Jose Ramirez

Jose Ramirez To Undergo Hand Surgery, Expected To Be Ready For Spring Training

By Anthony Franco | October 19, 2022 at 4:18pm CDT

Guardians star José Ramírez will undergo surgery on his right hand early next month, agent Rafa Nieves tells Enrique Rojas of ESPN (Twitter link). The procedure is not expected to impact his readiness for next Spring Training. Tenchy Rodriguez was first to report (on Twitter) that Ramírez would have to undergo surgery.

Ramírez first suffered the injury midseason, Rojas adds, but he played through the issue as the Guardians ran down and eventually cruised to an AL Central title. He remained in the lineup on a more or less everyday basis, appearing in 157 regular season games and starting all seven of the club’s postseason contests at third base. Ramírez did miss two games in late June due to a right thumb injury but avoided the injured list all season.

Whether directly related to the thumb issue or not, the four-time All-Star slowed down after an otherworldly first few months. Ramírez carried a .292/.389/.641 line through 244 plate appearances on June 13. By measure of wRC+, he was the fifth-best qualified hitter in the game to that point. Ramírez first suffered the thumb injury at some point during a series against the Rockies that ranged from June 14-16, however (link via Paul Hoynes of Cleveland.com). From that point forward, he posted a .273/.336/.446 line in 441 trips to the plate. Even the seemingly diminished version of Ramírez was an above-average player, but his second half was well below the MVP-caliber form he’s shown at his best.

After Cleveland’s elimination at the hands of the Yankees yesterday, Ramírez has decided to go under the knife. The expectation is that the issue will be corrected in plenty of time so as not to interrupt his preparation for next season. Assuming all goes according to plan, the 30-year-old should head into 2023 as one of the top handful of players in the sport.

Ramírez signed a team-friendly seven-year contract extension with Cleveland in Spring Training, ensuring he remains with the only organization he’s ever known. He’s due $119MM over the next six seasons, a bargain for the kind of production on both sides of the ball he provides at his peak. He’ll remain the integral piece of a young Cleveland lineup that was roughly average overall this season. The Guardians got solid contributions from a number of young players (i.e. Steven Kwan, Óscar González and Andrés Giménez) and will look to build off this year’s surprising division title over the coming seasons.

List Of Home Run Derby Contestants

By Anthony Franco | July 14, 2022 at 6:32pm CDT

July 14: Rangers shortstop Corey Seager will return to Dodger Stadium as the final Derby participant, Texas announced. Seager, who was also named to the American League All-Star team this afternoon as an injury replacement, has hit 21 homers on the season. He also appeared in the 2016 Home Run Derby.

July 13, 6:25pm: Guardians third baseman Jose Ramirez will also participate, reports Jeff Passan of ESPN (on Twitter). Ramirez has never participated in the Derby before, but he’ll join the event amidst a 17-homer season. Like Rodriguez, he’ll be part of the American League All-Star team the following night.

July 13, 3:50pm: Mariners outfielder Julio Rodriguez announced on social media that he will be joining the contest. As a rookie, this will naturally be his first appearance in the derby.

July 12: Phillies slugger Kyle Schwarber has joined the field, with Alex Coffey of the Philadelphia Inquirer relaying that he himself posted about it on Instagram.

July 11, 9:21pm: Nationals star Juan Soto will also participate. The Talk Nats blog first reported (on Twitter) that Soto would accept an invitation if offered and Héctor Gómez of Z101 confirmed he’d be in the event. Soto, who was a part of last year’s event, has hit 17 longballs on the season. He’ll also be part of the NL All-Star Team the following night.

7:06pm: The 2022 Home Run Derby will take place next Monday, and the field is beginning to take shape. Mets first baseman Pete Alonso and Braves outfielder Ronald Acuña Jr. each announced this afternoon that they’d be participating, while Katie Woo of the Athletic reports that Cardinals designated hitter Albert Pujols will partake as well.

Pujols’ participation is the most surprising (and notable) of the three. He’s a four-time contestant but hasn’t appeared in a Derby in more than a decade. He’s only hit five longballs this year but twice led the National League during his first stint in St. Louis and is fifth all-time in homers. In his final big league season, Pujols is already set to head to the All-Star Game in recognition of his career. He’ll add the Derby to the celebration.

Alonso is hoping to defend his two straight titles. The New York slugger won in 2019, then backed that up with another championship last year. (The 2020 Derby was canceled). Along the way, he knocked off Acuña in the semifinals during the 2019 event. Atlanta’s star outfielder will join the festivities for a second time. Both Alonso and Acuña will team with Pujols on the NL All-Stars; Alonso is a reserve, while Acuña will be in Brian Snitker’s starting lineup.

Jose Ramirez On Contract Extension

By Sean Bavazzano | May 5, 2022 at 8:10pm CDT

One month after agreeing to an extension that will keep him in Cleveland through 2028, Jose Ramirez and his agent spoke with ESPN’s Alden Gonzalez about how the new contract came together. The third baseman’s deal, which tacked on $115MM in new money to a pair of team-friendly club options, was widely considered to be a shrewd move by the Guardians’ frugal front office. While that may continue to be the case, Ramirez makes it abundantly clear to Gonzalez that his camp was not outmaneuvered.

Per Ramirez’s agent, Rafa Nieves, the star third baseman was flatly told that the club couldn’t afford to pay Ramirez “what [he was] worth”. Instead of welcoming a trade like former teammate Francisco Lindor, Ramirez doubled down on his desire to win a World Series with Cleveland and retire as a rare one-team Hall of Famer. “[W]hen I was a kid looking for an opportunity, this is the organization that gave it to me,” Ramirez recounted. “It was also the team I reached the big leagues with, that gave me my first contract. My dream was to stay here, in this organization. And also my daughter was born in Cleveland, too. I feel a part of that community.”

Accordingly, Ramirez dismissed the difference of earning power in Cleveland versus elsewhere and insisted that a deal get done. Nieves, for his part, mentioned that he and others tried to talk Ramirez out of the deal, and that Cleveland’s final offer was only incrementally better than previous offers thanks to a no-trade clause and lack of salary deferrals.

The exact difference in earning power will forever be speculative, though industry insiders believe that any team who traded for Ramirez would have immediately offered an extension approaching $200MM in new money. In a world where Ramirez reached free agency without an extension, a $35MM annual contract value, equal to the value established by Angels third baseman Anthony Rendon, seemed entirely attainable as well.

Two of Ramirez’s most ardent pursuers on the trade market, the Blue Jays and Padres, would have had various levels of money to allot for a nine-figure contract to their shiniest acquisition. Toronto seems like a prime candidate to issue a hypothesized $200MM contract, whereas the Padres seemingly remain on a quest to shed payroll instead of add to it.

Complicating either trade scenario as well is the fact that both teams have third base spoken for, with Matt Chapman and Manny Machado entrenched at the hot corner for both clubs, meaning a shift to second base would’ve been likely for Ramirez. It’s all moot now of course, but it may please Toronto and San Diego fans who came away empty in their team’s pursuit of Ramirez to know that their keystone players currently rank sixth and fourth in league-wide offensive production.

It’s incredibly soon to declare a final of assessment of Jose Ramirez’s new contract, but the early returns for his club (as well as those who pursued him) are promising. Through 24 games, the switch-hitting All-Star has hit a robust .318/.419/.659 (217 OPS+) with more walks than strikeouts, establishing a pace that may finally net the slugger MVP honors.

NL East Notes: Bassitt, Harper, Marlins, Meyer, Ramirez

By Mark Polishuk | May 4, 2022 at 5:00pm CDT

Both Chris Bassitt and Mets GM Billy Eppler declined to comment on whether any contract extension talks had taken place between the two sides, though a source tells The New York Post’s Joel Sherman that “nothing has been explored yet.” Since Bassitt is slated to become a free agent after the season, it would be a little surprising to see him sign an extension before testing the market for the first time, particularly since the righty is building a strong case for a pricey multi-year contract this winter. Over his first 31 innings in a Mets uniform, Bassitt has a 2.61 ERA, 28.1% strikeout rate, and 6.6% walk rate.

Locking up Bassitt would help the Mets solidify their 2023 rotation, as Jacob deGrom, Carlos Carrasco, and Taijuan Walker could all be free agents this winter. An extension would also allow Bassitt and the team to avoid the shorter-term problem of an arbitration hearing set for May 23. While this could be the 33-year-old Bassitt’s best (or only) chance to sign a big multi-year deal, he might prefer to just stay in New York if the Mets were to offer him such a deal right now, and the Mets have certainly shown they’re willing to spend for premium talent. For his part, Bassitt said that he has enjoyed pitching for the Mets and that he’d be open to extension talks.

Details On Jose Ramirez’s Contract Extension

By Anthony Franco | April 14, 2022 at 1:04pm CDT

Shortly before Opening Day, the Guardians and star José Ramírez agreed to an extension that’ll keep him in Cleveland through the 2028 campaign. Ramírez was already under club control for two seasons at a combined $26MM via a pair of options, and it was initially reported the team would lock in those options while tacking on $124MM over five subsequent years.

That’s not quite the case, as Jon Heyman of the New York Post reports (on Twitter) that Ramírez will be guaranteed $141MM over seven seasons. That comes out to $115MM in new money (assuming the Guardians would’ve exercised their 2023 option). It’s treated as a seven-year deal with an average annual value of approximately $20.1MM for competitive balance tax purposes, although it seems likely Cleveland’s payroll won’t approach luxury tax levels anyhow.

Heyman specifies the year-by-year breakdown of the extension:

2022: $22MM
2023: $14MM
2024: $17MM
2025: $19MM
2026: $21MM
2027: $23MM
2028: $25MM

Ramírez’s deal contains a full no-trade clause, as initially reported. It also includes various incentives upon awards finishes. While the guarantee is a bit lighter than initially believed, the three-time All-Star makes more money up-front than he would’ve had the Guardians simply tacked on five seasons of new money in 2024 and beyond.

He’d initially been set to play this season on a $12MM salary, but he’ll nearly double that figure with this new agreement. The deal brings Cleveland’s player payroll for this season up to around $69MM, per Jason Martinez of Roster Resource. That’s well above last season’s approximate $50MM mark, per Cot’s Baseball Contracts, although it still checks in 27th league-wide.

Guardians Extend Jose Ramirez

By Steve Adams | April 6, 2022 at 11:15pm CDT

Jose Ramirez won’t be going anywhere. The star infielder has agreed to a new five-year extension with the Guardians that will see his 2023 club option picked up and another five seasons and $124MM tacked onto his contract, reports ESPN’s Jeff Passan. Ramirez’s contract now runs through 2028 and contains a full no-trade clause as well, all but ensuring that he’ll remain in Cleveland for the long haul. The Guardians did explore trade scenarios while simultaneously discussing an extension, Passan adds, noting that the Padres in particular believed they had a chance to pry him away. Ramirez is represented by Repulik Sports.

The new contract is the largest in franchise history but will still be regarded as a club-friendly deal. Ramirez has emerged as one of the game’s elite players at a time when annual salaries well north of $30MM have become commonplace, but the switch-hitting 29-year-old has been “adamant” about his desire to remain in Cleveland during negotiations, tweets Zack Meisel of The Athletic. Ramirez was already set to earn $12MM this year, and next year’s now-exercised option came with a $14MM value, so he’ll now be guaranteed a total of $150MM over the next seven seasons.

Prior to this new deal with Ramirez and this week’s extension of closer Emmanuel Clase, the Guardians didn’t have a single dollar committed to the payroll beyond the 2022 season. Locking up Ramirez now puts any near-term trade chatter to bed and sets him up to serve as a focal point in the lineup through what will be his age-35 season. Ramirez’s contract clocks in south of the $151MM extension signed by Altuve at a similar juncture of his career and well shy of Nolan Arenado’s $234MM extension with the Rockies (although Arenado was just months from free agency, whereas both Altuve and Ramirez were controlled through the upcoming season and one more via an affordable club option). Maxing out his annual salary doesn’t appear to have been as large a priority as staying with the team that originally signed and developed him, however, and Ramirez’s new deal obviously offers more than a lifetime’s worth of financial comfort.

It’s a major win for the Guardians and their fans to keep Ramirez locked in as the face of the franchise as the team kicks off a new era in its franchise history. Trading Ramirez just one year after trading away Francisco Lindor and just months after a name change/rebranding that was far from universally praised by the fan base would’ve been a tough pill for many longtime Cleveland fans to swallow.

Instead, Ramirez will continue to show off his electric brand of across-the-board excellence at Progressive Field for more than a half decade. While he first broke out as an above-average player back in 2016, it was the 2017 season that saw Ramirez jump into the ranks of MVP-caliber talents — and he hasn’t looked back since. Dating back to 2017, Ramirez boasts a .280/.365/.547 batting line (39 percent better than league average, by measure of wRC+) with 144 home runs, 112 stolen bases (in 134 attempts) and strong defense at both third base and second base. There’s virtually no flaw in Ramirez’s game — evidenced by the fact that he trails only Mike Trout and Mookie Betts in total Wins Above Replacement, per FanGraphs, since 2017.

The extensions for Ramirez and Clase come at a time when the Guardians are set to welcome a wave of high-end young talent to a roster that is, once again, deep in talented young pitchers. Shane Bieber, Aaron Civale, Triston McKenzie, Zach Plesac and Cal Quantrill give Cleveland a strong collection of big league rotation pieces, and touted righty Daniel Espino isn’t far behind that quintet. On the position-player side of things, outfielder George Valera and infielders Brayan Rocchio, Tyler Freeman, Gabriel Arias and Nolan Jones (who’s also seen time in the outfield) could all be up in the big leagues by 2023 — some of them as soon as during the 2022 season.

That collection of young talent simultaneously gives Cleveland good cause to lock Ramirez into place and also provides the typically low-payroll club the ability to dedicate a significant portion of its annual budget to one player in just this manner. The Guardians will need to make a similar decision on their ace, Bieber, before too long, as he’s controlled another three seasons and will see his price tag continue to mount through the arbitration process.

With Ramirez putting pen to paper on a second club-friendly extension, however, it stands to reason that the team has a bit of extra leeway in trying to piece together an extension for the 26-year-old right-hander. The Marlins’ five-year, $56MM for Sandy Alcantara is the largest ever extension for a pitcher in Bieber’s service bracket. If the team waits until next year, the extension record for that four-plus service bracket jumps considerably; Jacob deGrom signed a five-year, $137.5MM deal in that same bracket. Bieber won’t have quite that same earning capacity, as deGrom was a Super Two player whose second-year arb price had already soared to $17MM — Bieber is not Super Two-eligible and is earning $6MM in his first year of arb in 2022 — but the gap in those two records still serves to illustrate the likely hike in Bieber’s eventual price tag.

Regardless of whether Cleveland keeps Bieber, goes year-to-year or even eventually considers trading him, the Guardians’ future looks quite a bit brighter with Ramirez now etched firmly into cornerstone status. And if the team prefers not to spend big money to keep Bieber in place alongside him, that’ll only further allow the front office to make some free-agent investments to supplement the burgeoning young core. It’s not likely that we’ll ever see Cleveland dive headlong into the deep end of the free-agent pool, of course, but some second-tier spending to surround Ramirez and whichever of the team’s prospects emerge as regulars will eventually be required if the Guardians hope to keep pace in an increasingly competitive AL Central.

The White Sox are currently the AL Central favorites, due in no small part to their own exciting young core and some key investments in veterans on the free-agent and trade markets. The Twins, meanwhile, have a series of young pitchers on the cusp of the big leagues and shocked the baseball world with their offseason signing of Carlos Correa, which firmly signaled there’s no intent to rebuild after a lost year in 2021. Detroit and Kansas City are both emerging from longstanding rebuilding efforts themselves and are set to welcome some of the sport’s premier prospects to the Majors when the season opens (Spencer Torkelson in Detroit, Bobby Witt Jr. in Kansas City).

The shifting landscape in the Central makes it all the more pivotal for the Guardians to not only retain Ramirez but to succeed with their own player-development efforts and to spend at least some money to supplement that group. Cleveland will probably always have the division’s lowest payroll, at least when all five Central clubs are aiming to contend, but successfully bartering a team-friendly extension with a superstar talent of Ramirez’s caliber helps to narrow the the edge that other division rivals may have in terms of their overall financial resources. Beyond that, a long-term deal for a face-of-the-franchise player of this nature is cause for any team’s fan base to celebrate. Ramirez jerseys ought to be flying off the shelves now in Cleveland, as Ramirez could spend the next seven seasons looking to add to his already-impressive collection of three Silver Sluggers, three All-Star nods and four top-six MVP finishes.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Latest On Jose Ramirez, Guardians

By Anthony Franco | April 2, 2022 at 4:23pm CDT

TODAY: Hoynes provides some more details on the negotiations, writing that the Guardians made an offer to Ramirez on Tuesday. Ramirez and his representatives made a counter-offer on Wednesday, and the team then halted talks the following day.

APRIL 1: The Guardians have had some extension discussions with star third baseman José Ramírez since the lockout was lifted. Those talks, which as of earlier in the week hadn’t yet progressed to an actual exchange of numbers, don’t appear to have gotten very far.

Paul Hoynes of Cleveland.com reports that conversations between the Guardians and Ramírez about a long-term deal “have bogged down, if not ended.” Even if talks haven’t completely fizzled out, Hoynes adds that the organization has set an Opening Day deadline for an extension to be in place. If no deal is agreed upon by next Thursday, it seems the plan is to just carry the three-time All-Star into the season on the option the team exercised last November.

It doesn’t come as a huge surprise that negotiations between Cleveland and Ramírez haven’t seriously progressed. The Guardians have never guaranteed a player more than the $60MM they spent on free agent Edwin Encarnación over the 2016-17 offseason. Even with Ramírez two years from hitting free agency, a long-term deal with the three-time Silver Slugger Award winner would probably exceed twice that amount.

If there’s no deal in place by next week and the Guardians cut off talks, rival clubs figure to gauge his trade availability. There’d be no shortage of league-wide demand in Ramírez, one of the sport’s best overall players. The Blue Jays — where former Cleveland executives Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins have key front office roles — are the one team known to have checked in with Guardians brass about Ramírez this winter. There are surely other clubs who have inquired, but there’s no indication Cleveland has given much thought to trading him.

At the very least, it seems the Guardians will keep Ramírez for the first few months of the season. Cleveland has designs on contending, and dealing their best player would represent a major blow to the team’s chances. It’d also be a source of frustration for a fanbase that is only a year removed from seeing previous face of the franchise Francisco Lindor shipped off to the Mets as his potential free agency loomed.

If the Guardians haven’t locked Ramírez up beyond 2023, though, there’ll be plenty of pressure on the team to get off to a good start. If they fall out of playoff contention by July, the 29-year-old could be one of the most talked-about players in advance of the trade deadline. Even a year and a half of club control over Ramírez would be incredibly valuable if he keeps up his recent form, particularly given his affordability. He’s playing this season on a $12MM salary and can be brought back in 2023 via $14MM club option.

In other Guardians extension news, Hoynes writes that Cleveland is “deep in negotiations” with closer Emmanuel Clase. No deal has yet been finalized, but Hoynes relays that Clase’s reps at Nova Sports Agency are en route to the team’s Spring Training facility in Arizona to meet with the right-hander and team officials.

Guardians, Jose Ramirez Have Reportedly Had Informal Extension Discussions

By Anthony Franco | March 28, 2022 at 9:32pm CDT

Since the end of the lockout, the Guardians have had “on and off” discussions with the representatives for star third baseman José Ramírez, reports Paul Hoynes of Cleveland.com. Hoynes characterizes the talks as exchanging ideas about players who could be considered comparable to Ramírez as opposed to floating actual frameworks for a deal.

It’s not surprising to hear the Cleveland front office has gotten in touch with Ramírez’s reps. The three-time All-Star is controllable for two more seasons, but it stands to reason the Guardians would want some idea about the kind of money it’d take to keep him around for the long haul. Ramírez is, after all, one of the game’s best players. The switch-hitting third baseman broke out as a superstar in 2017, and he’s been among the most valuable players in the sport over the past half-decade.

Going back to the beginning of the 2017 campaign, only Mike Trout and Mookie Betts edge out Ramírez among position players by FanGraphs’ measure of Wins Above Replacement. Ramírez owns a .280/.365/.547 line in that time, offensive production that checks in checks in 39 percentage points above average by measure of wRC+. That’s the 15th-highest mark among qualifiers, and Ramírez pairs that offensive damage with excellent marks for both his baserunning and defense at the hot corner.

Cleveland signed Ramírez to an incredibly team-friendly deal just before he took his game to new heights. In March 2017, they inked him to a $26MM guarantee that extended their window of team control by three seasons. He’ll play this season on an $11MM salary and is controllable in 2023 via a $13MM club option that’s a lock to be exercised barring catastrophic injury.

That extension delayed Ramírez’s path to the open market, and he’s not slated to hit free agency (assuming next year’s option is picked up) until the advance of his age-31 campaign. Accordingly, he won’t command a decade-long commitment in the Corey Seager mold, but teams have still paid a fair amount for slightly older star position players in recent offseasons. George Springer landed a six-year, $150MM deal from the Blue Jays heading into his age-31 season last winter; Marcus Semien picked up $175MM over seven years from the Rangers this offseason at the same age.

If he keeps playing at his current form over the next couple years, Ramírez would quite likely beat those deals in free agency. His camp could justifiably argue he’s a better player than either Springer or Semien, and the overall market could be more robust as teams move further away from the lost revenues in 2020. Draft pick compensation for free agents, which applied to both Springer and Semien, could also be pulled from the collective bargaining agreement depending on the status of an international draft.

The Guardians wouldn’t pay an open market price for Ramírez two years in advance, but it’d still register as a surprise if they went to the level it’d take to keep him in Cleveland long-term. The franchise has never gone above $60MM in guarantees on any individual player. A Ramírez extension would probably cost more than double that amount. Cleveland has had a bottom five player payroll in each of the past two years, and they’re currently slated to head into 2022 with around a $56MM mark, in the calculation of Jason Martinez of Roster Resource.

Owner Paul Dolan would probably have to greenlight more spending in the future to keep Ramírez around. The post-2023 payroll slate is wide open, but it’s tough to imagine the Guardians allocating 40-50% of their annual payroll to a single player. Hoynes writes that the front office is conferring with Dolan about the long-term spending plans and that no further negotiations with Ramírez have presently been scheduled. It stands to reason the front office will reengage with their star player once they have a better understanding about the kind of resources that’ll be at their disposal.

With their two years of club control, the Guardians don’t have to hammer out a deal with Ramírez in the coming weeks or months. So long as no extension is in place, however, chatter figures to mount about his future. That’s particularly true if the Guardians struggle early in the season.

Ramírez’s name was floated briefly in trade rumors this winter, with the Blue Jays among the teams to inquire about his availability, but it never seemed likely Cleveland would ship him out over the offseason. A rough first half for the team would probably result in increased speculation about a Ramírez trade as the deadline gets closer. Cleveland would surely prefer to avoid that situation — either by keeping him for the long haul or playing well enough in the season’s first couple months there’s no question about their direction come July.

Blue Jays Have Discussed Jose Ramirez Trade With Guardians

By Darragh McDonald | March 16, 2022 at 1:10pm CDT

The Blue Jays have had discussions with the Guardians about trades involving Jose Ramirez, with the idea of using him as a second baseman, tweets Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. In a subsequent tweet, Rosenthal adds that it’s unclear if Toronto’s acquisition of Matt Chapman will alter these discussions, hypothesizing that the Jays don’t want to continue depleting their prospect stock with yet another huge deal.

The fact that the Jays are interested in Ramirez is not surprising for multiple reasons. The team’s president and general manager, Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins, were both with Cleveland from the time of Ramirez’s signing through his first few MLB seasons. There’s also the fact that Ramirez is incredibly talented and affordable. Over the past six seasons, he’s hit 155 home runs, stolen 134 bases and hit .286/.364/.531, for a wRC+ of 135 and 32.7 fWAR. He’ll make $11MM this season and has a $13MM club option for next season. He’s also a switch-hitter, which would benefit a Blue Jays lineup that skews heavily right-handed. Furthermore, it has been previously reported that the Jays unsuccessfully tried to acquire Ramirez at last year’s trade deadline.

While Ramirez would certainly be an offensive upgrade over the Cavan Biggio–Santiago Espinal pairing the Jays currently have projected at second base, the plan would come with some complications. For one, Ramirez’s experience at second base is limited. He played there sporadically in the first few years of his career until 2017, when he got into 71 games at the keystone. That dropped to 16 games in 2018 and he hasn’t played there since.

There’s also the fact that the Guardians don’t really have the financial motivation to move Ramirez. They’re currently projected for an Opening Day payroll of just $52MM, per Jason Martinez of Roster Resource. Even for a typically low-spending team like them, that’s incredibly low, giving them little incentive to subtract the $11MM owed to Ramirez.

Also, there’s the question of whether Cleveland would want to do this from a public relations standpoint. The fanbase already had to endure a trade of a face-of-the-franchise player one year ago when Francisco Lindor was dealt to the Mets. That was followed up by the team abandoning the nickname they had used for over a century, a move that was clearly quite unpopular with certain sections of the club’s diehards. To turn around and trade the team’s best player yet again would only do further damage to the relationship between the franchise and their customers.

Finally, there’s also the fact that Cleveland can still compete in the AL Central. Despite a litany of injuries to their starting rotation last season, the team still finished 80-82. Even with marginally better luck on the health front, they should be able to push themselves back over .500 and into a playoff race, especially with an extra playoff spot being available this year. Given their incredibly low payroll commitments, they should be able to add to their roster rather than subtract, particularly in the outfield.

Guardians Exercise Option On Jose Ramirez, Decline Option On Roberto Perez

By Steve Adams | November 5, 2021 at 9:48am CDT

The Guardians announced Friday that they’ve exercised their 2022 club option on third baseman Jose Ramirez and declined a club option on catcher Roberto Perez, making him a free agent for the first time in his career. Cleveland also confirmed the previously reported hiring of Chris Valaika as the team’s new hitting coach.

Ramirez’s $12MM option was among the easiest option calls any team will ever have to make. His contract also contains a $14MM club option for the 2023 season. Perez, meanwhile, will receive a $450K buyout in lieu of a $7MM option and explore the open market.

There was never a shred of doubt that Ramirez’s option would be picked up. The 29-year-old has cemented himself as one of the game’s elite players and lived up to that billing once again in 2021, slashing .266/.355/.538 with 36 home runs, 32 doubles, five triples, 27 stolen bases and elite defense at the hot corner.

With just two years remaining on his contract, Ramirez will surely be the subject of offseason trade inquiries, but Cleveland needn’t feel obligated to move him unless an absolutely mammoth trade offer is made. Ramirez’s contract is the only one on the books for the team in 2022, and with a modest arbitration class there’s no real financial concerns for Cleveland, even if the hope is to again operate on a relatively stripped-down payroll. Suffice it to say, president of baseball ops Chris Antonetti and GM Mike Chernoff will have plenty of leverage if (when) clubs do come calling about Ramirez.

For all the speculation about a potential Ramirez trade, however, it’s important to note that there’s no reason Cleveland can’t seek to contend in 2022. Ramirez will return alongside a core that features Shane Bieber, Aaron Civale, Triston McKenzie and 2020 breakout arm Cal Quantrill. The lineup is rife with question marks, but Amed Rosario hit well in his first season with the club and there are several top-end prospects on the cusp of big league readiness. For the first year under a rebranded moniker, it’s only sensible that the Guardians would look to put out a more compelling product.

As for Perez, he’s been unable to replicate his breakout 2019 showing at the plate — a season that saw him swat 24 home runs and post a .239/.321/.452 batting line. Paired with his excellent defense, that offensive output made Perez one of baseball’s best all-around catchers in 2019. Since then, he’s dealt with a pair of shoulder injuries and a fractured finger. It’s quite obviously possible that the arm/hand injuries have combined to sap Perez’s production, but with a more affordable and comparably strong defender available in the form of Austin Hedges, Cleveland unsurprisingly chose to move on.

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