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Michael Conforto Undergoes Season-Ending Shoulder Surgery

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Michael Conforto underwent surgery on his right shoulder earlier this week, the New York Post’s Jon Heyman reports (via Twitter).  Conforto will be sidelined for the entire 2022 season but is expected to be ready for Spring Training.

Agent Scott Boras revealed his client’s shoulder problems in late March, saying that Conforto suffered a strain while training in January, but he had since resumed hitting.  Just yesterday, Mike Puma of the New York Post reported that Conforto still hasn’t been able to throw, and was initially presented with the option of surgery earlier this offseason, but was choosing to hold off on going under the knife.  In a follow-up tweet from Heyman, Conforto was deciding between either getting the “cleanup” procedure done now, or waiting until after the season.

Undergoing the surgery now makes sense given Conforto’s still-unsigned status.  If he did land a one-year deal with a team for a prorated salary, it is quite possible the shoulder issues would prevent from Conforto from performing at an acceptable level.  Coming off a middling 2021 season, a down 2022 season, and then a shoulder surgery in the offseason would essentially crater Conforto’s market in the 2022-23 free agent sweepstakes, whereas now, he can get the surgery and then head into next winter with a slightly cleaner slate.

Sitting out 2022 also removes the qualifying offer as a factor in Conforto’s market.  He turned down the Mets’ one-year, $18.4MM QO last fall, and thus any team signing Conforto would have to had to give up at least one draft pick as compensation.  Since Conforto now won’t be signing until after the 2022 draft anyway, the attached compensation no longer applies, and players are only eligible to be tagged with the QO once in their careers. (Though the qualifying offer system might be abandoned anyway, pending on international draft negotiations between the league and the MLBPA later this summer.)

Passing on the QO now seems like an error in hindsight for Conforto, and the decision even carried its share of controversy prior to his injury.  Conforto hit an unspectacular .232/.344/.384 with 14 home runs over 479 PA with New York last season, leading to speculation that he would either take the qualifying offer, or sign a one-year pillow contract of a similar value.  (This was MLBTR’s theory, predicting a one-year, $20MM pact for Conforto on the open market.)  With a one-season payday secured, Conforto would then look to bounce back and deliver a season similar to his 2015-20 prime years, thus setting him up for a bigger multi-year contract next winter.

The Marlins, Blue Jays, Yankees, Rockies, Diamondbacks, and Padres all had some level of interest in Conforto this past winter, and up to a dozen teams at least checked in on his services closer to the start of the free agent period.  Again, it is easy to say in hindsight that Conforto “should have” signed somewhere earlier in the offseason, though we don’t know what types of actual offers (if any) were on the table prior to the lockout.

Given Conforto’s production prior to 2021, it seems likely that he should be able to land a one-year, guaranteed big league deal in the offseason if he recovers well from his surgery, even if that salary is well south of $18.4MM.  Whether he’ll finally land that big multi-year pact remains to be seen, as Conforto will need to post some big numbers to settle any lingering doubts about his health, or his age (he’ll be 31 on Opening Day 2024).  In more immediate business, however, Conforto will simply have to focus on rehabbing his shoulder and getting himself fully back up to par.

Braves, Cubs Swap Sean Newcomb, Jesse Chavez

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The Cubs have acquired reliever Sean Newcomb from the Braves for right-hander Jesse Chavez and cash, according to announcements from both teams. Both clubs’ 40-man rosters are now full.

It’s a new landing spot for Newcomb, who has spent the past six seasons in Atlanta. A first-round pick of the Angels in 2014, the left-hander quickly developed into one of the sport’s top pitching prospects. After the 2015 season, the Angels flipped him alongside Chris Ellis to Atlanta for five years of Andrelton Simmons.

Newcomb was a starting pitching prospect at the time, with evaluators holding out hope that his high-octane arsenal could make him a top-of-the-rotation caliber hurler. He remained in that role for his first couple major league seasons, starting 49 of his 50 appearances between 2017-18. Newcomb showed some promise, posting a 4.06 ERA with a solid 23.3% strikeout rate. As he had throughout his time in the minor leagues, though, he struggled to throw strikes. After walking 12% of batters faced through his first couple seasons, the Braves transitioned him to the ’pen in 2019.

During his first season of relief, Newcomb pitched to a 3.16 ERA in 68 1/3 frames over 55 outings. Curiously, his strikeout and swinging strike numbers took a step back relative to where they’d been while he was starting, but he induced grounders on nearly half of batted balls against him and posted a personal-low 9.9% walk rate.

It looked as if Newcomb might thrive in shorter stints, but the Braves made an ill-fated effort to return him to the rotation in 2020. He was bombed in four starts and spent most of the season at the alternate training site. He returned to the big league bullpen last season but dealt with his worst control woes yet. In 32 outings, Newcomb walked a ghastly 18% of opponents while seeing his ground-ball rate tumble back to 39%. His 28.7% strikeout percentage was a career-high, but the free passes allowed hitters to rack up a .383 on-base percentage.

Newcomb has gotten off to another rough start this season. He’s worked five innings of four-run ball, allowing seven hits with four walks and strikeouts apiece. Because he’s out of minor league option years, the Braves had to either continue running him out against MLB hitters or designate him for assignment. They chose the latter course of action yesterday, likely knowing someone else would take a chance on him.

That team will be the Cubs, who add a live-armed southpaw to their bullpen. Newcomb has averaged north of 95 MPH on his heater in each of the past two seasons. He generated plus swinging strike rates on both his cutter-slider and curveball last year. For a team that entered the night with Daniel Norris as its only lefty reliever, it’s understandable why Chicago will take a shot to see if they can iron out Newcomb’s control woes.

He’s making a modest $900K this season (a little more than $800K of which remains owed) and can be controlled via arbitration through 2025. There’s a chance Newcomb sticks around on the North Side for the next few seasons, but the Cubs — like the Braves before them — will have to keep him on the active roster or designate him for assignment themselves.

The Braves, meanwhile, will replace Newcomb in the bullpen with one of his old teammates. Chavez, a 15-year MLB veteran, spent the 2021 season with Atlanta after being selected onto the big league roster in June. He pitched to a sterling 2.14 ERA in 33 2/3 innings, striking out a career-high 27.1% of batters faced against a fine 8.3% walk rate. Chavez rather remarkably didn’t allow a single home run in his 30 appearances.

That impressive strikeout total came in spite of a 91 MPH fastball and a subpar 7.1% swinging strike rate, though. Between Chavez’s lack of velocity, swing-and-miss stuff and understandable skepticism about his ability to repeat his 2021 home run suppression, teams didn’t ardently pursue him in free agency. He signed a non-roster deal with Chicago, although he wound up breaking camp nonetheless.

Chavez made three appearances as a Cub, tossing 5 2/3 frames of three-run ball. He has punched out three batters with a pair of walks and a homer allowed. He’ll return to Atlanta and again serve as a multi-inning bullpen option for skipper Brian Snitker.

Rockies Sign Kyle Freeland To Extension

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The Rockies have hammered out another extension, announcing agreement with Kyle Freeland on a five-year contract. The deal reportedly guarantees the MSM Sports Management client $64.5MM and comes with a vesting player option for the 2027 campaign. If Freeland tosses 170 innings in 2026, he’ll trigger a $17MM player option for a sixth season.

Freeland had been controllable via arbitration through 2023, so the deal buys out at least three free agent seasons. The southpaw will earn $7MM this year, $10.5MM in 2023, $15MM in 2024, then $16MM in both 2025 and ’26. Were Freeland to finish in the top five in Cy Young award balloting in either of the next two years, he’d earn the right to opt out after the 2024 campaign.

The deal evidently came together quickly, as Freeland told Nick Groke of the Athletic just last week there’d been “no movement” on an extension and that the club hadn’t put forth an offer. Within a few days, he and the team agreed to a long-term deal that figures to keep him around for at least an additional three seasons. It’s a particularly nice development for Freeland, a Denver native and career-long member of the organization.

Colorado selected Freeland with the eighth overall pick of the 2014 draft out of the University of Evansville. He was regarded at the time as a possible mid-rotation starter who could move through the minors quickly based on his polished strike-throwing ability. That projection more or less proved to be the case, as he was in the majors two and a half years later after performing well in the minors.

Freeland stepped immediately into the Colorado rotation, starting 28 of his 33 appearances as a rookie. He posted a 4.10 ERA in 156 innings that season, overcoming a mediocre 15.6% strikeout rate with an excellent 53.9% ground-ball percentage. The southpaw followed that up with a stellar sophomore campaign that has been the best season of his career to date. He made 33 starts and tossed 202 1/3 innings in 2017, posting a 2.85 ERA despite starting 15 games at the most hitter-friendly ballpark in the league. That mark still stands as the lowest single-season ERA for a qualified starter in Rockies’ history, offering plenty of evidence that Freeland could thrive despite the environmental challenges inherent for a Colorado pitcher.

Four years later, the Rox are presumably still placing a lot of emphasis on that showing. Freeland struggled mightily in 2019, allowing a 6.73 ERA. Colorado even optioned him to Triple-A Albuquerque for a month and a half that year. Over the past two seasons, he’s been solid but unspectacular, posting a matching 4.33 ERA in both 2020 and 2021.

Freeland’s general profile — few strikeouts or whiffs offset by plenty of grounders and plus control — hasn’t much changed throughout his time in the majors. Yet since his excellent 2018 showing, he owns a 5.32 ERA in 304 2/3 innings (including two starts thus far in 2022). Colorado surely considers the 2019 season an outlier, but even going back to the start of 2020, Freeland’s 200 1/3 innings of 4.58 ERA/4.65 FIP ball are more fine than exceptional.

The Rockies clearly believe the 28-year-old (29 next month) is capable of a return to something more closely approximating his early-career form. It’s the continuation of a pattern for general manager Bill Schmidt and his staff, who have worked diligently to keep many of the team’s veterans around for the long haul. Within the past eight months, Colorado has worked out multi-year extensions with Antonio Senzatela, Elias Díaz, C.J. Cron, Ryan McMahon and now Freeland. Those players join marquee free agent pickup Kris Bryant and staff ace Germán Márquez as the long-term core in Denver.

Márquez, Senzatela and Freeland are each under club control through at least 2024, leading a rotation the Rox envision as the backbone of the club. Senzatela’s October extension — a five-year, $50.5MM guarantee that contains a 2027 club option — is the most recent deal for a starter with between four and five years of service time. Freeland’s contract tops that of his teammate even though he’s nearly two years older and has been less effective over the past couple seasons. Freeland and Senzatela are similar pitchers stylistically, but the former has been a bit more home run prone and had an ERA about two tenths of a run higher (4.33 for Freeland, 4.11 for Senzatela) between 2020-21.

That’s not to say Senzatela fared poorly. His deal was generally regarded as a player-friendly pact at the time it was signed. Setting aside Jacob deGrom, the previous pitcher to sign an extension in that bucket was Cubs righty Kyle Hendricks. He signed a four-year, $55.5MM pact in March 2019. Like Freeland, Hendricks was headed into his age-29 season and thrived on his control and ground-ball propensity. The Cubs’ starter had posted five straight sub-4.00 ERA campaigns to open his big league career, though, making him a safer long-term bet than either of Colorado’s pitchers.

The Hendricks comparison makes the Rockies’ decision to commit $64.5MM to Freeland puzzling, although it’s not especially surprising. Colorado brass has shown repeatedly they value their own players more than many outside the organization might. While it has been some time since Freeland’s excellent first two seasons, he has shown himself capable of thriving despite the unique challenges the Rockies face at Coors Field. That’s no doubt of appeal to team brass, and the extension comes with the ancillary benefit of avoiding the hassle of an arbitration hearing.

Prior to today’s agreement, the team and player were set for a hearing next month to determine his 2022 salary. Freeland had filed at $7.8MM; the Rockies had countered at $6.425MM. They’ll settle a bit shy of the midpoint for this season and price in a raise for what would’ve been his final year of arbitration-eligibility before paying $15-16MM annually for what would’ve been his three free agent seasons.

The Rockies’ 2022 payroll isn’t much affected by today’s extension, but they’ll add another notable salary to the books for next season and beyond. Colorado’s 2023 player tab now checks in around $110MM, per Jason Martinez of Roster Resource, while Freeland ($15MM), Bryant ($28MM), McMahon ($12MM) and Senzatela ($12MM) all have notable 2024 salaries. Márquez has a $16MM club option that year. The Rockies have never eclipsed $150MM in Opening Day payroll, but they might be headed towards that mark in the next couple seasons. They’ll hope to build around the core in which they’ve invested in an ever-competitive NL West.

Jeff Passan of ESPN first reported the Rockies and Freeland had agreed to a five-year, $64.5MM deal, as well as the sixth-year option. Jon Heyman of the New York Post reported it was a $17MM vesting option, which Danielle Allentuck of the Colorado Springs Gazette reported Freeland needs 170 innings pitched in 2026 to trigger. Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic reported Freeland could opt out after 2024 with a top-five Cy Young finish in either of the next two seasons. Thomas Harding of MLB.com was first with the full breakdown of terms.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Braves Designate Sean Newcomb For Assignment, Option Huascar Ynoa

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The Braves have designated left-hander Sean Newcomb for assignment, per a club announcement. They’ve also optioned righty Huascar Ynoa to Triple-A Gwinnett and recalled right-hander Touki Toussaint and lefty Dylan Lee in place of Newcomb and Ynoa. Additionally, the Braves announced that Ronald Acuna Jr. is headed out on a minor league rehab assignment.

Newcomb’s DFA comes on the heels of a three-year downturn that have seen the starter-turned-setup-man’s effectiveness dwindle considerably. The No. 15 overall pick by the Angels back in 2014, Newcomb headlined the Braves’ return in the trade that sent Andrelton Simmons to Anaheim. After a solid rookie showing in 2017, he looked to have broken out in 2018 when he made 30 starts and pitched to a 3.90 ERA over the life of 164 innings. Newcomb’s 23% strikeout rate was solid, but his 11.6% walk rate marked a continuation of ongoing command troubles that had plagued him dating back to his minor league days.

Despite a decent start to the 2019 season, Newcomb was optioned to Gwinnett in mid-April and returned as a reliever in early May. The new role seemed to suit him just fine, as he pitched to a 2.89 ERA with improved strikeout and walk rates (25.5% and 8.9%, respectively) in 56 innings the rest of the way. Averaging just shy of 95 mph on his heater and putting the ball on the ground on more than half of the batted balls against him, Newcomb looked the part of a quality late-inning option.

That hasn’t proven to be the case, however. Dating back to 2020, Newcomb has a 6.71 ERA in 51 big league innings and has spent some time shuttling between Gwinnett and the big leagues. He’s walked more than 15% of his opponents since Opening Day 2020, plunked another five batters and thrown seven wild pitches. Newcomb is out of minor league options, and with him yielding four runs on seven hits and four walks through just five innings (26 batters faced) to begin the season, the Braves made the choice to cut bait.

Newcomb is earning $900K this season after avoiding arbitration this past offseason. He’s still owed about $842K of that sum for the remainder of the season, and any team that claims him or acquires him via trade would be on the hook for the remainder of that sum. If a new team is able to help Newcomb right the ship, however, he’d be controllable through the 2024 season via arbitration. Given that his salary is only $200K north of the new league minimum, it’s certainly possible that another club will look to help get the once-successful southpaw back on track. The Braves will have a week to trade Newcomb, attempt to pass him through waivers or release him. If he’s released, the new signing team would only owe him the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the big league roster.

As for Ynoa, he’ll remain on the 40-man roster and hope to work toward another big league shot after an awful start to the season. The former Twins prospect, acquired in the deal that briefly sent Jaime Garcia to Minnesota, had a short breakout last year when he pitched to a 3.09 ERA over an eight-start stretch that spanned 43 2/3 frames. Ynoa, however, suffered a broken hand when he punched the bench following a poor start and spent two months on the injured list. When he returned, he posted a 5.05 ERA in 46 1/3 frames, and those struggles have not only continued but escalated in 2022. So far this year, he’s made two starts, both shorter than four innings, and yielded five earned runs in each.

The news on Acuna is a welcome sight for Braves fans, as it signifies that — barring any setbacks in his rehab from last year’s ACL tear — he’ll be back with the big league club within a month’s time. Minor league rehab windows are capped at 30 days, so Acuna will be back by mid-May, health-permitting.

Jake Arrieta Announces Retirement

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A former Cy Young winner is stepping away from the game. In an appearance on Barstool’s Pardon My Take podcast, Jake Arrieta announced he is set to retire (interview around 56:00 mark). “I haven’t signed the papers, man, but I’m done,” Arrieta said.”It’s time for me to step away from the game. At some point, the uniform goes to somebody else. It’s just my time, really. … Yeah, man, I’m done.”

Arrieta, now 36 years old, retires after a 12-season MLB career. A fifth-round pick of the Orioles out of TCU in 2007, he made it to the majors midway through the 2010 campaign. He spent three-plus seasons in Baltimore, never really clicking despite getting a few opportunities to crack the starting rotation. Arrieta made 69 appearances in black and orange, pitching to a cumulative 5.46 ERA/4.72 FIP. His strikeout and walk numbers improved later in his time with the O’s, but the results never lined up and Baltimore traded him to the Cubs in early July 2013.

That deal — which saw Arrieta and reliever Pedro Strop head to the North Siders for starter Scott Feldman and backup catcher Steve Clevenger — proved one of the most consequential trades in recent MLB history. Arrieta had decent results down the stretch with the Cubs, but his peripherals didn’t suggest he was on the verge of a breakout.

Jake Arrieta

That’s exactly what transpired, though. By 2014, Arrieta had emerged as a top-of-the-rotation starter. He tossed 156 2/3 innings of 2.53 ERA ball, earning a ninth-place finish in NL Cy Young balloting. That was an unexpected age-28 breakout, but rather than showing any signs of regression, Arrieta took his game to another height the next season. In 2015, the right-hander tossed a personal-high 229 innings with an incredible 1.77 ERA. He led MLB with four complete games and three shutouts, allowing a league-low 5.9 hits per nine frames.

Arrieta had a very strong first half that year, posting a 2.66 ERA in 121 2/3 innings. Yet it’s the second half of that 2015 season for which he might best be remembered, as he orchestrated one of the most overpowering runs by any pitcher in MLB history. After that year’s All-Star break, Arrieta threw 107 1/3 frames and allowed just nine earned runs (0.75 ERA). Opposing hitters posted a laughable .148/.204/.205 line in just shy of 400 plate appearances during that stretch, as the Cubs won 97 games and earned a postseason berth.

During that year’s Wild Card game, Arrieta continued his run of absolute dominance, tossing an 11-strikeout shutout in that season’s Wild Card game against the Pirates. He wasn’t as excellent during starts in the NLDS or NLCS, but he had launched himself into the upper echelon of starting pitchers. Arrieta won that season’s Cy Young award, and he’d pick up a third consecutive top ten finish the following season.

In 2016, Arrieta worked to a 3.10 ERA in 197 1/3 frames. He again allowed a league-low 6.3 hits per nine, picking up his first All-Star selection in the process. Alongside Jon Lester and a career-best season from Kyle Hendricks, Arrieta played a key role in the Cubs team that snapped their 108-year title drought. Chicago won both of his starts during the seven-game triumph over the Indians, during which he tossed 11 1/3 innings of three-run ball.

Arrieta remained in Chicago for one more season. He never recaptured his otherworldly 2014-15 form, but he still offered mid-rotation production with a 3.53 ERA in 168 1/3 innings. That offseason, he signed a three-year, $75MM guarantee with the Phillies. Arrieta’s first season in Philadelphia was solid, as he allowed just fewer than four earned runs per nine in 31 starts.

The past three seasons proved a struggle, as Arrieta’s velocity had begun trending downwards from its mid-90s peak by 2017. He posted a 4.64 ERA or higher in each of his final trio of campaigns, including a 7.39 mark in 24 starts between the Cubs and Padres last season. Arrieta returned to the place where he’d had the most success last winter, but the Cubs released him in August. He struggled in four starts with the Friars, and San Diego let him go shortly before the regular season wrapped up.

Obviously, Arrieta’s career didn’t end the way he would’ve liked. Yet there’s no question he reached a height few players in the game’s recent history have hit. From 2014-16, only future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw bested Arrieta’s 2.42 ERA among qualified starters. He played a pivotal role on the most successful teams in the past century of Cubs baseball and leaves the game with a Cy Young and a World Series title. Over his 12-year run, he won 115 games, and struck out upwards of 1400 batters in 1612 1/3 innings.

Arrieta retires with a career 3.98 ERA, although that mark is inflated by the struggles he experienced at each end. For a three-to-four year period, he was among the top few pitchers on the planet. MLBTR congratulates him on his excellent run and wishes him the best in retirement.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Tony Watson Announces Retirement

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Veteran left-handed reliever Tony Watson is retiring after 11 seasons at the Major League level, he tells Stephen J. Nesbitt of The Athletic. Watson issued a statement thanking his teammates, peers, coaches and support staff members, as well as the four teams for which he pitched — Pirates, Dodgers, Giants, Angels — and his family and friends for their support throughout his career. Nesbitt further tweets that Watson originally hoped to continue on for at least a 12th season, but shoulder issues led him to call it a career.

As Nesbitt points out, Watson will step away from baseball as the all-time leader in holds (a statistic which has been recorded since 1999), having racked up 246 of them throughout his big league tenure. That’s a testament to the southpaw’s consistency and effectiveness. Not only did his reliability convince managers to give Watson the ball with small leads year-after-year, he frequently passed them along into the later innings by keeping runs off the board.

Watson exceeded 40 innings in ten of the the past eleven seasons, with only the shortened 2020 schedule keeping him from hitting that mark every year of his career. Only once did he post an ERA north of 4.00, and he allowed fewer than three earned runs per nine innings on four separate occasions. That included three straight excellent campaigns with the Pirates in 2013-15, during which time the University of Nebraska product tossed 224 1/3 innings of 1.97 ERA ball, stifling opposing hitters to a .212/.265/.297 slash line.

Amidst that run, Watson earned a deserved selection to the 2014 All-Star game. He struck out 26.6% of opposing hitters that year — the second-highest rate of his career — while posting a 1.63 ERA and leading the National League with 78 appearances. Watson remained eminently productive throughout his tenure in Pittsburgh, which concluded at the 2017 trade deadline when the non-contending Bucs shipped the impending free agent to the Dodgers. (That deal looks as if it’ll be a meaningful one for years to come in Pittsburgh, as now-top prospect Oneil Cruz went from L.A. in return).

As he was throughout his career, Watson proved an effective late-season addition for the Dodgers. He then signed a three-year deal with the division-rival Giants, where he remained a solid bullpen option. Between 2018-20, Watson posted a 3.20 ERA in 138 frames. He signed with the Angels in free agency last winter, but San Francisco brought him back via a deadline trade. Watson had run into some uncharacteristic struggles in Orange County, but he righted the ship for what’ll prove to be his final run in the Bay Area.

Even as he neared his 37th birthday, the Iowa native was one of the better left-handed relievers in this year’s free agent class. He reportedly drew some interest from the Mets last month, but his shoulder will prevent him from giving it another go. Nevertheless, Watson steps away from the game as one of the more quietly effective relievers of the past decade. He posted a 2.90 ERA in 648 1/3 innings across 11 major league campaigns. In addition to his aforementioned holds record, he saved 32 games and struck out 570 batters. MLBTR congratulates Watson on his long, successful run and wishes him all the best in retirement.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Red Sox, Bogaerts/Devers Were Far Apart In Spring Extension Talks

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In the days leading up to the start of the regular season, the Red Sox had extension discussions with star infielders Xander Bogaerts and Rafael Devers. The team didn’t reach a long-term deal with either player, and it’s not believed they want to continue negotiations during the season.

Jon Heyman of the New York Post now sheds more light on the respective talks, characterizing the sides as being $100MM or more apart in both instances. Heyman reports that Boston offered Bogaerts around $90MM over four seasons. Boston’s offer to Devers isn’t clear, but Heyman suggests there was a rather notable gap on the length of the commitment, with the young star seeking a much longer guarantee than the team put on the table.

Bogaerts’ and Devers’ situations aren’t analogous, so it’s worth considering them separately. The excellent shortstop is the more immediate concern, as Boagerts can reach free agency at the end of this season. The right-handed hitter is signed for $20MM annually between 2023-25, but he can opt out of the final three years on his deal at the end of this season. According to Heyman, the Red Sox offered to tack on around $30MM in 2026 while keeping his salaries for the next three years the same.

It’s no surprise that wasn’t an appealing proposition for the three-time All-Star. He’s just six months away from having a chance to test the open market in advance of his age-30 season. Bogaerts wouldn’t receive the kind of decade-long commitment the younger Corey Seager did, but he could be in position for a deal of seven or even eight years if he performs as expected in 2022.

This offseason, the Rockies signed Kris Bryant to a seven-year deal worth $182MM heading into his age-30 campaign. The Rangers signed Marcus Semien for seven years and $175MM for his age-31 through age-37 seasons. Trevor Story and Javier Báez — each of whom was headed into their age-29 seasons — inked six-year pacts worth $140MM with opt-out opportunities.

It’s fair for Bogaerts and his representatives at the Boras Corporation to argue for a deal that tops all those contracts. Going back to the start of 2019, the four-time Silver Slugger Award winner owns a .302/.375/.523 slash line that translates to a 135 wRC+ (indicating offensive production 35 percentage points above the league average). That’s much better than the respective marks for each of Bryant (123), Semien (128), Story (113) and Báez (104). Bogaerts also has the edge if one looks back two seasons, while Semien was similarly productive last year.

A deal matching Semien’s $25MM average annual value that takes Bogaerts through his age-37 campaign would pay him $200MM over eight seasons. He’ll need a typically strong platform year to land that kind of money on the open market, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility. Bogaerts isn’t the caliber of defender that Semien, Story or Báez are, but he has a longer track record of offensive excellence than any of those players.

Of course, it’s possible that Bogaerts gets injured or underperforms in 2022. In that instance, the remaining $60MM on his deal affords him plenty of security, since he could elect not to opt out. (The deal also contains a $20MM vesting option for 2026). Forgoing an opportunity at $175MM — $200+MM to raise the floor of his existing contract from $60MM to $90MM isn’t a particularly appealing concept. Heyman writes that Bogaerts’ camp decided not to make a counteroffer, with a friend of Bogaerts calling the team’s proposal “a slap in the face.”

Nothing prevents the Sox from upping their offer after the season if Bogaerts tests the open market, and they’d presumably have to do so significantly to keep him in the fold. Whether they’ll have interest remains to be seen, but Boston signed Story to the aforementioned $140MM deal this past offseason. Story was a career-long shortstop with the Rockies, and while he moved to second base in deference to Bogaerts, the Sox could kick him back to his old position next year. Boston has one of the game’s top second base prospects, Nick Yorke, at High-A. Former top prospect Jeter Downs is coming off a rough season in Triple-A but was nevertheless added to the 40-man roster last November.

That could be a precursor to Bogaerts’ eventual departure, but chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom tells Heyman the Story signing “doesn’t change our desire to keep” Bogaerts and Devers. He added “we’re hopeful we can keep both guys,” but declined to discuss the specifics of the team’s offers.

Unlike Bogaerts, the team can unilaterally keep Devers around in 2023. The slugging third baseman is arbitration-eligible once more next winter, when he’ll be due a raise on this year’s $11.2MM salary. With notable earnings already in the bank, Devers shouldn’t have much financial pressure to accept a team-friendly deal. He’s coming off his first All-Star campaign and Silver Slugger after hitting .279/.352/.538 with 38 home runs.

Devers, who debuted in the big leagues as a 20-year-old, is on track to reach free agency in advance of his age-27 campaign. He’ll face some questions about his ability to stick at the hot corner over the long haul given his subpar defensive metrics, but there’s little doubt about his offensive capability. Devers ranks 28th in wRC+ among 159 hitters with 1000+ plate appearances over the past three seasons, with his .290/.350/.537 line translating to a 129 mark.

The Red Sox, it should be noted, have plenty of long-term payroll flexibility. Until last month’s Story pickup, Bloom and his staff had shied away from making free agent splashes since he was hired in October 2019. Boston opened this season with a payroll in the $220MM range, but they’d have just $72MM in 2023 guaranteed commitments (before accounting for arbitration) if Bogaerts opts out. That number would drop to about $57MM in 2024, with Story and Chris Sale the only significant expenditures that year. (Sale himself can opt out after this season, but he looks less likely to do so after his last three years have been dampened by injuries). That sets up some interesting decisions for the front office around which players they’d like to build over the long haul.

Reds To Promote Nick Lodolo

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Top Reds pitching prospect Nick Lodolo will make his Major League debut tomorrow, the team announced. Lodolo, the No. 7 overall pick in 2019, will start tomorrow’s game against the Guardians and join fellow top prospect Hunter Greene in the rotation. Greene impressed with seven punchouts and a barrage of triple-digit heaters in his own MLB debut this past weekend. Lodolo has not yet been selected to the 40-man roster, so Cincinnati will need to make a corresponding move before he is formally promoted to the big leagues.

Nick Lodolo | Kareem Elgazzar-USA TODAY NETWORK

It’s been expected since the season opened that Lodolo would take the mound this week and make his big league debut, but it’s nevertheless notable that Cincinnati has now made it official and set the stage for a forthcoming 40-man move to add the prized young lefty to the roster. Lodolo split the 2021 season between Double-A Chattanooga and Triple-A Louisville, pitching to a combined 2.31 ERA with an eye-popping 38.8% strikeout rate, just a 5.5% walk rate and a 54.3% ground-ball rate.

Impressive as those numbers were, Lodolo also missed time last year with blister troubles and, far more troublingly, with a shoulder strain that ended his season in August. He looked plenty sharp this spring, tossing 11 1/3 innings of 2.38 ERA ball with a 12-to-2 K/BB ratio, so it certainly looks as though he’s put the shoulder troubles behind him for now. Still, those injuries limited Lodolo to just 50 2/3 innings in 2021, and he of course didn’t pitch at all in 2020, when there was no minor league season.

The largest workload Lodolo has ever recorded is the combined 121 1/3 innings he pitched between his junior season at Texas Christian University and the Reds’ lower minor league levels in 2019, when he was drafted. It stands to reason that Cincinnati will be relatively careful when it comes to managing his innings.

Even if the Reds limit his innings on the season as a whole or on a start-by-start basis, there’s good reason to be excited about the lefty’s arrival on the scene. As one would expect for a pitcher with that lofty draft stock and those scintillating 2021 numbers, Lodolo is widely regarded as one of baseball’s most promising young pitchers. He ranked as a top-100 prospect at Baseball America (No. 32), MLB.com (No. 42), Baseball Prospectus (No. 42), FanGraphs (No. 52) and ESPN (No. 79).

There’s a fairly wide split as to just how highly Lodolo ought to be regarded, though most scouting reports on him will characterize him as a likely mid-rotation arm. Still, FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen and Tess Taruskin wrote that Lodolo was one of the “more divisive” players discussed with evaluators when writing their top prospect rankings, noting that while analytics-driven evaluations love his changeup, scouts question it and wonder why he threw it so little (9%) if it’s truly one of his best offerings.

FanGraphs touts Lodolo for having three plus pitches, whereas Baseball America opines that the slider is Lodolo’s only plus offering. The Athletic’s Keith Law omitted Lodolo from his Top 100 altogether, but ranked him fifth in the Cincinnati system while opining on the lack of a third plus pitch and likening Lodolo’s slider and arm slot to that of Andrew Miller.

Split camps are nothing new when it comes to prospect evaluation, and there’s certainly still consensus that Lodolo is a big league talent who’ll play a role with the Reds for years to come. Data-driven models and traditional scouting may not agree on the lefty’s ceiling, but Lodolo will have the opportunity to start proving skeptics wrong beginning tomorrow. He’ll bring a mid-90s heater, a quality sweeping slider and that divisive changeup with him to Great American Ball Park, and there’s a clear long-term opportunity in the rotation now that Cincinnati has traded Sonny Gray and dropped Wade Miley via waivers.

If Lodolo is in the big leagues for good, there’s still enough time on the calendar for him to log a full year of service time — regardless of his finish in end-of-year awards voting. He’d be eligible for arbitration after the 2024 season and would be controlled through the 2027 campaign via arbitration. Of course, future optional assignments could impact that timeline, but Lodolo’s fate is largely in his own hands now that he’s getting his first big league look at a time when the rotation has such ample opportunity.

Pirates Sign Ke’Bryan Hayes Eight-Year Extension

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April 12: The Pirates have now formally announced the deal.

April 9: The full breakdown of the deal, per Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, is as follows: Hayes will earn $10MM in 2022 and 2023, $7MM in each of the next four years, followed by an $8MM salary in 2028 and 2029. The 2030 club option is worth $12MM and comes with a $6MM buyout.

April 7: The Pirates took a major step toward locking up their young core this afternoon, inking third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes to an eight-year, $70MM extension, reports Robert Murray of Fansided. The deal, which represents both the largest guarantee ever given to a player with between one and two years of service time and the largest deal ever handed out by the Pirates, will keep Hayes in Pittsburgh through at least 2029. It also includes a club option for the 2030 season, the terms of which are not yet clear. Hayes is represented by The Ballengee Group.

The deal buys out three years of the third baseman’s free agency, which would have arrived at the conclusion of the 2026 season barring an unforeseen demotion. Hayes, who is entering his age-25 season in 2022, will now remain under team control through his age-32 (or age-33, should the Pirates exercise his option) season. While he could still be in line for a solid payday at that point should he remain productive, today’s extension is likely to cover the great majority of his prime years — meaning that his $70MM guarantee is likely to constitute a majority of his career earnings.

Since being promoted to the big leagues midway through the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, Hayes has been one of the few bright spots for a moribund Pirates franchise, slashing a world-beating .376/.442/.682 across 95 plate appearances across 24 games that September. His numbers came back to earth in 2021, perhaps as a result of an early-season wrist injury that held him out of action for roughly a third of the year and sapped him of much of his power. In his short career, Hayes has posted a .280/.340/.442 triple-slash in 491 trips to the plate while playing high-end defense at third, winning the 2021 Fielding Bible Award for third basemen (edging out stalwarts Matt Chapman and Nolan Arenado).

While keeping Hayes (the son of long-time big-leaguer Charlie Hayes) around for the long term is sure to promote some optimism within the long-suffering Pittsburgh fanbase, few expect the Bucs to contend in the immediate future. After losing 101 games in 2021, GM Ben Cherington hardly re-loaded in the offseason, trading for infielder Josh VanMeter and signing first baseman Daniel Vogelbach, outfielder Jake Marisnick, and reliever Heath Hembree to low-cost free agent deals while trading starting catcher Jacob Stallings to the Marlins for right-hander Zach Thompson and a pair of minor leaguers. The club does have a series of high-end prospects on the horizon, however, including recently optioned 6’7″ shortstop Oneil Cruz and right-hander Roansy Contreras, both of whom are likely to see big-league action sooner than later. Second baseman Nick Gonzalez and righty Quinn Priester could also see the majors in 2022, while catcher Henry Davis (the top overall pick in the 2021 draft) is probably a year or two away.

Cherington’s success in locking up Hayes for the foreseeable future draws attention to questions surrounding the future of center fielder Bryan Reynolds, the other high-end talent on the Bucs’ active roster. Reynolds, who proved his 2020 struggles a fluke to the tune of a .302/.390/.522 triple-slash in 2021, is under club control through his age-30 season in 2025, reportedly turned down a number of extension proposals ahead of the 2021 season and didn’t re-engage with the club between the end of the season and the implementation of the lockout. He’s been the subject of endless trade rumors — he’s been directly linked to the Padres and Marlins this offseason — but Pittsburgh’s asking price is (understandably) sky-high. Even if they continue to go year-to-year with Reynolds (presently a Super Two, he’ll earn either $4.25MM or $4.9MM in 2022, depending on the outcome of an in-season arbitration hearing), the Bucs can expect their All-Star outfielder to play alongside their high-end up-and-coming talent for at least a few years before hitting the open market.

Indeed, while Hayes’ extension gives the Pirates the kind of cost certainty small-market clubs crave (as well as the potential for a boatload of surplus value), it isn’t likely to change their contention timetable. Even while competing in the NL Central, where the Cubs appear to be engaged in a mini-rebuild and neither the Brewers nor Cardinals seem to be interested in pushing all their chips in just yet, Pittsburgh isn’t likely to host October baseball for a few years yet.

That said, the unpredictability of prospect performance cuts in both directions, and the Pirates may have the sort of high-end prospect depth to take a big step forward as soon as 2023 — particularly if Cherington gets the go-ahead from ownership to add some payroll. At present, RosterResource projects the club to carry an Opening Day payroll of just $45MM (the lowest in Major League Baseball), and with almost nothing besides the Hayes extension committed beyond 2022. For a fanbase that hasn’t seen a meaningful game since losing the 2015 NL Wild Card Game (and still haunted by the 1992 NLCS), knowing the Bucs will hold onto their star third baseman for the bulk of his prime is likely the best news they’ve heard in a while.

{Note: Hayes left this afternoon’s game against the Cardinals with an apparent hand injury. Murray tweets that Hayes’ extension is still subject to a physical. Murray reports that Hayes suffered only a “very minor” cramp, and there’s no indication it’ll have any bearing on the long-term deal.}

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Lerner Family To “Explore” Possibility Of Selling Nationals

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In what could be a franchise-altering moment, Nationals owner Mark Lerner tells Barry Svrluga of the Washington Post that the team has enlisted New York-based investment bank Allen & Company to explore the possibility of selling the franchise or adding new investors/partners to the current ownership group. Lerner emphasized that the process is “exploratory” in nature and added that there’s no “set timetable or expectation of a specific outcome.”

The Lerner family purchased the Nationals, formerly the Expos, from Major League Baseball for a sum of $450MM back in 2006 after the former Montreal franchise was folded and moved to Washington, D.C. Forbes recently estimated that the franchise is worth $2 billion — a four percent increase from last year and the 12th-most of any MLB franchise. Sportico placed that same $2 billion estimate on the franchise’s value back in March 2021. Longtime control person Ted Lerner, who’s now 96 years of age, ceded control of the franchise to his son, Mark, back in 2018. At the time, as Svrluga points out, the younger Lerner was adamant that the family would never consider selling the team. Clearly, that mentality has shifted.

The Nationals’ open willingness to explore a sale of the club comes at a time when the on-field product has been largely torn down following last summer’s fire sale, which saw Max Scherzer, Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber, Daniel Hudson, Yan Gomes, Josh Harrison, Brad Hand and Jon Lester all traded for younger, more controllable players (and, in some cases, salary relief). Of that bunch, Turner was the only one who’d been controlled beyond the 2021 season. He’s now earning $21MM with the Dodgers. The rest of that group signed elsewhere in free agency (or, in Lester’s case, retired).

The Nats did reinvest some of those resources into the 2022 team, but their overall payroll is nearly $40MM lower than its 2021 level. Most notably, Nelson Cruz joined the club on a one-year deal worth a guaranteed $15MM. Cesar Hernandez ($4MM), Anibal Sanchez ($2MM), Steve Cishek ($1.75MM), Ehire Adrianza ($1.5MM), Sean Doolittle ($1.5MM) and Alcides Escobar ($1MM) all signed in the offseason as well, as did non-roster veterans Dee Strange-Gordon and Maikel Franco, who both made the club. None of those players are signed beyond 2022, though Cruz’s deal contains a mutual option for the 2023 season. That’s largely an accounting measure, as mutual options are very rarely exercised by both parties.

When looking at the potential sale of the franchise, there are various complicated factors to consider — even beyond the standard complexities associated with any multi-billion dollar sale of a team. Firstly, the Nationals have been mired in ongoing litigation with the Orioles regarding their television rights fees for the better part of a decade. The Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN) broadcasts Nationals games but is owned and operated by the Angelos family — who also own the Baltimore Orioles. At stake are hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.

The team’s long-term payroll outlook, of course, also impacts the sale price. That’s one reason that last summer’s broad-reaching sell-off was of some note, but it also shines a particular light on the Nationals’ thus-far unsuccessful efforts to extend superstar Juan Soto, who reportedly rejected a 13-year, $350MM extension this winter.

Of more concern to potential buyers than money that perhaps ought to be earmarked for extending a franchise cornerstone is the money that’s still owed to a host of players who no longer even play for the Nationals. The Lerner family has habitually included deferred money in deals for their free-agent signings as a means of tamping down present-day value. That overwhelming slate of deferrals, however, is beginning to mount.

For instance, the Nationals owe Max Scherzer $15MM in deferred salary each season from 2022-28 — even though he’s now pitching for the division-rival Mets. They’re paying Stephen Strasburg a third $10MM installment in deferred salary from his prior contract this year, before even considering the salary he’ll earn under the new $245MM deal he signed on the heels of his World Series heroics. That new deal for Strasburg calls for him to receive three equal payments of $26,666,667 each July from 2027-29 — the contract itself ends in 2026 — plus a final installment of $3,999,974 on Dec. 31, 2029 (hat tip to Cot’s Contracts for the specific figures).

Those are far from the only deferrals to consider. Patrick Corbin’s $140MM contract contains $10MM in deferrals to be paid out from 2024 through 2026. The Nationals will pay Brad Hand a combined $6.5MM from 2022-24 as part of the one-year, $10.5MM deal he signed to pitch the 2021 season. They are, somewhat incredibly, still even on the hook for $2MM annually to Rafael Soriano through 2025. Soriano retired after the 2015 season.

The enormous slate of deferrals and messy television rights dispute notwithstanding, the Nationals’ franchise value has undeniably skyrocketed from the point at which the Lerner family purchased the team. And given the relative rarity with which Major League franchises are put up for sale, there ought to be considerable interest, whether from an entirely new ownership group or from some wealthy investors looking to get a foot in the door as minority stakeholders with an eye toward growing that share over the years.

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