Mariners Release Drew Pomeranz, Jesse Hahn
The Mariners announced that right-hander Jesse Hahn and left-hander Drew Pomeranz were both released from their minor league contracts. Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times notes that both pitchers had enough service time to request releases if they weren’t going to make the Mariners’ Opening Day roster.
Pomeranz and Hahn have a combined 18 years of MLB experience between them, but the two veterans haven’t appeared in a big league game since the 2021 season. Hahn didn’t pitch whatsoever in 2022 or 2023 while apparently recovering from a shoulder injury, but he resurfaced to toss 50 1/3 minor league innings with the Triple-A affiliates of the Dodgers and Mariners in 2024. Hahn’s combined 4.29 ERA and 25.1% strikeout rate were respectable enough, but he also had an outsized 17.2% walk rate.
Injuries have dominated Pomeranz’s career narrative, and a variety of health issues (most notably a flexor tendon surgery) limited him to 19 1/3 minor league innings over the last three seasons. He did sign a Major League deal with the Giants last May but didn’t see any action at the MLB level, as he was designated for assignment and then outrighted off the 40-man within a few days of joining the team. An All-Star starter back in 2016, Pomeranz seemed to be on the verge of re-inventing himself as an elite relief arm, leading to a four-year, $34MM deal from the Padres in the 2019-20 offseason. Unfortunately, continued health problems kept Pomeranz from living up that salary, even though he had a 1.62 ERA over the 44 1/3 innings he was able to pitch in 2020-21.
Neither Hahn or Pomeranz posted particularly good Cactus League numbers, leaving the Mariners looking elsewhere for bullpen help. Right-hander Casey Legumina was also optioned to Triple-A, so Carlos Vargas will break camp as the final member of Seattle’s bullpen. Divish observes that Vargas’ out-of-options status might’ve helped the team’s decision, as Legumina has options remaining and can be more easily shuttled on and off the roster.
Mariners Sign Jesse Hahn To Minor League Contract
The Mariners inked Jesse Hahn to a minor league deal and assigned him to Triple-A Tacoma. Rainiers’ broadcaster Mike Curto tweeted the transaction.
Hahn, 35, is working to get back to the majors for the first time in three years. He was out of affiliated ball between 2022-23 after suffering a shoulder injury. Hahn returned to Triple-A on a minor league deal with the Dodgers. He tossed 41 2/3 innings of 4.54 ERA ball before being released last week. Hahn fanned a solid 24.2% of opponents while racking up grounders at a massive 58% clip, but his results were undercut by very poor control. The righty walked upwards of 18% of batters faced.
The extended layoff presumably hasn’t done Hahn any favors from a strike-throwing perspective. Yet he also battled his command during scattered MLB looks with the Royals between 2019-21. He issued 18 walks across 25 1/3 innings with Kansas City, turning in a 4.62 ERA in the process. Hahn has also pitched for the Padres and A’s and carries a 4.22 ERA over parts of seven major league seasons.
Dodgers Release Jesse Hahn
Right-hander Jesse Hahn has been released by Triple-A Oklahoma City, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. He had been pitching for that club after signing a minor league deal with the Dodgers in the offseason.
Hahn, now 35, had his 2021 season ended by a shoulder injury and then didn’t pitch in any official capacity in the following two years. With OKC here in 2024, he tossed 41 2/3 innings over 35 appearances, allowing 4.54 earned runs per nine. His 24.2% strikeout rate and 58% ground ball rate were both strong, but his 18.1% walk rate was abysmal. For reference, the major league average in 2024 is currently 8.2%.
It’s perhaps not surprising that Hahn has had some rust after such a long layoff, but it was also a trend prior to his absence. With the Royals from 2019 to 2021, he tossed 25 1/3 innings with a 26.1% strikeout rate but a 16.2% walk rate.
Hahn will now head to the open market and see if any club is interested in his services, presumably one that has a plan for reining in that control somehow. In 311 1/3 career innings from 2014 to 2021, he posted a 4.22 ERA with an 18% strikeout rate, 9% walk rate and 49.5% ground ball rate.
Dodgers Sign Jesse Hahn, Stephen Gonsalves To Minor League Deals
The Dodgers have signed right-hander Jesse Hahn to a minor league deal, reports Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic. They have also signed left-hander Stephen Gonsalves to a minor league deal, per J.P. Hoornstra of Dodgers Nation. The lefty is represented by John Boggs & Associates while the righty is with Excel Sports Management.
Hahn, 34, pitched in the big leagues from 2014 to 2021. He made 82 appearances, 50 of them being starts, suiting up for the Padres, Athletics and Royals. He allowed 4.22 earned runs per nine innings in that time, tossing 311 1/3 frames. His 18% strikeout rate wasn’t especially impressive but he kept 49.5% of balls in play on the ground.
Most of that work came in the earlier part of his career. He missed the entire 2018 season due to a UCL sprain that ultimately required surgery, then was held to less than 18 big league innings in each of the next three seasons. In early 2021, he landed on the injured list due to right shoulder impingement syndrome and he doesn’t appear to have pitched anywhere since that season.
Gonsalves, 29, has just 10 major league appearances on his track record. He tossed 24 2/3 innings for the 2018 Twins and another 4 1/3 for the 2021 Red Sox. He has a 6.21 ERA in that small sample of work. He missed most of 2022 due to Tommy John surgery but return to the mound last year on a minor league deal with the Cubs. He tossed 28 1/3 innings on the farm last year with a 5.72 ERA.
He was once a notable starting pitching prospect with the Twins but seemed to stall out upon reaching Triple-A. While he has an ERA under 3.00 at each minor league level below for the top one, his Triple-A ERA is 4.09. Across six separate seasons, he’s walked 15.2% of hitters at that level. He has transitioned from the rotation to the bullpen in recent years but hasn’t been able to log many innings due to the surgery.
The Dodgers are generally unafraid of taking a shot on talented pitchers with injury histories, with Blake Treinen, Daniel Hudson, Jimmy Nelson, J.P. Feyereisen and Alex Reyes just a handful of examples. There’s no real risk in bringing these two aboard on minor league deals to assess their arm health up close.
Neither of them would be optionable if added to the roster but Gonsalves has less than a year of service time and could be retained beyond the upcoming campaign if he clicked for the Dodgers. They only have three southpaws on their 40-man right now, with Caleb Ferguson, Alex Vesia and Ryan Yarbrough making up the club’s lefty contingent. That perhaps leaves a path open for Gonsalves to get back on track here in 2024.
Royals Acquire Domingo Tapia
The Royals have acquired right-hander Domingo Tapia from the Mariners, as announced by both teams. The M’s will receive cash considerations in their end of the deal. Tapia has been assigned to Kansas City’s Triple-A affiliate.
Signed as an amateur free agent by the Mets in 2009, Tapia finally made his MLB debut last season, tossing 4 1/3 innings for the Red Sox. Seattle acquired him via waiver claim last October, and Tapia tossed two scoreless innings before the Mariners designated him for assignment earlier this week.
Tapia has a 4.11 ERA over 691 1/3 innings in the minors. He has only a 17.6% strikeout rate against minor league batters, but Tapia is more of a grounder specialist, regularly topping the 50% threshold for groundball rates during his time in the Mets’ and Reds’ farm systems. Tapia will likely serve as a big league-ready depth option out of the Royals bullpen.
To create space on the 40-man roster for Tapia, Kansas City transferred righty Jesse Hahn to the 60-day injured list. Hahn, who was placed on the 10-day IL on April 12 with a right shoulder impingement, will now be out of action until at least June 11.
Royals Place Jesse Hahn On 10-Day Injured List
The Royals have placed right-hander Jesse Hahn on the 10-day injured list due to right shoulder impingement syndrome, the team announced. Righty Jake Newberry has been called up from the alternate site to take Hahn’s spot in the Kansas City bullpen.
It isn’t yet clear how long Hahn might be out of action, though manager Mike Matheny told reporters (including MLB.com’s Anne Rogers) that Hahn will miss “some time” with the injury. According to Matheny, Hahn felt a shoulder issue while warming up for an appearance yesterday against the White Sox, though he didn’t tell team trainers or coaches about the problem until after the game. Hahn was clearly affected by the injury — he issued a walk, a two-run homer to Adam Eaton, and then another walk before being removed from the game without a single batter retired.
Hahn is unfortunately no stranger to arm injuries, having undergone a Tommy John surgery and another UCL repair procedure already on his record. Thanks to that latter surgery, he has pitched only 25 1/3 Major League innings pitched since being acquired by K.C. in January 2018.
Hahn posted an 0.52 ERA/3.93 SIERA over 17 1/3 innings in 2020, though benefited from quite a bit of batted-ball luck (an absurdly low .108 BABIP). The Royals were counting on the 31-year-old to serve in a setup or high-leverage role this season, though Hahn had posted an 8.10 ERA and looked shaky over 3 1/3 innings even prior to Sunday’s disastrous outing.
Players Avoiding Arbitration: 12/1/20
With the non-tender deadline on the horizon tomorrow, expect quite a few players to agree to contracts for the 2021 season, avoiding arbitration in advance. In many (but not all) cases, these deals — referred to as “pre-tender” deals because they fall prior to the deadline — will fall shy of expectations and projections. Teams will sometimes present borderline non-tender candidates with a “take it or leave it” style offer which will be accepted for fear of being non-tendered and sent out into an uncertain market. Speculatively, such deals could increase in 2020 due to the economic uncertainty sweeping through the game, although there are also widespread expectations of record non-tender numbers.
You can track all of the arbitration and non-tender activity here, and we’ll also run through today’s smaller-scale pre-tender deals in this post. You can also check out Matt Swartz‘s arbitration salary projections here.
Latest Agreements
- Athletics second baseman Tony Kemp will get $1.05MM over one year, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle relays.
- The Rockies announced that they have re-signed righty Jairo Diaz to a one-year pact. It’s worth $1.1MM, Feinsand tweets.
- The Phillies and righty reliever Seranthony Dominguez have a one-year, $727,500 deal, according to Feinsand. Dominguez underwent Tommy John surgery at the end of June, so he might not pitch at all in 2021.
- The Athletics and utility player Chad Pinder reached a one-year, $2.275MM deal, per Nightengale. Pinder has two seasons of team control left.
- The Orioles and catcher Pedro Severino agreed to a one-year deal worth $1.825MM, MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand reports (Twitter link). There was some speculation that Severino could be a non-tender candidate, though he has posted pretty decent numbers over two seasons as Baltimore’s primary catcher. Severino is controllable through the 2023 season.
- The Nationals and right-hander Joe Ross agreed to a one-year, $1.5MM contract, USA Today’s Bob Nightengale tweets. This is a match of the salary Ross and the Nats had agreed on for the 2020 season, but Ross decided to opt out back in June. This was Ross’ third year of arbitration eligibility, and is now expected to return and compete for a job in Washington’s rotation in 2021.
- The Royals agreed to one-year deals with righties Jesse Hahn and Jakob Junis and outfielder Franchy Cordero, according to Feinsand and USA Today’s Bob Nightengale (Twitter links). Hahn signed for $1.75MM in guaranteed money with another $350K available in incentives. Junis will rake in $1.7MM. Cordero will earn $800K in his first arbitration-eligible year.
Earlier Agreements
- The Athletics and righty Burch Smith agreed to a one-year deal worth $705K, USA Today’s Bob Nightengale tweets. The 30-year-old Smith allowed three runs on seven hits and a walk with 13 strikeouts in 12 2/3 frames with the A’s in 2020. That was a solid showing for Smith to carry into his first trip through the arb process, though he carried a career 6.57 ERA in 135 1/3 frames into the 2020 season. The A’s can control Smith through 2023.
- The Rockies agreed to a one-year, $1.2MM deal with catcher Elias Diaz, per Nightengale (Twitter link). The contract contains another $300K in available incentives. The 30-year-old looked like a clear non-tender candidate after posting an ugly .235/.288/.353 slash with lackluster framing marks and just a 1-for-8 effort in throwing out base thieves, but the Rockies must remain hopeful he can return to his 2018 level of performance. Diaz is controllable through the 2022 season via arbitration.
- Right-hander Jacob Barnes and the Mets agreed to a one-year deal worth $750K, Nightengale tweets. Barnes, claimed off waivers back in October, was a quality reliever in Milwaukee from 2016-18 but has seen his results crater over the past two seasons. From 2019-20, he’s posted a 6.75 ERA over 50 2/3 innings. Barnes has averaged 10 strikeouts per nine frames in that time but also averaged 4.6 walks and 1.42 homers as well. Barnes is controllable through 2022.
Royals Re-Sign Jesse Hahn
The Royals have announced a deal with righty Jesse Hahn to bring him back, as Jeffrey Flanagan of MLB.com first reported (Twitter link). Hahn is slated to receive a $600K salary with $200K in available incentives.
Hahn had been non-tendered by the Kansas City organization. He was projected to earn $900K via arbitration. Evidently, the sides just needed a while longer to sort out a price tag.
It has been quite some time since Hahn, now 30, was last effective in the majors, His career got off to a stellar start in 2014-15, but he has struggled with health and performance lapses ever since.
Hahn worked his way back from a second Tommy John surgery last year with the Kansas City organization, making it back up to the majors late in the year. While it’s hard to gauge much of anything from the limited action, it seems quite promising that Hahn sat at 95 mph with his fastball.
Teams Announce Final Non-Tenders
We’ve been tracking the day’s arbitration decisions in the run-up to tonight’s deadline, which has produced a bevy of last-minute calls. In addition to those already covered elsewhere (with all projected salary figures from MLBTR/Matt Swartz projections) …
- The Padres announced they have non-tendered Miguel Diaz and Pedro Avila. Neither hurler had yet been eligible for arbitration, so this amounts to no more than a roster cleanup. Avila had already been designated for assignment. Diaz, meanwhile, saw extensive action as a Rule V pick in 2017 but has only sporadically logged MLB time since.
- Relievers Javy Guerra and Koda Glover were non-tendered by the Nationals, per a club announcement. Guerra would have cost a projected $1.3MM. Glover announced earlier today that he would retire.
- The Red Sox non-tendered infielder Marco Hernandez and reliever Josh Osich, per a team announcement. Neither projected at big dollars — $700K and $1.0MM, respectively — but obviously the club felt it could put the roster spots to better use on other players.
- The Blue Jays have non-tendered relievers Derek Law and Jason Adam, along with backstop Luke Maile. Shi Davidi of Sportsnet.ca (via Twitter) and Scott Mitchell of TSN (on Twitter) were on the news. Law projected at $1.3MM, while Maile was in line for a $800K payday. Adam is still pre-arb eligible.
- The Giants announced today that they have non-tendered outfielder Joey Rickard ($1.1MM projection), southpaw Tyler Anderson ($2.625MM), and righty Rico Garcia (pre-arb). Both Anderson and Garcia were claimed from the division-rival Rockies after the end of the 2019 season.
- In addition to other moves earlier today, the Braves have non-tendered catcher John Ryan Murphy and outfielder Rafael Ortega. Each provided depth down the stretch in 2019 for the Atlanta organization. Murphy would’ve been owed a projected $1.2MM, while Ortega remains shy of arbitration eligibility.
- A host of players were non-tendered by the Royals, per a club announcement. Righty Jesse Hahn was cut loose along with infielders Humberto Arteaga, Cheslor Cuthbert and Erick Mejia. Among these players, Hahn (projected $900K) and Cuthbert ($1.8MM) have the most MLB experience. With these 40-man trimmings, the K.C. org should be able to place some claims and/or make Rule 5 selections in the coming weeks.
- Righties Ian Gibaut and Wei-Chieh Huang are each heading to free agency after being non-tendered by the Rangers. Neither is anywhere near the service time needed for arbitration eligibility, so this was just an opportune time for the Texas org to drop them from the MLB roster.
Royals Activate Jesse Hahn, Add 3 Players To 40-Man Roster
The Royals have announced a series of transactions involving their 40-man roster. Righty Jesse Hahn was reinstated from the 60-day injured list and added to the active roster.
The club has also selected the contracts of three players — first baseman Ryan McBroom, utilityman Erick Mejia, and lefty Gabe Speier — who’ll also be active. Each will make his MLB debut with his first game action.
Hahn is a two-time Tommy John recipient who’ll be making his way back to the majors for the first time since 2017. He carries a 4.19 ERA in 286 lifetime innings at the game’s highest level. Hahn only completed 3 2/3 innings in four appearances before the minor-league season ended, so he’ll presumably be utilized as a reliever down the stretch.
McBroom was just acquired after a strong showing at Triple-A with the Yankees organization. He slashed .315/.402/.574 with 26 homers in 482 plate appearances, a big stat line even in the International League.
The 24-year-old Mejia will presumably be considered as a future utility infield candidate. He carried a .271/.339/.382 batting line through 556 plate appearances this year in the Pacific Coast League.
As for Speier, he has had some home run troubles at Triple-A and carries only a 5.63 ERA there over forty frames. But he was still able to compile a 45:17 K/BB ratio at the highest level of the minors and had been more effective in terms of results (2.42 ERA) earlier in the year at Double-A.