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Astros Receive PPI Pick For Hunter Brown’s Top Three Cy Young Finish

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The Baseball Writers Association of America is announcing the finalists for the 2025 awards tonight. Astros right-hander Hunter Brown is one of the American League Cy Young finalists, alongside Tarik Skubal of the Tigers and Garrett Crochet of the Red Sox. Since Brown was eligible for the Prospect Promotion Incentive, the Astros will receive an extra pick after the first round of the 2026 draft.

The 2022-2026 collective bargaining agreement between MLB and the MLBPA introduced measures to try to reduce service time manipulation. Previously, teams would often hold their top prospects down in the minors until a few weeks into the start of a season, thus gaining an extra year of club control over the player.

Under the new CBA, if a player is on two of the three top 100 prospect lists from Baseball America, ESPN and MLB Pipeline, then his club promotes him early enough in a season to earn a full service year, that player becomes PPI eligible. If the player wins Rookie of the Year or finishes in the top three of Cy Young or MVP voting in his pre-arbitration seasons, he earns the club an extra draft pick. Each player can only earn a club one extra pick total.

Brown got called up to the majors late in 2022 but maintained rookie status going into the following season, featuring prominently on top prospect lists. The Astros haven’t optioned him to the minors since then, so he’s been a mainstay on their roster for the past three full seasons. By being up for the full 2023 season, he became PPI eligible.

He has been PPI-eligible for the past three years but he didn’t receive any awards votes in 2023 or 2024. Here in 2025, he made 31 starts for Houston, logging 185 1/3 innings. He allowed only 2.43 earned runs per nine. His 28.3% strikeout rate, 7.8% walk rate and 48.1% ground ball rate were all above average.

He will likely finish third in the voting behind Skubal and Crochet but it’s enough for the Astros to get a bonus pick in 2026. That’s a nice bonus for them, as the club’s farm system isn’t especially well regarded at the moment.

Julio Rodríguez, Corbin Carroll and Gunnar Henderson each earned their clubs bonus picks by winning Rookie of the Year. Bobby Witt Jr. didn’t win Rookie of the Year but earned the Royals an extra pick by finishing in the top three of MVP voting in 2024. Drake Baldwin is a finalist for National League Rookie of the Year in 2025 and can net Atlanta an extra pick if he ultimately wins the award.

Photo courtesy of William Purnell, Imagn Images

Hall Of Fame Announces Eight Names On Era Committee Ballot

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Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Carlos Delgado, Jeff Kent, Don Mattingly, Dale Murphy, Gary Sheffield, and Fernando Valenzuela were revealed today by the Hall of Fame as this year’s candidates on the Era Committee ballot. Previously called the Veterans Committee, a panel made up of 16 former players, executives, sportswriters, and historians from around the game will meet during this year’s Winter Meetings to vote on whether or not these eight players will be elected into the Hall of Fame. At least 12 of those 16 votes are needed to be inducted into Cooperstown, and the results of this year’s vote will be revealed at 6:30pm CT on December 7.

The Era Committee rotates between three pools of candidates every year. The “Contemporary Baseball Era” is split into two pools, one for players from 1980 to the present and one for executives, managers, and umpires from that same period. A third pool is made up of all individuals from the “Classic Baseball Era,” which covers everything from before 1980. This year’s pool is littered with recent stars who should be household names for the majority of baseball fans. Bonds, Clemens, Kent, and Sheffield in particular fell off the BBWAA Hall of Fame ballot only in the past few years. This process is separate from the BBWAA ballot, where Carlos Beltran looks like the likeliest candidate to be inducted into Cooperstown this winter after garnering 70.3% of the vote in 2025.

The Hall of Fame tweaked the Era Committee eligibility rules earlier this year. Starting with this year’s class, any candidate who falls short of five votes will be ineligible for consideration during their era’s next cycle. Candidates who receive fewer than five votes multiple times will be made permanently ineligible for future consideration. The change is not retroactive, so it will not impact any previous candidates.

The last Contemporary Era players ballot saw the unanimous election of Fred McGriff in 2022. Half of the candidates from that pool (Bonds, Clemens, Mattingly, and Murphy) will get another shot this year. Curt Schilling, Rafael Palmeiro, and Albert Belle were dropped off the ballot. With many of the names mentioned in this post, the players would have been elected long ago just based on statistics, but connections to steroid use have complicated the process.

Bonds received 66% of the votes in his final BBWAA ballot in 2022. Clemens also came up short that year, getting 65.2% of the vote. Kent got 46.5% of the vote in 2023, his final year of eligibility. Sheffield fell off the ballot after 2024, when he received 63.9% of the vote. Delgado was a one-and-done in 2015 when he received just 3.8% of the vote. Valenzuela was only on the ballot two years, getting 6.2% of the vote in 2003 and then 3.8% in 2004. Mattingly’s last season on the writers’ ballot was 2015, though he has been considered by the Veterans Committee three times since. Murphy has also been considered by the Veterans Committee three previous times, with his last year on the writers’ ballot being 2013.

Cody Ponce Has Drawn Interest From MLB Teams

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Former MLB pitcher Cody Ponce is generating interest from MLB clubs after a dominant season in the KBO. Francys Romero reports that numerous teams have scouted the right-hander over the course of the 2025 season.

Ponce, 31, was Milwaukee’s second-round pick in 2015. Four years later, the Brewers flipped him to the Pirates ahead of the deadline in exchange for Jordan Lyles. After five seasons in the minors, Ponce made his MLB debut for Pittsburgh in 2020, and from 2020-21, he appeared in 20 games (five starts) at the big league level, pitching to a 5.86 ERA and a 4.38 SIERA in 55 1/3 innings. Following the 2021 season, the Pirates released him so he could sign with NPB’s Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters.

Over two seasons with the Fighters, Ponce was solid if unspectacular, making 24 starts with an ERA about 10% higher than league average. The highlight of his tenure with the club was the no-hitter he threw in 2022. Unfortunately, the righty struggled tremendously in 2024 after leaving the Fighters and signing with the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles. Although he improved his strikeout-to-walk ratio, his groundball rate fell by about five percentage points, and he pitched to a 6.72 ERA in 15 games (12 starts). Some of that was surely the result of bad luck – his .382 BABIP was 20 points higher than that of any other NPB pitcher (min. 50 IP) in any of the previous five seasons – but nonetheless, he ended up spending almost as much of the season with the Golden Eagles’ farm team as he did with the NPB club.

In 2025, Ponce opted for a fresh start in South Korea, leaving the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles to sign with the Hanwha Eagles. His move to the KBO turned out to be just what he needed. Over 29 starts and 180 2/3 innings, the 6-foot-6 right-hander pitched to a league-leading 1.89 ERA. Ponce set the KBO single-season record with 252 strikeouts and also set a new single-game record in the KBO by punching out 18 opponents. Ponce’s velocity has taken a notable step forward. After sitting 93.2 mph with his heater back in 2020-21, he now sits 94-98 mph and has added a kick changeup that wasn’t part of his repertoire during his MLB run.

Ponce also finished tied for the KBO lead in wins, securing the Triple Crown as he led the Eagles to an 83-57-4 record in the regular season – and an appearance in the Korean Series. His stellar performance earned him the Choi Dong-won Award, given annually to the best starting pitcher in the league.

The last two winners of the Choi Dong-won Award, Erick Fedde (2023) and Kyle Hart (2024), both signed guaranteed contracts to return to Major League Baseball after their award-winning seasons in the KBO, so it stands to reason that Ponce could pursue an MLB deal of his own if his goal is to end up closer to home. While he struggled during his brief stint with the Pirates, that was a 55-inning sample from five seasons back.

Ponce’s stuff has since ticked up, and his more recent accomplishments against NPB and KBO hitters could certainly convince a team to look past the reasons the Pirates released him all those years ago. Ponce throws harder and misses bats at a higher rate than either Fedde or Hart did during their time in South Korea. If Ponce indeed opts for a return to North American ball, a multi-year deal — perhaps even one topping Fedde’s $15MM with the White Sox — shouldn’t come as a major surprise.

Brewers Exercise Option On Freddy Peralta; Brandon Woodruff Declines Option

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The Brewers announced several roster moves on Monday. The team picked up the $8MM option on righty Freddy Peralta. Right-hander Brandon Woodruff declined his mutual option, while Milwaukee has declined its end of catcher Danny Jansen’s mutual option. Righty Coleman Crow has been added to the 40-man roster.

Peralta agreed to a five-year, $15.5MM extension ahead of the 2020 season. The deal bought out his remaining years of arbitration and included club options for 2025 and 2026. Milwaukee picked up the $8.1MM option last season and will do so again this year.

The decision to pick up Peralta’s option comes as no surprise after the 29-year-old led the National League in wins and recorded a career-best 2.70 ERA in 2025. He reached career highs in starts (33) and innings (176 2/3) while leading a pitching staff that ranked second in ERA during the regular season.

Peralta began his big-league tenure in a versatile role, bouncing between starting and relieving over his first three seasons. His fastball-led approach generated strikeouts at an elite rate, though he struggled with control. Peralta entered the rotation full-time in 2021. He pitched to a 2.81 ERA over 28 outings and earned his first All-Star bid. Right shoulder inflammation cost Peralta a chunk of 2022, but he’s been healthy since then, topping 30 starts and 165 innings in each of the past three seasons.

Woodruff declined his end of a $20MM mutual option, though the club might’ve done the same given his health struggles in recent years. He had been a fixture in the Milwaukee rotation alongside Peralta, but injuries have limited him to 23 starts since 2023. Shoulder inflammation cost Woodruff three months in 2023 and ultimately led to surgery that offseason. He missed the entire 2024 campaign and the first half of the 2025 season. Woodruff returned in July and delivered a dozen strong starts, posting a 3.20 ERA with an elite 32.3% strikeout rate. His velocity wasn’t at its pre-injury levels, but he was missing bats like he did at his peak.

Unfortunately, Woodruff was bitten by the injury bug once again in September. A lat strain ended his season in late September. The 32-year-old will head into free agency with a solid track record of performance, but a shaky healthy history. The flashes of dominance over this past season, as well as his past success, could be enough to garner a multi-year deal. Woodruff is a two-time All-Star who finished fifth in Cy Young voting in 2021.

Milwaukee acquired Jansen in a July trade with Tampa Bay. He hit well in 25 games with the Brewers, slashing .254/.346/.433. Jansen provided some catching depth for Milwaukee as they tried to ease the defensive load on William Contreras, who was playing through a fractured finger. Contreras has been one of the most durable catchers in the league over recent seasons, so picking up the $12MM option on Jansen likely wasn’t necessary. The Brewers can find a cheaper alternative to fill in for Contreras whenever he hits the bench or serves as DH.

Crow joined the organization in a December 2023 trade that sent Adrian Houser and Tyrone Taylor to the Mets. He posted a strong 2.51 ERA over 10 starts with Double-A Biloxi this year, earning a promotion to Triple-A. He was knocked around in two appearances with the Sounds before going down with a right flexor strain that did not require surgery. Getting added to the 40-man roster today is likely to prevent him from becoming a minor league free agent.

Rockies Have Spoken With Adam Ottavino About Top Front Office Job

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Rockies owner Dick Monfort has spoken with longtime big league reliever Adam Ottavino about the team’s top front office vacancy, reports Tim Healey of The Boston Globe. (That’ll presumably be a general manager but the title could change based on whomever they hire.) Meanwhile, Brittany Ghiroli of The Athletic reports that Guardians’ assistant general manager Matt Forman and Diamondbacks’ AGM Amiel Sawdaye — previously reported to be finalists for the position — are now out of the running.

It’s unclear how seriously the Rockies are considering Ottavino as a candidate to run baseball operations. The 39-year-old not only has no front office experience of any kind, he’s still technically an active player. Ottavino pitched in the majors with the Yankees as recently as this past April. He made three appearances before electing free agency. He spent the rest of the season as a free agent but has not officially announced his retirement.

Ottavino has long been expected to find a front office or coaching role once he concluded his playing career. He was well-versed in using analytics as a pitching development tool. He’s also media savvy and has frequently appeared as a guest analyst on the MLB Network over the offseason. Still, it’d be shocking if a team hired him as their top decision-maker before he gets any kind of post-playing experience.

The Rockies have been one of the sport’s most insular organizations with front office and coaching hirings. They’ve already announced that they would not promote from within this time around. Ottavino would be an outside-the-box hire, but he also has close ties to the franchise and to Monfort. He has spent almost half of his MLB career in Denver. He posted a 3.41 earned run average over 361 appearances with the Rockies between 2012-18.

Ottavino is personally familiar with the challenges of pitching (and succeeding) at Coors Field. He discussed exactly that in an MLB Network appearance in May. It makes sense that the Rockies would want him in a front office role of some kind, yet a GM hire would obviously be a massive amount of responsibility.

There doesn’t appear to be a clear timetable for the Rockies to install anyone at the top of baseball operations. Forman and Sawdaye were the only two known remaining candidates coming into today. Ghiroli writes that they were indeed the only two finalists as of last week. It seems they’re now branching back out.

Tyler O’Neill Declines Opt-Out Chance; Orioles Decline Jorge Mateo’s Club Option

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Outfielder Tyler O’Neill is staying in Baltimore. He could have opted out of the final two years of his contract, walking away from $33MM, but Andy Kostka of The Baltimore Banner reports that he will forgo that chance and stay with the Orioles. In other Baltimore contract news, Francys Romero of BeisbolFR reports that the club will turn down their $5.5MM club option on infielder/outfielder Jorge Mateo, who will become a free agent.

Neither decision is a major surprise. O’Neill, 31 in June, signed a three-year, $49.5MM deal with the O’s last winter, with that deal giving him a chance to opt out after the first season. At the time, he was coming off a solid 31-homer season with the Red Sox. However, he had a lengthy injury history. The deal was hopefully going to give the O’s a potent bat while O’Neill could return to the open market if he had a healthy and productive season.

It did not work out as hoped. O’Neill had multiple IL stints due to neck, shoulder and wrist injuries. He only got into 54 games and put up a dismal .199/.292/.392 line in those. After that performance, he wasn’t going to top $33MM, so he’ll stay with the O’s for another two seasons.

Baltimore’s outfield picture should look different next year, as they traded Cedric Mullins and Ramón Laureano at the deadline. Going into next year, O’Neill is in the mix for playing time alongside Colton Cowser, Dylan Beavers, Jeremiah Jackson and others. It’s also possible the Orioles give O’Neill lots of time as the designated hitter to keep him off the IL, though they also might want to have catchers Adley Rutschman and Samuel Basallo sharing the DH spot. Basallo can play first but the O’s also have Coby Mayo and Ryan Mountcastle in the mix there, unless Mountcastle is traded or non-tendered.

Mateo, 31 in June, has been with the O’s since 2021. He’s never been much of a hitter but has been a useful bench/utility piece thanks to his ability to steal bases and play multiple positions. 2025 was his final year of arbitration. He and the O’s avoided arb by agreeing to a $3.55MM salary with a $5.5MM club option for 2026.

However, 2025 was mostly a lost season for Mateo. He underwent left elbow surgery in August of 2024. Inflammation in that elbow put him back on the shelf in June of this year. While on a rehab assignment in July, he suffered a hamstring strain that kept him out of action until September.

Around all those injuries, Mateo got into 43 games and hit .177/.217/.266, so the O’s have made the easy decision to move on. He’ll become a free agent for the first time in his career. The O’s could bring him back at a lower price point or even on a minor league deal. Other clubs might also be interested in him as a depth add on a minor league pact or a modest big league deal for a utility role.

Photo courtesy of James A. Pittman, Imagn Images

Lucas Giolito Declines Mutual Option

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Red Sox right-hander Lucas Giolito has declined his end of a $19MM mutual option, reports Alex Speier of the Boston Globe. He’ll be paid a $1.5MM buyout and return to the open market in search of a new opportunity. The Red Sox will have the right to make him a $22.025MM qualifying offer, as Giolito has not previously received a QO in his career.

Giolito signed a two-year, $38.5MM deal with the Red Sox on the heels of a disappointing platform with the White Sox. He’d posted excellent results from 2019-21 and cemented himself as one of the sport’s most durable starters before logging back-to-back ERAs near 5.00 in 2022-23. Giolito, 32 next July, had hoped to bounce back in Boston and take an opt-out in his contract last offseason.

Instead, the clock struck midnight on the durable right-hander’s arm. He tore the UCL in his pitching elbow during spring training 2024 and didn’t pitch a single inning inning that year. Giolito naturally forwent the opt-out in his contract and returned to Boston for the 2025 season. He stumbled out of the gate, struggling so badly that for a few starts it looked like his entire two-year contract would go down as a bust. By early June, he had an ERA north of 6.00 through seven starts.

Giolito rebounded in terrific fashion, however. Beginning with six shutout innings against the Rays on June 10, he took off on an extended hot streak. From June 10 through season’s end, Giolito posted a 2.51 ERA in 111 1/3 innings. His 20.3% strikeout rate and 9.7% walk rate in that stretch were both worse than average, and his .244 average on balls in play showed plenty of good fortune. Even with some expected regression in his ERA, Giolito looked like a solid mid-rotation starter who’d take a place in Boston’s postseason rotation — at least until the next roadblock arose.

On Sept. 29, manager Alex Cora announced that Giolito was dealing with an elbow issue and would not be on the team’s roster in the Wild Card round of postseason play. The next day, the team indicated that Giolito was unlikely to return at all in 2025, regardless of how deep the Sox advanced in the postseason field. While his surgically repaired UCL was intact, the veteran righty was hobbled by flexor irritation and a bone issue in his elbow.

The Sox had a $14MM club option on Giolito for the 2026 season that they might still have exercised even after the elbow troubles, but when he completed his 140th frame of the season — Giolito totaled 145 innings overall — that option vested instead as a $19MM mutual option. Players tend to make the first call with regard to mutual options, and Giolito is seemingly confident enough in his health that he’ll turn down a net $17.5MM to once again test free agency.

His decision to decline the mutual option also forces the Red Sox into a decision on whether to issue a qualifying offer. They exceeded the luxury tax line in 2025, so they’d only net a compensatory pick after the fourth round of the 2026 draft if Giolito declined and signed elsewhere. That minimal compensation, coupled with more elbow troubles for Giolito, might be enough for the Sox to forgo extending a QO in the first place. If they do, however, Giolito will again have a decision to make — this time on a sum that clocks in a bit over $3MM north of his prior option price. Add in the buyout he’s owed for declining, and a QO could at least net him $4.525MM over the value of the option he declined today.

With Giolito headed toward the market — or at least somewhat up in the air — the Sox project for a rotation including Garrett Crochet, Brayan Bello and a handful of question marks. Top prospects Payton Tolle and Connelly Early impressed late in the season but only have a handful of MLB starts between them. Kutter Crawford missed the entire season due to knee and wrist injuries (the latter of which required surgery). Patrick Sandoval didn’t pitch in 2025 after signing a two-year deal on the heels of his 2024 UCL procedure, but he’ll be in the mix next year. Tanner Houck had Tommy John surgery in August and is likely a nonfactor in 2026.

Given all the uncertainty in the ’pen, the Sox are expected to pursue rotation help this winter. That could include a reunion with Giolito, but there are plenty of options for them to peruse on both the free agent and trade markets.

Ha-Seong Kim Opts Out Of Braves Deal

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Middle infielder Ha-Seong Kim is opting out of his deal with the Braves, reports Jon Heyman of The New York Post. He passes on a $16MM salary to return to the open market.

It’s a disappointing but not entirely unexpected development for Atlanta. The Braves claimed Kim off waivers from the Rays at the beginning of September. They weren’t competing but hoped to lock in their starting shortstop for the ’26 season. They instead wound up taking on the remaining $2MM of Kim’s 2025 salary for the final month of a lost season.

Maybe that’ll still turn out to be a worthwhile decision. President of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos said in September he hoped that getting Kim acclimated with the Atlanta organization and clubhouse would give them a leg up even if the infielder decided to head back to free agency. They’ll certainly make an effort to bring him back, but Nick Allen is atop the depth chart at shortstop for the time being.

For the second straight winter, Kim hits free agency with significant questions. He had an outside shot at a nine-figure deal over the 2024-25 offseason until he suffered a labrum tear in his right shoulder in August. Kim required season-ending surgery, leading the Padres to decline to issue him a qualifying offer. He signed a two-year deal with the Rays that guaranteed $29MM and allowed him to retest the market after one year.

Kim’s rehab from the shoulder procedure carried into July. He’d wind up going back on the injured list twice more as he battled lower back issues. Those stints were brief, but his time in Tampa Bay consisted of 24 games with a .214/.290/.321 batting line. It’s certainly not what the Rays wanted for what amounted to nearly $11MM on their part. They were happy to shed the contract in the final month, getting them off the hook for the ’26 option.

The brief stint in Atlanta was a little more encouraging. Kim played 24 games with the Braves. He hit three homers with a .253/.316/.368 slash in 98 trips to the plate. That included a 10-game hit streak in the middle of September, though he recorded only two hits in 25 plate appearances in the final week of the season. He concluded with a .234/.304/.345 line across 191 trips to the plate.

Kim’s camp nevertheless feels he’ll be able to find a multi-year contract that is preferable to the $16MM option. They’ll be aided by the lack of middle infield alternatives on the open market. Assuming Trevor Story doesn’t opt out of the two years and $55MM remaining on his contract with Boston, Kim would be the second-best free agent shortstop after Bo Bichette.

He’ll hit the market without any draft compensation, as the Braves are not permitted to make a qualifying offer because he changed teams midseason. Kim could try to max out on a three-year deal or look for another two-year pact with an opt-out similar to the one he got from Tampa Bay. His old team in San Diego could look for a shortstop to push Xander Bogaerts back to second base. The Giants, Tigers, Royals, Pirates and Brewers are other clubs that look for help at one or both middle infield positions.

Wandy Peralta Will Not Opt Out Of Padres Deal

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Veteran reliever Wandy Peralta will forgo the opt-out in his contract, reports Annie Heilbrunn of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Peralta’s four-year, $16.5MM contract contained opt-out opportunities after each season. He’s exercising a $4.45MM player option for the 2026 season and will have one final player option for the same amount next offseason.

Peralta effectively has two years and $8.9MM remaining on his contract, with an opt-out at the midway point. He might’ve had a chance to beat that in free agency on the back of a 3.14 ERA in a career-high 71 2/3 innings, but it’s far from a sure thing. The 34-year-old doesn’t exactly have age on his side, and this year’s 20.1% strikeout rate and 9.6% walk rate were both a fair bit worse than the league average.

Peralta still throws hard, sitting 95-96 mph with his sinker, and piles up grounders at a near-60% clip, but he’s worked primarily in low- and medium-leverage spot since signing with San Diego. He’ll stay put and once again be a heavily used piece of the Friars’ bullpen picture.

The Padres boast a deep bullpen, headlined by deadline acquisition Mason Miller. Closer Robert Suarez opted out of the remaining two years on his contract earlier today. Assuming they keep Miller in the ’pen — they’ve reportedly at least considered moving him into the rotation — he’ll be supported by Peralta, Adrian Morejon, Jeremiah Estrada and standout rookie David Morgan. The Padres will have a notable decision to make on excellent setup man Jason Adam, who is projected for a $6.8MM salary in arbitration but suffered a ruptured quadriceps tendon in September, which required season-ending surgery.

Lourdes Gurriel Jr. Exercises Player Option

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Outfielder Lourdes Gurriel Jr. has triggered his player option, per Francys Romero of BeisbolFR. Gurriel will return to the Diamondbacks next year and will make a $13MM salary. His deal also contains a $14MM club option for 2027 with a $5MM buyout, so he’d have to have topped $18MM in free agency to come out ahead in an opt-out scenario. Given that Gurriel tore his ACL in early September and is staring down a recovery period of nine or ten months, there’s no way that was going to happen.

As such, Gurriel will return for what’ll be a fourth season in Arizona. The former Jays outfielder was traded to the D-backs prior to the 2023 season, his final year of contractual control, and returned to the Snakes on a three-year, $42MM deal with an opt-out. He had a solid 2024 showing and a lackluster 2025 campaign prior to his injury. Overall, in three seasons as a Diamondback, Gurriel has taken 1691 turns at the plate and logged a .263/.309/.439 batting line (103 wRC+) with 61 homers, 81 doubles, six triples and 22 steals (in 27 attempts). He won’t be an option for them until next summer, based on the provided timetable for his recovery.

With Gurriel on the shelf to begin the year, Arizona’s outfield mix includes Corbin Carroll, Alek Thomas, Jake McCarthy and Blaze Alexander. McCarthy is a non-tender candidate, and Thomas stands as a change-of-scenery candidate after part of four underwhelming seasons for the former top prospect. The Snakes have been getting longtime infield prospect Jordan Lawlar some reps in center field, and he could be considered for outfield work next year as a result.

Of course, the Diamondbacks will be on the lookout for some outfield additions this winter as well. Starting pitching and bullpen help will presumably be a larger focus, but the struggles of McCarthy and Thomas, coupled with Gurriel’s injury, create enough uncertainty that some external help feels all but certain.

Looking longer-term, if Gurriel returns to form whenever he’s reinstated next summer, he’ll have the chance to set himself up for a fifth year in Phoenix. The $5MM buyout on that $14MM option makes it a net $9MM decision for the team. That’s an affordable rate if Gurriel can approximate the .276/.322/.442 batting line he posted in 540 games between Toronto and Arizona from 2021-24.

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