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Frank Schwindel Signs With NPB’s Orix Buffaloes

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Former Cub Frank Schwindel has reportedly signed a deal with the Orix Buffaloes of Japan’s NPB. Schwindel had been playing for the Águilas Cibaeñas in the Dominican Winter League. Sung Min Kim had previously tweeted that the two parties were discussing a deal, and Cibaeñas general manager Ángel Ovalles recently told reporters that the 30-year-old had signed with the Buffaloes and was leaving the team.

Designated for assignment in July 2021 by Oakland, Schwindel was picked up by Chicago and immediately sent to Triple-A Iowa. However, after Anthony Rizzo was traded to the Yankees, Schwindel received a call-up and never looked back. During the second half of the 2021 season, he slashed a robust .342/.389/.613, with a strong 15% strikeout rate, 6.7% walk rate, and 13 homers in 239 plate appearances. This tremendous output, albeit in a limited sample size, earned him minor consideration in the 2021 NL Rookie of the Year voting.

Schwindel opened the 2022 season with the Cubs but struggled and was shuffled between Iowa and Chicago. He also missed time with lower back strains in May and June. His poor performance led to the Cubs designating him for assignment in mid-September, and he was granted his unconditional release. Schwindel finished the 2022 season hitting .229/.277/.358 with eight homers in 292 plate appearances. Notably, his strikeout rate increased to 19.9%.

With a poor 2022, Schwindel might have been hard-pressed to find anything beyond a minor league deal with an MLB team this winter. Instead, the right-handed hitter will head to Japan in search of the magic he captured during the 2021 season. With the Buffaloes, he will likely earn more guaranteed money and ample opportunity to rediscover his swing, perhaps eventually exploring a return to North American baseball.

Guillermo Heredia Signs With KBO’s SSG Landers

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The SSG Landers of the Korea Baseball Organization have announced that they have signed outfielder Guillermo Heredia (hat tip to Dan Kurtz of MyKBO.net). Heredia will earn $900K, with the possibility of earning an additional $100K in performance bonuses.

Heredia, who was projected to make $1.1MM in his final trip through the arbitration process, was non-tendered by the Braves in November. A veteran of parts of seven Major League seasons, Heredia joined Atlanta after the 2020 season, having been designated for assignment by the Mets, and would go on to win a World Series with the club.

Heredia appeared in 74 games (82 plate appearances) with the Braves during the 2022 season. However, he hit a poor .158/.220/.342 with a colossal 39% strikeout rate and below-average 7.3% walk rate. While never a major factor at the plate, with a career .231/.310/.346 line, 20% strikeout rate, and 8.3% walk rate, the right-handed hitter has a history of above-average fielding, having accrued at least five Outs Above Average (OAA) in five of his seven seasons. Nevertheless, during the 2022 season, Heredia earned 0 OAA while posting 1 Defensive Run Saved and a 0.8 Ultimate Zone Rating.

With the Braves hosting an outfield of three-time All-Star Ronald Acuna Jr., reigning Rookie of the Year Michael Harris, Eddie Rosario, and two-time All-Star Marcell Ozuna, Heredia was evidently deemed non-essential by the club. Instead, Heredia, who turns 32 years old in January, will make the transition overseas. He will earn a raise compared to a minor league salary and can explore a return to MLB if his time in South Korea proves fruitful.

Quick Hits: Kiermaier, Dodgers, Red Sox, Marlins, Bellinger, Bell, Rays, Diaz, Reds

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Kevin Kiermaier is off the market after agreeing to a deal with the Blue Jays earlier today, and the former Gold Glover was drawing interest elsewhere on the market.  The Dodgers “were in the running down to the end” on Kiermaier, according to Jorge Castillo of the Los Angeles Times (Twitter link), as Kiermaier was presumably being eyed as the left-handed hitting, center field replacement for Cody Bellinger.  Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman is no stranger to Kiermaier, as Friedman was the Rays’ general manager when Kiermaier began his career in Tampa Bay.

Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom is also a former member of Tampa’s front office, but Kiermaier and the Sox had only “periphery discussions” about a possible contract, MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo tweets.  Adding Kiermaier would’ve helped the Sox address their needs in the outfield, but the newly-signed Masataka Yoshida is Boston’s biggest swing in the outfield market to date.  For now, the first-choice Red Sox starting outfield looks like Yoshida in left field, Enrique Hernandez in center, and Alex Verdugo in right.

More from around baseball…

  • Speaking of past pursuits, Bellinger and Josh Bell were among the players “targeted” by the Marlins, according to Jordan McPherson of the Miami Herald.  Both free agents are now off the market, after Bellinger signed with the Cubs and Bell joined the Guardians.  Bellinger would’ve been a natural fit for the Marlins’ longstanding need in center field, and would’ve at least provided strong defense, even if it remains to be seen if his bat can return to anything close to his past MVP levels of production.  Bell has provided solid (if not always consistent) offense over the last two seasons, and the Marlins naturally have a lot of familiarity with Bell from his days with the Nationals.  Miami already parted ways with Lewin Diaz and Garrett Cooper has been a trade candidate in the past, so it would seem like first base could be a target position for the Marlins as they look to add some much-needed pop to their lineup.
  • Though the Rays are also looking to add offense and particularly a left-handed hitting first base option, Bell “wasn’t high on their list,” Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times writes.  It’s a moot point anyway with Bell now in Cleveland, and the Rays can continue their search for a bat at just about any position.  “Outside of maybe a shortstop, there probably aren’t too many other areas where we’d say, ’No, we don’t have any interest in that’….We’re fortunate, because we have enough moving pieces and versatility with our players that there’s a lot of different players we could bring in and make it work,” Rays GM Peter Bendix told Topkin and other reporters.
  • “Teams have checked” in with the Reds about Alexis Diaz, Bobby Nightengale of the Cincinnati Enquirer writes.  No trade seems close or particularly likely, given how the rookie right-hander looks more like a building block than a trade chip.  In his first MLB season, Diaz finished fifth in NL Rookie of the Year voting after posting a 1.84 ERA over 63 2/3 innings out of the Reds’ bullpen.  Apart from a very high 12.9% walk rate, Diaz’s Statcast metrics were otherwise excellent, and he could be on his way to joining older brother Edwin as a star closer.  Interestingly, the Mets explored a trade for the younger Diaz before the trade deadline, but while Cincinnati is in a rebuild phase, Nightengale figures it “would take an absolute haul to even pique the Reds’ interest” in a Diaz swap.

Nationals Sign Trevor Williams To Two-Year Deal

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TODAY: The Nationals officially announced Williams’ deal.

DECEMBER 9, 9:22am: Williams will be guaranteed a total of $13MM, Stephen J. Nesbitt of The Athletic reports (via Twitter).

8:54am: The Nationals are in agreement on a two-year contract with free-agent righty Trevor Williams, reports Mark Zuckerman of MASNsports.com (via Twitter). Williams is represented by John Boggs & Associates.

Williams, 31 in April, has spent the past season and a half with the Mets, pitching to a 3.17 ERA in 122 innings while splitting his time between the rotation (12 starts) and bullpen (28 appearances). He’d previously spent the bulk of his career as a starting pitcher, highlighted by a 31-start, 170 2/3-inning season of 3.11 ERA ball with the Pirates back in 2018. However, Williams has yet to consistently sustain that level of success over the course of multiple seasons.

For instance, Williams followed up that strong 2018 season with a 5.38 ERA in 26 starts in 2019, and he endured similar woes in the shortened 2020 season (6.18 ERA, 55 1/3 innings). That said, Williams has been a source of average or better innings in the other four full seasons of his career, dating back to 2017. In all, he owns a career 4.27 ERA and 4.40 FIP in a span of 715 1/3 Major League innings. He’s also coming off a career-high 22.6% strikeout rate and career-low 6.2% walk rate with the Mets in 2022.

Williams works with a traditional starter’s repertoire, leaning primarily on a four-seam fastball and complementing that with a sinker, slider and changeup that were all used at roughly equal levels in 2022 (plus a much more seldom-used curveball). None of those pitches generate huge spin, and none but the slider come with standout whiff rates. Still, Williams regularly excels at limiting hard contact, with above-average marks in exit velocity and hard-hit rate throughout the majority of his career to this point.

Zuckerman suggests that Williams could well end up in the Nationals’ rotation, but that’s not yet set in stone, and a return to the swingman role in which he’s thrived with the division-rival Mets is possible. At present, the Nats have a pair of albatross contracts atop the rotation in Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin, and that pair will be followed by some combination of Josiah Gray, MacKenzie Gore, Cade Cavalli and perhaps Williams. Given Strasburg’s avalanche of recent injury troubles, plus the uncertainty surrounding inexperienced arms like Gore and Cavalli, there ought to be ample rotation innings available even if Williams initially begins the season in the bullpen.

Williams is the second free-agent addition of the winter for the Nats, who also inked corner infielder Jeimer Candelario to a one-year, $5MM contract last month. Washington has a projected payroll of about $106MM next season, though the bulk of that is tied up in their onerous commitments to Strasburg and Corbin. Strasburg is still signed through the 2026 season, while Corbin is signed through 2024.

Chaim Bloom Discusses Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, Extensions

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Xander Bogaerts signed with the Padres on the final day of the Winter Meetings, agreeing to a huge 11-year, $280MM deal.  Despite speculation that the Red Sox were coming closer to re-signing the shortstop, “that was definitely not what our impression was throughout the day and even the day before,” Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom told MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo.

The signing officially ended Bogaerts’ time with the Red Sox, a tenure that began when Bogaerts was an international signing in August 2009 and lasted through 10 Major League seasons, two World Series championship teams, and four All-Star appearances for the shortstop.  Bogaerts signed a six-year, $120MM contract extension with the Sox prior to the 2019 season, but chose to exercise his opt-out clause after the first three years of the extension, thus paving the way for his departure from Boston and his new home in San Diego.

Last spring, the Red Sox both signed Trevor Story to a long-term free agent deal and offered Bogaerts only a one-year extension (worth $30MM) on his contract, which were both widely interpreted as signs that the Sox weren’t counting on Bogaerts remaining beyond the date of his opt-out.  Bloom publicly said several times that the Red Sox did indeed want to retain Bogaerts, and reiterated that stance even in the aftermath of the shortstop’s deal with the Padres.

“We wouldn’t have said that if we didn’t mean it,” Bloom said. “I think it became clear to us as things went on that this [Bogaerts’ price tag] was going to go to a point that we just weren’t, irrespective of how we prioritize things, it just wasn’t something that we should do.  It’s hard because of how much we love him.  But it’s just the reality of the situation.”

In fairness to the Red Sox, nobody expected Bogaerts to receive anything near a $280MM contract, and it is understandable why the organization didn’t want to reach that far.  That said, reports suggested the Red Sox offered Bogaerts six years and around $160MM, which didn’t match the seven-year, $189MM deal MLBTR projected Bogaerts would land on the open market.  In addition, the Sox have obviously had exclusive negotiating rights with Bogaerts for years, and could’ve more aggressively pursued an extension at any point before Bogaerts reached free agency.

Bogaerts joins Mookie Betts and Jon Lester as homegrown Red Sox stars who left the team (Bogaerts in free agency, Betts and Lester in trades) after extension talks didn’t materialize into a longer-term deal.  Of course, as Bloom noted, Bogaerts did already ink one extension with the team, putting him “at a different place in his career.”  The Sox have signed relatively few extensions in recent years and only three extensions since Bloom took over the front office following the 2019 season.  Bloom told Cotillo that the team may change how it approaches extension candidates, perhaps with more of a focus on extending players to contracts before they reach salary arbitration.

“Anytime you have a situation where you have a homegrown player who wants to be here and we want him here and it doesn’t happen, I think those are fair questions to ask and those are questions we certainly need to ask ourselves,” Bloom said.  “We haven’t, as an organization, always found a way to come together in those situations. I think it’s something to think about and assess.”

Rafael Devers presents the next big question for the Red Sox in this regard, as the star third baseman is set to reach free agency following the 2023 season.  In a separate piece, a source close to Devers told Cotillo that “Bogaerts’ decision would not make it more likely that Devers would want to leave Boston,” as much as Devers would be “disappointed” at no longer playing with his longtime friend.

Bloom reiterated his team’s interest in keeping Devers, saying that “Raffy, for sure, is somebody we want to build around.”

“I’ve said it, and I know we haven’t demonstrated this to the degree that we’ve hoped to, but we believe in building around homegrown talent.  You want to do it in the right way,” Bloom said.  “It’s certainly something we want to do as often as we can….[Devers] has been somebody that we love and want right at the center of everything we hope to accomplish, obviously in 2023 but more importantly, in the years beyond, because those are the years he’s not under our control. We’re hoping to change that.”

Cole Hamels Planning Comeback In 2023

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Cole Hamels is looking for one more shot at continuing his baseball career, and told The Associated Press that he is hoping to catch on with a new team this offseason.  “A Spring Training invite is no risk, all reward.  If you start me out in February, I’ll be ready by April 1,” Hamels said.  “Or I’ll know exactly I can’t do it, and I will be the first one to admit, nope, I had a great career. I can hang it up and be proud of what I did.”

The left-hander is a veteran of 15 Major League seasons (2006-20), and is best remembered as one of the key figures of the Phillies’ 2008 World Series team.  Hamels was named the MVP of both the NLCS and World Series during that championship season, the highlight of an excellent 10-year run in Philadelphia.  After being traded to the Rangers in 2015, Hamels spent parts of four seasons in Texas before heading to the Cubs in 2018-19, and then one single game with the Braves in 2020.

That lone game represents Hamels’ last appearance in the big leagues.  Triceps and shoulder injuries limited his time in Atlanta, and after he inked a $1MM deal with the Dodgers in August 2021, his Los Angeles stint was also derailed by injuries.  Continued shoulder problems resulted in surgery, and Hamels has now spent over a year both recovering and taking care of some other related health issues.

The shoulder procedure was only one of three surgeries for Hamels over the last year, as he also dealt with a pinched nerve in his left foot and a torn right meniscus.  “It’s hard to train when you’ve got body parts that are not doing what they’re supposed to do to allow you to do what you want to do,” Hamels said, and the fuller scope of surgeries allowed for more “understanding what was kind of wrong, getting it fixed and then actually being able to rehab it, just kind of addressing the right areas and not trying to overcompensate.”

This cleaner bill of health could make any interested teams feel more comfortable about signing a pitcher who turns 39 later in December, and who essentially hasn’t pitched in three full seasons.  However, as Hamels noted, there isn’t much risk in a minor league contract, and clubs can use spring camp as a better chance to evaluate what the southpaw can still bring to the table.  While Hamels would ideally like to start games, his primary goal is just getting back onto the mound, as he said he is “not opposed” to working as a reliever.

Padres Still Want Starter, Corner Bat

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Even after adding Xander Bogaerts to an eleven-year, $280MM deal, the Padres are looking for more, and Jon Heyman of the New York Post reports they’re keen to bring in a starting pitcher and a corner bat.

The Padres have been busy this winter, signing Bogaerts and getting deep in the markets of Aaron Judge and Trea Turner before they signed elsewhere. They have seen starters Mike Clevinger and Sean Manaea depart in free agency (although Manaea is still available), while they weakened their depth a bit by dealing MacKenzie Gore to Washington in the Juan Soto trade, so it makes plenty of sense that they’ll now focus on bolstering their rotation.

Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove and Blake Snell are currently lined up in San Diego’s rotation, while the re-signed Nick Martinez is expected to start the 2023 season there too (although he wound up in the bullpen after ten starts in 2022). Adrian Morejon is an option as a starter, but he only appeared out of the bullpen last year after returning from Tommy John surgery. There’s every chance the Padres still view him as a starter, but given he has two options remaining it wouldn’t hurt for them to add another starter to give them another option.

The Padres luxury tax payroll is projected at around $254MM now, just shy of the second tier of luxury tax penalties. That’d seem to make it unlikely that they’d pursue someone like Carlos Rodon – the top free agent starter available – but then again, it’d be foolish to rule San Diego out of anything at this point. The Padres did meet with Koudai Senga last month, and were reported to have interest in Seth Lugo as well, but either of those two or options like Nathan Eovaldi and Chris Bassitt could make sense. They could also look to the trade market where someone like Pablo Lopez could be available, but having pulled off some big trades in recent years they may be reluctant to part with more prospects.

A corner bat seems like less of a need for the Padres. It’s not entirely clear how the team will align defensively after bringing in Bogaerts, but there seems a good chance that Fernando Tatis Jr. (when he returns from suspension) and Soto handle the outfield corners, and Manny Machado and Jake Cronenworth take the infield spots, especially after AJ Preller said (via The Athletic) Bogaerts would at least begin as their everyday shortstop. Tatis will return in late-April so they won’t be without him long, but the team may want to rotate some of their starters through the DH spot and so a utility-type free agent addition could make some sense there.

Mets Re-Sign Brandon Nimmo To Eight-Year Deal

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Dec 10: The Mets have officially announced the signing.

Dec 8: The Mets and outfielder Brandon Nimmo are in agreement on a deal that would bring him back to Queens. He will make $162MM over eight years, with a salary of $20.25MM in each season. He will have a no-trade clause. Nimmo is represented by the Boras Corporation.

Nimmo, 30 in March, was considered by most observers to be the clear #2 outfielder on this winter’s free agent market, well behind Aaron Judge but also well ahead of anyone else. Nimmo is nowhere near Judge in terms of power, as he has only 63 home runs in his seven-year career, while Judge hit 62 in 2022 alone.

Despite that lack of power, Nimmo stood out from the rest of the outfielders on the market for a couple of reasons. One is an ability to play center field and a second is his ability to get on base. For his career, which began in 2016, he has a 13.6% walk rate and .385 on-base percentage. Only 17 qualified hitters have a better walk rate in that time while only seven have a better OBP. His career batting line is currently .269/.385/.441, leading to a 134 wRC+, indicating he’s been 34% better than the league average hitter.

That level of production would be welcome at any position but it’s especially valuable in center field, where many teams are looking for upgrades. Nimmo was unsurprisingly popular as a free agent, getting publicly reported interest from the Blue Jays, Giants, Yankees, Rays and Mariners, with others surely interested as well. But it will be the Mets, the franchise that drafted Nimmo 13th overall back in 2011, who will keep him. Even before the offseason truly began, it was reported that the Mets were prioritizing retaining Nimmo and closer Edwin Díaz, and they have now succeeded on both fronts.

The deal is not without its risks, as Nimmo has spent his share of time on the injured list. In his career, he has landed on the IL due to hamstring strains, a collapsed lung, a neck issue and a bruised finger. Due to those various ailments, he has only twice eclipsed 100 games in a season. Most of those injuries are a few years in the past at this point, as Nimmo stayed healthy in the shortened 2020 season, played 92 games in 2021 and then 151 games this year. That means he’s been healthy for the vast majority of the past three seasons. However, this deal has gone well beyond expectations in terms of both length and guarantee. MLBTR predicted a five-year, $110MM deal but Nimmo got three extra years and an extra $52MM, meaning this deal will take him into his age-37 season.

But the Mets are clearly as “win-now” as a team can possibly get and likely won’t worry themselves with the later years of the deal for now. Owner Steve Cohen, who just purchased the club at the end of the 2020 season, has shown he’s willing to blow well past previous spending limits shown by the Mets or anyone else. The Mets had never had an Opening Day payroll that reached $160MM in their pre-Cohen history, per Cot’s Baseball Contracts. But they moved up to $195MM in 2021 and $264MM this past season. Cohen had previously hinted at a $300MM limit for 2022 to The New York Post but that number is well in the rear-view mirror now.

Today’s deals for Nimmo and reliever David Robertson bring the Mets’ payroll for next season to an incredible $322MM, according to the calculations of Roster Resource. In terms of the competitive balance tax, which uses the annual average values of contracts as opposed to just the 2023 salaries, they are at $335MM. That means they are incredibly more than $100MM beyond the lowest CBT threshold of $233MM. There are also three further tiers of luxury tax payments, going up in $20MM increments to finish at $293MM, with the Mets now more than $40MM above that top level.

The CBT also has escalating penalties for going over the line in successive seasons, with the Mets sure to be a second-time payor. They will pay a 30% tax on spending over the first tier, 42% over the second, 75% over the third and 90% over the fourth. That means that they are currently slated to pay a tax of about $67MM, on top of that $322MM payroll. It’s also possible that they’re not done, as Andy Martino of SNY reports that they could still sign Kodai Senga, even after the Nimmo deal.

It seems that we don’t really know how far Cohen and general manager Billy Eppler are willing to go in their pursuits of building the best baseball team possible. The aggressive spending yielded mixed results in 2022, as the club won 101 games, the second-highest win total in franchise history. However, Atlanta snuck in and nudged the Mets aside for the division crown in the National League East, which then led to the Mets falling to the Padres in the first round of the playoffs.

For 2023, the Mets were facing a serious challenge in even repeating that performance. They had a huge free agent class that included Nimmo, Díaz, Jacob deGrom, Taijuan Walker, Chris Bassitt and a whole host of relievers. However, they have pulled out all the stops in trying to ramp back up for another shot next year. deGrom and Walker have signed elsewhere, but the Mets signed Justin Verlander and José Quintana to replace them, in addition to retaining Díaz and Nimmo.

Nimmo will now return to his center field position in Queens, flanked by Starling Marte and Mark Canha. The division will be a fascinating one to watch, as the Phillies have followed up their trip to the World Series by aggressively spending on Walker and Trea Turner, while Atlanta are still loaded with all of their young stars that they have locked into lengthy extensions.

Joel Sherman of The New York Post first reported the contract details (Twitter links 1, 2 and 3).

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Giants Made Offer To Brandon Nimmo

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It’ll come as little consolation to Giants fans, but the team did have an offer on the table for top remaining free agent outfielder Brandon Nimmo before he wound up re-signing with the Mets for eight years and $162MM, according to Mike Puma of the New York Post. As Puma notes, it appears that once owner Steve Cohen got personally involved, Nimmo’s return to the Mets materialized quickly. It’s not known what terms the Giants were offering Nimmo.

It’s the second-straight outfielder the Giants have missed out on, having aggressively pursued Aaron Judge before he ultimately return to New York on a nine-year, $360MM deal. They have added Mitch Haniger on a three-year, $43.5MM deal but from the outset of the off-season they’ve been strongly linked with the top free agents. They could still sign one, and they’re one of the teams (along with the Twins and Cubs, per the New York Post’s Jon Heyman) that are heavily rumored to be in on Carlos Correa.

The outfield has been an area of focus for president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi this winter. Haniger’s addition bolsters their group, but Zaidi’s wanted two outfield signings. Now that they’ve missed out on the clear top two options available, it’ll be interesting to see whether they look for another outfielder, or go with a mix of Haniger, Austin Slater and Mike Yastrzemski and divert their resources to other options like Correa, or a starting pitcher.

If they do continue with their plans to add another outfielder, Andrew Benintendi is probably the top free agent available now. MLBTR predicted a four-year, $54MM deal for him, and given the Giants’ payroll space they could conceivably go after someone like that while still having space to pursue a long-term deal with Correa. They could also look to the trade market, and approach the Pirates about a deal to bring Bryan Reynolds back to the team that drafted him in 2016. While Reynolds is only due to make $6.75MM in 2023, he’s under club control for three more seasons and Pittsburgh looks to have a sky high asking price for him.

The Giants have a projected payroll of about $139MM as things stand, but they also have in the region of $60MM+ coming off the books at the end of next season. Given their payroll has stretched north of $200MM in recent seasons, they do have plenty of room to make a number of additions over the next season or two.

Dylan Cease Tops Pre-Arbitration Bonus Pool

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One of the big new additions to the collective bargaining agreement signed between the league and the players was the implementation of a $50MM bonus pool set aside for players with less than three years of league service time.

The pool would be handed out to the top 100 eligible players, with MLB’s WAR metric determining which players made the list. Beyond that, further bonuses could be earned for qualified players if they ranked in the top two of Rookie of the Year, top five in MVP or Cy Young, as well as being named in the first or second All-MLB team.

According to ESPN’s Jesse Rogers, White Sox pitcher Dylan Cease topped the class in 2022, taking home a bonus of $2,457,426, in addition to his $750K base salary. Cease threw 184 innings of 2.20 ERA ball for Chicago this year, finishing 2nd in AL Cy Young voting. That finish earned him $1.75MM in addition to the $707,425 he earned for his WAR ranking. 2022 was Cease’s last pre-arbitration season, so he won’t be eligible for the bonus pool after the 2023 season.

The Astros’ Yordan Alvarez was the top hitter on the list, as he took home a $2,381,143 bonus. Alvarez torched pitching to the tune of a .306/.406/.613 line with 37 home runs, finishing third in AL MVP voting. He picked up $881,143 as the top ranked player via the WAR metric, and an additional $1.5MM for his MVP finish. He also won’t be eligible for the pool next season.

Here’s the top ten bonus pool earners (all of these figures are in addition to the player’s base salary):

Per MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand, Atlanta’s Spencer Strider was the only other player to earn a bonus greater than $1MM, while four more players (Sean Murphy, Tommy Edman, Will Smith and Ryan Helsley) earned more than $700K, with another eleven players (Steven Kwan, Bo Bichette, Alejandro Kirk, Nestor Cortes, Logan Webb, Shane McClanahan, Cal Raleigh, Daulton Varsho, Nico Hoerner, Triston McKenzie and Tony Gonsolin) earned a bonus greater than $500K.

Each player’s team will pay out the bonuses by December 23, but they will be reimbursed by the Commissioner’s Office.

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