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Royals Hire Ned Yost As Senior Advisor

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The Royals announced this afternoon that they’ve hired Ned Yost as a senior advisor to general manager JJ Picollo. Yost, the winningest manager in franchise history, returns to the organization six years after retiring as skipper.

“My deep love for the Royals, for Kansas City and for the people there never left,” the 69-year-old said in a press release. “So I just want to help, because I know I can help. I know what it takes to build a world championship club, and I think we’re getting close. I think we’re getting really close.”

Yost managed the Royals between 2010-19. His 10-year tenure is by far the longest of any manager in organizational history. While the team was in a rebuild at the bookends of that run, Yost guided them to consecutive pennants in 2014-15. He joined Dick Howser as the only skippers to lead the Royals to a title when they won the World Series in 2015. Yost finished with a 746-839 record. The Royals inducted him to their team Hall of Fame late in the ’23 season.

“Our fans remember Ned’s leadership helping produce some of the best moments in Royals history,” Picollo said. “He knows what winning a World Series here takes because he’s helped make it happen, and his experience both as a leader and with young players will help us make better decisions and keep pushing toward another championship.“

Mets Keeping Jose Butto In Relief

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The Mets are keeping José Buttó in a multi-inning relief role, skipper Carlos Mendoza told reporters (including Newsday’s Tim Healey). Righty Tylor Megill will stay stretched out as a starter and compete for a rotation spot in camp.

Buttó opened last season in the rotation. He started seven games and managed decent results, working to a 3.08 ERA across 38 innings. Buttó’s command was worrisome, though, as he walked nearly 14% of opposing hitters. New York optioned him to Triple-A in the middle of May. He started eight games and turned in a 3.05 ERA before being recalled at the beginning of July.

Upon his return to the majors, Buttó worked exclusively in relief. He was a quality bullpen piece for the season’s final few months. Buttó allowed only two earned runs per nine with an excellent 29.7% strikeout percentage over 36 frames. His walk rate remained elevated at a 12.3% clip. It’s difficult to stick as a starter with that kind of command, so it’s not especially surprising that the Mets will keep Buttó in a 2-3 inning role.

New York is likely to run a six-man starting staff. Kodai Senga, Sean Manaea, David Peterson, Frankie Montas and bullpen conversion Clay Holmes will be in the Opening Day rotation if healthy. The sixth spot could involve a camp battle between Megill, Paul Blackburn and free agent signee Griffin Canning.

Megill started 15 of his 16 appearances a year ago, pitching to a 4.04 earned run average while fanning 27% of batters faced through 78 frames. Canning started 31 times for the Angels last season, struggling to a 5.19 ERA with a 17.6% strikeout rate. Blackburn, whom the Mets acquired from the A’s at last year’s deadline, had a 4.66 mark while striking out 18.7% of opponents over 14 starts. Blackburn underwent postseason surgery to address a spinal injury, but the Mets are hopeful that he’ll be ready by Opening Day.

Mendoza also provided some details on the team’s infield mix. Free agent pickup Nick Madrigal will get shortstop work this spring, relays Mike Puma of The New York Post. The former fourth overall pick has not played shortstop in his MLB career and only has six innings of minor league work there. He saw some action at shortstop in college, though he was mostly a second baseman in amateur ball as well.

The Mets have less of a need for a true backup shortstop than most teams do. Francisco Lindor rarely takes days off. They’d ideally have someone capable of playing the position available off the bench, though. If Ronny Mauricio opens the season on the injured list, Luisangel Acuña is their most experienced shortstop depth. The Mets would presumably rather have the 22-year-old (23 next month) playing every day at Triple-A Syracuse than spending most days on the major league bench.

New York has three players locked into the starting infield: Pete Alonso at first base, Lindor at shortstop, and Mark Vientos at the hot corner. Second base is arguably the biggest question in a deep lineup. While Acuña and Brett Baty should each get time there in camp, Mendoza indicated that Jeff McNeil has the leg up on the job going into Spring Training.

“There’s competition but Jeff is pretty much right there,” the manager said (link via Tim Britton and Will Sammon of The Athletic). McNeil rebounded from a terrible first half to hit .289/.376/.547 over 40 games in the second half. A broken wrist cut his regular season short. McNeil made it back for the NL Championship Series. He had a rough series, which is understandable for a player returning from a month-long absence from game speed, but the excellent second half and his broader track record should make it an easy call for the Mets to keep him in the lineup to start the year.

Poll: Do The Braves Need Another Starter?

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The Braves struggled through a difficult season on offense last year amid another lost season for superstar Ronald Acuna Jr. and a number of down seasons all around the lineup. The club still managed to win 89 games and make it to the postseason on the back of its excellent rotation, however. Headed into 2025, that rotation has lost two key pieces: southpaw Max Fried and right-hander Charlie Morton.

Both departing pitchers had down seasons relative to their career norms last year, with Fried’s 3.25 ERA being a bit of a step back from his ace-level production of previous years while Morton clocked in right around league average. Even so, both were key pieces of the club’s rotation last year from a volume perspective. The pair combined for 59 starts and 339 2/3 innings in 2024, and they joined Chris Sale as the only three pitchers in the Atlanta rotation last year to throw even 140 innings.

That led to plenty of speculation early in the offseason that the club would be in the market for starting pitching help, with at least a back-of-the-rotation veteran to help eat innings widely expected to be a priority. That didn’t end up coming to fruition, however, despite a reported pursuit of Jeff Hoffman as a potential convert to the rotation that ultimately fell apart due to concern over Hoffman’s medicals. With Spring Training just over the horizon, the Braves have yet to make any sort of additions to their pitching staff with outfielder Jurickson Profar being the club’s only major free agent signing of the winter.

Even after losing one of the better pitchers in the sport in Fried, the club still has one of the highest-ceiling rotations in the majors. Reigning NL Cy Young award winner Sale leads the group coming off a season where he won the NL Triple Crown award and got his career back onto a potential Hall of Fame track after struggling to stay healthy with the Red Sox in recent years. He eventually figures to pair at the top of the club’s rotation with hard-throwing righty Spencer Strider, who missed almost all of last season due to internal brace surgery but struck out an incredible 36.8% of opponents in 2023 en route to a fourth-place finish in Cy Young voting. Reynaldo Lopez is the club’s number three starter on paper after posting a 1.99 ERA in 26 appearances (25 starts) last year in his first season as a full-time starter since 2020. Spencer Schwellenbach delivered solid mid-rotation production in 21 starts as a rookie last year with a 3.35 ERA in 123 2/3 innings of work.

It’s a front four that’s hard to argue with from a talent perspective, but it’s difficult to ignore the many health question marks at play here. Sale was nothing short of elite last year but combined for just 151 innings of work in the four years prior to 2024 and ended the season unable to pitch in Atlanta’s postseason run due to back issues. Strider, of course, is coming off elbow surgery and is not even expected to be ready for the start of the season. Lopez had previously last topped 66 innings back in 2019, while Schwellenbach pitched in relief during his college days and had never made more than 16 starts or thrown more than 65 innings in a season prior to last year, leaving questions about whether or not either can handle a full slate of 30+ starts in 2025.

All of that makes an innings-eating veteran addition seem like an option, to say nothing of how valuable a more reliable mid-rotation arm like Nick Pivetta could be for the club. Pivetta, Andrew Heaney, Jose Quintana, Spencer Turnbull, and Kyle Gibson are among a number of noteworthy starting pitching options still available in free agency, while the trade market holds options such as Marcus Stroman and Jordan Montgomery who could be had for minimal return outside of salary relief. Pivetta and Gibson in particular would immediately become the most reliable source of innings on Atlanta’s entire staff if signed, but any of them would raise the floor of a volatile rotation group.

With that being said, it’s worth noting that the club is deep in potential starting options beyond their top four, despite none of those players being proven at the big league level at this point. Grant Holmes, 29 next month, was excellent for the Braves in a swing role last year as a rookie. Ian Anderson was one of the club’s best arms during their 2021 World Series run and won’t turn 27 until May, though he didn’t pitch in the majors in either of the last two seasons. AJ Smith-Shawver and Hurston Waldrep are both entering their age-22 and -23 campaigns respectively and have pedigree as former top-100 prospects who could easily break out with more reps at the big league level, Bryce Elder was an All-Star in 2023 despite a rough 2024 season, and even more depth is available in the form of Dylan Dodd and Davis Daniel.

That’s a list of potential fifth starter options that’s seven names deep, including two players with successful seasons as wire-to-wire MLB starting pitchers under their belts, a player who produced in a limited rotation look last year, and two well-regarded young arms who have been ranked among the organization’s best prospects in recent years. Most clubs would love to have that sort of depth in competition for the final spot in their rotation, but given the history of health issues and lack of reliable innings that permeate the rest of Atlanta’s rotation, even that deep cache of arms might not be enough to let the Braves keep up with the Phillies and Mets in a highly competitive NL East division.

There’s also the financial component to consider. RosterResource puts the club’s competitive balance tax number a bit above $230MM, just over $10MM shy of the $241MM base threshold. While they have some willingness to pay the tax again this year, they may not consider the available arms enough of an upgrade over their internal options to justify going beyond the line right now.

What do MLBTR readers think? Does Atlanta have enough internal pitching options to make it through the season, or at least until trade season resumes over the summer? Have your say in the poll below:

Do the Braves need another starter?
Yes, add another starter on an MLB deal before Opening Day. 66.55% (3,686 votes)
No, stick with internal options and re-evaluate over the summer. 33.45% (1,853 votes)
Total Votes: 5,539

Dodgers Re-Sign Enrique Hernandez

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The Dodgers have officially welcomed Enrique Hernandez back on a one-year, $6.5MM free agent deal. Los Angeles placed Gavin Stone on the 60-day injured list to open a 40-man roster spot. Stone underwent shoulder surgery last year and will miss the entire season, so that’s a procedural move. Hernandez is represented by Wasserman.

Hernandez, 33, returns to Los Angeles for a ninth season in Dodger blue. The veteran utility man got his start as a sixth-round pick by the Astros back in 2009 and debuted with the club in 2014, but was traded to the Marlins midseason before being flipped to L.A. prior to the 2015 season. Hernandez quickly became an instrumental part of the Dodgers’ roster. His versatility has allowed him to appear at every position on the diamond except for catcher in a Dodgers uniform, and his first six-season stint with the club saw him hit a respectable .240/.312/.425 (98 wRC+) from 2015 to 2020. That includes an excellent 122 wRC+ against southpaws, and Hernandez was a regular fixture in the club’s lineup against left-handed pitching throughout his first stint in California.

Hernandez’s first foray into free agency following the Dodgers’ 2020 World Series championship led him to sign with the Red Sox on a two-year, $14MM deal before he was extended for an additional year and $10MM. Hernandez actually had the best season of his career in Boston during the 2021 campaign, when he slashed .250/.337/.449 (109 wRC+) while splitting time between center field and second base for the Red Sox en route to a campaign worth 3.7 fWAR and 5.0 bWAR. Hernandez struggled badly for the club after that first brilliant year, however, and hit just .222/.286/.330 (68 wRC+) over his final year and a half in a Red Sox uniform.

That led to a trade back to the Dodgers, with whom he’s started to look once again like a more viable bench bat. His overall slash line of .240/.289/.389 (87 wRC+) since rejoining the Dodgers at the 2023 trade deadline is still below average, and since returning to Los Angeles he’s actually played as a more or less split-neutral hitter after for years hitting much better against southpaws. With that being said, he remains as versatile as ever in the field. He’s also had a history of being a quality postseason contributor, with a .278/.353/.522 career slash line in the playoffs. Those postseason heroics haven’t disappeared even as the rest of his game has taken a step backwards in recent years, and Hernandez slashed .294/.357/.451 in 14 postseason games for the Dodgers during their World Series championship run last year.

Hernandez’s combination of versatility, postseason track record, and status as a fan favorite and beloved clubhouse presence were enough to convince the Dodgers to bring him back into the fold for a ninth season in spite of an already very crowded mix of position players. As things stand, Hernandez appears to fit best as a right-handed complement to lefty-swinging infielders Hyeseong Kim and Max Muncy, though that same role also applies to veteran infielder Miguel Rojas, who is generally regarded as a superior defender to Hernandez on the dirt. Perhaps Hernandez could back up Tommy Edman in center field and serve as a right-handed complement to Michael Conforto in the outfield, though fellow utility veteran Chris Taylor and outfield youngster Andy Pages both figure to compete for a similar role this spring as well. However Hernandez ultimately ends up fitting into the club’s day-to-day plans, his return could leave Pages and James Outman on the outside looking for the Dodgers’ roster, set to at least start the 2025 season in Triple-A barring a surprise decision to part ways with Taylor, Rojas, or another more established player.

Hernandez first announced the deal on social media. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reported that it was a one-year contract, while Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic was first on the $6.5MM salary. Image courtesy of Imagn.

Diamondbacks Sign Scott McGough, John Curtiss To Minor League Deals

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The Diamondbacks signed relievers Scott McGough and John Curtiss to minor league contracts with invitations to big league camp. The deals were announced by the club’s Triple-A affiliate in Reno.

McGough is a familiar face for Arizona fans. The 35-year-old righty has spent the last two seasons with the Diamondbacks. He signed a two-year, $6.25MM contract over the 2022-23 offseason. McGough had come off a solid four-year run with the Yakult Swallows in Japan. That didn’t translate as hoped against major league competition.

While McGough picked up nine saves in 2023, he also surrendered a 4.73 earned run average through 70 1/3 relief innings. His production went backwards last year, as he allowed 7.44 earned runs per nine over 32 2/3 MLB frames. McGough walked 14% of batters faced with a mediocre 16.7% strikeout rate. He had a better showing with Reno, where he posted a 3.22 ERA across 36 1/3 innings. McGough fanned a solid 23.7% of Triple-A opponents but still issued free passes at an alarming 11.5% clip.

Arizona had an easy decision to buy McGough out of a $4MM mutual option. The front office remains intrigued enough by his arsenal and minor league numbers to give him another look in Spring Training. Opponents have teed off on his 93 MPH fastball, but McGough has gotten strong results on his mid-80s splitter over the past couple seasons.

Curtiss is a new addition to the organization. He made three big league appearances as a member of the Rockies last season. Curtiss pitched well for Colorado’s top farm team, turning in a 3.96 ERA through 50 innings in an extremely hitter-friendly setting in Albuquerque. That came with a pedestrian 19.1% strikeout percentage but he limited walks to a 7% clip.

A veteran of parts of seven MLB seasons, Curtiss had his best run with the Rays and Marlins between 2020-21. Miami traded him to the Brewers at the ’21 deadline. Curtiss blew out his elbow shortly thereafter and underwent Tommy John surgery that wiped out his ’22 season. He returned to the majors with the Mets two seasons ago, tossing 19 2/3 innings of 4.58 ERA ball.

Padres Sign Jason Heyward

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February 11: The Padres have officially announced the deal. Per Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune, Heyward is guaranteed $1MM with another $250K available via incentives. Jon Heyman of The New York Post provides details on those incentives, with Heyward getting $50K for getting to 200, 250, 300, 350 and 400 plate appearances.

February 7: The Padres have reached agreement with Jason Heyward on a free agent deal, reports Dennis Lin of The Athletic. Lin indicates that Heyward is expected to split time in left field with San Diego’s other recent free agent pickup, Connor Joe. Terms are unreported, but it seems likely to be a one-year major league deal for the Excel Sports Management client. The Padres have four openings on the 40-man roster and can accommodate Joe and Heyward without any corresponding moves.

Heyward is headed into his age-35 season. He has spent the past two years as a left-handed platoon bat in the corner outfield. That role suited him quite well in 2023. Heyward caught on with the Dodgers after being released by the Cubs before what would have been the final season of his eight-year contract. He had his best offensive showing in some time, hitting .269/.340/.473 with 15 homers across 377 plate appearances.

The Dodgers brought him back on a $9MM contract early last offseason. He was unable to match the previous year’s production. Heyward missed six weeks early in the season rehabbing a lower back injury. He hit fairly well immediately upon his return but suffered a bone bruise in his left knee at the beginning of July. That knocked him out of action for another three weeks. He fell into a slump upon coming back from that injury. The Dodgers designated him for assignment towards the end of August.

Heyward was sitting on a .208/.289/.393 line when the Dodgers cut him. He quickly landed a big league deal with the Astros, where he fared a bit better in a small sample. Heyward hit four homers in 24 games with Houston, posting a .218/.283/.473 slash across 61 trips to the plate. He cracked the playoff roster and got the start in left field for Game 2 of Houston’s Wild Card series loss at the hands of the Tigers.

Between the two teams, Heyward finished the year with a .211/.288/.412 slash over 258 plate appearances. He posted roughly average strikeout and walk rates while showing a bit of power, connecting on 10 homers in around a half-season’s worth of playing time. He hit a lot of ground-balls to the pull side, though, an approach that wasn’t conducive to strong ball in play results. His .226 average on balls in play was a career low; only seven hitters with 250+ plate appearances had a lower BABIP.

Heyward has only taken 50 plate appearances against left-handed pitching over the past two seasons. He’s hitting .188 with a .220 on-base percentage in that tiny sample. The Padres will limit him to almost exclusively facing right-handers. He had a .214/.298/.422 line with the platoon advantage last year and is two seasons removed from a strong .276/.347/.471 showing against righties. It’s unlikely that he’ll get back to the ’23 level, but he can potentially turn in slightly above-average numbers with the platoon advantage. Joe, a right-handed hitter, had a .251/.353/.418 line against left-handed pitching over his two seasons with the Pirates.

The Friars used David Peralta as a lefty platoon corner outfielder last season. He hit .273/.329/.431 across 234 plate appearances in that role — strong work for a player who joined the team on a minor league deal in the middle of May. Peralta remains unsigned, while the Friars didn’t make a serious effort to retain Jurickson Profar because of payroll limitations. A Heyward/Joe platoon is going to be a significant step down from Profar’s unexpected .280/.380/.459 performance. They were inevitably going to downgrade at the position. Profar played last season on a $1MM salary, making him the biggest bargain signing of last offseason.

Neither the Joe nor Heyward terms have been reported, but they’ll each be modest deals. They join Elias Díaz’s $3.5MM signing as San Diego’s free agent acquisitions this winter. RosterResource calculates their competitive balance tax payroll around $247MM (pending the Joe and Heyward deals). That puts them about $6MM above the luxury tax threshold; they ended last season with a CBT number in the $228MM range. A late-offseason trade to clear payroll and add affordable help to the back of the rotation remains a possibility.

Image courtesy of Imagn.

Marlins Claim Ronny Henriquez, Designate Xzavion Curry For Assignment

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The Marlins announced that they have claimed right-hander Ronny Henriquez off waivers from the Twins. The latter club had designated him for assignment last week. To open a roster spot, the Marlins have designated right-hander Xzavion Curry for assignment.

Henriquez, 25 in June, came up through the minors as a starter but has been kept mostly in a relief role for the past two seasons. To this point in his career, he has thrown 31 innings in the big leagues over 19 appearances, including one start. He has allowed just 2.90 earned runs per nine in that small sample. His 18.2% strikeout rate is subpar but his 6.1% walk rate and 53.1% ground ball rate are both strong numbers.

He made 34 Triple-A appearances last year, just three of those being starts, logging 55 innings overall. In that time, he had a 3.44 ERA, 24.9% strikeout rate, 7.2% walk rate and 53.8% ground ball rate.

That was a pretty decent season on the farm but he exhausted his final option year, meaning he’s now out of options going into 2025. That got him squeezed off the Minnesota roster when the Twins needed to make space for their signings of Danny Coulombe and Harrison Bader.

For the Marlins, they are clearly not targeting a competitive year in 2025. Their offseason has mostly focused on subtractions, as they have traded controllable players like Jesús Luzardo to the Phillies and Jake Burger to the Rangers.

Their bullpen is fairly wide open. They traded Tanner Scott, A.J. Puk, Bryan Hoeing, Huascar Brazobán and JT Chargois at last year’s deadline. Now Anthony Bender is the only reliever on the club with more than three years of service time and Andrew Nardi is the only other guy over the two-year line. In short, Henriquez has much better odds of sticking on the roster in Miami than he did with a competitive club like the Twins.

If he manages to hold onto a spot, he’ll be affordable and controllable for quite a while. He has less than a year of service time, meaning he’s still at least two years away from arbitration and six years from free agency. Though of course, that all depends on him performing well enough to avoid another DFA from his new club.

Curry, 26, was claimed off waivers from the Guardians in August. He has 147 innings of big league experience with a 4.35 ERA, 15.7% strikeout rate and 6.9% walk rate. He tossed 60 2/3 minor league innings last year with a 6.97 ERA, 18.5% strikeout rate and 9.6% walk rate.

The Marlins will now have a week of DFA limbo to figure out what’s next for Curry, whether that’s a trade or some fate on waivers. He was once a notable prospect in the Cleveland system, which could intrigue some clubs. Over 2021 and 2022, he tossed 219 2/3 innings in the minors with a 3.28 ERA, 28.7% strikeout rate and 6.5% walk rate. He was then kept in the big league bullpen in 2023 before struggling last year.

Curry still has an option remaining, so he could be kept as minor league depth if any club is willing to give him a 40-man spot. If he passes through waivers unclaimed, he would provide the Marlins with some non-roster depth. He has less than three years of service time and doesn’t have a previous career outright, meaning he won’t have the right to reject an outright assignment.

Braves Sign Jake Diekman, Dylan Covey To Minor League Deals

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The Braves have added three more pitchers to their list of non-roster invitees, as relayed by Justin Toscano of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. They are left-hander Jake Diekman as well as righties Dylan Covey and Chad Kuhl. MLBTR covered the Kuhl deal last week.

Diekman, 38, has a long track record of walking a tightrope with a lot of strikeouts but also a lot of free passes. In 602 1/3 innings of relief dating back to his 2012 debut, he has allowed 3.91 earned runs per nine. His 28.7% strikeout rate in that time is a few ticks above average and his 46.9% ground ball rate around par, but his 13.4% walk rate is definitely on the high side.

He’s coming off a down year. He signed a $4MM deal with the Mets but was released in early August. He had a 5.63 in 32 innings. His 27.6% strikeout rate was near his usual range but his 16.6% walk rate was high, even for him. Among pitchers with at least 30 innings pitched last year, only youngsters Nick Nastrini and Joe Boyle had higher walk rates. He didn’t sign anywhere else for the final two months of the season.

Upgrading the bullpen has been a priority for Atlanta this offseason. They lost guys like A.J. Minter, Jesse Chavez and others to free agency at season’s end. In early November, it was reported that Joe Jiménez might miss all of 2025 while recovering from knee surgery.

Seemingly operating with a tight budget, they haven’t been too active in pursuing upgrades to the relief mix. Anderson Pilar was brought in via the Rule 5 draft and is arguably the most notable addition to this point.

They don’t specifically need a lefty, as they already have Dylan Lee, Aaron Bummer and Angel Perdomo in the mix, but Diekman doesn’t have huge splits regardless. Lefties have a .229/.344/.311 line against him in his career whereas righties have hit .210/.329/.357. He’s not coming off a great season but he adds some experienced depth for cheap, and without taking up a roster spot for now.

Covey, 33, is coming off a mostly lost season but had some intriguing results the year prior. After spending 2021 and 2022 pitching for the Rakuten Monkeys in Taiwan’s Chinese Professional Baseball League, he split 2023 between the Dodgers and Phillies. He logged 43 innings between those two clubs with a 3.77 ERA. His 15.7% strikeout rate was low but he got grounders on 54.3% of balls in play.

A shoulder strain kept him on the shelf for most of 2024. He didn’t pitch in the majors at all and was limited to 20 1/3 innings on the farm. 15 of those innings were at the Triple-A level with intriguing results in a small sample. He had a 1.20 ERA at that level, 27.6% strikeout rate, 12.1% walk rate and 71.4% ground ball rate.

The Phils had outrighted him off their roster in August and he elected free agency at season’s end. He signed a split deal with the Mets but was recently outrighted off that club’s roster and elected free agency. Like Diekman, he’ll give Atlanta some cheap rotation depth without taking up a roster spot for now.

Yankees Claim Brent Headrick, Designate Owen White For Assignment

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The Yankees announced they have claimed left-hander Brent Headrick off waivers from the Twins. Right-hander Owen White has been designated for assignment in a corresponding move. There wasn’t any previous indication that Headrick had been bumped off Minnesota’s roster, so their 40-man count drops to 39. Phil Miller of the Minnesota Star Tribune reported the claim prior to the official announcement.

It’s possible that the Twins made this move on account of the calendar. Teams around the league can start using the 60-day injured list to open roster spots once pitchers and catchers report to camp. That means it will be harder to pass a player through waivers unclaimed in the coming days, as all clubs open their respective camps. The Twins seemingly tried to open a roster spot just ahead of that unofficial deadline but didn’t succeed.

Headrick, 27, will now join a new club for the first time in his career. He was selected by the Twins in the ninth round of the 2019 draft and worked his way up to the majors. He was added to the club’s 40-man roster in November of 2022 to keep him out of that year’s Rule 5 draft.

His 2024 was largely wiped out by injury. After just two Triple-A appearances, he landed on the minor league injured list with a forearm strain. He didn’t start a rehab assignment until late August. He finished the year with 19 1/3 innings tossed on the farm and another three in the majors. Prior to that, he seemed like a viable rotation depth option. Over 2022 and 2023, he logged 183 1/3 innings in the minors, mostly as a starter. In that time, he had a 3.88 ERA, 28.8% strikeout rate and 6.7% walk rate.

After his mostly lost season, the Twins tried to pass him though waivers but the Yankees are intrigued enough that they have grabbed him. It’s possible that they will want Headrick to focus more on relief work. That would be a reflection of his injury-marred 2024 but also the situation in the Bronx. The Yankees have a crowded rotation and are reportedly trying to trade Marcus Stroman. But their bullpen has just one lefty in it right now: 35-year-old groundballer Tim Hill.

Headrick does still have one option remaining, so the Yanks don’t need to guarantee him an active roster spot. But if he’s healthy and pitches well, he could come up and fill a clear need in the bullpen.

White, 25, was just claimed off waivers last week. Once a notable prospect in the Rangers’ system, he was designated for assignment by that club in December. He went to the Reds in a cash deal before then going to the Yankees via waivers.

The past two years have been rough for him. He has a 16.71 ERA in his tiny sample of seven big league innings. His 4.90 ERA in the minors over 2023 and 2024 was better but not great. That was in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League but his 18.3% strikeout rate and 11.3% walk rate in that time weren’t great numbers.

Prior to that, White had been one of the top pitching prospects in the league. Over the 2021 and 2022 seasons, he tossed 115 2/3 innings in the minors with a 3.42 ERA, 34.1% strikeout rate and 7.5% walk rate.

The Yankees will have to trade him or put him on waivers in the coming days. White still has an option year remaining and less than a year of service time. Given his past prospect pedigree and the aforementioned opening of the 60-day IL, some club will likely find a spot for him. DFA limbo can last a week but the waiver process takes 48 hours, so any trade talks would need to come together in the next five days.

Angels Claim Michael Petersen, Designate Kelvin Cáceres For Assignment

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The Angels announced that they have claimed right-hander Michael Petersen off waivers from the Blue Jays. The latter club had designated him for assignment last week. To open a roster spot, the Angels designated fellow righty Kelvin Cáceres for assignment.

Petersen, 30, made his big league debut with the Dodgers last year, pitching 14 innings with a 6.43 ERA. He went from Los Angeles to the Marlins via waivers late in the year and tossed another five innings for Miami. Overall, he finished with a 5.95 ERA, 15.6% strikeout rate and 12.2% walk rate in his first 19 2/3 innings in the majors.

The U.K.-born Petersen spent his career prior to last season with the Rockies and Brewers organizations. He’d joined the Dodgers on a minor league pact and posted lights-out numbers in Triple-A: 1.64 ERA, 35.2% strikeout rate, 6.4% walk rate in 33 innings. Petersen’s towering 6’7″ frame only makes his 97 mph heater and upper-80s cutter play up. That power arm, last year’s huge numbers in the minors and multiple minor league option years have combined to make a popular waiver target. The Angels will be his fourth organization since September.

Cáceres, 25, missed the entire 2024 season after undergoing surgery to repair a torn lat. He made his MLB debut with the 2023 Angels but pitched just 1 1/3 innings in that brief cup of coffee. He’s posted solid numbers in the minors with the Halos, most recently working to a combined 4.12 ERA with a 34.8% strikeout rate and 13.1% walk rate in 54 2/3 innings across three levels. That included a dominant 10-inning run in Triple-A, where he allowed just one run on five hits and five walks with 11 strikeouts.

Cáceres sits 95-96 mph with his heater and couples the pitch with a curveball and changeup. He still has multiple minor league options remaining, so perhaps another club will be intrigued by the optionable power arm and place a claim or work out a small trade. His health outlook remains murky for now, but an optionable 25-year-old with a power arm and a history of missing bats is the type of prospect teams love to speculate on if they have the roster space.

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