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Cole Wilcox

Mariners Acquire Cole Wilcox From Rays

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The Mariners have acquired right-hander Cole Wilcox from the Rays in exchange for cash considerations, per announcements from both clubs. The righty had been designated for assignment by the Rays earlier in the week. The M’s had 40-man space thanks to players recently becoming free agents.

Wilcox, now 26, came to the Rays in the December 2020 trade which sent Blake Snell to San Diego. The righty required Tommy John surgery in September of 2021, which wiped out most of his 2022. In the following two years, the Rays kept developing him as a starter in the minors, with fairly uninspiring results. In 250 1/3 innings over those two seasons, he had a 4.28 earned run average, 19.8% strikeout rate and 8.3% walk rate.

In 2025, he was used primarily as a reliever, which seemed to help him find a new gear. He tossed 58 1/3 innings over 39 appearances on the farm with a 3.70 ERA. His 10.8% walk rate was a bit high but he struck out 25.1% of batters faced and got grounders on 50.3% of balls in play. The Rays added him to the 40-man in September and he tossed one big league inning, allowing three earned runs.

With the injured list going away this week, the Rays needed to open up some roster space and Wilcox was one of the casualties. Conversely, the Mariners had a few open roster spots and have used one to grab Wilcox. Seattle has a pretty good track record of coaxing good results from low-profile pickups like this, so it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Wilcox flourish with his new club. Even if that is setting expectations too high, he has a full slate of options and can serve as a depth arm in Triple-A.

Photo courtesy of Kim Klement Neitzel, Imagn Images

Rays Designate Six Players For Assignment

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The Rays announced a major shake up of their 40-man roster today as they get started on their offseason. Right-hander Alex Faedo and outfielder Stuart Fairchild were both activated from the 60-day injured list and designated for assignment, while right-handers Cole Wilcox, Caleb Boushley, Joey Gerber, and Garrett Acton were all designated for assignment as well. Those moves make room for recently-acquired outfielder Ryan Vilade on the 40-man roster and also clear up spaces for players to be reinstated from the 60-day injured list, which goes away five days after the World Series.

Faedo, 30 later this month, missed the entire 2025 season due to shoulder inflammation. He was acquired by the Rays last offseason in a trade with the Tigers after Detroit designated him for assignment back in January. A back-end starter and swingman for parts of three seasons with the Tigers, Faedo has 175 2/3 big league innings under his belt with a 4.51 earned run average, 20.9% strikeout rate and 9.7% walk rate. He is out of options, which makes him hard to roster. The Tigers designated him for assignment last winter. The Rays took a shot on him but got a lost season as the result.

Fairchild, 30 in March, spent the past three seasons with the Reds and entered Spring Training with the club this year. He was squeezed off the roster and ultimately wound up traded to the Braves, for whom he appeared in 28 games as a reserve outfielder. He was traded from Atlanta to Tampa shortly before the trade deadline this year, but an oblique strain prevented him from playing for the Rays. Fairchild is a strong defender and baserunner but is a career .223/.305/.384 hitter across 229 games with five different clubs since he made his big league debut with the Diamondbacks in 2021. Like Faedo, he is out of options.

Wilcox, 26, just made his major league debut this year. He originally came to the Rays in the December 2020 trade which sent Blake Snell to San Diego. Wilcox required Tommy John surgery the following September. After returning from that procedure, his results in the minors as a starter were fairly middling. He was moved to the bullpen in 2025 with decent results. He tossed 58 1/3 innings on the farm with a 3.70 ERA, 25.1% strikeout rate, 10.8% walk rate and 50.3% ground ball rate. The Rays added him to the 40-man in September and he tossed one big league inning, allowing three earned runs.

Boushley, 32, has been a long reliever for the Brewers, Twins and Rangers. The Rays claimed him off waivers from the Rangers in September but kept him in the minors. Boushley has 49 2/3 big league innings over 28 appearances with a 5.80 ERA, 21.1% strikeout rate, 8.1% walk rate and 40.6% ground ball rate.

Gerber, 29 in May, made his debut with the 2020 Mariners. Injuries wiped out much of the next few years. He signed a minor league deal with the Rays coming into 2025. He earned a 40-man spot in the summer but was mostly kept in the minors. He only pitched 4 1/3 big league innings this year, allowing one earned run. He logged 44 1/3 innings in the minors with a 6.09 ERA, 27.9% strikeout rate and 7.6% walk rate.

Acton, 27, signed a two-year minor league deal with the Rays going into 2024. He had undergone Tommy John surgery prior to signing that deal and missed the entire 2024 campaign. He was added to the 40-man late in 2025 and tossed one scoreless inning in the bigs. He threw 58 2/3 innings in Triple-A with a 3.68 ERA, 30.1% strikeout rate and 11.4% walk rate.

All six players now head into DFA limbo. The Rays will have seven days to trade them or pass them through waivers. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so any trade talks would have to come together in the next five days. If Fairchild clears, he would have the right to elect free agency since he has at least three years of service time. Boushley will have the right to elect free agency since he has previously been outrighted in his career. Faedo should be eligible for seven-year minor league free agency five days after the World Series but he could be held in DFA limbo longer than that.

Photo courtesy of Nathan Ray Seebeck, Imagn Images

Rays Select Cole Wilcox

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The Rays have selected the contract of righty Cole Wilcox from Triple-A Durham, per a team announcement. He’ll join the bullpen and make his major league debut the first time he gets into a game. Infielder Taylor Walls was transferred from the 10-day IL to the 60-day IL to open a spot on the 40-man roster, while right-hander Joey Gerber was optioned to Durham to clear space on the active roster.

Wilcox, 26, was a third-round pick by the Padres in 2020, though that undersells his stock at the time of the draft. Wilcox “slid” into the third round due primarily to signability concerns. A draft-eligible sophomore at the University of Georgia, Wilcox was widely regarded as a first-round talent. San Diego plucked him with the No. 80 overall pick and swayed him with a $3.3MM signing bonus that was a record for a third-round pick at the time. Just five months later, he was traded to the Rays alongside Francisco Mejia, Luis Patiño and Blake Hunt in the Blake Snell blockbuster.

Things haven’t panned out for Wilcox in the years since. He was dominant for the Rays’ Class-A club in 2021 but made just 10 starts before incurring an elbow injury that eventually led to Tommy John surgery. He returned late in the 2022 season but totaled just 16 innings between the Rays’ Class-A and Rookie-level affiliates.

Wilcox spent the 2023 season pitching out of the rotation with Tampa Bay’s Double-A affiliate but struggled to a 5.23 ERA while showing far worse command than he had prior to surgery. He repeated the Double-A level in 2024 and found better success in terms of his bottom-line run prevention numbers; Wilcox dropped his ERA all the way to 3.18, but he did so with a below-average 18.9% strikeout rate. That still prompted a promotion to Triple-A, but Wilcox again struggled with shaky command and diminished stuff. His fastball, which had previously sat 94-97 mph and scraped triple digits, instead sat at 92.5 mph that season.

Tampa Bay moved Wilcox to the bullpen in 2025, and the results are more encouraging. He’s pitched to a 3.70 ERA in 58 1/3 innings. His 10.8% walk rate is still too high, but he’s averaging 95.8 mph on his sinker now that he’s moved into a short relief role. He’s also scrapped his changeup and now relies on a pure two-pitch mix featuring that sinker and a sharp slider that always graded as his best pitch in scouting reports. Wilcox has kept 50.3% of his opponents’ batted balls on the ground, and his 12.3% swinging-strike rate is better than average as well.

At the time of the Snell trade, the Rays had surely hoped that Wilcox would develop into a key member of their rotation. That no longer appears to be in the cards, but with a sinker approaching 96 mph and a quality slider that’s averaging 86.1 mph, he still has the makings of a potentially useful reliever. He’ll get his first opportunity in the majors in the final weeks of the 2025 campaign, but now that he’s on the 40-man roster, Wilcox will have a full slate of three minor league option years and ample runway to prove himself as a member of manager Kevin Cash’s relief corps in subsequent seasons.

This Date In Transaction History: Blake Snell Trade

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Today marks three years since the blockbuster that sent a former (and future) Cy Young winner across leagues. The Rays dealt Blake Snell to the Padres in the late evening of December 27, 2020, bringing back a four-player prospect package. Luis Patiño headlined the return, which also included Blake Hunt, former top prospect Francisco Mejía and 2020 third-round draftee Cole Wilcox.

The deal came as something of a surprise, as the Rays weren’t under huge financial pressure to move Snell. Despite the controversy surrounding Kevin Cash’s decision to lift Snell in Game 6 of that year’s Fall Classic, Tampa Bay could’ve held the southpaw into the following season. Snell was under contract for respective salaries of $10.5MM, $12.5MM and $16MM covering the 2021-23 campaigns.

Nevertheless, the Tampa Bay front office felt the prospect return was too strong to pass up. Patiño was viewed as one of the sport’s most talented pitching prospects despite struggling in a brief MLB debut that season. Hunt was a borderline Top 100 minor leaguer at the time. Mejía’s stock had fallen from its peak as he struggled against big league pitching, but he was only entering his age-25 season and had less than three years of MLB service. Wilcox was viewed by many evaluators as a first-round talent that year, only dropping to the third because of a lofty bonus demand.

The deal didn’t pan out at all as the Rays had envisioned. While Snell has had a volatile career, he recaptured the ace-caliber upside he’d shown in Tampa Bay. After turning in a 4.20 ERA over 27 starts during his first year with the Friars, he rebounded to post a 3.38 mark in 2022. The cumulative 3.79 ERA he managed across 256 2/3 innings was solid, although it didn’t hint at the Cy Young level he’d reach in 2023.

Snell didn’t start the ’23 campaign well. He owned a 5.48 ERA with a strikeout rate just under 24% through the first month. After a slight uptick in strikeouts and a 3.82 mark in May, Snell kicked off a four-month stretch as the most dominant pitcher on the planet. From June 1 on, he struck out 35% of batters faced and allowed 1.23 earned runs per nine. His 1.54 ERA after the All-Star Break is the 12th-lowest second half rate since 2000 (minimum 75 innings).

The dominating finish led Snell to cruise to a second career Cy Young. He was a near-unanimous choice as the NL’s top pitcher after posting an MLB-best 2.25 ERA through 180 innings. Snell hit free agency and seems unlikely to return to a San Diego organization that has cut spending. Assuming he signs elsewhere in the coming weeks, he concludes his time as a Padre with a 3.15 ERA while striking out 31.5% of opponents in 436 2/3 frames.

As a team, San Diego didn’t have the kind of success they envisioned. They reached the postseason just once in the last three years. A second-half collapse cost them a playoff berth in 2021. They rebounded with a trip to the NLCS in ’22 but finished 82-80 last season. A strong final couple weeks ostensibly brought them within a couple games of a playoff spot, but the 2023 club was more or less finished by the end of August.

One can debate whether the Friars should’ve more aggressively marketed Snell, Juan Soto and Josh Hader at the deadline. A fringe contender at the time, they elected to add around the margins rather than move their top impending free agents or Soto (whose arbitration price tag they knew was rising). As a team that exceeded the luxury tax threshold, they’ll only receive picks after the fourth round as compensation for losing Snell and Hader, each of whom rejected a qualifying offer.

San Diego’s subsequent decisions don’t negate how well they fared in the Snell trade, however. That turned out to be one of the more lopsided deals of the past few seasons. No one in the return found much success in Tampa Bay. Three of the four are out of the organization entirely.

Patiño saw MLB action in each season from 2021-23. He logged 101 1/3 innings as a Ray, turning in a 5.24 ERA. Patiño’s control hasn’t developed as expected and he has struggled with home runs throughout his MLB tenure. The Rays moved on at the deadline, sending him to the White Sox for cash. He ended up back in San Diego last week; the Friars claimed him when Chicago put him on waivers. He’s out of options, so he’ll either need to open the season on the MLB roster or be made available to other teams yet again.

Neither of the other prospects involved have reached the majors. Hunt has slowly climbed the minor league ladder, hitting at a roughly league average level at each stop. The Rays didn’t want to carry him on the 40-man roster, yet Hunt was eligible for minor league free agency after this season. Tampa Bay dealt him to the Mariners (who did add him to the 40-man) for 2022 eighth-round pick Tatem Levins last month. Wilcox remains in the organization but underwent Tommy John surgery late in the ’21 season. He returned to post a 5.23 ERA in 25 starts at Double-A this year. He went unselected in the Rule 5 draft a few weeks ago.

Mejía, arguably the fourth piece of the return at the time, had the most success for Tampa Bay. The switch-hitting catcher had a .260/.322/.414 batting line in 84 games in 2021. His offense cratered over the last two years, though, as he hit .237/.262/.387 in 459 plate appearances over that stretch. The Rays designated him for assignment in August. He reached free agency at year’s end and signed a minor league deal with the Angels last week.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Rays Prospect Cole Wilcox Undergoes Tommy John Surgery

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Top Rays pitching prospect Cole Wilcox underwent Tommy John surgery on Wednesday this week, reports Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times (Twitter link). That’ll quite likely wipe out his entire 2022 campaign.

Wilcox, 22, came to the Rays as one of the key young pieces in the trade that sent lefty Blake Snell to San Diego. He was a third-round pick, selected No. 80 overall, just last summer — although that draft placement is somewhat misleading. Wilcox, a draft-eligible sophomore last summer, was widely viewed as a first-round talent but slipped down the draft board due to signability concerns. The Friars gave him a $3.3MM signing bonus — a record number for a third-round selection.

The Padres added Wilcox to their 60-man player pool last year and let him work out with at their alternate site over the course of the summer, but last year’s nixed minor league season meant that the former Georgia Bulldogs righty didn’t make his professional debut until this year with the Rays’ Class-A affiliate. Wilcox looked every bit like a first-round talent when cruising through A-ball lineups. In 44 1/3 innings, he pitched to a 2.03 ERA with an impressive 29.9 percent strikeout rate and an incredibly low 2.9 percent walk rate.

Wilcox only recently turned 22, so he’ll still be just 23 years of age when he returns to the mound — presumably early in the 2023 campaign. Obviously, it’s not ideal for a promising young pitcher to effectively lose two seasons of development (2020 and 2022, in this case), but Wilcox has age on his side. Assuming he’s able to pitch a mostly full season in 2023, he’ll likely be added to Tampa Bay’s 40-man roster in the 2023-24 offseason, as he’d otherwise be eligible for the Rule 5 Draft that winter.

Even with Wilcox sidelined next season, the Rays have an impressive crop of rising young arms to tap into both in 2022 and in 2023. Luis Patino (also acquired in the Snell deal) and Shane McClanahan have already made an impact at the MLB level, and top prospect Shane Baz likely isn’t too far behind. Right-hander Seth Johnson, like Wilcox, has yet to pitch beyond Class-A, but the 2019 No. 40 overall selection has upped his prospect stock with an outstanding showing in A-ball this season.

Tampa Bay did trade away a pair of nearly MLB-ready arms — Joe Ryan and Drew Strotman — in order to acquire Nelson Cruz, but it seems we can scarcely go a year without a pop-up pitching prospect or two in the Rays’ perennially deep farm system garnering national attention. Recent trades and the loss of Wilcox notwithstanding, the Rays still boast a deep farm system that’ll continue to be ranked among the game’s best.

Padres Acquire Blake Snell From Rays

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TODAY: The Padres have officially announced the trade.

DECEMBER 28: The Padres have an agreement in place to acquire Blake Snell from the Rays, report Dennis Lin, Josh Tolentino and Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic (Twitter link). Luis Patiño, Francisco Mejía and prospects Blake Hunt and Cole Wilcox are headed back to Tampa Bay. The deal is pending review of medicals. R.J. Anderson of CBS Sports had first reported the two sides were in discussions about a potential Snell trade.

It’s a shocking, out-of-the-blue acquisition for San Diego. The Rays were known to be open to offers on Snell, but there had been no indication prior to tonight any deal was particularly close. Snell, 28, is one of the sport’s best pitchers. The 2018 American League Cy Young winner, he has posted a 2.85 ERA across 337.2 innings over the past three seasons. Along the way, he’s struck out 32.1% of opposing hitters, holding them to a .206/.279/.350 slash line. This past season, Snell worked to a 3.24 ERA/4.35 FIP with his typical strikeout and walk numbers.

Snell becomes the second big-ticket starting pitcher acquired by the Padres within the past six months. San Diego picked up Mike Clevinger from the Indians prior to the August 31 trade deadline. Clevinger, though, required Tommy John surgery after the season, leaving the Padres looking to add to their rotation. They’ve done so with a bang, picking up perhaps the top starter available on the trade market. Snell will join Dinelson Lamet, who’s coming off a Cy Young caliber 2020, at the top of a rotation that also features Zach Davies and Chris Paddack and should soon welcome top prospect MacKenzie Gore, to say nothing of fellow prized prospect Adrián Morejón.

The Padres are clearly aiming to push the reigning World Series champion Dodgers in the NL West in both 2021 and beyond. In addition to that high-end rotation, San Diego boasts an enviable position player core including Fernando Tatís Jr., Manny Machado, Jake Cronenworth, Trent Grisham and a resurgent Eric Hosmer. It’s a win-now strike, but it’s not solely a move for next year. Snell comes with three seasons of remaining control under the terms of the extension he signed with Tampa Bay in March 2019. He’ll make a bargain $10.5MM salary next season, with respective salaries of $12.5MM and $16MM the following two years (his 2023 figure has potential escalators based on future Cy Young finishes).

Snell’s combination of high-end talent and cheap, long-term control meant the Padres had no choice but to offer an elite package to pry him from Tampa. All four players headed back to the Rays are highly-regarded youngsters, headlined by the 21-year-old Patiño. A 2016 international signee out of Colombia, the extremely athletic right-hander quickly emerged as one of the game’s best prospects. Each of Baseball America, The Athletic’s Keith Law, and FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen placed him among the top twenty farmhands in the sport entering 2020. He draws praise for a mid-high 90’s fastball and plus slider and shows the makings of a plus changeup and above-average control, per Baseball America.

Patiño made his MLB debut, mostly working out of the bullpen, in 2020. His first 17.1 MLB innings didn’t go well, as he struggled to throw strikes and only managed a 5.19 ERA. But Patiño had only thrown 7.2 innings above A-ball entering the season and surely would’ve been given more minor-league time in 2020 had there been a season. He was nothing short of dominant in the low minors from 2018-19 and is a high-upside arm who could contribute for Tampa Bay in the near future. Patiño has yet to accrue a full year of service and comes with six seasons of team control. If he were to stick in the majors for good, he’d be controllable through 2026.

Hunt, too, has emerged as a top 100 caliber prospect, tweets Longenhagen. The 22-year-old catcher has “been hitting to all fields with power” and shown high-end arm strength in recent workouts, he adds. Hunt placed just 20th among Padre farmhands in Baseball America’s midseason system rankings but seems to have turned a corner in recent months. In 2019, he slashed .255/.331/.381 over 376 plate appearances in Low-A.

While Hunt may have the brighter long-term future behind the plate, Mejía isn’t far removed from being seen as an elite catching talent himself. The 25-year-old ranked among Baseball America’s top 35 overall prospects every year between 2017 and 2019 and headlined the Padres-Indians 2018 Brad Hand blockbuster. He comes with question marks about his aptitude behind the dish and has compiled just a .225/.282/.386 slash line in 362 career plate appearances over the past four seasons.

As MLBTR’s Mark Polishuk recently examined, though, it’s easy to understand the appeal he holds to Tampa Bay. Mejía’s a switch-hitter who demonstrated elite bat-to-ball skills in the minors and has a top-of-the-scale arm. Given his lack of MLB track record, there’s more risk in his profile than there may have been at the peak of his prospect status, but Mejía carries some long-term intrigue and can immediately step into the Rays’ catching mix with Mike Zunino. Mejía has two-plus years of service and can be controlled through the 2024 season. He’ll be eligible for arbitration for the first time next winter.

Rounding out the return is Wilcox, a 2020 draftee out of the University of Georgia. Selected in the third round, Wilcox was generally seen as a first-round talent who fell because of a high bonus demand as a draft-eligible sophomore. The Padres signed the 21-year-old for an overslot $3.3MM signing bonus. The right-hander has a high-90’s fastball with a pair of promising secondaries in his slider and changeup, Baseball America noted in their pre-draft scouting report. Wilcox was ranked twelfth among San Diego farmhands by BA.

From a broader perspective, the trade is symbolic of the respective team-building approaches of the two organizations. Padres GM A.J. Preller has shown a willingness to make bold acquisitions both through trade and free agency, leveraging the treasure trove of prospects the club accrued throughout their rebuild to support an emergent core of homegrown talent. The Padres still boast plenty of talent in the system they could leverage for future additions to the MLB roster, with the bullpen standing out as a potential target area.

Altogether, the addition of Snell cements the Friars alongside the Dodgers and Braves as the top three teams in the National League. The Snell acquisition brings the San Diego payroll to a projected $141MM after factoring in arbitration raises, per Roster Resource. That leaves a little bit of wiggle room under last year’s season-opening payroll of $157MM (before prorating) if ownership is willing to repeat that level of spending.

The Rays, meanwhile, continue to operate without regard to name recognition, showing a willingness to move anyone if they can recoup what they deem sufficient value. Tampa Bay continuously churns the major league roster while prioritizing long-term control and cost certainty. That’s helped them compile a farm system that was generally regarded as the league’s strongest even before today’s haul of prospects.

Between Snell and Charlie Morton, however, the reigning American League champs have moved on from two of their top three starters this winter. Tampa Bay now figures to add pitching this offseason as they look to compete with the Yankees and hold off the Blue Jays at the top of the AL East. With Snell’s contract off the books, the Rays’ payroll is down to a projected $57MM, per Roster Resource, $17MM shy of last season’s opening payroll of $74MM (before prorating).

This post was originally published on December 27th.

Padres To Add Cole Wilcox To 60-Man Player Pool

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The Padres will add recently signed third-round pick Cole Wilcox to their 60-man player pool today, tweets Dennis Lin of The Athletic. The former University of Georgia right-hander was considered a potential first-round talent but, as a draft-eligible sophomore, came with some signability concerns. The Friars paid him a $3.3MM bonus that stands as a record for a third-round pick. That bonus falls roughly in line with the slot value for the No. 20 overall selection, so Wilcox ultimately did get paid at a mid-first-round level.

Wilcox will join top Padres pick Robert Hassell III in the organization’s 60-player pool, although neither is likely to be viewed as a big league option in 2020. Still, with no minor league season this year, the Padres are understandably interested in getting the top two talents they secured in this year’s draft some additional development reps — even if they’re only in a simulated game setting. There’s obvious benefit to getting the pair some in-person time with minor league coaches and player development staff as well.

Wilcox, who’ll turn 21 next week, got out to a ridiculous start to his 2020 season, pitching to a 1.57 ERA with a 32-to-2 K/BB ratio in 23 2/3 frames for the Bulldogs before the NCAA season was halted. The lack of walks was a particularly notable development for Wilcox, who’d issued 38 free passes in 59 2/3 frames as a freshman. The Athletic’s Keith Law was must bullish on Wilcox prior to the draft, ranking him 14th in the class and noting the 6’5″, 232-pound righty’s No. 1 or 2 starter upside while cautioning that there’s considerable development needed to reach that ceiling.

San Diego is now up to 53 players in its initial player pool.

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