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Red Sox Sign Brayan Bello To Extension

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The Red Sox announced they have signed right-hander Brayan Bello to a six-year extension with a club option for 2030. It will give the team an extra two years of control over the 24-year-old and reportedly has a $55MM guarantee. Bello had previously been controllable through the 2028 season, but the Sox have locked in one would-be free agent year and also secured a club option for a second season that’s said to be valued at $21MM. Bello is represented by ISE Baseball.

Chris Cotillo of MassLive was among those to relay the full breakdown. Bello will get a $1MM signing bonus and salary of $1MM here in 2024, followed by successive salaries of $2.5MM, $6MM, $8.5MM, $16MM and $19MM. There’s also a $1MM buyout on the $21MM club option. There are also bonuses and escalators based on Cy Young voting and All-Star selections.

Bello, 25 in May, was signed out of the Dominican Republic for a modest bonus of $28K. But he continued to find success as he moved up the minor league ladder, climbing prospect lists in the process. Baseball America had him in the 15-20 range of their list of the top 30 Red Sox prospects in 2020 and 2021, then vaulted him up to #5 going into 2022. That was based on a 2021 season wherein Bello tossed 95 1/3 innings on the farm with a 3.87 earned run average, 32.8% strikeout rate and 7.7% walk rate while also keeping about half of balls in play on the ground.

He was added to the club’s 40-man roster late in 2021 to keep him out of that year’s Rule 5 draft. In 2022, he posted a 2.76 ERA at the Triple-A level and also got to make a brief major league debut, tossing 57 1/3 innings. His 4.71 ERA in that time wasn’t especially strong but his 55.7% ground ball rate and .404 BABIP suggested at least some of that was misfortune.

Last year got out to a shaky start, as he began the year on the injured list due to some elbow inflammation. He returned in mid-April and had a couple of shaky starts before the Sox decided to option him to the minors. An injury to Garrett Whitlock led to a quick return for Bello and it was at that point that he put together a strong stretch of work that established him as a viable big league hurler.

From his April 28 recall through the end of August, he made 21 starts for the Sox with a 3.20 ERA. His 19% strikeout rate was below average but his 6.4% walk rate and 55% ground ball rate were very strong. He seemed to run out of gas at that point, as he allowed 22 earned run in 26 September innings. Between the poor finish and the rough start, Bello ended up with a 4.24 ERA on the year overall, but the middle section of the season clearly opened some eyes.

It’s obviously a bit favorable to Bello to exclude his worst results, but he was a bit banged up at the beginning of the year and the thud at the end could be chalked up to last year being his largest innings tally thus far. The Sox clearly believe he’s capable of taking a step forward if they are willing to invest in him. He’s already shown he can keep the ball on the ground and the strikeouts might come around eventually, as his 11% swinging strike rate in his career so far is right around league average and he’s punched out 28.9% of hitters faced in the minors.

The Sox have very little starting pitching certainty going forward. Lucas Giolito was signed to a two-year deal this offseason but he now seems to be facing a significant absence due to a partially-torn UCL and a flexor tendon strain. Nick Pivetta is slated for free agency after 2024. That leaves their long-term rotation mix consisting of Bello, Kutter Crawford, Tanner Houck and Garrett Whitlock. Those are talented arms, but each of Crawford, Whitlock and Houck are still somewhat unestablished, with none of them having tossed 130 innings in a major league season yet. On BA’s current list of the top 30 prospects in the system, only two of the top 10 are pitchers, with Wikelman Gonzalez at #7 and Luis Perales at #9. The latter has yet to reach Double-A and the former has less than 50 innings pitched at that level.

Given those options, it’s understandable why the Sox wanted to build around Bello. And from the player’s perspective, his small bonus means he has yet to bank meaningful earnings, unlike a top draft pick or hyped-up international player who may already have millions stashed away. Bello’s service time clock is currently at one year and 82 days, meaning he wouldn’t have even reached arbitration until after the 2025 season.

A deal has seemed like a strong possibility for some time now. Back in January of last year, the young righty expressed his openness to such an arrangement and reporting from July suggested the club would likely broach the subject at some point. A few weeks ago, further reporting indicated that the two sides were discussing a new deal and it seems they are now making some headway.

As shown in MLBTR’s Contract Tracker, Bello is just the fifth pitcher with between one and two years of MLB service time to sign an extension in the past eight years. The two most recent examples — Cincinnati’s Hunter Greene and Atlanta’s Spencer Strider — signed six-year deals worth $53MM and $75MM, respectively. Strider’s contract is a record for this service class and was never likely to be matched by Bello. But the Boston right-hander will settle in just north of Greene’s deal, which was surely a point of focus for Bello and his camp.

Extensions usually feature climbing salaries as the years progress, roughly mirroring the arbitration process. The Sox currently have little on the books that would coincide with the most expensive years of this potential extension. Rafael Devers is under contract through 2033, but no one else is guaranteed a contract beyond 2027. Trevor Story and Masataka Yoshida are the only players guaranteed a salary beyond 2026. Adding Bello to that mix will put another salary of note on the payroll and modestly add to the team’s luxury ledger, but the extension is nonetheless an affordable means of locking in some stability while giving the team some upside in the event that Bello takes his game to a new level.

Alex Speier of the Boston Globe first reported that the two sides were in “advanced” talks on a deal. ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel broke the news that the two parties had agreed on a six-year, $55MM deal.

Lucas Giolito Diagnosed With Partial UCL Tear, Flexor Strain

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March 6: Giolito will receive a second opinion from Dr. Jeff Dugas, Cora said this morning (X link via McCaffrey). Cora conceded that surgery is indeed an option, but no final decisions will be made until the right-hander receives that second opinion.

March 5: Red Sox right-hander Lucas Giolito experienced discomfort in his right elbow after his most recent throwing session, manager Alex Cora announced Tuesday morning (X link via Jen McCaffrey of The Athletic). He’ll undergo additional testing, but ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports that the initial diagnosis is a partial tear of the right ulnar collateral ligament and a flexor strain. A determination on treatment won’t be made until Giolito receives additional opinions, but season-ending surgery is obviously now on the table.

It’s a brutal blow for the Red Sox, who signed Giolito to a two-year, $38.5MM contract that allows the right-hander to opt out following the 2024 campaign. Assuming additional opinions confirm the team’s initial diagnosis, Giolito’s decision on next year’s $19MM player option will be rendered a foregone conclusion before the season even begins. If he indeed picks up that player option, the team would be granted a $14MM club option for the 2026 season. Giolito could then convert that into a mutual option by pitching 140 innings in 2025.

Giolito, 29, signed his current deal in hopes of putting a rough couple years behind him and reentering the market in a stronger position. From 2022-23, the right-hander logged 346 innings but pitched to an ineffective 4.89 ERA between the White Sox, Angels and Guardians. A spike in Giolito’s home run rate contributed heavily to the downturn in performance, but he maintained a better-than-average 25.5% strikeout rate against a slightly higher-than-average 9% walk rate in that span.

The primary culprit in Giolito’s struggles was a spike in home run rate; metrics like xFIP (4.08) and SIERA (4.01) felt he was better over the past two seasons than his earned run average would indicate — but also still worse than he was in 2019-21 peak, when he fanned nearly 31% of his opponents against a stronger 8% walk rate.

Now, with Giolito’s entire season in doubt, any chances of rebounding could well be placed on hold for a year or more. At the very least, he’s in for a lengthy IL stint and will be absent to begin the season. That leaves Brayan Bello, Nick Pivetta, Tanner Houck, Kutter Crawford and Garrett Whitlock as the likeliest options to open the season in Boston’s rotation. Others on the 40-man roster include Brandon Walter, Chris Murphy and Cooper Criswell. The Sox have not yet added much in the way of veteran arms on non-roster deals to compete for jobs this spring, and they traded lefty Chris Sale to the Braves in the swap that brought second baseman Vaughn Grissom back to Boston.

A major injury to Giolito will undoubtedly fuel speculation regarding the top remaining arms on the market. Red Sox fans have clamored for Jordan Montgomery for much of the offseason. The team has spoken to him and shown interest at multiple points, including just prior to the start of spring training. The Boston connection for Montgomery is particularly strong, as his wife is doing her medical residency in the city. To this point, ownership and/or the front office have resisted meeting the 31-year-old’s asking price, but pressure to make some kind of move will only increase.

While fellow Boras Corporation clients Cody Bellinger, Matt Chapman and (reportedly) Blake Snell shifted from seeking long-term deals and instead pursued opt-out laden short-term deals, all indications regarding Montgomery to this point have been that he’s still seeking a long-term deal. The Red Sox will need to weigh that ask while determining whether they want to throw more resources at a team that appears poorly positioned to contend for a postseason spot.

Montgomery wouldn’t cost the Sox a draft pick or international money, as he didn’t receive a qualifying offer, and the Sox are about $35MM from the luxury tax threshold, so Montgomery wouldn’t push them to that point either. Snell did reject a QO and would thus cost the Sox their second-best draft pick and $1MM of space in next year’s bonus pool for international amateur free agency. There are, of course, alternative options who’ve also not yet signed. Michael Lorenzen and Mike Clevinger, for instance, are both still available and both performed reasonably well in the majors just last season.

Out Of Options 2024

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Every spring at MLBTR, we publish a list of players who are out of minor league options and cannot be sent to the minor leagues without first clearing outright waivers. Option status is particularly relevant as teams set their rosters prior to Opening Day. A lack of minor league options is often a key reason a certain player will make the roster over another who had a superior spring performance, and it’s a frequent factor in March trades.

The following is a list of all 40-man players throughout the league with fewer than five years of service time — players with more than five years of service can refuse an optional assignment — and no minor league options remaining. We’ve included players who have signed extensions or multi-year deals, even though they’re often less likely to be optioned.

Angels

Astros

Athletics

Blue Jays

Braves

Brewers

Cardinals

Cubs

Diamondbacks

Dodgers

Giants

Guardians

Mariners

Marlins

Mets

Nationals

Orioles

Padres

Phillies

Pirates

Rangers

Rays

Red Sox

Reds

Rockies

Royals

Tigers

Twins

White Sox

Yankees

Navigation Improvements Made To MLBTR Mobile Website

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As you might imagine, as the owner of MLB Trade Rumors, I am a heavy user of the website.  When it comes to website traffic, 80% of ours comes via mobile devices, so I often navigate the site on my phone.  In recent years, I’ve experienced difficulty in getting good results from MLBTR’s search tool, as well as in general navigation.  This year, I set out to fix that.

I started by gathering data on what MLBTR users usually search for, and I found that in the offseason it’s almost always a player name, team name, or an attempt to find free agent-related links.  Within the limited real estate of MLBTR’s mobile web navigation bar, we’ve made it easier to find those things.

Previously, the search icon was not on the home screen; it was instead buried within the “three lines” menu.  We’ve moved that to the main navigation bar in the upper left, signified by the classic magnifying glass icon:

Given the indication that people tend to search for player or team names rather than specific post headlines, we’ve limited the autocomplete to players and teams.  Type a few letters of the player’s name and you’ll see the options:

This allows you to get to the player’s chronological archive quickly and easily, where you’ll see the latest posts on him at the top.  It’s also helpful for difficult-to-spell player names.  Here’s what a player page looks like:

When it comes to navigating to the team archives, I grappled with the best way to do it.  Previously, we had a Teams link in the navigation bar on the mobile website.  In practice, I didn’t think using this link on a phone was all that convenient – especially if you were seeking a team name in the middle or end of the alphabet.  You’d hit Teams and then often do a fair bit of scrolling and then pick out your team from the list of 30.

The new way to get to the team page is to type a few letters of that team name into the search box.  You can start with the city name or the team name.  Usually about three or four letters does the trick:

That’ll bring you to our team archive, with all posts tagged with that club in chronological order:

Though the autocomplete function in the search box gets you directly to player and team archive pages, there may be cases where you have a specific post in mind.  You can still type any phrase into the box and then hit the Search button on your phone to get more algorithmic results rather than our human-curated player and team archives.

I also wanted to solve the issue of finding free agent-related links easily, while keeping some flexibility to curate a few relevant links depending on the time of year.  To accomplish this, the “flame” icon was born.  Tapping that brings you to various “hot” and timely reference links:

We’ll change some of these links at different times of year, for example putting some trade-related links up in July.

In my experience, these changes to the MLBTR mobile website navigation bar have made the site faster and easier to navigate.  If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below.

Sonny Gray Diagnosed With Hamstring Strain, Could Open Season On Injured List

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Cardinals right-hander Sonny Gray has been diagnosed with a “mild” strain of his right hamstring, president of baseball operations John Mozeliak announced Tuesday morning (X link via Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch). While Mozeliak called it “encouraging” news that Gray had dodged a more serious strain, he acknowledged that it could be “challenging” to get Gray ready for the beginning of the season and that Opening Day is now “in question” for the team’s top offseason acquisition.

Gray missed time with a pair of strains in this same hamstring as a member of the Twins back in 2022, though Mozeliak told reporters today that the team is confident this is less severe. It’s a mild enough issue that Mozeliak has already spoken out against the possibility of Gray’s injury spurring further additions on the starting staff (X link via John Denton of MLB.com).

“I definitely feel it’s not something that is required at this point,” Mozeliak said when asked about potentially bringing in some additional help for the rotation. “Obviously if something changes, we’d have to look at it differently, but we’re not thinking we’ll have to do anything now.”

The Cardinals haven’t spoken with the Boras Corporation about either Blake Snell or Jordan Montgomery recently, and a “mild” injury for Gray would’ve been an unlikely catalyst for such a major response anyhow. Mozeliak’s comments make it unlikely that remaining second-tier arms like Michael Lorenzen and Mike Clevinger will be considered, though it’s possible the Cards could look to add some modest depth either via waivers or perhaps with a minor league deal for a veteran who’s amenable to a non-guaranteed pact.

With Gray presumably on the shelf to start the season, the Opening Day nod feels likelier to fall to veteran Miles Mikolas. He’d be followed by lefty Steven Matz and righties Lance Lynn and Kyle Gibson, both of whom signed a one-year contract in free agency this past offseason. (Matz is entering the third season of a four-year, $44MM free agent deal himself.) The top in-house options to step into the fifth starter spot, if needed, are lefties Matthew Liberatore and Zack Thompson. Fellow southpaw Drew Rom made eight starts for the Cards last season but struggled to an ERA north of 8.00 in the process.

The Cardinals signed Gray to a three-year, $75MM contract this offseason and forfeited their second-highest draft pick as well as $500K of space from next year’s international bonus pool in order to do so. He’d already been tabbed the team’s Opening Day starter. Gray finished second to Gerrit Cole in American League Cy Young voting last season after giving the Twins 184 innings of 2.79 ERA ball through 32 starts. He fanned 24.3% of his opponents against a 7.3% walk rate.

The Cardinals, meanwhile, posted the fifth-worst ERA in baseball at 5.08 — a number that includes 21 starts from Montgomery (3.52 ERA) and 20 from Jack Flaherty (4.43 ERA) — both of whom were traded at the deadline. The trio of Gray, Gibson and Lynn was signed in large part to provide some stable veteran innings, though Gray obviously comes with a front-of-the-rotation ceiling as well. For now, his ability to lead the staff will be placed on hold, but if it’s a short enough absence there’ll still be time for Gray to perhaps make 30 starts for the Cards when all is said and done.

Justin Verlander To Begin Season On Injured List

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Astros ace Justin Verlander will begin the season on the injured list, manager Joe Espada announced Tuesday morning (X link via Matt Kawahara of the Houston Chronicle). There’s been no setback for Verlander after he initially reported some soreness in his right shoulder, Espada emphasized, but the 41-year-old will simply need more time to get ramped up for the season. Espada added that Verlander is “doing really well” in his progression, but the team wants to be “smart” rather than try to rush the three-time Cy Young winner back for the Opening Day nod.

Verlander has tossed multiple bullpen sessions since initially revealing he was behind schedule due to his right shoulder — including one as recent as Sunday. Espada didn’t place a firm timeline on Verlander’s return, but there’s been no indication from the team or the player himself that any of his throwing sessions have gone poorly thus far. That’s all reason for some cautious optimism and to hope for a short-term IL stint that sees Verlander miss only a couple of starts.

Fans might be tempted to draw some parallels between the Verlander news and the Kendall Graveman injury that prompted the team’s signing of Josh Hader — but a short-term absence for Verlander doesn’t seem likely to push the ’Stros to one of the high-profile arms remaining on the market. Signing Hader cost the Astros a draft pick but only a 20% tax (about $3.8MM overall), and that move was made largely in response to a season-ending injury. Verlander’s case is quite different both in terms of his recovery timetable and the associated tax ramifications.

The Astros are already well into luxury-tax territory thanks to that Hader deal and are about $1.3MM from crossing the into the second tier of penalization, per RosterResource. Signing either Blake Snell or Jordan Montgomery would require incurring relatively substantial taxes and, quite likely, crossing into the third tier of penalty and having their top pick in the draft pushed back 10 places. Houston will be taxed at that same 20% clip on the next $1.3MM added to the payroll, followed by a 32% tax on the next $20MM and a 62.5% tax on the next $20MM spent. A $25MM AAV deal, for instance, would come with $8.9725MM of taxes. A $30MM AAV deal would trigger about $12.1MM of taxes. Adding anything more than $21-22MM in terms of AAV would also be enough to trigger that hit to their top pick in the draft, and Snell in particular would cost Houston their third-round pick. Like Hader, he rejected a qualifying offer.

Verlander’s timetable to recover will be worth keeping a close eye on not just for the potential roster ramifications and any contingency plans, however. He also has a vesting $35MM player option for the 2025 season that’ll kick in if he pitches 140 innings and if a third-party doctor confirms that Verlander does not have an arm injury (at season’s end) that’d keep him from being ready for the 2025 campaign. Notably, as a condition of the trade sending Verlander from Queens to Houston, the Mets are on the hook for $17.5MM of that option’s value if it vests and if Verlander picks it up.

It’s not yet clear just how long Verlander will be sidelined, but his season-opening IL stint paves the way for lefty Framber Valdez to make his second straight Opening Day start. He’d presumably be followed by a combination of right-handers Cristian Javier, Jose Urquidy, Hunter Brown and, if he’s healthy, J.P. France.

Like Verlander, France has been slowed by some shoulder troubles this spring, although all reports out of Astros camp on his progress have been encouraging. The team has not yet indicated that Opening Day is in jeopardy for France. If he’s also sidelined, he’d join Verlander, Lance McCullers Jr. and Luis Garcia as Houston starters on the injured list. In that scenario, right-handers Ronel Blanco and Brandon Bielak would likely be ticketed for the fifth spot on the staff.

Phillies Sign Zack Wheeler To Extension

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Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski has been open with his desire to extend ace Zack Wheeler before he reaches free agency at the end of the 2024 season, and he got it done Monday, announcing that Wheeler has signed a three-year extension covering the 2025-27 seasons. The Wasserman client will reportedly be guaranteed $126MM on the contract, which does not include any options or opt-out opportunities.

As shown in MLBTR’s Contract Tracker, that $42MM annual rate is the largest on any contract extension in the sport’s history and the fourth-largest AAV on any contract ever, placing Wheeler only behind Shohei Ohtani, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander. Wheeler has now been added to MLBTR’s list of the game’s largest AAVs ever, as well.

That the contract begins in 2025 rather than overriding the final season of the right-hander’s current five-year, $118MM contract is notable for luxury tax purposes. Because the deal goes into place in 2025, Wheeler’s CBT hit will remain $23.6MM for the upcoming season before vaulting substantially in 2025. The Phillies were already into the second tier of luxury penalization, and a significant boost for Wheeler would’ve pushed them into the third tier, dropping their top pick in the draft by 10 spots.

Wheeler already has more than ten years of major league service time, and he’ll hit five years with the Phillies at the end of the 2024 season. That’ll give him 10-and-5 rights, granting Wheeler the power to veto any potential trade over the life of his new contract with the Phils.

It’s rare for any nine-figure deal in free agency to wind up being considered a bargain, but Wheeler has been worth every penny of his original $118MM contract — and then some. Currently 33 years old, Wheeler ranks fourth in Major League Baseball with 629 1/3 innings pitched dating back to 2020, the first season of the contract. His 3.06 ERA, 2.90 FIP and 3.42 SIERA rank 11th, fourth and 15th among 121 qualified big league pitchers in that time.

Since signing with the Phils, Wheeler has punched out 26.7% of his opponents against a sparkling 5.3% walk rate. Despite the homer-friendly nature of Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park, Wheeler has yielded an average of just 0.74 homers per nine frames — closely in line with his career mark of 0.83.

Wheeler’s 96 mph average fastball velocity in 2023 was down from its 97.3 mph peak (set in 2021), but he actually posted excellent swinging-strike and opponents’ chase rates, sitting at 13.% and 36.6%, respectively. Those two marks were not only his best as a Phillie but the best single-season marks he’s posted in either category in his entire career to date. When opponents did manage to make contact against Wheeler, it was typically of the feeble variety. Hitters averaged a dismal 86.9 mph exit velocity against Wheeler this past season, placing the right-hander in the 88th percentile of big league pitchers.

Detractors can point to Wheeler’s 3.61 ERA in 2023 as a sign of decline, but as already laid out, Wheeler missed bats at career-best levels in 2023, maintained plus velocity and kept his walk rate among the league’s best. The primary skill change in Wheeler’s approach was a decline in grounders (41.2% — down from 49.6% in his first three years with Philly). That led to a few more home runs but correlated with the uptick in missed bats. Given that the Phillies annually trot out a poor defensive alignment behind their pitchers, the increase in missed bats is a better portent of long-term success than a reliance on keeping balls on the ground anyhow. Wheeler’s 71.3% strand rate — an outlier mark when looking at his year-to-year levels — figures to regress closer to the 74.3% mark he carried into the 2023 season. Assuming that indeed plays out, so long as Wheeler maintains something close to his current K-BB%, there’s a good chance his ERA will improve accordingly.

The dominance for Wheeler stretches far beyond his regular season work, however. He’s been an integral part of the Phillies’ deep playoff over the past two seasons — his first two tastes of postseason action to this point in his career. Wheeler has made 11 appearances (10 starts, one relief) and piled up 63 1/3 innings of 2.42 ERA ball with a 28.6% strikeout rate against a 4.2% walk rate while pitching in the postseason.

With Wheeler now entrenched in Philadelphia through the 2027 season and Aaron Nola also re-signed for another seven seasons, the Philadelphia rotation is set for the foreseeable future. That pair will continue to lead the way, with Ranger Suarez, Cristopher Sanchez and Taijuan Walker all controlled/signed for multiple additional seasons. Suarez is arbitration-eligible through the 2026 season, while Walker is signed through 2027 and Sanchez is controllable all the way through 2028. Strong as that group may be, the Phillies continue to be linked to a possible short-term deal with reigning NL Cy Young winner Blake Snell — though signing Snell would catapult the team into the top tier of luxury penalization, which would push the team’s top draft choice back ten spots and likely mean more than $35MM in taxes on top of any salary.

Barring a one final, surprising splash on the free agent or trade market, the Phillies have other depth options in house. Former Tigers righty Spencer Turnbull and former Braves/Rangers southpaw Kolby Allard both signed big league deals over the winter. The Phils also have a stable of touted pitching prospects including Andrew Painter (currently rehabbing from Tommy John surgery), Mick Abel and Griff McGarry all working their way toward MLB debuts, giving them some quality young options. Painter isn’t likely to pitch at all in 2024 while recovering from last summer’s surgery, but he was in the mix to be the team’s fifth starter last year in spring training despite being just 19 years old during camp. He’ll be firmly in the 2025 rotation mix, though the team will presumably have him on some form of innings limit.

The Wheeler extension will take the Phillies north of $200MM in payroll commitments for the 2025 season before the first pitch of the 2024 campaign is even thrown, and with him now signed through the 2027 season, the Phils have a quartet of nine-figure deals they’ll be paying out at least four years down the road (Wheeler, Nola, Trea Turner, Bryce Harper). From a CBT standpoint, the Wheeler deal all but ensures that the Phillies will again be luxury tax payors next season at the very least. RosterResource projects Philadelphia for a hefty $229MM of luxury obligations next season, and that doesn’t even include next offseason’s dealings or any of the team’s arbitration-eligible players.

Wheeler would have been one of the top arms available in a deep class of free agent pitchers next winter. The 2024-25 offseason will still feature Corbin Burnes, Max Fried, Shane Bieber, Walker Buehler, Scherzer and Verlander — pending further extensions among the group. Gerrit Cole also has an opt-out in his contract next winter, though the Yankees can (and very likely will, barring any sort of major injury) override that opt-out by picking up a club option for a tenth season at $36MM.

Wheeler would’ve landed behind younger aces like Burnes and Fried in terms of overall earning power, but as this extension shows, his earning power on a strict AAV basis very well could have been the highest of the bunch. Instead, he’ll anchor a deep Phillies rotation that’ll take aim at a third consecutive NLCS appearance in 2024 and look to secure the World Series title they fell just short of back in 2022.

ESPN’s Buster Olney first reported that the two parties had agreed to a multi-year extension. Matt Gelb of The Athletic first reported the terms of the contract.

Josh Donaldson Announces Retirement

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Third baseman Josh Donaldson announced his retirement today on The Mayor’s Office (YouTube link). Back in November, he expressed an openness to playing one more year under the right circumstances, but it now seems the Bringer of Rain has decided it’s time to hang up his spikes.

Donaldson, now 38, took a winding path to the major leagues and was a late bloomer, but he nonetheless reached incredible heights as a big leaguer once everything aligned.

While playing third base at Auburn University, he began to learn how to catch. The Cubs then selected him as a catcher with the 48th overall pick in the 2007 draft. In July of 2008, he was traded to the Athletics, one of four players going to Oakland in exchange for Rich Harden and Chad Gaudin.

As he climbed the minor league ladder with his new club, his bat was considered ahead of his glove, an understandable situation given that he was relatively new to catching. He made his major league debut in 2010 but hit just .156/.206/.281 in his first 34 plate appearances.

He was stuck in the minors in 2011 and then spent 2012 being shuttled between the majors and the minors, gradually spending more time at third base over that stretch. His breakout season finally came in 2013, when Donaldson was 27 years old. Now done with catching for good, he got into 158 games for the A’s that year as their everyday third baseman. He hit 24 home runs and drew a walk in 11.4% of his plate appearances, only striking out at a 16.5% rate. His .301/.384/.499 batting line translated to a wRC+ of 147 and he got strong grades for his defense at the hot corner, leading to a tally of 7.3 wins above replacement from FanGraphs and 7.2 from Baseball Reference. He finished fourth in American League MVP voting.

Donaldson followed that up with a similarly excellent season in 2014 and the A’s made the postseason for a third straight year, but made a quick playoff exit all three times. The club decided to undergo a huge roster overhaul that winter, a frequent occurrence for the club and its persistent financial concerns. Going into 2015, the club traded away guys like Brandon Moss, Jeff Samardzija and also flipped Donaldson to the Blue Jays for a four-player package.

His first season in Toronto would eventually prove to be the best of his career. He launched 41 home runs and slashed .297/.371/.568 for a wRC+ of 154. The Jays won the A.L. East that year and Donaldson launched another three home runs in that year’s playoffs as the Jays advanced as far as the ALCS. He was graded as worth 8.7 fWAR and was voted as that year’s A.L. MVP, just ahead of Mike Trout.

He would go onto to have another excellent season for the Jays in 2016, hitting 37 home runs that year as they advanced to the ALCS yet again. He scored the winning run in the ALDS by dashing home from second on a fielder’s choice to secure an extra-inning victory over the Rangers.

But in 2017, injuries started to crop up, which would go on to be a key issue in the rest of his career. He was still excellent that season, slashing .270/.385/.559 while hitting 33 home runs, but was limited to 113 contests due to a calf strain. He and the Jays agreed to a $23MM salary for 2018, his final year of arbitration control. Since the Jays had fallen to fourth place the year prior, there were some trade rumors around Donaldson that winter but he ultimately stayed put.

He spent much of that year on the injured list due to shoulder and calf issues. With the Jays out of contention at the August waiver deadline, he was flipped to Cleveland for Julian Merryweather. Donaldson only played 16 games for Cleveland after that deal as he continued battling his injuries.

He finally reached free agency that winter, but with a limited amount of momentum. Thanks to his late-bloomer trajectory, he was going into his age-33 season and coming off an injury-marred campaign. Alex Anthopoulos, who acquired Donaldson when he was making decisions for the Blue Jays, had become the general manager in Atlanta prior to the 2018 campaign. He gave Donaldson a one-year “prove-it” deal worth $23MM.

Josh DonaldsonDonaldson bounced back tremendously with Atlanta, getting into 155 games, walking in 15.2% of his plate appearances and hitting .259/.379/.521 for a 131 wRC+. He then rejected a qualifying offer from Atlanta and then signed a four-year, $92MM deal with the Twins. Issues with his right calf cropped up again in 2020, as he only played 28 games during that shortened season, but was able to get into 135 contests the year after and launch 26 home runs in the process.

With two years still left on that deal, the Twins flipped him to the Yankees alongside Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Ben Rortvedt, with Gio Urshela and Gary Sánchez going the other way. Donaldson was healthy enough to get into 132 games in 2022 but his production tailed off. He only hit 15 homers and struck out at a 27.1% clip, leading to a line of .222/.308/.374. He spent much of 2023 on the injured list and was released at the end of August, joining the Brewers for the stretch run before returning to free agency this winter.

It wasn’t a storybook ending but Donaldson nonetheless managed to weave together quite a career. Despite not truly breaking out until the age of 27, he still managed to get into 1,384 games and rack up 1,310 hits. That latter figure includes 287 doubles, 12 triples and 279 home runs. He had matching tallies of 816 runs scored and runs batted in, stealing 40 bases in the process. He received an MVP award, three All-Star selections and two Silver Sluggers. His fiery personality which drove him to succeed also rankled some people around the game, as he often quarrelled with umpires, coaches and fellow players, but that combination of his talent and prickly character will likely lead him to being one of the more memorable players of his era. We at MLBTR salute him on his many accomplishments and wish him the best in whatever comes next.

Sign Up For The Free MLBTR Newsletter

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Giants Sign Matt Chapman

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MARCH 3: The Giants officially announced Chapman’s signing and the terms, with the additional detail that the contract includes a mutual option covering the 2027 season.

Chapman will receive a $2MM signing bonus and a $16MM salary in 2024, plus a $2MM buyout on the $17MM player option for 2025.  If the third baseman remains in his contract through the 2025 season, he’ll have an $18MM player option for 2026 with a $3MM buyout attached.  Should he remain in his contract through those three seasons, Chapman and the Giants will share a $20MM mutual option for the 2027 season, with a $1MM buyout if either party declines their side of the option.

MARCH 1: Matt Chapman is headed back to the Bay Area. The four-time Gold Glove winner has reportedly agreed to terms with the Giants on a three-year, $54MM guarantee. The Boras Corporation client can opt out after each of the next two seasons.

He’ll make $20MM this season, followed by successive $18MM and $16MM player options. The contract has an $18MM average annual value for competitive balance tax purposes. San Francisco will need to make a 40-man roster move once the deal is finalized.

Chapman, 31 next month, reunites with Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi and manager Bob Melvin. He’s familiar with both from his early days with the A’s. Chapman was a first-round pick by Oakland in 2014 and debuted three years later. He stepped in as one of the sport’s best all-around players.

The Cal State Fullerton product put up a .255/.336/.503 batting line through his first three and a half seasons. He paired that with the best third base defense in the American League. Chapman finished among the top 10 in AL MVP balloting in 2018 and ’19, securing Gold Glove honors in both years.

Chapman’s 2020 season was cut short by a labrum tear in his right hip. He underwent surgery that September, shutting him down for the year. While it wasn’t clear at the time, that injury has proven to be something of a turning point in his career. His offensive production hasn’t been the same since he made his return.

The right-handed hitter stumbled to a career-worst .210/.314/.403 line in 2021. The A’s dealt him to the Blue Jays the following offseason. Chapman’s offensive production ticked up slightly in Toronto, but he hasn’t found his 2018-19 form outside of a scorching April last year.

After a .229/.324/.433 showing in 2022, Chapman entered his platform season looking to reestablish himself as a middle-of-the-order force. He began the year as the hottest hitter on the planet. Chapman mashed at a .384/.465/.687 clip through the end of April. While he’d cut his strikeout rate to a 22.8% mark in the season’s first month, his whiffs spiked as the summer approached. A dismal May kicked off what proved to be a disappointing finish to his Jays tenure.

Over his final 467 plate appearances, Chapman hit .205/.298/.361 with a strikeout rate near 30%. By the second half, he was often hitting in the bottom third of the lineup. The Jays briefly sent him to the injured list in late August for a sprain of the middle finger on his right hand. It’s possible that had an adverse effect on his offense, but the biggest concern is that he didn’t sustain the strides in contact rate he had seemed to make early on.

That presented a tough evaluation for teams as he hit the open market for the first time. Even if he’s no longer an MVP-caliber player, Chapman is still an above-average regular. He has drawn walks in more than 10% of his plate appearances in each of the last three seasons. He connected on 27 homers in both 2021 and ’22. That dipped to 17 longballs a year ago, yet that’s not a reflection of a drop in his contact quality.

Chapman actually hit the ball harder than ever last season, averaging 93.5 MPH in exit velocity. He made hard contact (defined as 95+ MPH) on 56.4% of batted balls. That was the highest rate for any qualified hitter in the majors, narrowly ahead of impact bats like former teammate Matt Olson, Juan Soto, Ronald Acuña Jr., Rafael Devers and Shohei Ohtani.

He remains an asset on the other side of the ball. Chapman’s defensive grades aren’t quite as eye-popping as they were early in his career, but he’s still a plus at third base. Both Statcast and Defensive Runs Saved have rated him as an above-average defender in every season of his career. That includes an estimated three runs better than par by Statcast and an excellent +12 mark from DRS over more than 1200 innings last season.

Infield defense was an issue for the Giants, particularly on the left side. San Francisco led longtime shortstop Brandon Crawford walk in free agency. They’re set to turn that position to 22-year-old Marco Luciano. Incumbent third baseman J.D. Davis drew mixed reviews from defensive metrics last season. There’s no question that Chapman will be an upgrade on that side of the ball. While there had been some speculation the Giants could consider kicking Chapman up the defensive spectrum to shortstop, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle reports that he’ll stick at the hot corner at Oracle Park.

San Francisco has targeted Chapman throughout the offseason, having been tied to him as early as the middle of November. They were content to wait out the market as he was one of a handful of top free agents who lingered well into Spring Training.

A $54MM guarantee certainly isn’t what his camp had in mind at the beginning of the offseason. Chapman had reportedly declined a 10-year, $150MM extension offer from the A’s back in 2019. He also reportedly passed on an offer from Toronto that would’ve topped $100MM at some point before he got to free agency. Whatever asking price he had set at the beginning of the winter wasn’t met. As with fellow Boras Corporation client Cody Bellinger, Chapman turned to a short-term deal that gives him the chance to get back to the market next offseason instead.

He was one of seven players to receive and decline a qualifying offer in November. The QO would have been valued at $20.325MM, a hair above what he now stands to make next season. This contract structure is certainly preferable to taking the qualifying offer — there’s added security built in via the player options in case he struggles or suffers an injury — but the end result could be similar. The likeliest outcome is that he collects a $20MM salary in 2024 and retests the market next winter.

It remains to be seen if it would treat him more kindly the next time around. He’d be entering his age-32 season with a profile that is heavily dependent on defense. Chapman won’t be eligible for another qualifying offer — players can’t receive that more than once in their careers, per the CBA — but he’s unlikely to be the clear top free agent at the position, as he was this winter. Alex Bregman headlines next year’s third base class, which will also include Davis.

The Giants surrender their second-highest pick in the upcoming draft (#51 overall) and $500K in international signing bonus space to add a player who had declined the QO. The Jays were one of eight teams that paid the luxury tax last season, so their compensation is minimal. They’ll get an extra draft choice after the fourth round, roughly 136th overall.

It’s a bigger penalty for the Giants than it is compensation for Toronto. It’s one the Giants are nevertheless happy to pay to get Chapman at a price well below what they could have expected coming into the offseason. (MLBTR predicted he’d receive six-year, $150MM pact at the start of the winter.) The contract pushes their 2024 player payroll to roughly $183MM, as calculated by RosterResource. They’re around $231MM in luxury tax obligations, keeping them $6MM shy of next year’s threshold.

If they want to avoid the CBT, that wouldn’t leave a ton of room for in-season acquisitions. It’s possible they’re comfortable exceeding the threshold for the first time since 2017. San Francisco has been tied to Blake Snell (and to a much lesser extent) Jordan Montgomery. They’re still in clear need of rotation help, particularly after expected #5 starter Tristan Beck underwent surgery on Friday to address an aneurysm.

Forfeiting a draft choice to sign Chapman to a contract that allows him to opt out after one season is the clearest win-now move of San Francisco’s offseason. They’ve also brought in Jung Hoo Lee to take center field, Jorge Soler at designated hitter, and signed Jordan Hicks to a four-year pact to transition to the rotation. Revamping the lineup to that extent without adding more certainty behind Logan Webb, Hicks, and rookie Kyle Harrison seems unlikely.

Davis is set for a $6.9MM salary in his final season of arbitration and just lost his spot in the starting lineup. Soler and Wilmer Flores are ahead of him as right-handed hitters who’ll factor in at DH at first base, respectively. Flipping Davis to a team that needs third base help before Opening Day could clear spending room for the Giants and seems the best outcome for him personally. There’s very likely more to come at Oracle Park in the next three weeks.

Jon Heyman of the New York Post first reported the agreement, opt-outs, and salary breakdown. Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

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