Cardinals Recall Bryan Torres For MLB Debut
May 22: These moves have now been formally announced by the club. Church was diagnosed with a left shoulder strain. A timetable for his return is not yet clear.
May 21: The Cardinals will promote second baseman/outfielder Bryan Torres for their weekend series in Cincinnati, reports former big leaguer Carlos Baerga. Jeff Jones of The Belleville News-Democrat reports that outfielder Nathan Church will land on the 10-day injured list in a corresponding move. Church was scratched from this afternoon’s lineup with an undisclosed issue and will miss at least the next week and a half.
St. Louis added Torres to their 40-man roster in November, so they won’t need any further transactions. The 28-year-old would otherwise have qualified for minor league free agency. Torres was coming off an excellent .308/.441/.464 season with Triple-A Memphis.
A native of Puerto Rico, Torres joined the professional ranks more than a decade ago. He signed with the Brewers as an undrafted free agent in 2015. Torres never made it out of rookie ball in the Milwaukee system. He had a brief stop in the Giants organization and was playing in the independent ranks as recently as 2023. The Cardinals evidently liked what they saw, as they added Torres on a minor league deal going into the ’24 season. He spent that year in Double-A and climbed to Triple-A a season ago.
Baseball America ranked Torres the #27 prospect in the St. Louis system over the offseason. They credit him with an above-average hit tool and average speed. Torres has minimal power but offers a bit of defensive flexibility and an OBP-oriented skillset off the bench. He’s out to an even better start in Memphis this year, running a .336/.454/.477 slash with more walks than strikeouts in 166 trips. He very rarely chases off the plate and makes a lot of contact, and he’s 10-12 in stolen base tries.
Torres is nearing his 29th birthday, so he’s not a traditional prospect. He’s in the top five among International League hitters in on-base percentage and doesn’t have much more to show versus minor league pitching. He can replace Church as the left-handed side of a left field platoon with José Fermín and Thomas Saggese for the time being.
Giants To Select Victor Bericoto
The Giants will select the contract of outfielder Victor Bericoto from Triple-A Sacramento today, as first reported by journalist Manolo Hernández Douen. San Francisco already has an open 40-man spot. Corresponding moves aren’t yet clear, but Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle suggests that Jung Hoo Lee could need to miss a few more games or perhaps even head to the injured list. He’s been day-to-day with a back issue recently.
It’s the first call to the majors for the 24-year-old Bericoto. He’s generally not considered to be among the organization’s top 30 prospects, but he’s enjoying a nice start to his season with the River Cats. In 186 plate appearances, the righty-swinging outfielder has slashed .299/.355/.449 with six homers. He’s walked at a slightly below-average 8.1% clip, but his current 18.8% strikeout rate would be a career-low mark over a full season.
Bericoto has played all three outfield spots and first base in his professional career. He’s spent the bulk of his time in right field and at first base, however, and hasn’t appeared in center field since 2024, when he logged only six games there. In January 2025, FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen wrote that Bericoto has plus power but contact skills that were “toward the very bottom of the acceptable range.” He’s made some modest gains in that regard. His 73.5% overall contact rate is still below the major league average (76.8%), but he’s connected on 85.5% of the swings he takes on pitches within the zone, which is right in line with MLB average.
Cubs Promote Pedro Ramirez, Place Matt Shaw On Injured List
The Cubs have called up top prospect Pedro Ramirez for his major league debut, per Sahadev Sharma of The Athletic. Fellow infielder Matt Shaw heads to the 10-day injured list (retroactive to May 20) due to tightness in his back. ESPN’s Jesse Rogers first noted that Ramirez was in the clubhouse at Wrigley Field this morning.
Ramirez, 22, is one of the top prospects in Chicago’s system. He’s elevated his status with a brilliant start to his season in Des Moines, home of the Cubs’ Triple-A affiliate. The Venezuelan-born infielder has taken 196 turns at the plate and delivered a robust .312/.395/.547 batting line. By measure of wRC+, that’s 36% better than league average.
Ramirez has swatted nine homers and added 11 doubles and a triple. He’s 19-for-21 in stolen base attempts and has walked at a hearty 10.7% clip against a 16.3% strikeout rate that’s considerably lower than the 22.1% major league average. He’s drawn praise for above-average raw power in the past, but it hadn’t fully manifested until this season. His nine long balls are already a career-high.
A switch-hitter with above-average tools across the board, Ramirez can also play either second or third base. He won a minor league Gold Glove for his work at the latter position in 2025. This year’s terrific start has catapulted Ramirez onto several top-100 prospect rankings. He’s currently 80th at FanGraphs and 85th at both Baseball America and MLB.com.
Though Ramirez is clearly an exciting prospect, it’s fair to question how he fits into the long-term picture. Chicago has Alex Bregman, Dansby Swanson and Nico Hoerner all signed long-term. Michael Busch is locked in at first base and controlled through 2029. Pete Crow-Armstrong is entrenched in center field. Moises Ballesteros doesn’t even have a full year of service yet. He’s a long-term option behind the plate and/or at designated hitter.
Perhaps there’s a scenario where both Ramirez and Shaw slide into the corner outfield vacancies that’ll be created this winter when Ian Happ and Seiya Suzuki become free agents. Either could settle in as a multi-position, semi-regular as well. It’s a crowded mix of talented players. Obviously, that falls into the “good problem to have” bucket, and there’s no need to answer any such questions in the immediate future, with both Ramirez and Shaw being optionable. It’s still a scenario that’ll loom in the background, and it’s easy to imagine Ramirez and/or Shaw commanding interest at the trade deadline, as other clubs take note of the Cubs’ stock of young big league-ready players.
As for Shaw, he’s cooled considerably after a hot start. His .242/.291/.400 is a near mirror image of last year’s .226/.295/.394 batting line as a rookie. Both are a couple percentage points shy of league average. Shaw has spent the season acclimating to the outfield, as the Bregman signing filled the infield and left him only sparse playing time on the dirt. He’s continued to show good contact skills but employ a swing- and chase-heavy approach that’s undercut his on-base percentage.
It’s not clear how long Shaw will be sidelined, but the backdated nature of his IL stint means he could be back as soon as next weekend. In the meantime, Ramirez can fill in around the infield as needed. The Cubs recently gave him his fifth career game in left field as well, so they could at least consider using him in the corners.
Twins Recall Gabriel Gonzalez For MLB Debut
The Twins announced they’ve recalled outfielder Gabriel Gonzalez from Triple-A St. Paul. Infielder Tristan Gray has been placed on the paternity list in a corresponding move. Marcos Grunfeld of El Emergente first reported the Gonzalez promotion. He’s already on the 40-man roster after Minnesota selected his contract last November to protect him from being taken in the Rule 5 Draft.
Gonzalez’s first big league call will probably be brief. A player’s stint on the paternity list can last up to three days. They’ll occasionally take an extra day or two on the restricted list, but Gray should be back during Minnesota’s series against the White Sox at the beginning of next week.
Minnesota didn’t want to make a 40-man roster move for such a short-term absence. They only have four healthy position players on optional assignment to St. Paul. They just sent Matt Wallner and Royce Lewis down this week to get them on track. That left Gonzalez and fellow outfielder Hendry Mendez as the two logical options; the latter was only just promoted to Triple-A two weeks ago.
A high-profile amateur signee by the Mariners out of Venezuela, Gonzalez headlined Minnesota’s return for Jorge Polanco in 2024. His prospect stock has dipped a little since that trade. He had a middling season in High-A while battling a back injury in his first year with the organization.
The 22-year-old rebounded to hit his way to Triple-A last year, but his numbers have dipped this season. Gonzalez has a .216/.294/.392 line over 197 plate appearances. That’s weighed down largely by a .231 average on balls in play. Gonzalez has connected on eight home runs and has kept his strikeout rate to a manageable 20% clip.
Baseball America ranks the righty batter the #10 prospect in the Minnesota system. They credit him with an above-average hit tool and solid raw power, but his in-game power output has been held back by an aggressive approach and a high ground-ball rate. Gonzalez is a below-average runner who can’t play center field, putting a lot of pressure on the bat. He clobbered lefties last season (.368/.430/.592) and has hit them well this season (.263/.328/.544) even amid an overall downturn in production, so there’s a good chance he’ll be in the lineup tonight against Boston southpaw Payton Tolle.
The Opener: Cole, Valdez, Guardians
The league’s two highest-scoring offenses will face off this weekend. It’ll be the Braves taking on the … Nationals? Washington surprisingly paces the league in runs so far. MLBTR’s Leo Morgenstern dove into the Nats’ offense in this piece.
1. Cole, Caballero rejoining Yankees
Yankees right-hander Gerrit Cole will make his long-awaited return tonight against the Rays. The six-time All-Star missed all of 2025 as he recovered from Tommy John surgery. Cole cruised through 5 1/3 innings of one-run ball in his final rehab outing, striking out six. New York will also get infielder Jose Caballero back in the mix. The versatile veteran will return after a minimum stint on the injured list with a fractured finger. Outfield prospect Spencer Jones will head back to the minors to clear room for Caballero. Jones went 4-for-24 with 12 strikeouts in his first taste of the majors.
2. Valdez gets the call
Pirates prospect Esmerlyn Valdez is expected to be promoted for a series against the Blue Jays. He’ll take the spot of outfielder Billy Cook. Valdez is a consensus top 10 prospect in the organization. The 22-year-old has shown solid power in the minor leagues, including 26 home runs across two levels in 2025. Valdez has already popped 10 homers in 46 games at Triple-A this year. Perhaps more importantly, he’s trimmed his strikeout rate to a reasonable 21.1%. Valdez has mostly played the corner outfield spots with Indianapolis this season. He also has experience at first base. Valdez will be an option at both first and right field with Pittsburgh with Ryan O’Hearn sidelined.
3. Red-hot Guardians sweep sputtering Tigers
Cleveland beat Detroit on Thursday afternoon behind a strong outing from lefty Joey Cantillo. Recent trade acquisition Patrick Bailey launched his first home run with the club. The Guardians took all four games from the Tigers and have now won six straight and nine of 10. With the White Sox falling to the Mariners, Cleveland now has a 3.5-game lead in the AL Central. Detroit has gone in the exact opposite direction. The club has dropped six straight and nine of 10, sinking to last in the division. The Tigers had managed to stay afloat despite injury issues heading into May, with an even .500 record. The team is now 20-31 on the year. Detroit will look to get back on track in Baltimore this weekend.
Photo courtesy of Patrick Oehler of the Poughkeepsie Journal, via Imagn Images
Red Sox Select Tayron Guerrero
May 22: Boston has officially announced the move. It will indeed be Crawford moving to the 60-day IL to clear a 40-man spot for Guerrero.
May 21: The Red Sox are going to select right-hander Tayron Guerrero to their roster, per reporting from Andrew Parker of SoxProspects.com. He’ll be back in the big leagues for the first time since 2019. Righty Zack Kelly has been optioned as a corresponding active roster move, per Chris Cotillo of MassLive. The Sox will need to make a corresponding move to open a 40-man roster spot. That will likely involve moving someone to the 60-day injured list, with Kutter Crawford being a logical candidate.
It’s an incredible comeback story for the 35-year-old. Guerrero was in the big leagues from 2016 to 2019, pitching for the Padres and Marlins. He logged 106 innings with a 5.77 earned run average. He lost his roster spot ahead of the 2020 season. Since then, he has alternated between minor league deals and time spent in Japan, without a ton of success. He was with the Chiba Lotte Marines in 2022 and 2025. The first stint overseas was okay, with Guerrero posting a 3.52 ERA, but he had a 6.41 ERA last year. In his minor league work from 2021 to 2024, he posted a 7.62 ERA.
He signed a minor league deal with the Sox this offseason and has been shoving in Triple-A. He has thrown 19 2/3 innings for the WooSox, allowing just two earned runs for a 0.92 ERA. His 8% walk rate is right around average, while his 29.3% strikeout rate is quite strong and his 69.6% ground ball rate is massive. His fastball is still averaging in the upper 90s, with his slider and changeup coming in around 90ish.
The Sox will take a chance on Guerrero to see if he can translate any of that to the big leagues. Given his age and his recent track record, it’s an unusual move, but there’s obvious appeal in his numbers so far this year. If the gambit doesn’t pan out, Guerrero is out of options.
Photo courtesy of Kim Klement Neitzel, Imagn Images
Angels Notes: Closer, Moncada, Grissom
The Angels continue to operate without a defined closer, manager Kurt Suzuki tells Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com. That comes after Kirby Yates blew a save by surrendering a ninth-inning homer to Jeff McNeil on Wednesday. The A’s would go to win that game by plating the free runner against Chase Silseth in the top of the 10th.
Yates was going for his first save of the season. The 39-year-old missed the first six weeks to right knee inflammation. He’d worked scoreless appearances in three of four outings before the ill-timed longball yesterday.
The Halos have been the worst team in the league, so it’s not a surprise that they have the fewest saves in MLB. That said, it’s remarkable that four of their five saves all year were by the since released Jordan Romano within the first two weeks of the season. They have one save in the last six weeks, which went to Ryan Zeferjahn against the White Sox on May 5.
Aside from Yates, Silseth technically has their only other blown save this month. That came in the sixth inning, so it was more accurately a missed opportunity for a hold. The Halos didn’t have a save opportunity tonight, but they went right back to Yates in a situation typically reserved for a team’s closer — to pitch the top of the ninth in a tied game. The righty worked around a Vaughn Grissom error to toss a scoreless inning.
Grissom got the nod at the hot corner for the third consecutive game. The last two have come against right-handed starters Aaron Civale and Luis Severino. That’s not a coincidence, as Suzuki confirmed to Jeff Fletcher of The Orange County Register that they’re reducing playing time for scuffling third baseman Yoán Moncada.
Re-signed to a $4MM deal over the offseason, Moncada has hit .189/.308/.297 across 130 plate appearances. Although he has avoided the injured list, the 30-year-old confirmed he’s still dealing with discomfort in his right knee related to the injury that cost him five weeks last summer. The switch-hitter said the knee bothers him when he bats from the right side. The Halos have accordingly limited his exposure to left-handed pitching for a second straight year.
Moncada had been productive from the left side of the dish last season, posting an .815 OPS against righties. That’s down to a .225/.330/.360 line with 34 strikeouts in 104 plate appearances this year — more or less leading to an unofficial benching.
“That’s the route that we’re going to go,” Suzuki told Fletcher. “I talked to him and he knows what he has to do. … Right now, this is where we’re at. I’m not saying it’s going to be like this the rest of the year. It might change. It might not.”
The Angels took a flier on the right-handed hitting Grissom in an offseason deal with Boston. A minor sprain of his left wrist sidelined him for a couple weeks to begin the season. Grissom came out on fire when he was activated, hitting .342 with a homer and four doubles in 13 games through the end of April. His bat has gone ice cold since the calendar flipped, and he’s now hitting .226/.308/.355 over 108 plate appearances. The Halos have used an Oswald Peraza/Adam Frazier platoon at second base but could get Peraza more work at the hot corner if Grissom doesn’t pick back up.
Orioles Outright Jose Espada
The Orioles announced that right-hander Jose Espada has cleared outright waivers and been assigned to Triple-A Norfolk. He had been designated for assignment earlier this week when the O’s claimed outfielder Michael Siani. This is Espada’s first career outright and he has less than three years of service time, so he doesn’t have the right to elect free agency. He’ll provide the Orioles with some non-roster depth for the time being.
Espada, 29, signed a minor league deal with the O’s in July of 2025. He was added to the 40-man in August and then optioned to the minors, suggesting he probably had some kind of opt-out in that deal. He was called up in September and made one appearance before getting optioned back to Norfolk. He’s had a similar experience so far this year, spending most of it in the minors. He was recalled three times but only made one appearance.
He also made one appearance with the Padres in 2023, so he has three big league appearances on his ledger. He has thrown five scoreless innings in total. A career earned run average of 0.00 is nice but it’s obviously a very small sample. His larger body of work at Triple-A is less impressive. In 65 innings at that level, he has a 4.57 ERA. He has a strong 27.5% strikeout rate in that sample but a worrisome 15.5% walk rate. He mostly throws a mid-90s fastball and mid-80s slider, with a 90ish splitter being his third pitch in terms of usage.
After the 2023 season, the Padres non-tendered Espada, sending him to free agency without needing to put him on waivers. He spent 2024 in Japan, throwing 27 innings for the Yakult Swallows with an ERA of 5.00. He re-signed with the Friars on a minor league deal ahead of 2025 but eventually was released from that pact and signed with the Orioles. Since this is his first time clearing waivers and his service time count is under three years, he has to accept the outright assignment. He will try to improve his control and earn his way back to the majors.
Photo courtesy of Jamie Sabau, Imagn Images
Denzel Clarke Out Beyond All-Star Break With Hamstring Strain
The Athletics announced this evening that center fielder Denzel Clarke suffered a high-grade strain of his left hamstring while playing in a rehab game. The A’s won’t even have a defined return timeline until he’s reevaluated at some point after the All-Star Break.
Clarke sustained the injury on Tuesday with Triple-A Las Vegas. He was working back from a bone bruise in his right foot that had already cost him a month. The hamstring seems to be far more significant, as it’ll be a couple months before they consider a return to play. That all but ensures he won’t be ready for MLB action until at least August.
One of the most talented defensive players in the sport, Clarke has missed most of the past calendar year with injuries. He lost almost all of the 2025 second half with an adductor strain. The injuries have robbed the A’s of their starting center fielder and Clarke of much needed reps to develop at the plate.
The 26-year-old has appeared in 69 games at the big league level. He has struck out 85 times while batting .214/.262/.323 over 219 plate appearances. Clarke has already racked up an impressive highlight reel on the other side of the ball, pulling off multiple home run robberies while grading as one of the top outfielders in MLB. Statcast credits him with 14 Outs Above Average in a little over 500 innings in center field.
Zack Gelof initially handled center field when Clarke went on the injured list in late April. They’ve moved him to third base of late, giving the center field responsibilities to Henry Bolte and Lawrence Butler. The latter hasn’t gotten going in his return from last fall’s patellar tendon procedure. Butler is hitting .174/.273/.265 over 150 plate appearances. Bolte is batting .269 with one double in his first seven MLB games.
The A’s enter play tonight with a 25-24 record that has them narrowly above the Rangers and Mariners in the AL West. It’s unlikely they’ll invest much prospect capital to upgrade center field on the trade market, though they’ll need at least one of Bolte or Butler to get on a roll offensively. They’ll move Clarke to the 60-day injured list the next they need to open a spot on the 40-man roster.
Paul DeJong To Undergo Hamstring Surgery
6:51pm: Jon Heyman of The New York Post reports that DeJong suffered a hamstring injury that’ll require season-ending surgery.
5:45pm: It appears that Paul DeJong, who recently signed a minor league deal with the Tigers, is done for the year. The Triple-A Toledo Mud Hens have placed him on the full-season injured list, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com.
An injury isn’t listed but it’s likely something related to his lower body. DeJong last appeared in a game on May 12th. In that game, he was visibly limping around the bases to score a run, as seen in this clip from Tigers ML Report.
It will unfortunately be a second straight injury-marred season for DeJong. Last year, he missed over two months after a fastball hit him in the face and caused several fractures. He was limited to just 57 games with the Nationals and didn’t perform especially well when he was on the field.
He had to settle for a minor league deal with the Yankees coming into 2026. He hit well for their Triple-A club for a while. He was held back by a .167 batting average on balls in play but hit six home runs in 83 plate appearances, leading to a lopsided .203/.361/.516 line and 123 wRC+.
He opted out of that deal and was able to secure a fresh minor league deal with the Tigers, which was a pretty decent landing spot considering they had some injured infielders. But in just his sixth game with the Mud Hens, he was bitten by the injury bug himself and will apparently miss the remainder of the campaign.
Assuming he can get healthy for the 2027 season, he should be able to secure another minor league deal somewhere. DeJong strikes out a ton but hits home runs and is a solid shortstop defender, with the ability to play other positions as well. Dating back to the start of 2022, he has been punched out in 32.1% of his 1,327 plate appearances but has hit 50 homers in that time.
For the Tigers, as mentioned, they have been dealing with a number of infield injuries. Gleyber Torres, Trey Sweeney and Javier Báez are all on the IL at the moment. Due to those injuries and others, the club went out and added DeJong for extra depth. With DeJong no longer available, that could prompt them to find a way to bring in someone else.
Photo courtesy of Brad Mills, Imagn Images