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Dodgers Place Freddie Freeman On Injured List

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April 4: Catcher Hunter Feduccia was recalled today as the corresponding move, per a club announcement.

April 3: The Dodgers announced that they’ve placed Freddie Freeman on the 10-day injured list with a right ankle sprain. The placement is retroactive to March 31, so Freeman will be eligible to return a week from today.

Freeman has not played since Saturday. Manager Dave Roberts told reporters that the star first baseman tweaked his ankle when he slipped in the shower (via Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic). Freeman played through an ankle sprain down the stretch and throughout last year’s playoff run. He had a monster World Series despite the injury but nevertheless required surgery in early December. That procedure didn’t prevent him from starting the season, but the recent shower slip will require at least another week of rest.

IL placements can be backdated by up to three days. That the Dodgers elected not to place Freeman on the IL right away suggests they didn’t consider this a significant injury. It was enough to send him for an extremely rare IL stint though. Freeman last went on the shelf in 2020 for a positive virus test. His most recent non-illness IL stay came back in 2017, when a fracture in his left wrist knocked him out for more than two months.

Enrique Hernández drew into the lineup at first base for the Dodgers’ series against the Braves. While he went a combined 1-11, the Dodgers swept Atlanta to move to 8-0. The four top teams in the NL West have all gotten out to excellent starts — the 7-0 Padres join the Dodgers as the only remaining undefeated clubs — but the Dodgers obviously have plenty of talent to weather what seems likely to be a short-term absence.

Los Angeles didn’t announce a corresponding roster move. They’re off today, so there wasn’t any urgency to fill the spot, but waiting until tomorrow to place Freeman on the IL would have pushed back his retroactive date by a day. They can recall another hitter leading up to their weekend series in Philadelphia.

Dodgers Recall Hunter Feduccia Ahead Of MLB Debut

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The Dodgers recalled catcher Hunter Feduccia to the big leagues earlier today, who takes the place of Freddie Freeman after the former MVP was placed on the family emergency list. Feduccia was already on the 40-man roster after being added ahead of the Rule 5 Draft back in November, though his first game action will be his MLB debut.

Feduccia, 27, was the Dodgers’ 12th-round pick in the 2017 draft. The catcher climbed through the club’s minor league system to eventually reach the Triple-A level back in 2022 and has remained there ever since. His already solid offensive numbers have steadily improved during his time at the level, and he’s slashing a strong .295/.420/.451 with a 124 wRC+ and a 16.8% walk rate against an 18.6% strikeout rate in 64 games at the level this year. Ranked 25th in the Dodgers farm system by Fangraphs entering this season, Feduccia pairs those solid offensive numbers with fairly strong work behind the plate. His framing and blocking skills are both strong, though his arm is somewhat lackluster for the position and leaves him to struggle with controlling the running game at times.

With Will Smith as the Dodgers everyday catcher and Austin Barnes acting as the primary backup to Smith, Feduccia seems unlikely to get much playing time while he’s in the majors outside of possible pinch-hit appearances. That being said, its possible that the Dodgers take this opportunity to see how Feduccia performs at the big league level with Barnes currently in the final guaranteed year of his contract. The Dodgers have a $3.5MM team option on the 34-year-old’s services for 2025, however, and he’s rebounded from a brutal 2023 season to post roughly league average (99 wRC+) offensive numbers this season.

As for Freeman, Noah Camras of Dodgers Nation relays that the first baseman’s wife, Chelsea, wrote in an instagram post earlier this week that their son, Maximus, was dealing with health issues. Freeman is now headed back home to L.A. from the club’s road trip to Houston, and manager Dave Roberts told reporters (including Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register) yesterday that Freeman’s son was still undergoing tests and that he was not anticipating Freeman being available during the remainder of their series against the Astros.

With a day off on Monday, Roberts added that the club “will see” if a return to action for Freeman is possible when the club returns to California for series against the Padres in San Diego and the A’s in Oakland next week. In the meantime, Cavan Biggio has been handling first base in Freeman’s absence. The 29-year-old was acquired by the Dodgers from the Blue Jays last month after he was designated for assignment by Toronto, and he’s struggled in a bench role with L.A. ever since. In 59 trips to the plate since joining the Dodgers, Biggio has hit a paltry .180/.281/.240 with a 30.5% strikeout rate while splitting time between first base, third base, and right field.

Dodgers Add Three To 40-Man Roster

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The Dodgers have selected the contracts of three players: right-handers Nick Frasso and Landon Knack and catcher Hunter Feduccia. The trio would have otherwise been eligible for the Rule 5 draft. The 40-man count is up to 38.

Frasso was a fourth round selection of the Blue Jays in 2020. The Dodgers acquired him at the ’22 deadline in the deal sending Mitch White to Toronto. A Loyola Marymount product, Frasso has mid-upper 90s velocity and is an excellent athlete. Baseball America recently ranked him as the #5 prospect in the L.A. system. He spent the bulk of 2023 at Double-A Tulsa, working to a 3.91 ERA in 73 2/3 innings. The 6’5″ hurler struck out almost 30% of opponents against a solid 7.6% walk rate in that breakout showing.

Knack, 26, was a second round pick in the same draft. A senior sign out of East Tennessee State, he’s a potential back-end starter. Knack split the ’23 campaign between Tulsa and Triple-A Oklahoma City, posting a sub-3.00 ERA at both stops. He allowed 2.51 earned runs per nine in 100 1/3 frames overall, striking out 24% of batters faced with a 7.3% walk percentage.

Feduccia, also 26, is a left-handed hitter out of LSU. A 12th-round pick in 2018, he has spent six seasons in the minors. He logged all of 2023 in OKC, running a .279/.387/.451 batting line over 380 trips to the plate. Feduccia walked at a huge 15.3% clip, struck out around 21% of the time and connected on 11 home runs.

Ari Alexander of KPRC 2 first reported the selections of Frasso and Feduccia this afternoon.

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