Minor MLB Transactions: 5/11/18

Here are Friday’s minor moves from around the game…

  • The Brewers announced late Thursday that they’ve signed second baseman Darren Seferina to a minor league deal. The former Cardinals’ farmhand was a fifth-round pick back in 2014 and opened the 2018 season in Double-A, where he struggled considerably. But Seferina, 24, split the 2017 season between Class-A Advanced and Double-A, faring well at both levels and hitting a combined .278/.357/.409 with seven homers, 17 doubles, 10 triples and 19 stolen bases. He’s never been considered one of the Cardinals’ premium prospects, but he’s hit fairly well throughout his minor league tenure with the exception of the first few weeks of the 2018 season.
  • Right-hander Jorge Rondon was released from the White Sox‘ Double-A affiliate in Birmingham, per the Southern League transactions log. The 30-year-old Rondon tossed 19 innings in the Majors between the Pirates, Cardinals, Rockies and Orioles from 2014-16, though he struggled at each stop and allowed 28 runs with a 13-to-11 K/BB ratio in just 19 innings at the game’s top level. Rondon has a career 2.81 ERA in 263 innings at the Triple-A level, but he’s never missed all that many bats (6.8 K/9 in AAA) and was off to a fairly pedestrian start to his 2018 campaign (14-to-8 K/BB ratio, 13 hits allowed, 4.85 ERA in 13 innings).

Minor MLB Transactions: 1/7/17

Baseball America’s Matt Eddy has released a long list of minor transactions from over the holidays. Here are a few of the bigger moves from that list not already noted elsewhere on MLBTR (we’ll also keep track of additional minor moves from Saturday as they happen):

  • The Brewers have signed first baseman Cody Decker to a minor league deal, tweets Tommy Stokke of FanRag. The pact doesn’t include an invitation to big league camp, per Adam McCalvy of MLB.com (Twitter link). Decker announced (via Twitter) that he’ll move to catcher, where he has seen action in 23 games during parts of eight minor league seasons. The 29-year-old has slashed an impressive .255/.333/.501 in 1,498 Triple-A plate appearances, though he has only logged eight PAs in the majors (with San Diego in 2015).
  • The Cubs have signed catcher Carlos Corporan and re-signed infielder Munenori Kawasaki to minor league contracts. Corporan spent several years as a backup in Houston and last appeared in the Majors in 2015 with Texas; he hit .197/.246/.333 at two Triple-A stops in 2016. The 35-year-old Kawasaki played briefly for the Cubs last season and spent most of the year playing shortstop with Triple-A Iowa, where he batted .255/.352/.312. The popular former Blue Jays infielder has now appeared in parts of five seasons in the big leagues, as well as 11 in Japan.
  • The Red Sox have signed outfielder Brian Bogusevic to a minor league deal. The 32-year-old had a tough season with Orix in Japan in 2016, batting just .187/.320/.322 over 193 plate appearances. He last appeared in the big leagues with the Phillies in 2015.
  • The White Sox have released hard-throwing righty Jorge Rondon so that he can sign with Chunichi in Japan. They had previously signed him to a minor league deal after he posted a 2.67 ERA, 5.8 K/9 and 2.8 BB/9 pitching in the bullpen of the Pirates’ Triple-A Indianapolis bullpen in 2016.
  • The Angels have re-signed lefty reliever Cody Ege to a minor league deal. They had previously non-tendered him even though he had far less than three years of service time and was very effective in 8 2/3 innings for them last season, although he struggled in three innings with the Marlins and posted a modest 4.50 ERA, 7.2 K/9 and 5.5 BB/9 in 44 innings at Triple-A.
  • The Phillies have signed righty reliever Pedro Beato to a minor league deal. The 30-year-old Beato was very effective for Triple-A Norfolk in 2016, with a 2.65 ERA, 8.2 K/9 and 3.2 BB/9 in 68 innings (although he allowed nine unearned runs). He’s pitched in the big leagues for three teams, but hasn’t appeared in the Majors since 2014 and hasn’t logged significant time since he was a Met in 2011.
  • The Nationals have signed reliever lefty Josh Outman to a minor league deal. The 32-year-old last pitched in the big leagues in 2014, when he appeared with the Indians and Yankees. He posted a 4.95 ERA, albeit with 6.8 K/9 and 1.4 BB/9, in 20 innings with Indianapolis in 2016 before being released.
  • The Tigers have signed first baseman Efren Navarro to a minor league deal. The 30-year-old batted .275/.337/.368 at two Triple-A stops in 2016. He’s appeared in parts of four big-league seasons, all with Anaheim.

Minor MLB Transactions: 12/26/16

Here are some recent minor league moves from around the game, as chronicled by Baseball America’s Matt Eddy unless otherwise credited.  The newest transactions are at the top of the post…

  • The Giants inked catcher Josmil Pinto to a minor league deal.  Pinto appeared in six games with Milwaukee last season, his first MLB exposure since 2014.  The backstop has 84 games and 286 plate appearances to his record with the Brewers and Twins, as well as a .274/.349/.442 slash line over 3242 minor league PA.
  • The Mariners signed outfielder Kyle Waldrop to a minors contract.  The longtime Reds farmhand became a free agent after a 2016 season that saw him outrighted off Cincinnati’s 40-man roster.  Waldrop (a different player than the former Twins right-hander of the same name, for the record) appeared in 15 games for the Reds last season, mostly as a pinch-hitter or late-game sub.  He has a .274/.320/.429 slash over 2698 PA in the Reds’ minor league system.
  • The White Sox signed righty Jorge Rondon to a minor league pact earlier this month.  Rondon has a 13.26 ERA over 19 career innings pitched in the majors, making brief appearances in each of the last three seasons with the Cardinals, Rockies, Orioles and Pirates.  A pro since 2006, Rondon has a 4.24 ERA, 5.8 K/9 and 1.54 K/BB rate over 647 1/3 career frames in the minors, appearing as a reliever in 346 over his 387 career games.
  • The Red Sox re-signed catcher Dan Butler on a minor league deal.  Originally signed as an undrafted free agent in 2009, Butler has spent his entire pro career in Boston’s organization, save for a season with the Nationals in 2015.  Butler has a .256/.348/.405 slash line over 2441 career PA in the minors, and he appeared in seven games in the bigs in 2014.
  • The Tigers signed righties Jake Brigham and outfielder Jim Adduci to minor league deals.  As Eddy notes, Detroit has been active in signing players from international leagues as minor league depth, including these two former big leaguers.  Brigham spent 2016 with Japan’s Rakuten Golden Eagles after nine pro seasons in North America, receiving his first taste of the majors in the form of 16 2/3 innings with the Braves in 2015.  Adduci, 31, played 11 seasons in the minors and parts of two seasons (148 PA with the Rangers in 2013-14) in the majors before spending the last two years with the Korean Baseball Organization’s Lotte Giants.