Yankees add some more catching depth. New York traded backup catcher Kyle Higashioka to the Padres as part of their deal to acquire Juan Soto, and they’ll face a decision on Ben Rortvedt this spring given that he’s out of minor league options. With prospect Austin Wells and veteran Jose Trevino already on the 40-man and likelier to make the roster, Rortvedt could be squeezed out, and Torrens adds some depth in the event that he’s claimed by another club. If not, he can join Rortvedt and Carlos Narvaez as catching options in Triple-A Scranton, where he could also see occasional action at first base — a position where Torrens has tallied 482 innings between the majors and minors.

Mets Claim Penn Murfee From Mariners

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The Mariners announced several roster moves this afternoon, chief among them the departure of right-hander Penn Murfee, who was claimed off waivers by the Mets.  In addition, the Mariners assigned three players outright to Triple-A: catcher Luis Torrens along with right-handers Easton McGee and Adam Oller.

Murfee underwent UCL surgery back in June and is expected to miss at least the first half of the 2024 campaign.  Prior to his injury, Murfee had a 1.29 ERA over 14 innings for Seattle in 2023, following up on a 2022 rookie season that saw the righty post a 2.99 ERA in 69 1/3 frames of work.  For his career, Murfee has an impressive 27.6% strikeout rate and an 8.5% walk rate, though that latter number rose significantly from a 6.6BB% in 2022 to an ungainly 17.2% total this past season.

Between the UCL injury and Murfee’s spike in walks, the Mariners had some legitimate reasons for seeing the reliever as expendable, and Murfee is also turning 30 in May.  On the other hand, Murfee had some very strong numbers since becoming a full-time reliever in the minors in 2021, and he hasn’t yet reached his arbitration years.  Should Murfee return in good health, the Mets might’ve landed themselves some quality relief help for some portion of the 2024 season and beyond, as Murfee is controlled through the 2028 season.

Torrens has the right to reject the outright assignment and elect free agency, since he has previously been outrighted in his career.  Oller and McGee, meanwhile, lack the requisite service time to reject their assignments but still figure to be eligible for minor league free agency in November.

Now perhaps nearing the end of his second stint with the Mariners, Torrens was signed to a minor league deal back in August.  Seattle didn’t tender Torrens a contract last winter, and he subsequently signed a minors contract with the Cubs before eventually moving to the Orioles and Nationals in other transactions over the course of a journeyman season for the 27-year-old catcher.  Brought back as some catching depth after Tom Murphy was injured, Torrens appeared in five MLB games with the M’s, to go along with the 13 Major League appearances he made with the Cubs during the 2023 campaign.

Never known for his defense, Torrens’ market will be limited since some teams go glovework-first when considering backup catcher options.  Torres did hit 15 homers as recently as 2021 when it looked like he might be carving out a place for himself in Seattle’s catching mix, but he has a .227/.289/.354 slash line over his 807 career plate appearances in the majors.

Torrens will surely catch on somewhere on a new minor league deal since teams are always in need of catching depth, yet he might need some spark at the plate to keep himself from another carousel of roster transactions.  This winter marked Torrens’ second trip through the arbitration process, and since he was projected to earn $1.3MM in 2024, it made for a pretty easy decision for the Mariners to part ways.

Like Murfee, McGee is in the midst of a lengthy rehab, as he underwent Tommy John surgery back in May.  That will keep the right-hander out until at least halfway through the 2024 season, with the timeline perhaps a little fluid depending on both health and whether or not McGee is built back up for a starters’ workload.  McGee has worked mostly as a starter throughout his pro career, though the Mariners (or a new team) could bring him back as a reliever next year as a way of getting him back into the field, and then fully stretching him back out in Spring Training 2025.

McGee (who turns 26 in December) was a Rays fourth-round selection in the 2016 draft, and his big league experience to date has consisted of exactly two games — three innings in an outing with Tampa in 2022, and a 6 2/3-inning start with Seattle in 2023.  His minor league resume consists of 485 1/3 innings and a 4.30 ERA, including a 4.78 ERA over 141 1/3 frames at the Triple-A level.  McGee isn’t a big strikeout pitcher, relying on good control and grounders to get results.

All of Oller’s MLB experience came with the Athletics (94 innings in 28 games) in 2022-23, though he has been part of five different organizations in his career.  Oller was a Rule 5 Draft selection for the Mets off the Giants’ roster in 2019, and Oller was part of the trade package New York sent to the A’s for Chris Bassitt prior to the 2022 season.  Seattle claimed Oller off waivers from the A’s in July but he never made any appearances for the M’s at the big league level.

Oller has a 7.09 ERA over his 94 innings for Oakland, and a 4.50 ERA in 526 1/3 career innings in the minors.  It seemed as though Oller had turned a corner in 2021 with an impressive years in the Mets’ farm system, but things soured in 2023 as Oller struggles both the big leagues, and at the Triple-A level with the Athletics’ and Mariners’ top affiliates.

Mariners Select Luis Torrens

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The Mariners announced that they have selected the contract of catcher Luis Torrens, with fellow backstop Brian O’Keefe placed on the paternity list in a corresponding move. There was already a vacancy on their 40-man roster.

Seattle was operating with Tom Murphy as its backup to Cal Raleigh for much of the year, but Murphy landed on the injured list in August due to a thumb issue, which bumped O’Keefe into the job. It was reported earlier today that Murphy’s injury, initially reported as a displaced tendon, was actually revealed to be a fracture once the swelling subsided. He’s been shut down from baseball activities for the next 10 days and may not be able to return to the team this year.

Now with O’Keefe leaving the club for a few days, that has bumped Torrens up to the big league club. Torrens was signed to a minor league deal in August to provide some extra depth after Murphy’s injury and O’Keefe’s promotion. He’s been wearing many jerseys this season, having signed a minor league deal with the Cubs in the offseason and cracking that club’s Opening Day roster. But he was designated for assignment about a month into the season and traded to the Orioles for cash. But he got the DFA treatment again less than a week later, eventually clearing waivers before electing free agency and signing another minors deal with the Nationals. After about six weeks without getting promoted to the big leagues, he opted out of that deal, which allowed him to sign with the M’s.

Amid all of those transactions, he hit .250/.318/.300 in 22 big league plate appearances and .244/.295/.442 in 95 trips to the plate in the minors. He’s generally considered to be a bat-first catcher, which he showed with the Mariners in 2021. He hit 15 home runs in 378 plate appearances that year but his 26.2% strikeout rate has ticked up since. It climbed to 30.1% last year and 36.4% this year, leading to his nomadic trip around the league.

He’ll now get another shot at the big leagues, which may be brief, depending on what happens when O’Keefe comes back. The latter has options and could be sent down to the minors in order to preserve depth, though Torrens is out of options. It’s also possible the club keeps three catchers for the stretch run, with expanded rosters giving them a bit more roster flexibility. If Torrens hangs onto his roster spot, he can be retained via arbitration for three more seasons.

Mariners’ Tom Murphy Shut Down From Baseball Activity Due To Thumb Fracture

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Mariners catcher Tom Murphy has been shut down from baseball activity for another ten days and is not a lock to return to the team this year, Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times reports. The 32-year-old has been out since Aug. 14, when a foul tip caught him on the thumb and resulted in what was originally diagnosed as a displaced tendon. However, general manager Justin Hollander revealed to the Mariners beat last night that subsequent imaging performed after much of the swelling had subsided revealed a small fracture as well.

Murphy’s hand has been placed in a splint and will be reevaluated on Sept. 22. That’ll be something of a make-or-break point, as Hollander added that there is “no likelihood” of Murphy returning if follow-up testing “doesn’t go well.” Seattle has been using Brian O’Keefe to back up starter Cal Raleigh. Veterans Pedro Severino and Luis Torrens are also on hand in Triple-A Tacoma, though neither is on the 40-man roster.

While some might wave off the importance of a backup catcher to a team’s postseason chances, Murphy is no ordinary backup catcher. He’s taken 159 turns at the dish this season and turned in an outstanding .290/.335/.538 slash with eight home runs and a dozen doubles. Since joining the Mariners in 2019, he’s tallied 807 plate appearances and delivered a .250/.324/.460 batting line. That’s 15% better than league-average production, by measure of wRC+. Considering the standard catcher in that time has been about 10% worse than average at the plate in that time, Murphy’s production relative to his positional peers — particularly backups — is exceptional.

That said, staying on the field has been a challenge for Murphy. After a terrific first season in Seattle (2019), a broken foot cost him the entire 2020 season. He returned in 2021 but logged a lackluster .202/.304/.350 slash in his first year back from that injury. He looked excellent to begin the 2022 season — but left shoulder surgery sidelined him for the season after he’d played in just 14 games. As Murphy mended from that shoulder issue, Raleigh stepped up and solidified himself as one of the top power-hitting catchers in the sport. The 26-year-old switch-hitter has popped 55 homers over the past two seasons, including 28 this year while hitting .237/.315/.473.

Raleigh’s presence assures that the M’s will have an offensive threat behind the dish (and a standout defender as well), but a season-ending injury for Murphy would sting nonetheless. He’s hit well enough during his Mariners tenure that he’s a legitimate option at designated hitter, particularly versus southpaws. In 473 career plate appearances against lefties, Murphy touts a .264/.352/.489 batting line.

If Murphy is indeed done for the year, backup catching duties will continue to fall to the inexperienced O’Keefe, who’s 3-for-22 in his young big league career. The 30-year-old did bat .240/.325/.511 with 22 home runs in Triple-A this season, so there’s likely more in the tank from an offensive standpoint — though he clearly can’t be expected to replace Murphy’s production.

If the Mariners choose to go with one of their veteran options in Triple-A, both Severino and Torrens would be postseason-eligible. Severino has played 41 games in Tacoma this year (plus another 18 games with the Padres’ top affiliate) but carries a tepid .237/.310/.411 slash between those two stops. Torrens went 5-for-20 in a brief big league stint with the Cubs earlier this season and is batting .244/.295/.442 in 95 Triple-A plate appearances on the year. He’s a familiar commodity for the Mariners, having spent parts of three seasons in Seattle, where he logged a .239/.297/.388 line in 609 plate appearances.

The Mariners are currently in a tightly contested American League playoff race, sitting outside of the postseason picture by the narrowest of margins at the moment. They’re trailing Texas by just a half game for the final Wild Card spot, with the Blue Jays only a half game up on the Rangers. The Mariners were leading the AL West not long ago, but they’re presently two and a half games behind the Astros in that regard. It’s still eminently plausible that the M’s win the AL West, capture a Wild Card spot or miss the playoffs entirely, so every win/loss and every injury is magnified.

From a personal standpoint, the injury has implications for Murphy as well. He’s slated to become a free agent for the first time this offseason and will be one of the top-hitting catchers in a thin class at the position. If he’s able to return to the lineup by season’s end and potentially demonstrate his health in the playoffs, that could strengthen his free-agent case a bit, but the current six-week absence he’s facing won’t do Murphy any favors in that regard.

Mariners Sign Luis Torrens To Minor League Deal

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The Mariners have signed catcher Luis Torrens to a minor league deal and assigned him to Triple-A Tacoma, per Rainiers broadcaster Mike Curto. By joining the organization prior to September 1, Torrens will be eligible to play for the Mariners in the postseason.

Torrens, 27, returns to the Mariners organization, which was his club from 2020 to 2022. But he was non-tendered at the end of last year and has been fairly nomadic since. He signed a minor league deal with the Cubs in the offseason and cracked the Opening Day roster but was designated for assignment and flipped to the Orioles a month later. He was designated for assignment again about a week after that, this time clearing waivers and electing free agency. He landed with the Nats on a minor league deal but opted out on the first of July and has been unattached until now.

Amid all of those stops on his journey, he hit .250/.318/.300 in 13 major league games for the Cubs and .258/.311/.470 in 19 games for Triple-A Rochester. He’s generally considered a bat-first catcher and showed that potential with the M’s, hitting .245/.303/.421 over 2020 and 2021. That production translates to a league average wRC+ of 100, though catchers generally hit roughly 10 points lower as a group. But his line dropped to .225/.283/.298 last year, 71 wRC+, leading to his non-tender and wayward 2023 campaign.

The Mariners have Cal Raleigh as their primary catcher but placed backup Tom Murphy on the injured list a couple of weeks ago, bumping Brian O’Keefe up from Triple-A to the majors. They have Cooper Hummel on the 40-man but he’s spent more time in the outfield than behind the plate in Triple-A this year. Pedro Severino is in the organization as experienced non-roster depth and Torrens can now join him on the depth chart. The M’s have been one of the hottest clubs in the league of late and seem to be surging towards the playoffs. If any of their catchers suffers an injury now or through the postseason, Torrens can be an option to replace them.

Luis Torrens Opts Out Of Minors Deal With Nationals

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Catcher Luis Torrens is back on the open market, as Talk Nats indicates the 27 year old has exercised a clause in the minor league deal he signed with the Nationals back in May that allows him to return to free agency if not added to the roster by July 1.

The decision leaves Torrens poised to search for what would be his fourth organization of the 2023 campaign. After signing a minors deal with the Cubs back in January, Torrens made the Opening Day roster in Chicago but appeared in just 13 games before being designated for assignment and swapped to the Orioles at the beginning of May. The Orioles then designated Torrens for assignment the following week, leading the catcher to elect free agency rather than accept an outright assignment to Triple-A.

From there, Torrens signed on with Washington on a minor league deal, and posted a decent .258/.311/.470 slash line in 74 plate appearances with the club’s Triple-A affiliate. Still, with Keibert Ruiz and Riley Adams entrenched as the club’s catching tandem at the big league level and Drew Millas acting as serviceable depth in the upper minors, there wasn’t a clear path to the big leagues for Torrens with the Nationals, prompting him to return to the open market.

Considering Torrens’s relative youth and unique developmental track as a former Rule 5 draft pick, he figures to receive interest from clubs on a minor league deal, particularly considering the importance of having ample catching depth available. That importance has been showcased at various points through this season by the woes of teams such as the Padres, Mets, Giants, and Angels behind the plate. Torrens isn’t the only intriguing depth option who could be available behind the plate, however, as Jorge Alfaro, who the Rockies designated for assignment yesterday evening, could also return to free agency in the coming days should he clear waivers and reject an outright assignment.

 

Nationals Sign Luis Torrens To Minor League Contract

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The Nationals have signed catcher Luis Torrens to a minor league deal, the club announced. Washington also confirmed its previously reported signing of designated hitter Franmil Reyes to a non-roster pact.

Torrens joins his third organization of 2023. He opened the year with the Cubs on a minor league deal and cracked the Opening Day roster. Working as a third catcher, he appeared in 13 games and hit 22 times before being designated for assignment. The Cubs traded Torrens to the Orioles for cash but he spent just a few days in Baltimore prior to being DFA for a second time. After going unclaimed on waivers, he chose minor league free agency and heads to Washington.

It’s a sensible depth add for the Nats. Washington saw veteran backstop Kevin Plawecki opt out of a minor league deal earlier in the week. Torrens will take his spot as a veteran catcher at Triple-A Rochester. He has appeared in parts of six MLB seasons. Torrens’ best year came with the Mariners in 2021, when he hit .243/.299/.431 with 15 home runs in a career-high 378 plate appearances. He stumbled to a .225/.283/.298 showing in 57 games the next year, though, leading Seattle to run him through waivers twice.

Public defensive metrics have pegged Torrens as a below-average pitch framer and blocker. His career 21.7% caught stealing rate is a few percentage points below par, though he cut down an excellent 32.1% of basestealers last season.

The Nationals have three catchers on the 40-man roster. Israel Pineda has spent the entire year on the minor league injured list with a broken finger, leaving Keibert Ruiz and Riley Adams as their only healthy backstops. Ruiz, whom the Nats signed to a $50MM extension over the winter, is entrenched as the starter. The 26-year-old Adams has played just seven times as the backup, hitting .192/.250/.346 in 29 plate appearances. Adams still has a minor league option year remaining, so Washington could eventually turn to another #2 backstop if they’d like to get him more consistent reps in Triple-A.

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