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Giants Notes: Devers, Eldridge, Payroll

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The baseball world was stunned by Sunday’s Rafael Devers trade and further details have continued to spill out in subsequent days. Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle reports that the Red Sox asked for prospect Bryce Eldridge in trade talks but the Giants quickly rebuffed that.

Eldridge is clearly a talented prospect, making it understandable that the Sox would ask about him, and that the Giants preferred to keep him. The 16th overall pick of the 2023 draft, he has since taken 845 plate appearances in the minors, hitting 39 home runs with an 11.5% walk rate. His 26.5% strikeout rate is a bit on the high side but he’s also been facing far older competition basically the whole time. He’s now in Triple-A even though he’s still only 20 years old.

He started this year at Double-A and mashed, putting up a line of .280/.350/.512 in 34 games. That got him quickly promoted to Triple-A, where his production has stalled a bit. He is hitting just .160/.232/.340 at the top minor league level so far with a 33.9% strikeout rate. But it’s a small sample of 13 games and, as mentioned, he is extremely young for the level.

By keeping Eldridge in the fold, the Giants may have a bit of a squeeze in the first base/designated hitter mix over the long run. It appears that Devers’ days of being a third baseman are effectively done. Matt Chapman is one of the top defensive third basemen in the league and is signed through 2030. Devers is now learning first base and could be a viable option at that spot in the coming weeks.

Whenever Eldridge earns his way up to the majors, he and Devers will have to share the first base and DH spots, though that may not be a short-term problem if Eldridge still needs some time to develop against Triple-A pitching. The Giants are presumably fine with the long-term fit, since they seemingly took a hard line against even considering Eldridge being included in the deal.

Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area also reports on the Sox asking for Eldridge and notes that players like Hayden Birdsong and Carson Whisenhunt also came up at times during the talks. It’s unclear if the Giants were opposed to dealing those guys or if the Sox just preferred Kyle Harrison and James Tibbs, who ultimately were included in the completed deal.

Beyond the players, money was a key component of this trade, with Devers having about $250MM still to be paid out over the eight and a half years remaining on his contract. Jordan Hicks is still owed about $30MM in the two and a half years remaining on his deal, which offsets that somewhat, but the Giants still took on roughly $220MM in the swap. Considering the largest contract the Giants have ever signed in the history of the franchise is the $182MM free agent deal for Willy Adames, absorbing the money in the Devers trade was no small matter.

With that kind of financial commitment changing hands, ownership would naturally have to be involved. Giants chairman Greg Johnson spoke to John Shea of The San Francisco Standard, noting that he and Red Sox CEO Sam Kennedy spoke about the pact fairly early in the process, at the urging of Giants president of baseball operations Buster Posey.

“I talked to [Kennedy] at the (owners’) meetings (in early June) in New York, and I talked to him this week. Just put the message in that we’re serious. It’s not just chatter. Nobody wants to do all this work and then say, ’Oh, now we’ve got to sell it to our owners.’ We wanted to let the other owners know ’these guys are serious. They want to get something done.’ That changes the urgency. Buster was very smart to recognize that point. That goes back to his sense. He’s got a good nose for how people think and operate. It’s one of his strengths.”

RosterResource currently estimates the Giants to have a competitive balance tax number of almost $223MM, roughly $18MM below the $241MM base threshold. That should leave the club plenty of wiggle room to continue adding to the roster ahead of the deadline, whether they plan to avoid the tax or not.

Photo courtesy of D. Ross Cameron, Imagn Images

Poll: Can The Blue Jays Keep This Up?

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Entering the 2025 season, the narrative surrounding the Blue Jays had centered primarily around the future of star first baseman Vladimir Guerrero Jr. for quite some time. Questions regarding Guerrero’s future arguably overshadowed questions regarding the state of the team as a whole coming off an 88-loss season in 2024 that saw the team finish dead last in the AL East. The Jays finally locked up their homegrown star in early April, but the following month saw the team fail to do much on the field that inspired confidence in their status as potential contenders. On May 7, the Jays had a lackluster 16-20 record and would need to leapfrog six teams in order to get into playoff position. Six weeks later, they’ve done all of that and more. Toronto currently boasts a robust 40-33 record that places them in the second of three AL Wild Card spots and just two games back of the Yankees for the AL East crown.

Going 24-13 over their past 37 games is certainly impressive, but it begs the question: which version of the Blue Jays is the real one? Looking at the season as a whole, Toronto is a somewhat middling club. Their team wRC+ of 106 ranks 12th in the majors, which is solid but hardly spectacular. The same can be said of their bullpen, which ranks 11th in ERA and 9th in FIP this year with identical 3.60 figures in both stats. While both of those numbers are more or less in line with what one would expect from a Wild Card contender, the starting pitching is a different story. The Jays’ rotation has been a disaster this year with a 4.61 ERA (26th in the majors) and 4.72 FIP (27th). That bottom-five rotation in the sport has left the Jays with a negative run differential, as they’ve been outscored by their opponents 319-315 even after this recent stretch of strong play.

A closer look at the team’s performance over the past six weeks offers a hint at what’s changed. While the Toronto offense has been only slightly better than average on the season as a whole, Blue Jays hitters have been among the sport’s very best from May 8 onward. In that time, they’ve slashed .270/.339/.443 as a team with a 121 wRC+, second to only the Dodgers in MLB. In other words, the team’s average slash line during their recent hot streak has roughly mirrored Gunnar Henderson’s overall offensive production this year. Guerrero is a big part of this, as he’s begun to heat up after a slow start to the year with a 152 wRC+ over the past six weeks. Bo Bichette (131 wRC+) and Alejandro Kirk (145 wRC+) have played closer to the star-level expectations they had fostered in previous seasons than 2024’s down years during that same time frame, as well. Not all of that success is entirely sustainable—no one should expect Addison Barger to replicate his 167 wRC+ from the past six weeks long term—but the extreme outlier performances have been balanced by injuries to plays like Daulton Varsho and slumps for players like George Springer (98 wRC+ since May 8).

Some things have remained consistent about the Blue Jays throughout the entire season, however. Even as they’ve found success in recent weeks, the starting pitching has remained brutal. The rotation’s ERA is actually worse over the past six weeks than it has been for the season overall, with a 4.78 ERA that comes in ahead of only the Orioles, Rockies, and Athletics. Decent mid-rotation performances from Jose Berrios, Chris Bassitt, and Kevin Gausman haven’t been enough to outweigh the struggles of Bowden Francis and the absence of Max Scherzer. Francis was recently placed on the injured list himself and Scherzer is working his way back to the big league roster on a rehab assignment at present, but even a strong return from Scherzer ahead of his 41st birthday would leave the Jays at least one starter short without much top-of-the-rotation impact.

On the other hand, the Jays have generally managed to make up for their abysmal starting pitching with a defensive unit that has been consistently excellent. No team in baseball has come close to Toronto’s defensive prowess this season according to Fangraphs’ defense metric, which gives the Blue Jays a 20.3 figure that’s good for more than double the second-place Braves (8.3). According to Statcast’s Fielding Run Value, Kirk and Ernie Clement have both been elite defensively, as has the center field tandem of Myles Straw and Varsho. Andres Gimenez has also been excellent at the keystone, and even Guerrero has looked solid at first base. While Bichette’s defense leaves much to be desired at shortstop and Springer shouldn’t play the field at this point in his career, it’s a strong defensive unit that has managed to buoy the Jays through their pitching woes. It wouldn’t be a shock if they managed to continue fielding well enough to overcome their weak pitching, at least until closer to the trade deadline when they’ll presumably look to make some external additions.

Where do MLBTR readers stand on the Blue Jays’ chances of sustaining the success they’ve found in recent weeks? Will they be able to hold onto a Wild Card spot and get back into the postseason, or are they destined to fade down the stretch? Have your say in the poll below:

Phillies Select Buddy Kennedy, Transfer Aaron Nola To 60-Day IL

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The Phillies announced that they have selected the contract of infielder Buddy Kennedy. Infielder/outfielder Weston Wilson has been optioned to Triple-A Lehigh Valley as the corresponding active roster move. To open a 40-man spot, right-hander Aaron Nola has been transferred to the 60-day injured list.

Kennedy, now 26, was acquired from the Tigers about a year ago. He exhausted his final option year in 2024 and was therefore out of options coming into 2025. He didn’t break camp with the club, which got him pushed onto the waiver wire. After he cleared waivers, the Phillies re-signed him to a new minor league deal. Matt Gelb of The Athletic reports that Kennedy had recently triggered an upward mobility clause in that deal. The Phils didn’t want him to get away, so they have added him to the roster today.

Since signing that deal, Kennedy has been in good form at the Triple-A level. He has appeared in 61 games for the IronPigs, hitting eight home runs with an 11.6% walk rate and 15.3% strikeout rate. That’s led to a .283/.388/.447 line and 126 wRC+, indicating he’s been 26% better than league average at the plate overall.

Triple-A success isn’t new for him but he hasn’t yet translated it to the majors. He has received scattered big league time from the Diamondbacks, Tigers and Phils, with a .203/.295/.313 line and 72 wRC+ in 149 trips to the plate over the 2022-2024 campaigns.

He has experience at all four infield positions and left field, so he should replace Wilson as the club’s multi-positional bench piece. That may not lead to a lot of playing time for Kennedy. Wilson was reinstated from the injured list about two months ago but has received only 42 plate appearances since then, including just one since June 9th.

As for Nola, he landed on the IL in the middle of May due to a sprained right ankle, though that’s no longer the main concern. It was reported just over a week ago that he would be shut down for two weeks due to a stress reaction in his rib cage. He’s now ineligible to return until 60 days from that initial IL placement, which would be mid-July. Even if he’s declared healthy in a week, he will need to ramp up his throwing and probably make a few rehab starts, so he likely wasn’t going to be back before the All-Star break anyway.

Photo courtesy of Eric Hartline, Imagn Images

Marlins To Select Robinson Piña

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The Marlins are calling up right-hander Robinson Piña for his major league debut, reports Kevin Barral of Fish On First. The team has not announced the move yet. Piña’s contract will need to be selected to what is currently a full 40-man roster in Miami, so the Fish will need to make a corresponding move in that regard.

Piña, 26, will make his big league debut the first time he takes the mound. He spent the 2017-23 seasons in the Angels system before becoming a minor league free agent and signing with the Phillies ahead of the 2024 campaign. The Phils never added him to the 40-man roster, and Piña again became a minor league free agent this past offseason, signing with Miami in his second run through the open market. This time around, he’ll get that coveted first MLB opportunity.

Piña has certainly earned his call to the majors. He’s appeared in 13 games, 11 of them starts, and tallied 57 innings with a 3.47 ERA, a 22.2% strikeout rate, a 6.2% walk rate and a 46.9% ground-ball rate. Command was an issue for him early in his minor league career, but he’s now turned in consecutive minor league seasons with walk rates that clock in considerably south of average. This year’s 92.8 mph average sinker is up a mile per hour over last year’s levels, and Piña has been consistent all season; he hasn’t yielded more than three earned runs in any appearance and has held opponents to two or fewer runs in 10 of 13 outings overall.

Miami has Edward Cabrera lined up to start today, with Janson Junk, Eury Pérez and Sandy Alcantara listed as probables in their next three games thereafter. There’s no need for an immediate spot starter — barring an injury the team has not yet made public — but they could be looking to add some length with Junk having spent the season in a long relief role. The Marlins also have an off-day coming on Monday, so they could option Adam Mazur and skip the fifth starter’s spot next time through the rotation. Doing so would give them options for how best to use Piña, who’s fully stretched out and has topped 80 pitches in five of his past six appearances.

D-backs Place Gabriel Moreno On Injured List, Select Aramis Garcia

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The Diamondbacks announced Thursday that they’ve placed catcher Gabriel Moreno on the 10-day injured list due to a right hand contusion (retroactive to June 16) and selected the contract of fellow catcher Aramis Garcia from Triple-A Reno. Righty Christian Montes De Oca was transferred from the 15-day IL to the 60-day IL to open a 40-man spot for Garcia, who returns just nine days after being outrighted off the 40-man roster.

Moreno originally hurt his hand while trying to block a wild pitch earlier this month. He’s played just three games in 12 days since taking that errant pitch off his hand. Arizona was clearly hoping to avoid an IL stint, but things have reached a point where they’ll sit him down for the next week and get another catching option on the roster to complement Jose Herrera.

The 25-year-old Moreno is enjoying another solid all-around year. The former top prospect’s .270/.324/.414 batting line isn’t elite but is firmly above league average (106 wRC+). That’s big production from any catcher, a position that is regularly manned by below-average hitters, but it’s especially nice for a player with Moreno’s elite defensive grades. He draws plus marks for his framing, blocking and throwing alike. Since 2023, he ranks as the game’s third-best defender behind the plate, by measure of the Defensive Runs Saved metric, and the seventh-best in MLB according to Statcast. Because Moreno’s IL stint is backdated three days (the maximum allowed under MLB rules), he’ll be eligible to return a week from now.

As for Garcia, he’s a 32-year-old journeyman who was briefly up with the Snakes in the wake of the original injury to Moreno. He only appeared in one game, however, and didn’t take a plate appearance before being designated for assignment and passed through waivers. He’s played in parts of six big league seasons and carries a career .211/.248/.325 line in 327 trips to the plate during that time. He currently sports a .250/.399/.524 line in 38 Triple-A games and is a career .235/.306/.430 hitter in parts of seven seasons at that level.

Presumably, Garcia will see a bit more game action this time around. Herrera, who’ll serve as the primary catcher with Moreno down, has played eight games in 12 days since Moreno was originally banged up. It’s a heavy workload for any catcher but particularly a glove-first backup who’s hitting .171/.284/.244. Herrera is up to 101 plate appearances this year — already just 23 shy of his career-high in the majors, where he’s a lifetime .199/.279/.256 hitter.

The 60-day IL move for Montes De Oca was an inevitability. The 25-year-old righty landed on the injured list earlier this month due to elbow inflammation, but the D-backs announced five days ago that he was headed for surgery to repair a stress fracture in his lower back. That surgery was likely to take him out for most or all of the remaining season anyhow — a miserable turn of events for a young hurler who’d tossed 2 2/3 innings of scoreless ball in his MLB debut just days prior to landing on the injured list.

Yankees Select Jayvien Sandridge

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The Yankees announced today that they have selected the contract of left-hander Jayvien Sandridge. He’ll take the active roster spot of right-hander Yerry De los Santos, who has been placed on the 15-day injured list with right elbow discomfort. To open a 40-man spot, infielder/outfielder Oswaldo Cabrera has been transferred to the 60-day injured list.

De los Santos has given the Yankees 20 innings this year while only allowing 1.80 earned runs per nine. That level of performance is surely not sustainable with a 14% strikeout rate and 12.9% walk rate. He’s managed to keep runs off the board by having a huge 88.2% strand rate and no home runs allowed on the season.

The Yankees haven’t provided any information about how long they expect him to be out, though an elbow injury is naturally always a concern for a pitcher. More information is likely to be forthcoming in the near future.

For now, his IL placement opens a path for Sandridge to get to the big leagues for the first time. The 26-year-old southpaw has spent time in the minors with the Orioles, Reds and Padres without getting called to the majors. He reached minor league free agency at the end of last year and signed a minors deal with the Yankees.

Sandridge started the season on the injured list but was able to get back on the mound by the middle of May. He made a few rehab appearances at lower levels before moving up to Triple-A. Combined, he has thrown 12 innings this year with four earned runs allowed. He has walked six opponents but also struck out 20, for respective rates of 11.8% and 39.2%.

That’s generally been Sandridge’s recipe throughout his minor league career. From 2021 to 2024, he tossed 173 2/3 innings for various minor clubs with a 3.94 ERA. His 18.2% walk rate in that time was massive but he also struck out 33.7% of batters faced.

As of July of last year, FanGraphs considered Sandridge to be one of the top 20 prospects in the Padres’ system. That report noted that his fastball was sitting in the upper 90s but that controlling his slider is his biggest issue, throwing out Jake Diekman as a potential ceiling comp since Diekman carved out a nice career despite consistently high walk rates.

The Yankees came into today with the only lefty in the bullpen being Tim Hill, a veteran soft-tossing ground ball guy. Sandridge will give them a second southpaw with a different profile. Since this is his first big league call, he has a full slate of options and can be cheaply controlled for years to come, though he’ll obviously have to perform well enough to hold his 40-man roster spot.

As for Cabrera, his transfer to the 60-day IL is not a surprise. He suffered a grisly ankle injury in the middle of May and underwent surgery. He’s technically able to be reinstated 60 days from that initial IL placement, so mid-July, but he’s expected to miss most or all of the remainder of the season.

Photo courtesy of Nathan Ray Seebeck, Imagn Images

The Opener: Doubleheaders, Mets, Twins

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Here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day:

1. Doubleheaders in the Midwest:

A trio of games got canceled due to inclement weather yesterday, and while the Cubs/Brewers matchup was rescheduled for a date in August, the other two contests are set to be made up as part of doubleheaders today. The Pirates and Tigers will make up their missed game as part of a split doubleheader that will feature Tarik Skubal in Game 1 (opposite Andrew Heaney) and Paul Skenes in Game 2 (opposite an unannounced Tigers starter). As noted by Jason Beck of MLB.com, tickets for yesterday’s game (which would have featured Skubal) will be valid for Game 2 (which will feature Skenes). Meanwhile, tickets for today’s regularly scheduled game will be valid for Game 1. Fans who had tickets for yesterday’s game and are unable to attend Game 2 can exchange their tickets for another game of equal value this season.

Meanwhile, the Cardinals and White Sox had their game in Chicago canceled last night. It’ll be made up as part of a single-admission doubleheader that will feature former White Sox righty Erick Fedde on the mound for St. Louis against Sox youngster Sean Burke. Rule 5 Pick Mike Vasil will start Game 2 for Chicago opposite Cardinals prospect Michael McGreevy. According to Scott Merkin of MLB.com, fans with tickets to yesterday’s game will receive a credit to their account while fans with tickets to today’s game will be welcome to watch both games this afternoon.

2. Mets lose six in a row:

The Mets have fallen into a funk lately, losing six straight contests. The club now sits half a game behind the Dodgers and Cubs in the standings, meaning that if the season ended today they’d fail to secure a bye through the Wild Card round of the playoffs. Even more concerning is the fact that the Phillies are hot on their heels in the NL East race, lurking just one game behind New York in the standings.

The Mets will look to turn things around during tonight’s game, where they’ll face Braves righty Spencer Strider. Strider’s sporting an uncharacteristic 4.35 ERA through six starts this year, though he looked more like his typical Cy Young-caliber self last time out when he punched out 13 Rockies across six scoreless frames. The Mets will send Clay Holmes (2.87 ERA) to the mound for his 15th start of the season to counter Strider.

3. Twins slip out of playoff position amid skid:

Meanwhile in the AL, the Twins are in the midst of their own six-game losing streak. Minnesota was holding onto the second of three AL Wild Card spots just last week, but this recent skid has knocked them out of the playoff picture entirely. They now sit 1.5 games out of a playoff spot with a lackluster 36-37 record. They’re set to face off against the Reds in Cincinnati this afternoon, when right-hander Chris Paddack will attempt to turn things around for Minnesota. Paddack has a pedestrian 4.30 ERA in 14 starts this year and allowed eight runs to score in four innings against the Astros last time out, though only one of those runs was earned. He’ll face veteran hurler Nick Martinez (3.92 ERA) in today’s contest.

Read The Transcript Of Nicklaus Gaut’s Fantasy Baseball Chat

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Nicklaus Gaut will be talking fantasy baseball with Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers today at 11 am Central Time.  Get your question in early or participate in the live event at the link below!

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MLB Mailbag: Devers, Red Sox, Braves, Alonso, Helsley

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This week's mailbag gets into many aspects of the Rafael Devers trade, remaining questions to answer in Boston, no-trade clauses, shortstop options for the Braves, Pete Alonso's next contract, Ryan Helsley's struggles, and much more.

Kevin asks:

What's your personal take on the Giants trade? I think Boston got the better deal.

John asks:

Seen a lot of talk from fans and the media that Devers contract will age badly but I did a little digging into the Contract Tracker. Between 2015 and 2020 there were 12 contracts with an AAV at 30 mil. and over. This year alone there were 5, including one for 50. So am I wrong to think that given the way salaries have escalated by the end of the contract 30 mil. likely won't be that big a deal?

Denny asks:

Will Devers HR stats suffer playing home games at whatever the current name is of the ballpark in SF?

My initial reaction was to favor the Giants' side of the deal.  They added a 28-year-old top 10 hitter in baseball who should be worth 3-4 WAR per year for the foreseeable future.  The Giants also ditched Jordan Hicks' contract in the process.

The Giants could feel pain from moving Kyle Harrison and James Tibbs III, but probably not in the short-term.  The balance of this deal hinges heavily on Harrison, who is just 23 and retains number two starter upside.  The Red Sox can control Harrison through 2030 if they keep him in the minors for a few weeks, which I'm guessing is the plan.  Harrison has at least held his own through the equivalent of one Major League season.

Tibbs is considered a 50-grade prospect; he'll have to hit a lot to profile as a corner outfield regular.  Jose Bello is the wild card prospect, and those get moved regularly.

I have seen multiple anonymous executives suggest Devers' contract is underwater, meaning he's worth less than he's owed.  You could look at that in a strict dollars per WAR/aging curve sense, plugging in Devers as a 4-ish WAR player for 2025 who will begin his decline in 2026 or '27 and will be paid through 2033 (age 36).  WAR doesn't like a player like this, especially if he's a DH, and I could see valuing him below $250MM with this approach.

Say Devers was owed $253MM at the time of the trade, plus a $2MM assignment bonus paid by the Giants.  Let's also say that Hicks should be valued around $8MM per year.  Given that his contract pays $12MM a year through 2027, the Giants save approximately $10MM by unloading Hicks' contract.  Factor in Devers' deferrals and we'll say it's like the Giants are paying Devers around $225MM for the next 8.5 years.

Had Devers been declared a free agent on June 15, would he have topped $225MM?

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Anthopoulos On Trading Chris Sale: “Will Not Happen”

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The Braves enter play tonight seven games below .500. They’re 12 back of the Mets in the division and 6.5 out in the Wild Card race with five teams to jump. They’ve got their work cut out for them in getting to October for an eighth straight season, but that remains the focus for the front office.

President of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos spoke with Nick Cellini and Chris Dimino of 680 The Fan this afternoon. The veteran executive made clear he’s operating with a buyer’s mentality six weeks before the trade deadline. He was even more forceful in pushing back against the idea that they’d consider trading away key players — at least barring a terrible stretch of play in July.

Anthopoulos interrupted a question about other clubs potentially attempting to pry defending Cy Young winner Chris Sale out of Atlanta. “No, zero. I’ve seen the speculation. It’s completely ridiculous to me. We are not selling, especially someone that has club control beyond the current year,” he said. “Will not happen. I never make definitive statements unless I’m going to stick to them. Once you make definitive statements and then you go back on them, you’re a liar and you’re done.

Will. Not. Happen. Bold, italicize it, caps. So much so that I’m trying to make a trade now — it’s very hard to make a trade in June — just to signal to everybody that we will not sell. (If) you get to the end of July and things are completely changed, I guess we would reevaluate, but you’d have to be extreme. We’re built to win. Our expectations are to win. Our expectations are to go for it the entire time.”

It’s not common for an executive to rule out trading a player that definitively. It’s even rarer for them to reverse course after making a public statement to that effect. Skeptics will point to Nationals’ GM Mike Rizzo saying the team was “not trading Juan Soto” less than two months before they did exactly that, but the turn of events required Soto rejecting an intervening $440MM extension proposal. Anthopoulos left the door slightly open to selling if the team’s play over the next month and a half made a postseason run all but impossible. Even in that scenario, it’s not clear that they’d be willing to discuss players who are signed beyond this season.

MLBTR examined the Sale situation in a post for Front Office subscribers last week. He’s playing this year on a $22MM salary and is under control via an $18MM option for one more season. They’ll rubber stamp the option unless he suffers a significant injury in the second half. Sale would command upwards of $30MM annually (for at least two and possibly three years) if he were a free agent. After running into some tough batted ball luck in April, he’s been every bit as dominant as he was last season. Sale had not allowed more than two earned runs in any of his past 10 starts coming into tonight’s game against the Mets. He is through another six scoreless innings at the time of this writing.

Even if the Braves miss the postseason in 2025, they’ll certainly go into next year expecting to contend. Having Sale atop the rotation makes that much more reasonable. At the same time, they’d bypass an opportunity at a massive trade haul this summer. Teams would be willing to give up significant young talent for the ability to control Sale for two postseason runs. The Braves still expect to be in that position themselves. If they remain well below .500 on July 31, however, they’d arguably be leaving significant value on the table as an at best long shot contender for one of Sale’s two remaining control years.

Anthopoulos argued that the next few weeks represent a huge opportunity. They’re currently playing the second game of a three-game set against the Mets. They’ll head to Miami this weekend before squaring off against the Mets (for four) and Phillies (for three) next week. They rearranged their rotation to ensure that Sale is lined up for both New York series rather than starting last weekend against the Rockies and taking on the Marlins in a few days.

They’re far enough behind New York and Philly that it’s difficult to see them winning the NL East, but they could theoretically pull back into the race if they go on a tear over the next two weeks. They’ll also take on St. Louis, one of the teams above them in the Wild Card standings, in their final series before the All-Star Break. While those will be tough sets, they have softer matchups against a few teams toward the bottom of the American League standings (the Angels, Orioles and A’s) in the first two weeks of July.

In the meantime, they’re evidently searching for a short-term boost. In this morning’s radio interview (which Atlanta fans will want to give a full listen), Anthopoulos identified the offense as the team’s biggest disappointment to date. Jon Heyman of The New York Post wrote last week that they were pursuing outfield and shortstop help.

Nick Allen is a Gold Glove-caliber shortstop but isn’t going to provide anything offensively. Left field would be the obvious area to upgrade in the outfield. Neither Alex Verdugo nor Eli White have stepped up since Jurickson Profar’s performance-enhancing drug suspension. The Braves will get Profar back in early July, but he’s coming off a nearly three-month layoff and faces questions about the sustainability of last year’s breakout season. He’s also ineligible for postseason play this year, so the Braves probably want a contingency plan for that position regardless of how Profar performs next month.

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