NL West Notes: Dahl, Aardsma, Bradley, Cahill
Rockies prospect David Dahl was at one point thought to be out for the season following a collision that led to a massive laceration on his spleen, but he’s now opted for a splenectomy and, incredibly, is hoping to return to the field within six weeks, agent Adam Karon tells ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick. “David has put in an incredible amount of work the last two offseasons, and he just couldn’t fathom the idea of a shortened season,” Karon told Crasnick. “…A normal person would just leave the spleen in. But for an athlete, there’s an additional risk of the spleen rupturing again in a collision. David said, ‘I can’t play the rest of my career worrying about this, and I don’t want to miss any more time this year than I have to.'” Dahl got off to a slow start at Double-A this season, but it seems likely that he’ll get a chance to improve those numbers yet — an outcome that seemed impossible as recently as one week ago.
Here’s more from the NL West…
- The Dodgers are in the midst of a 72-hour window to make a decision on veteran right-hander David Aardsma, writes Jacob Unruh of The Oklahoman. The 33-year-old Aardsma has been lights-out in relief for the Dodgers’ Triple-A affiliate in Oklahoma City this year, but the team may not be able to find room for him on the 25-man roster. Aardsma’s contract contains a June 1 opt-out that triggers the 72-hour window; he must be added to the roster or he can elect free agency. Aardsma reworked his mechanics and went throw a program called Top Velocity this offseason in an effort to rediscover his velocity, and he tells Unruh that he feels he can contribute to a Major League bullpen again. If the results in Triple-A are any indication, that may well be true, as Aardsma has posted a 2.55 ERA with a 21-to-7 K/BB ratio and 15 saves in 17 2/3 innings thus far.
- Archie Bradley is placing the Diamondbacks in a tough spot, writes Zach Buchanan of the Arizona Republic. The top prospect won a job in the rotation out of Spring Training — impressing the team so much that they traded Trevor Cahill to clear a place for him — but he’s struggled since returning from a frightening injury. Bradley missed two weeks after being struck in the face by a Carlos Gonzalez line drive, and since coming back, he’s averaged just four innings a start and allowed 19 runs in 15 2/3 innings. Bradley maintains that the injury isn’t the reason for his downturn in performance, but as Buchanan notes, the D-Backs rank at the top of the league in terms of innings pitched by their bullpen. Bradley’s current inability to work deep into games is further stretching the club’s relief corps, but despite that troubling trend, general manager Dave Stewart told Buchanan that there are “no plans right now” to make a move involving Bradley.
- Speaking of Cahill, the right-hander recently spoke to the Republic’s Sarah McLellan about being traded to Atlanta at the end of Spring Training. Cahill said that it was “kind of shocking” to be traded with just one day of camp remaining, but he ultimately told himself to view the transaction as a new opportunity. Of his time with the Snakes, Cahill told McLellan, “I worked hard and competed as best as I could, but I wished I could have done more to help the team.” His struggles have persisted to this point in Atlanta, where he’s pitched to a 7.33 ERA with 12 strikeouts against 11 walks in 23 1/3 innings and ceded his spot in the rotation to young flamethrower Mike Foltynewicz.
- A pair of NL West news items came in late last night as well, for those who had turned in for the evening: the D-Backs announced that Tuffy Gosewisch will miss the remainder of the season with a torn ACL, and veteran righty Juan Gutierrez opted out of his minor league deal with the Giants.
Quick Hits: Ruth, Slowey, Nix, Cuba
Babe Ruth pioneered many things in baseball, of course, and one lesser-known among them came in the insurance arena, as Richard Sandomir writes for the New York Times. Before the 1920 campaign, Ruth took out a disability policy of the kind that is now standard for players looking to protect themselves from injury or illness.
Here are some more stray notes from around the game:
- 31-year-old righty Kevin Slowey has joined the MLBPA as a special assistant, per a press release. He’ll assist in the union’s preparations for the coming collective bargaining negotiations. Slowey, who spent the spring in Phillies camp, has appeared in the big leagues with the Twins and Marlins. All said, he compiled 662 innings of 4.62 ERA pitching, striking out 6.7 and walking 1.5 batters per nine along the way.
- Bob Nightengale of USA Today spoke with Jacob Nix, the righty who saw his deal with the Astros fall through last year as part of the Brady Aiken fallout. Nix explains that he has tried to stay positive, but did not sugarcoat the difficulties he faced. “Last year pretty much sucked,” said Nix. “I was literally in the wrong place and the wrong time. It was a bad situation. The whole year was pretty difficult for myself and for my family.” Houston ultimately offered Nix a $620K bonus after pulling back the $1.5MM deal that had been struck, says Nightengale, but he declined. Nix was set to attend UCLA — even driving out to the campus — but ultimately ended up at the IMG Academy as eligibility issues loomed due to the NCAA’s rules (which are, in my view, remarkably unfair). While winning a grievance against the Astros that “paid him a fraction of his original signing bonus,” Nix says he also pushed his development on the mound and is now a much more complete pitcher entering this year’s draft. The whole piece is well worth a read and comes highly recommended.
- Exhibition baseball is likely heading to Cuba next year, as commissioner Rob Manfred told reporters yesterday, including Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Twitter link). The expectation is that clubs chosen by the league will head to the neighboring island during Spring Training.
Brewers Claim Hernan Perez, Designate Elian Herrera
The Brewers have claimed infielder Hernan Perez off waivers from the Tigers, Milwaukee announced. To clear a roster spot, the club designated utilityman Elian Herrera for assignment.
Perez, 24, has seen very brief playing time at the major league level in each of the last four seasons. In 647 Triple-A plate appearances, he slashed .280/.321/.387 while adding 21 stolen bases. The Venezuelan native has split his time as a professionally evenly between shortstop and second base.
Meanwhile, the 30-year-old Herrera has delivered a career .249/.304/.343 slash line in 470 turns at bat in the majors, all compiled in sporadic action over 2012-15. He is a true utility player, having spent time at all three outfield spots and every infield position left of first base. Herrera has had some success at the plate at the Triple-A level, where he owns a .307/.375/.431 batting line in just over 1,000 plate appearances.
NL East Notes: Marlins, Cishek, Phils, Strasburg, Fister
Despite what the standings say, the Marlins are not yet entertaining the idea of selling, MLB.com’s Joe Frisaro reports. The club is not interested in moving core players, says Frisaro, noting that dealing third baseman Martin Prado — who is under contract for next year as well — does not make sense, at least at present.
Here’s more from the NL East:
- Skipper Dan Jennings says that the Marlins‘ decision to option Steve Cishek was motivated by a desire to get his mechanics in order outside the big league spotlight, Frisaro reports. Noting that Cishek’s velocity has improved of late, Jennings said he expects a short minor league stint: “I don’t see this being a long-term deal at all. I think he will come back and be the same Steve Cishek we’ve known in the past.”
- The upcoming draft is an important one for a Phillies organization that is working to add as much impact talent as possible, Jim Salisbury of CSNPhilly.com writes. Johnny Almaraz will oversee the picking for the first time, and Salisbury suggests he’s likely to “stay away from project-type players, at least up high.” Philadelphia has struggled to produce draft talent in the not-so-distant past, but seems thus far to have hit on both of its last two picks: shortstop J.P. Crawford and righty Aaron Nola. “It’s an interesting draft,” said GM Ruben Amaro Jr. “There’s some depth. Maybe not tons of super difference makers, but there’s some good players out there.”
- Medical analysis confirms that Nationals starter Stephen Strasburg has a strained left trapezius, James Wagner of the Washington Post reports. For now, the plan is for Strasburg to rest, with the hope that he’ll be ready to resume throwing in relatively short order.
- The Nationals have also received encouraging news on another injured right-handed starter, Doug Fister. As Wagner writes, Fister says his forearm tightness has “pretty much subsided completely.” The veteran went on to say that he has never been too concerned about the issue: “It was really just more tight than complete, utter mayhem. So I mean, it wasn’t a bad issue. It was more of just I really need a break for some reason, there’s so much tightness going on that we really need to address it.” As important as Fister is to Washington, his ability to recover and regain his effectiveness may tell even more on his free agent status. The 31-year-old has produced consistently excellent results over the last four seasons, but saw a dip in his velocity and strikeout tallies early this year.
Red Sox Notes: Offseason, Farrell, HanRam
With a 22-29 record on the books, the Red Sox may already have cause to regret several recent decisions, writes Jason Mastrodonato of the Boston Herald. Whether or not the team is better set up for the long term, he says, adding Wade Miley, Justin Masterson, and Joe Kelly (as opposed to, say, keeping John Lackey and acquiring Jeff Samardzija) has not paid off in the short run. Likewise, the signings of Hanley Ramirez (who has not adapted well to the outfield) and Pablo Sandoval (who owns a .688 OPS) have not paid the dividends hoped for when the club allocated $183MM between the two veterans.
Here’s more from Boston:
- Dealing with the on-field problems is not just a baseball question, explains Rob Bradford of WEEI.com. It’s imperative for the bottom line that the club do what it can to stay in contention, which is made plausible by the fact that the rest of the divisions has been mired in mediocrity. The risk of another long season out of the race, says Bradford, is an apathetic fan base that could lose patience with the organization.
- Boston’s struggles have put manager John Farrell’s job at risk, says Christopher Gasper of the Boston Globe, even if they aren’t really his fault. The club is nearing a point where some drastic change is needed, says Gasper, and the “even-keeled and cerebral” Farrell may need to engineer a quick turnaround to keep his position. Gasper observes that, while the club’s less-than-powerful offense can hope for better luck given its league-low .269 BABIP, it has also produced a league-worst 21.1% soft contact rate (per Fangraphs).
- As if trouble on offense and in the rotation were not enough, the Globe’s Alex Speier discusses the team’s sub-par overall efforts on defense. Errors have not generally been a big problem on the whole, but advanced metrics view the Sox as one of the league’s worst defensive units. The biggest problem, says Speier, is that Ramirez has been the league’s single worst fielder by a significant margin. Remarkably, Ramirez has cost the club about one quarter of a run per game thus far, and Speier observes that there are no ready solutions (other than continuing to work toward and hope for improvement) given Boston’s current roster alignment.
- In an interview with Toucher & Rich of CBS Boston (audio link), Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe explains that Farrell is not the main issue with the Red Sox. The skipper has done what he can with the roster, says Abraham, who goes on to argue that Ramirez can’t just be shifted to first base — which might create even greater problems. Nevertheless, with the AL East underperforming, Abraham says there is reason to believe the club can stay in the hunt.
AL Notes: Gallo, Plouffe, Rondon, Mariners
The Rangers made an aggressive move in bringing up top prospect Joey Gallo, even if it promises to be short-lived, and Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News discusses what it means. It could be that the club truly believes that Gallo is ready, in spite of the fact that his huge power has been accompanied by a sizable strikeout rate. More likely, as GM Jon Daniels suggested, is that the big league club can not only use Gallo for the interim, but provides a good current environment for him to get his first taste of the bigs. “The deciding factor was that we are really confident in the environment, the culture and the clubhouse,” Daniels explained. “It’s a good spot for a young player. We have a lot of confidence in our staff and in the value sitting next to Adrian Beltre and Prince Fielder and learning.”
- Twins third baseman Trevor Plouffe is off to a nice start, sporting a 135 wRC+ at the plate and continuing to look like at least an average defender at third after struggling earlier in his career. While Miguel Sano is waiting in the wings, he could still end up moving off of the hot corner. Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN wonders (Twitter link) whether there is an extension format that would make sense for both Minnesota and Plouffe. He should be in line for a hefty raise over his $4.8MM salary, and can be controlled for the 2017 season as well, meaning that the club would likely need to plunk some really money down to get a deal done.
- Righty Bruce Rondon is finally nearing activation for the Tigers, which presents some welcome roster complications, as James Schmehl of MLive.com reports. Detroit will certainly hope that Rondon and his big-time stuff can help anchor the club’s pen at some point this year, but Schmehl says it’s possible he won’t head straight to the big leagues even when he’s ready physically. The three candidates for demotion — Angel Nesbitt, Alex Wilson, and Al Alburquerque — all have options, so there’s plenty of flexibility.
- While it’s not clear how much urgency there is at this point on the calendar, the Mariners are “trying” to add an arm, Bob Dutton of the Tacoma News Tribune tweets in response to a reader. Seattle’s staff has produced middle-of-the-road results on the whole, but some notable struggles (Taijuan Walker and Fernando Rodney both have allowed over six earned runs per nine) and injuries (Hisashi Iwakuma and James Paxton) have opened some space for an addition.
Rays Designate Ernesto Frieri For Assignment
The Rays designated righty Ernesto Frieri for assignment after last night’s ballgame, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times was among those to report on Twitter.
Frier, 29, signed a one-year, $800K deal to join the Rays this winter. He could have picked up a $50K bonus had he reached thirty appearances, with other escalators also available, but he’ll have to be content with earning his base guarantee at this point.
Frier worked to a 4.63 ERA over 23 1/3 innings for Tampa Bay, striking out 7.3 and walking 4.2 batters per nine. That K rate is a far cry from the double-digit numbers he ran up during his run as the Angels closer, and ERA estimators suggest he may be lucky that the results have not been worse.
There could be room for improvement if a team can figure out the cause for Frieri’s significant loss of fastball velocity. After averaging about 94 mph over recent years, Frier’s heater has dipped into the 91-92 mph range in 2015.
Tuffy Gosewisch Out For Year With ACL Tear
Diamondbacks catcher Tuffy Gosewisch will miss the rest of the season after being diagnosed with a torn ACL, the club announced. The 31-year-old had already been placed on the 15-day DL.
Gosewisch earned his first opportunity at a regular role this year for Arizona. Generally a meager offensive producer in his time in the minors — most of it spent with the Phillies — Gosewisch was able to crack the lineup due to his quality glovework and the club’s lack of options behind the plate.
Through 138 plate appearances this year, Gosewisch largely matched the batting output he put up in reserve duty last year. All told, he has taken 317 turns at bat in the majors, slashing .212/.241/.285 with two home runs and two stolen bases. But Baseball Prospectus has valued him as a slightly above-average performer behind the dish.
Fellow backstop Wilson Ramos also suffered a May ACL tear back in 2012, ultimately missing the entire rest of the season. Despite missing the early part of Spring Training, he recovered in time to open the year on the active roster. Barring any setbacks, Gosewisch figures to follow approximately the same timeline.
With Gosewisch down for the rest of the year, it seems likely that mid-season signee Jarrod Saltalamacchia will do most of the receiving, with Jordan Pacheco functioning as the backup. But the door is now slightly more open for prospect Peter O’Brien, who is bludgeoning Triple-A pitching (.339/.379/.650) while he continues to work to establish himself as a viable defensive option.
Juan Gutierrez Opts Out Of Contract With Giants
Righty Juan Gutierrez has opted out of his minor league contract with the Giants, MLBTR’s Steve Adams reports (Twitter links). The 31-year-old had agreed to that pact over the winter after declining an outright assignment from the club.
Gutierrez played a big role in the San Francisco pen last year, throwing 63 2/3 frames of 3.96 ERA ball. He posted 6.2 K/9 against 2.3 BB/9 in his most productive full season as a big leaguer. All said, Gutierrez has tossed just under 300 innings at the major league level, compiling a 4.49 career ERA.
The results have not quite been there for Gutierrez at Triple-A this year, as he has allowed 13 earned runs in his 23 2/3 innings of work. He has struck out 21 batters against eight walks, however, falling largely in line with his career marks. As Adams notes, Gutierrez still brings a mid-90s heater and has enough big league experience that he ought to draw interest from other teams.
Poll: Should The Brewers Trade Carlos Gomez This Summer?
In his first piece for MLBTR’s newly-minted newsletter (subscribe in the sidebar at the right), Tim Dierkes argued that the Brewers ought to strongly consider dealing star center fielder Carlos Gomez. As he explained, Gomez has immense present value that is probably worth more to another club than to Milwaukee.
Nothing has changed since that time, as the Brewers remain buried in a highly competitive NL Central. True, Gomez has battled through some relatively minor injury issues, but he’s also bounced back from a tepid start. Over the month of May, he slashed .265/.318/.461 with four home runs and five stolen bases — numbers that fall shy of his impressive output over the last two seasons but nevertheless suggest he’s well on his way to getting back on track.
Best of all, of course, is the fact that Gomez is owed only $9MM for next season and the balance of an $8MM salary this year. That puts him within reach of any team in baseball — remember, the Royals took on even more salary when they acquired James Shields — and makes him the rare premium player who is both available and affordable. A team weighing the departure of big-named prospects would be comforted by the knowledge both that Gomez would remain a big trade piece next summer or in the offseason (remember, that’s what the A’s did with Jeff Samardzija) and that the team would stand to recoup a draft pick through the qualifying offer if they kept him for the duration of his contract.
An impact player with a budget contract ought to bring back a big return. In his second newsletter, Tim listed several plausible suitors and interesting trade pieces that the Brewers could pursue. He tabs the Yankees, Mariners, Blue Jays, and Angels as the most likely possible trade partners.
As Tim argued, it’s entirely possible that Milwaukee could actually improve its near-term and long-term outlook by moving Gomez (if not also stud catcher Jonathan Lucroy, who the club will likely be less amenable to discussing). But all the things that make Gomez so appealing to the rest of the league also make him a rare commodity for a smaller-budget club like the Brewers.
So, we’ll ask the MLBTR readers: would the Brewers be better off dealing Gomez, or holding onto him in hopes of building around him for another season?
Should The Brewers Trade Carlos Gomez This Summer?
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Yes 80% (7,150)
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No 20% (1,761)
Total votes: 8,911