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Royals Sign Jake Diekman

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The Royals announced Wednesday evening that they’ve signed left-handed reliever Jake Diekman to a one-year contract with a mutual option for the 2020 season. Right-hander Jesse Hahn has been transferred to the 60-day injured list in a corresponding move. MLB.com’s Jeffrey Flanagan reports that Diekman, a client of the Beverly Hills Sports Council, will earn a $2.25MM base salary in 2019, and there’s a $500K buyout on next year’s option, making for a $2.75MM guarantee (Twitter link).

Jake Diekman | Rick Scuteri-USA TODAY Sports

Diekman, 32, has long shown a penchant for missing bats at a lofty rate but also issuing far too many free passes. Dating back to the 2014 season, he’s averaged an impressive 11.2 strikeouts against an unsightly 4.9 walks per nine innings pitched. In that time, Diekman owns a 3.91 ERA in 246 1/3 innings of relief between the Phillies, Rangers and Diamondbacks. He’s handled both lefties (.255/.346/.346) and righties (.204/.320/.337) reasonably well outside of the obvious proclivity for issuing walks.

Last season, Diekman split the year between Texas and Arizona, working to a combined 4.73 ERA with 11.1 K/9, 5.2 BB/9, 0.68 HR/9 and a 47.8 percent ground-ball rate in 53 1/3 innings. That marked the lefty’s first full season back after missing most of the 2017 campaign due to a colectomy procedure that stemmed from ulcerative colitis.

Diekman is the second veteran arm the Royals have added in the past week, joining right-hander Brad Boxberger (a teammate last year in Arizona) as a newcomer to manager Ned Yost’s bullpen. He’ll give Kansas City a much-needed, experienced lefty; prior to this addition, Brian Flynn and Tim Hill were the team’s only southpaw relievers on the 40-man roster.

Diekman and Boxberger will be joined by holdovers Wily Peralta and Kevin McCarthy, at the very least, although the remainder of the relief corps’ composition will be determined in Spring Training. There’s even been talk of utilizing veteran starter Ian Kennedy in relief this season, which underscores the point that Spring Training will be of particular importance in assigning bullpen roles.

While Kansas City technically can control Diekman for the 2020 season, it seems quite likely that this’ll be a pure one-year arrangement. Mutual options are exercised by both parties with the utmost rarity, and the Royals utilize that specific option type regularly as an accounting measure — effectively deferring a portion of free agents’ salaries by a year in doing so.

Beyond that, there’s a good chance that if Diekman pitches well in his new environs, he’ll emerge as a trade chip this summer. Kansas City is fresh off a 58-104 season and has only made some marginal additions as the continue along in a rebuilding process. Diekman netted the Rangers a pair of minor league pitchers last summer and could once again be dangled to contending clubs this June or July if the signing goes according to plan.

Doug Fister Retires

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Veteran right-hander Doug Fister has elected to call it a career after spending parts of 10 seasons in the Majors, agent Page Odle tells Jon Morosi of MLB.com. Fister, 35, received multiple Major League contract offers this winter, according to Odle, but is instead making a “100 percent family-driven” decision to spend time with his wife and two children.

A seventh-round pick of the Mariners back in 2006, Fister ascended to the Majors as a largely unheralded prospect with the Mariners in 2009. After establishing himself as a quality starter over his first 378 frames with the Mariners, Fister was flipped to the Tigers in a 2011 trade deadline deal, where he’d go on to thrive over another three seasons. Fister, in fact, was somewhat quietly one of the game’s better starters from 2011-14, pitching to a 3.11 ERA (129 ERA+) with 6.5 K/9, 1.7 BB/9 and 0.7 HR/9.

A 2015 forearm strain led to diminished velocity and diminished results for Fister, though he managed to make 32 starts for the 2016 Astros and served as a stabilizing force in their rotation. Hip and knee injuries slowed Fister in his most recent run with the Rangers, with the latter of the two issues ultimately ending his season after 66 innings.

All in all, Fister will walk away from his baseball career with a lifetime 83-92 record, a 3.72 ERA, 6.1 K/9 and 2.1 BB/9 in 1422 1/3 big league innings. The towering 6’8″ righty also amassed an impressive postseason resume, tallying 56 2/3 innings of 3.02 ERA ball with a 41-to-17 K/BB ratio in five separate postseasons runs (three with the Tigers, one with the Nats and one with the Red Sox). He made one World Series start, with the Tigers in ’12, where he tossed six innings of one-run ball against the Giants.

Fister earned more than $36MM in player salaries over the life of a career that both Baseball-Reference and Fangraphs value at 20 wins above replacement. Best wishes to the former Tigers, Mariners, Nationals, Astros, Red Sox and Rangers righty in his life beyond baseball.

NL Health Notes: Wieck, Seager, Arrieta, Eickhoff

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Padres lefty Brad Wieck was diagnosed with testicular cancer earlier this year, as AJ Cassavell of MLB.com reports. The 27-year-old hurler went under the knife not long thereafter. Fortunately, the medical prognosis appears to be good, though it’s obviously something that’ll be watched closely by doctors. Though Wieck will be building back to full strength during camp, it seems his outlook on the field also remains promising. He could return to the hill in the next few weeks, it seems, and could again present the team with a MLB option after making his debut during a promising 2018 campaign.

As we send our best wishes to Wieck for a cancer-free future, we’ll cover some other health matters from the National League …

  • President of baseball operations Andrew Friedman says that the Dodgers are quite encouraged by the progress of shortstop Corey Seager in his recovery from Tommy John surgery, Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register reports on Twitter. It’s “a best-case to this point,” in fact, which certainly paints a hopeful picture. Seager went under the knife at the end of April last year, so he’s about ten weeks shy of being a full year removed from the procedure. The hope remains that Seager will be prepared for Opening Day, manager Dave Roberts indicated yesterday (via Jorge Castillo of the Los Angeles Times, on Twitter), though it stands to reason that the club will take a cautious path before fully unleashing the young star.
  • Phillies starter Jake Arrieta underwent a meniscus procedure on his left knee about a month back, manager Gabe Kapler told reporters including Scott Lauber of the Philadelphia Inquirer (Twitter link). The surgery, which addressed an injury that occurred during the offseason, does not appear to be a major concern, with Kapler saying the expectation is for Arrieta to be ready for the start of the season. Still, the hope was that the veteran righty, who’ll soon turn 33, would be at full health and focused on finding improvements after his ERA rose for the third-straight season.
  • Meanwhile, the Phillies are holding their collective breath on fellow righty Jerad Eickhoff. As Kapler explains, and Lauber tweets, Eickhoff has again experienced symptoms relating to the carpal tunnel issues that led to surgery last season. While another procedure isn’t on the table at present, it’s another suboptimal situation. The 28-year-old has shown quite a bit of talent, but is looking to bounce back after missing almost all of the 2018 campaign.

Cardinals May Consider Utilizing Carlos Martinez In Bullpen

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While he’ll unquestionably enter camp as a starter, Carlos Martinez may well end up in the bullpen, MLB.com’s Jenifer Langosch reports.

Martinez ended the 2018 season in a relief role, though that decision was driven by the practical fact that he did not have time to work fully back from a shoulder injury. Though he (rather unsurprisingly) pitched well out of the pen, the stated plan was to slide Martinez back into the rotation.

Now, with camp opening, there are signals from the Cards’ uniformed staff that Martinez could be seen internally as a late-inning relief asset. Pitching coach Mike Maddux, in particular, dropped a few winks at the possibility, saying he “liked [Martinez] out of the bullpen a lot.”

“Right now, Carlos is in the rotation, but that’s the great thing about the flexibility we have,” said Maddux. “You might be a starter in Spring Training, but you might end up in the bullpen or something like that.”

While he wasn’t quite as suggestive, skipper Mike Shildt also wasn’t shy about acknowledging the possibility of Martinez returning to the relief unit. He emphasized that Martinez is “expected to be a starter,” but in the same breath made clear that “he is a piece that could transition to the bullpen.”

“The thing we like about Carlos is the flexibility that he can bring, and his effectiveness in both roles,” Schildt also said. “So as you look at your total team and what it looks like, you always want to have the option or the availability to know that there is flexibility.”

Those comments obviously don’t represent anything approaching a clear indication that the Cardinals actually intend to bump Martinez to the pen. Still, that’s an awful lot of discussion of the possibility at the outset of camp. Both Maddux and Schildt expressed openness, if not more, to a reprisal of Martinez’s late-2018 role.

We’ll see how things turn out, but a permanent change of job titles would be a significant development. Martinez has had plenty of success as a starter and would surely have greater potential value in that role. He’s one of the highest-upside hurlers in a starting mix that has quite a lot of talent but also some real uncertainties. Martinez is also already being paid close to top dollar for a reliever, with three years and $34.5MM left on his extension. That deal’s option-year price tags ($17MM and $18MM) seem much likelier to be appealing if Martinez is working from the rotation.

Bauer, Cole, Wood Win Arbitration Cases

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The players may be suffering through a winter of discontent in the free agent market, but they have now scored some notable wins in arbitration. Trevor Bauer of the Indians, Gerrit Cole of the Astros, and Alex Wood of the Reds have all been awarded the contract values they sought by their respective arbitration panels, per ESPN.com’s Jeff Passan (Twitter link).

Bauer will take home $13MM, a full $2MM more than the Indians had sought to pay him. Cole’s $13.5MM salary was about the same amount higher than the Astros’ $11.425MM filing figure. And Wood secures a $9.65MM payday that tops the $8.7MM the Reds defended.

[RELATED: MLBTR Arbitration Tracker]

Those cases break what had been a tie in arb hearings. The players already had a solid edge in the more significant cases, with Blake Treinen ($6.4MM vs. $5.6MM), Carlos Correa ($5MM vs. $4.25MM), and Tommy Pham ($4.1MM vs. $3.5MM) all coming out ahead while Kyle Barraclough ($2MM vs. $1.725MM), Michael Taylor ($3.5MM vs. $3.25MM), and Ryan Tepera ($1.8MM vs. $1.525MM) lost smaller-value contests.

In coming away with wins, all three of the starters also managed to top their projected earning power from MLBTR and Matt Swartz. Bauer ($11.6MM), Cole ($13.0MM), and Wood ($9.0MM) had projected in range of what they ultimately earned, but took shots on securing bigger paydays by making their cases to panels.

Bauer’s situation is particularly noteworthy, since he won a previous arb hearing and remains eligible for one more trip through the process after the 2019 season. This time last year, Bauer emerged with a $6.525MM salary rather than the $5.3MM the team proposed. That made him $1.225MM richer this time around as well, since his raise was dropped on top of a greater starting point. The same will hold true next year.

That serves to illustrate how important these cases can be to an individual player. But there’s also a broader market significance. Each data point that trends north can be cited by another player in the future, either in seeking a bigger arb number or in negotiating out the terms of an extension.

Yankees Have Discussed Extension With Luis Severino

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The Yankees have held at least some extension talks with young righty Luis Severino, according to Jon Heyman of MLB Network (Twitter link). Whether a deal is likely, though, is not yet clear.

For the time being, Severino remains scheduled to participate in an arbitration hearing to determine his salary for the 2019 season. He filed at $5.25MM, with the team countering at $4.4MM. It’s not an especially high-stakes hearing, then, though setting a high mark in his Super Two year would set up Severino for greater future earnings.

It’s a different situation, then, from that which faced Aaron Nola and the Phillies before they hammered out a long-term deal today. In that case, a hefty $2.2MM spread in arb positions left significant risk on both sides. They ultimately settled for a four-year, $45MM deal that gives the team one option year.

Interestingly, the Yanks’ filing number on Severino sits just below the figure the Phillies would have defended ($4.5MM) on Nola, despite the fact that the Philadelphia hurler has a much more compelling statistical case and was in the 3+ service class. It seems the Yanks and Severino are closer to the same page as a starting point, not that it necessarily spells a greater likelihood for a long-term deal.

The Nola contract does not necessarily bear directly on Severino’s case, given the service differences, but it does represent a notable market marker. Certainly, that new deal does not break significant new ground. It’d be curious, at least, to see Severino secure a stronger deal than Nola with one season longer to go before he’s a free agent, though it’s entirely unclear what terms are being discussed at present. Gio Gonzalez (five years, $42MM, two options) still holds the high-water mark for a Super Two starter.

Phillies Extend Aaron Nola

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The Phillies have officially reached a long-term deal with star righty Aaron Nola. The contract, which forestalls an arbitration hearing and expands the team’s control rights over its best pitcher, is said to be a four-year, $45MM deal that includes a club option.

Nola, a client of Paragon Sports, will receive a $2MM signing bonus and $4MM salary for the coming season. He’ll then earn successive salaries of $8MM, $11.75MM, and $15MM. The 2023 option is valued at $16MM and includes a $4.25MM buyout. Nola’s 2022 salary and 2023 option value will reportedly each increase by $1MM for each Cy Young win he secures, by $500K for a second-place finish and by $250K for finishing third through fifth in Cy Young voting.

Ultimately, then, the Phillies can control five future seasons of Nola, including 2019, at a total outlay of just $56.75MM (or perhaps a bit more, depending on Cy Young finishes). Nola gives up two would-be free agent campaigns in the deal. He had been nearing a hearing to determine his first-year arbitration salary, with his side filing at $6.7MM and the club countering at $4.5MM.

Now 25, Nola originally came to the Phillies organization as the seventh overall pick of the 2014 draft. He has rewarded the club handsomely for that selection, having already thrown 569 innings of 3.35 ERA ball at the game’s highest level while maintaining 9.4 K/9 and 2.5 BB/9 along with a 50.9% groundball rate.

Those shiny peripherals have been there from the outset for Nola, who has been a darling of ERA estimators ever since he took a big league mound. For his career to date, Nola is credited with a 3.24 FIP, 3.29 xFIP, and 3.48 SIERA.

In a sense, then, Nola’s eye-popping 2018 season was more a continuation than a turning point. But his 212 1/3-inning effort was still clearly a coming-out party, as Nola showed he could sustain excellence over a big workload while pitching meaningful innings. His resulting 2.37 ERA would have made him a Cy Young winner in some campaigns, though he settled for a still-impressive third-place finish after Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer both turned in monster seasons.

[RELATED: MLBTR Extension Tracker]

The obvious comp for this extension is the deal reached two years ago between the Cardinals and Carlos Martinez. That agreement included more money, but a lengthier term, for another high-quality, 25-year-old hurler who was nearing a first arbitration hearing. Martinez took home a $51MM guarantee over five years, while giving the Cards successive $17MM and $18MM options with a cumulative $1MM buyout, meaning his deal would top out at seven seasons and $85MM.

Nola’s camp probably prefers his deal to Martinez’s, which set a high-water mark for arb1 pitcher extensions but did give away two additional seasons of control. Still, it’s a bit of a surprise to see that Nola did not break new ground in earnings, particularly since he secured a significant initial draft bonus in addition to already having one season of arb salary (nearly) in hand. Even if he ended up losing the hearing and suffering a major injury this spring, he’d profile as an easy 2020 tender candidate. The recent experience of Garrett Richards — who has thrown just 138 2/3 innings over the past three seasons and is rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, yet earned over $20MM in his final three arb years and then signed for $15.5MM in free agency — shows that teams will pay big money to hang onto the upside of top arms. Nola’s downside was limited, even in the event of a catastrophic injury. In terms of upside scenarios, the tepid free agent market is perhaps a factor, but team squeamishness toward long-term deals did not prevent Patrick Corbin from landing six years and $140MM — due in no small part to the fact that he hit the open market at 29 years of age.

If the option is indeed picked up, Nola will stand to reach free agency in advance of his age-31 campaign. He’d certainly still have ample earning capacity at that point, though leaving two prospective free agent campaigns in the hands of the Phils unquestionably removes some of the highest-upside contract scenarios. Of course, chasing the biggest imaginable guarantee certainly isn’t the top priority for every player, and it’s not hard to see how this contract serves Nola’s own interests as well — particularly since he did deal with a worrying forearm strain not long ago.

Whatever one thinks of the deal from the player’s perspective, it seems to be an easy risk for the big-budget Phillies to take. The Martinez experience does show some of the downside risks at play, as his injuries would have tamped down his arb earnings and do cloud his future, though he’s still a talented and youthful pitcher with ample promise. Locking up Nola comes with its own risks, but loads of upside as well.

It’s notable in this case that the sides had such a wide spread in their arb filing numbers. That had set up an important hearing decision, with Nola seeking to step in not far below Dallas Keuchel’s record $7.25MM salary and the Phils defending something closer to the longstanding ceiling for first-time eligible pitchers (the 2006 Dontrelle Willis salary of $4.35MM). MLBTR projected a $6.6MM salary for Nola, though the team obviously felt comfortable with its aggressively low stance and the panel would have been forced to pick one of the two filing numbers. That left plenty of risk for Nola; the $2.2MM gap, after all, would also have been reflected in his prospective arb2 and arb3 salaries.

On the team’s side, though, the deal forecloses the greater earning situation. Had Nola landed the $6.7MM he asked for, and then turned in two more seasons in range of his career norms, he easily could have cleared $30MM in arbitration earnings and might well have done quite a bit more than that. deGrom’s other-worldly campaign scored him a record-setting $9.6MM year-over-year raise; expecting anything on that order would be foolish, of course, but that number shows the magnitude of potential earnings.

Of greater importance than controlling Nola’s arbitration earnings is the acquisition of control rights over two more seasons, his age-29 and age-30 campaigns. Had Nola hit the open market after his arb time ran out, he might well have commanded a huge and lengthy deal — with any acquiring team interested especially in capturing his remaining prime years. Doing a contract now allows the Phillies to hang onto those seasons for a relatively low price and without any need to promise Nola money well into his thirties.

Ken Rosenthal and Matt Gelb of The Athletic first reported the deal (Twitter link). Jeff Passan of ESPN.com tweeted the contract breakdown. The Athletic’s Jayson Stark reported the contract’s escalator clauses.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Athletics To Sign Robbie Grossman

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The Athletics have agreed to a one-year contract with outfielder Robbie Grossman, per Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (Twitter link). It’s a major-league deal that lands in the $2MM range and also comes with some incentives, per Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle.

Grossman, a 29-year-old switch-hitter, was non-tendered by the Twins last fall after projecting to earn $4.0MM. He has turned in above-average offensive numbers for the Twins, though hasn’t replicated his breakout 2016 effort in the ensuing two campaigns.

The calling card here is on-base ability. Through over two thousand plate appearances, Grossman carries a .355 OBP. He has boosted that mark up to .371 over the past three years. While he delivers little in the way of power (.122 ISO), Grossman has walked at a 12.8% lifetime clip.

Grossman doesn’t shine as an outfield defender, earning mostly slightly below-average grades from advanced metrics. He doesn’t add value on the bases; in fact, he was panned for his efforts on foot in 2018 (-4.8 BsR).

Clearly, then, the interest here for the A’s is in picking up Grossman’s ability to get aboard. He’ll presumably function mostly as a reserve outfielder, with Khris Davis taking up the DH slot. Grossman has been particularly effective against left-handed pitching in his career.

Giants Acquire Trevor Gott

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The Giants have acquired righty Trevor Gott from the Nationals, per Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (via Twitter). Cash considerations are headed to D.C. in return. The Giants placed injured righty Johnny Cueto on the 60-day injured list to make roster space.

Gott was designated for assignment recently by the Nationals. The hard-throwing sinkerballer becomes the latest relief arm to be targeted by the San Francisco organization.

Still just 26 years of age, Gott turned in a highly promising 2015 campaign but has stalled out since heading to the Nationals in the ensuing offseason. All told, he owns a 4.64 ERA with 6.1 K/9 and 3.8 BB/9 in 75 2/3 MLB frames. Gott’s standout pitch is a blistering two-seamer that has enabled him to carry a 54.3% groundball rate in the majors.

Athletics Re-Sign Brett Anderson

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WEDNESDAY: The deal is now official.

TUESDAY: Anderson and the A’s do indeed have an agreement, pending a physical that is slated to take place today, Slusser writes in a full column. ESPN’s Buster Olney tweets that if the medicals check out, Anderson will be guaranteed $1.5MM and can make another $1MM via incentives.

MONDAY: The Athletics are nearing a contract with lefty Brett Anderson, per Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle (Twitter links). Anderson himself tweeted this evening (without divulging the team) that he’s preparing for a physical tomorrow, so that may be all that remains before the agreement is finalized.

It’ll be a MLB deal for Anderson, a client of The Legacy Agency. Financial terms remain unknown at this time.

There have been quite a few ups and downs over the years for the southpaw, who is now 31 years of age. Once a highly promising young hurler in Oakland, Anderson has often been effective on the mound but has dealt with countless injuries, particularly to his back. All told, he has made about half of the starts he might have over his decade in the majors.

Last year came with a typical blend of positives and setbacks. Anderson dominated at Triple-A to earn his way back to the A’s staff, missed some time with a shoulder injury, and ultimately turned in 80 1/3 innings of 4.48 ERA ball over 17 starts in the big leagues.

As usual, Anderson turned in underwhelming strikeout numbers, with just 5.3 per nine in 2018. He made up for that by drawing grounders on 55.6% of the balls opposing hitters put in play, his highest rate since his last full season of 2015, and by allowing a personal-low 1.5 walks per nine. Statcast actually felt Anderson was a bit unfortunate, as it valued him with a .338 wOBA-against but a .318 xwOBA-against. ERA estimators valued Anderson as a solid back-of-the-rotation performer (4.17 FIP, 3.91 xFIP, 4.13 SIERA).

There’s a lot to like about that profile on a low-cost, low-risk deal. Clearly, there isn’t much appetite around the game for promising multiple seasons to Anderson, given his health history. But for an Oakland org that is still looking to fill out a decent rotation on the cheap, it’s easy to see the appeal.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

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