Robert Stephenson

Angels Select Ehire Adrianza

By Nick Deeds | April 21, 2024 at 10:53am CDT

The Angels announced this afternoon that they’ve selected the contract of infielder Ehire Adrianza. Adrianza will take the place of third baseman Anthony Rendon on the active roster, as Rendon is headed to the 10-day injured list with a left hamstring strain. Meanwhile, right-hander Robert Stephenson was transferred to the 60-day injured list to make room for Adrianza on the club’s 40-man roster. MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger first reported that Adrianza was likely to replace Rendon on the club’s roster last night.

Adrianza, 34, will now participate in the 12th big league season of his career. The veteran made his big league debut with the Giants back in 2013 and made intermittent appearances with the club as a utility infielder off the bench, remaining the the club for four seasons despite a meager .220/.292/.313 slash line at the big league level. Despite that lackluster offense, Adrianza earned his role in San Francisco with his versatility, which allowed him to cover all four infield positions, as well as his switch-hitting, high-contact bat that allowed him to strike out just 18.1% of the time despite a 72 wRC+.

Prior to the 2017 season, Adrianza found himself designated for assignment by the Giants and eventually made his way to the Twins on waivers. He’d spend the next four seasons in Minnesota receiving far more regular playing time, and earned his expanded role by taking a small step forward with the bat. In 312 games with the Twins from 2017 to 2020, Adrianza slashed a decent .253/.317/.377 (86 wRC+) while posting a 19.1% strikeout rate against an 8% walk rate. The switch-hitter also expanded his defensive resume while in Minnesota, spending time at both outfield corners and even making a mop-up appearance on the mound in addition to his work around the infield.

After hitting free agency for the first time following the 2020 season, Adrianza signed with the Braves on a minor league deal ahead of what would become a career year of the infielder. The then-31-year-old made appeared in 109 games with Atlanta that year, slashing a respectable .247/.327/.401 with an excellent 10% walk rate against a 20.1% strikeout rate in 209 plate appearances while splitting time between shortstop, all three outfield spots, second base, and third base. Adrianza went on to appear on the club’s postseason roster that fall and earned a ring with the club when they won the 2021 World Series.

Things have taken a turn for the worse for the veteran in recent years, however. He’s appeared in just 42 big league games since the end of the 2021 campaign, slashing a putrid .159/.248/.187 in 121 combined plate appearances for the Nationals and Braves amid elbow and shoulder injuries. He caught on with the Angels this past winter on a minor league deal in spite of those injury and ineffectiveness issues in recent years, reuniting with former Braves third base coach and current Halos manager Ron Washington in the process. With Anaheim, Adrianza figures to provide the club with depth off the bench all around the infield, where the club is currently utilizing a combination of Nolan Schanuel, Brandon Drury, Miguel Sano, Zach Neto, and Luis Rengifo.

In doing so, Adrianza will take the roster spot of Rendon, who was pulled from yesterday’s game in the top of the first inning due to a hamstring strain. Now the soon to be 34-year-old veteran will head to the injured list once again after making frequent trips to the shelf in recent years that have limited him to just 219 total games since he signed a seven-year deal with the Halos during the 2019-20 offseason. Rendon had begun to heat up in recent weeks with a solid .357/.413/.411 slash line in his last 63 trips to the plate but now will be forced out of the lineup for the time being, though no timetable has been specified for his return to action.

Making room for Adrianza on the 40-man roster is Stephenson, whose placement on the 60-day IL is hardly a surprise after the club announced earlier this week that the right-hander would miss the entire 2024 season due to an elbow injury. It’s Stephenson’s first year with the Angels, and he remains under contract for two more seasons after this one with a club option on his services for the 2027 campaign.

Robert Stephenson To Miss 2024 Season With Elbow Injury

By Anthony Franco | April 17, 2024 at 11:39pm CDT

Angels reliever Robert Stephenson is out for the season with an elbow injury, the team informed reporters (X link via MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger). The club will provide further details tomorrow. They have not yet announced whether Stephenson will undergo surgery or whether he is expected to be ready for the start of the 2025 campaign.

It’s a brutal blow for the Halos, who made Stephenson their biggest addition of the offseason. The Angels inked him to a three-year, $33MM contract — their only multi-year investment of the winter. That deal contained a conditional $2.5MM team option for 2027 that triggered if Stephenson suffered damage to an elbow ligament that required an injured list stint of at least 130 consecutive days. Sam Blum of the Athletic tweets that the option will go into effect as a result of the injury.

That still offers little solace in the short term. The Halos envisioned Stephenson taking high-leverage setup work in front of closer Carlos Estévez. The righty was one of the top upside plays in last year’s relief class after an utterly dominant finish to the ’23 season.

Despite a first-round and top prospect pedigree, Stephenson has had inconsistent results for the bulk of his career. He’s long had excellent stuff, though, and he translated that into four months of elite results after being traded to the Rays last June. Stephenson leaned increasingly on a power slider/cutter in Tampa Bay that bordered on unhittable. In 42 games as a Ray, he worked to a 2.35 ERA while punching out nearly 43% of opposing batters. He induced swinging strikes on a laughable 28.9% of his pitches, an MLB-best mark that was well more than double the league average.

The Angels won’t get the chance to see how replicable that production is in 2024. Stephenson battled some shoulder soreness in Spring Training, keeping him out of action during exhibition play. The Halos sent him on a rehab stint last week, but that proved disastrous. Stephenson felt elbow discomfort against the first hitter he faced and was pulled from the game. Unfortunately, that evidently presaged a significant injury.

Los Angeles will move Stephenson to the 60-day IL whenever they need a spot on the 40-man roster. They’ll need to move forward without a player they envisioned as the key piece in a revamped bullpen. Each of Matt Moore, Luis García, José Cisnero, Adam Cimber and Hunter Strickland were offseason additions (although Moore played with the Halos before being waived last summer as part of their CBT-avoiding payroll cuts). The bullpen entered play Wednesday ranked 22nd with a 4.83 cumulative ERA, but they’d been successful holding leads until playing a pair of back-and-forth games against the Rays in the last two days.

Robert Stephenson Being Evaluated For Elbow Soreness

By Anthony Franco | April 15, 2024 at 6:34pm CDT

The Angels are dealing with a bit of a scare involving offseason signee Robert Stephenson. The righty reliever departed Saturday’s Triple-A rehab outing after facing one hitter (whom he walked). While details are still sparse, the team told reporters this afternoon that he’s headed for further testing after experiencing soreness in his throwing elbow (X link via Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com).

Stephenson has spent the entire season on the injured list, but the elbow issue seems to be new. His original IL placement came as a result of some shoulder discomfort that arose during Spring Training. The abbreviated rehab appearance was his first official game action as a member of the Los Angeles organization.

The Halos signed Stephenson to a three-year, $33MM pact that represented their biggest investment of the winter. While they more or less overhauled the entire bullpen, Stephenson was the only player to whom they made a multi-year commitment. They envisioned him stepping in as a high-end setup arm in front of Carlos Estévez, but his Angels tenure has gotten off to a rocky start. Stephenson was arguably the best reliever in MLB for the final few months of the 2023 season. After being traded from the Pirates to the Rays in early June, he threw 38 1/3 innings of 2.35 ERA ball with a massive 42.9% strikeout rate.

It’s far too soon to know whether he’s in danger of missing significant time. If there is a long-term elbow issue, however, it could have an impact on Stephenson’s contract status. His three-year deal includes a provision that the Halos would receive a $2.5MM club option for the 2027 campaign if he suffers an elbow ligament injury that knocks him out of action for 130+ days.

AL West Notes: Stephenson, Canzone, Verlander, Valdez

By Mark Polishuk | April 14, 2024 at 5:44pm CDT

Robert Stephenson ended his minor league rehab outing after four pitches yesterday, as the Angels right-hander called for the team trainer and then left the mound. Manager Ron Washington told reporters (including Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register) that Stephenson would be undergoing tests, but didn’t offer any other details about the situation.

Shoulder inflammation kept Stephenson from pitching during Spring Training, yet after beginning the season on the 15-day injured list, the reliever seemed to be making good progress in his recovery and was looking to be part of the Angels’ roster before April was over. Yesterday’s news seems to put that timeline in jeopardy, and the only hope now is that Stephenson’s setback is less ominous than it seemed. A dominant four-month stretch with the Rays last season turned Stephenson into one of the more sought-after commodities in the free agent relief market this past winter, and the Angels landed the righty on a three-year, $33MM contract.

Angels Notes: Silseth, Rotation, Stephenson

By Darragh McDonald | April 11, 2024 at 10:15am CDT

The Angels got a bit of a scare recently when right-hander Chase Silseth was placed on the 15-day injured list due to right elbow inflammation and was sent for an MRI. Thankfully, that MRI found just inflammation and no ligament damage. The pitcher himself gave the good news to members of the media yesterday, including Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com, adding that he hopes to be back in about three weeks.

That’s obviously a much better outcome than the worst-case scenario of some kind of surgery that would have wiped out the rest of his season or even part of next year. Silseth was able to toss 52 1/3 innings for the club in a swing role last year with a 3.96 earned run average, showing enough promise to get a rotation job here in 2024. His first two outings didn’t go especially well, resulting in six earned runs allowed over eight innings, but it’s possible the injury was playing a role there.

With Silseth out, the Angels bumped José Soriano into the rotation, alongside Reid Detmers, Patrick Sandoval, Tyler Anderson and Griffin Canning. Soriano struck out six opponents in four innings last night but also allowed four earned runs on six hits.

It’s just one start and Soriano could certainly get in a better groove going forward, but he also may hit an innings limit at some point if he were to stay in the rotation. He underwent Tommy John surgery in both February of 2020 and June of 2021, meaning he hardly pitched over the 2020 to 2022 period before throwing 65 1/3 innings last year between the majors and minors. Perhaps he can hold down a rotation spot for a few weeks while Silseth is out and then slide back into the bullpen, allowing him to grow his workload relative to last year but without hitting a wall. The Angels are still interested in seeing what he can do as a starter over the long term but they are surely aware that he can’t suddenly launch into the 200-inning range this year.

Turning to the bullpen, Robert Stephenson is going to start a rehab assignment this Sunday, per Bollinger. He was the biggest signing for the Halos this winter, netting himself a three-year, $33MM deal. But he hasn’t yet made his debut as an Angel since he experienced some shoulder soreness during the spring and began the season on the injured list. He recently said he’s targeting a late April return and this seems to be in line with that.

After being acquired by the Rays last year, Stephenson was one of the best relievers in the league. He posted a 2.35 ERA in his 42 appearances, striking out a tremendous 42.9% of batters faced while walking just 5.7% of them. Since he was previously a first-round pick and highly-touted prospect, this seemed to be the long-awaited breakout that didn’t materialize in previous seasons as injuries got in the way. The Angels are still waiting to find out if their bet on Stephenson was a wise one but it seems he’ll be able to join the club shortly.

Getting both Silseth and Stephenson healthy will be good for the club, bolstering both the rotation and the bullpen. The Halos are out to an even 6-6 start through 12 games, but that’s largely in spite of some poor pitching. The club’s collective ERA of 5.09 this year is 29th out of the 30 clubs, ahead of only the Rockies and their dreadful 6.57 mark.

Robert Stephenson Aiming For Late-April Activation From 15-Day IL

By Mark Polishuk | March 30, 2024 at 3:02pm CDT

Robert Stephenson’s tenure with the Angels got off to an unwelcome start when the reliever had to start the season on the 15-day injured list due to right shoulder inflammation. The righty provided MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger with an update, saying that his hope is to be available before April is over, though he’ll first need to complete a rehab assignment.

The shoulder soreness first arose before the Angels’ spring camp even opened, and as a result, Stephenson wasn’t able to pitch at all in the Cactus League. Stephenson will therefore need some extra ramp-up time to try and simulate the Spring Training experience, though he has already started to pick up his throwing progressions. The right-hander had his first bullpen session on Thursday and another is planned for Monday.

Los Angeles signed Stephenson to a three-year, $33MM free agent deal in January, as the 31-year-old was handsomely rewarded for a major in-season turnaround. With a penchant for inconsistency both as a starter and then after he became a full-time reliever in 2019, Stephenson had a 5.14 ERA in 14 innings for the Pirates before the Bucs dealt him to Tampa in a somewhat under-the-radar deal. Stephenson then became the latest in the Rays’ long line of pitching reclamation projects, as he broke out with a 2.35 ERA, eight percent walk rate, and a fantastic 38.3% strikeout rate over 38 1/3 innings in a Tampa Bay uniform.

While the shoulder injury isn’t the best start to a $33MM deal, the Angels are betting that Stephenson can keep the magic going to become a lockdown member of their bullpen. The Halos invested heavily in their relief corps (and not much else) this winter, adding Stephenson, Matt Moore, Luis Garcia, Adam Cimber, and Jose Cisnero as part of an extensive bullpen overhaul.

Robert Stephenson Questionable For Opening Day

By Darragh McDonald | March 15, 2024 at 10:27pm CDT

Angels right-hander Robert Stephenson is still dealing with some shoulder discomfort and may not be in game shape by the time the season starts, per Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register. Manager Ron Washington tells Fletcher that José Soriano may move back to the bullpen to take Stephenson’s spot.

Stephenson, 31, came into camp with some shoulder soreness and he hasn’t yet appeared in an official Spring Training game. As relayed by Fletcher, Stephenson has resumed throwing full bullpens and still plans on being ready for Opening Day, but he has to get over the discomfort and advance to live batting practice before getting some game work in.

Barring a late March signing of Blake Snell or Jordan Montgomery, the Angels’ most significant move of the offseason will be their three-year, $33MM deal for Stephenson. He got that nice deal for himself based on his stint with the Rays in the second half of 2023, when he was one of the most dominant pitchers in the league.

He made 42 appearances for Tampa last year with a 2.35 earned run average, thanks to a new breaking ball. Statcast classified it as a cutter but Fletcher describes it as a tweak to his slider. Regardless of the terminology, it helped him strike out 42.9% of batters faced while walking just 5.7%. His 28.9% swinging strike percentage was more than double last year’s 11.6% league average for relievers.

The Angels were primarily focused on bullpen upgrades this winter with Stephenson the highlight. The only free agent they signed to a major league deal that wasn’t a pitcher was Aaron Hicks, who only requires the Halos to pay the prorated league minimum since the Yankees are still on the hook for the majority of his contract. Pitchers Matt Moore, Luis García, Adam Cimber, José Cisnero, Adam Kolarek and Zach Plesac got one-year deals with Moore’s $9MM the largest of them.

Stephenson’s deal was larger than all of those, in length and in average annual value. It’s unclear if he will miss much time, or even any at all, but it’s not the ideal start to his tenure with the Angels.

In response to his status, the club may be pivoting with Soriano, as mentioned up top. It was reported a couple of weeks ago that the Angels were planning to stretch him out as a starter, though Washington admitted earlier this week that he wouldn’t be able to secure a rotation spot unless there was an injury to one of Reid Detmers, Patrick Sandoval, Tyler Anderson, Griffin Canning or Chase Silseth. Now with Stephenson behind schedule, Soriano might return to the bullpen.

“First, you take care of need, and then you can start thinking long term,” Washington said. “We decided we wanted to try to see if Soriano can start, and so far he has proven to us that he possibly can. Now, Stephenson down that means we’ve got a void in the bullpen. Now we’re going to make a decision on our need right there. Long term would be Soriano being a starter. But if we can’t fill that void in the bullpen, Soriano has done it before. We’ve got an option.”

Soriano came up as a starter in the minors but was significantly delayed as he required two Tommy John surgeries in fairly quick succession, one in February of 2020 and the other in June of 2021, which naturally led to him hardly pitching at all in that 2020-2022 period. He was finally healthy last year and tossed 42 innings for the Angels with a 3.64 ERA. His 12.4% walk rate was on the high side, but that’s hardly surprising given the time he missed. He also punched out 30.3% of batters faced and got grounders on 51% of balls in play.

Based on Washington’s comments, it seems the club still thinks Soriano is a viable starter down the road but he may be used in the bullpen for now. In addition to his 42 innings of major league work last year, Soriano also tossed 23 1/3 innings in Double-A, bringing his tally for the year to 65 1/3. After missing most of the previous three seasons, he would probably run into an innings cap at some point this year if he were acting as a starter the whole time, speculatively in the range of 100 to 120 or so.

He does have a couple of options, so the Halos could perhaps use him as a reliever in the big leagues for now but send him down and stretch him back out later in the year if they want to have him log some innings and perhaps get towards a full starter’s workload in 2025.

Angels Notes: Wantz, Stephenson, Suarez

By Steve Adams | February 29, 2024 at 2:41pm CDT

The Angels are stretching reliever Andrew Wantz out as a starter this spring, manager Ron Washington revealed today in chatting with the team’s beat writers (X link via The Athletic’s Sam Blum). The 28-year-old righty has worked almost exclusively as a reliever dating back to the 2021 season, but the Halos feel they need more rotation depth than they have at present, per Washington.

Wantz has been a frequent contributor in the Anaheim bullpen in each of the past three seasons, posting particularly solid results in 2022-23. Over the last two big league campaigns, he’s totaled 89 1/3 frames and worked to a 3.51 ERA, albeit with more dubious underlying numbers.

Wantz sports a roughly average 23.4% strikeout rate in that time but has walked just under 10% of his opponents and averaged 1.2 big flies per nine frames. He’s had some good fortune on balls in play (.232 BABIP), although as an extreme fly-ball pitcher, he’s more apt to carry a lower-than-average mark in that regard. Fielding-independent metrics like FIP (4.32) and SIERA (4.17) feel he’s been solid but perhaps not quite to the extent his ERA would suggest.

While Wantz is no stranger to working multiple innings — he had 11 appearances lasting two innings in 2023 — he’s never pitched more than 2 1/3 innings in a single big league outing. The transition won’t be entirely foreign to him, given he made 18 minor league starts during the 2019 season, but it’s been a good while since he’s been tasked with working in longer stints.

Of course, if the Angels are truly concerned about their rotation depth, there are some rather straightforward ways to address that need. The free agent market is still rife with options, including top names like Blake Snell and Jordan Montgomery, in addition to solid mid-rotation/back-end arms like Mike Clevinger and Michael Lorenzen. There are a handful of rebound candidates who could likely be had on low-cost one-year or even minor league deals, including Eric Lauer, Jake Odorizzi and Johnny Cueto (among others).

From a payroll vantage point, the Angels should be able to accommodate just about anyone — even Snell or Montgomery. After opening the 2023 season with a payroll north of $212MM, they’re projected for a $173.4MM mark, per RosterResource. The Angels are also nearly $50MM shy of the first tier of luxury penalization, so they could accommodate either a long-term deal or a short-term, high-AAV deal with multiple opt-out opportunities, depending on the preferences of Snell/Montgomery. Moving further down the free agent pecking order, someone like Lorenzen or Clevinger could be signed without pushing payroll anywhere close to record levels.

Historically speaking, however, Angels owner Arte Moreno has steadfastly refused to commit long-term deals to pitchers. As shown in MLBTR’s Contract Tracker, last year’s three-year, $39MM deal with Tyler Anderson was the first time the Halos inked a free agent pitcher to a multi-year deal since Joe Blanton’s two-year deal in 2012. You’d have to go way back to C.J. Wilson in 2011 to find the last time the Halos went more than three years on a pitcher.

The Angels haven’t eschewed spending entirely, but they’ve once again focused their free agent efforts on the bullpen. That’s been a familiar trend for the Angels in recent years. Already this offseason, they’ve committed a combined a combined $50.6MM to Robert Stephenson, Matt Moore, Adam Cimber, Luis Garcia, Jose Cisnero and Adam Kolarek. Dating back to the 2021-22 offseason, the Angels have given out 13 big league deals to free-agent relievers — including five multi-year pacts (topped by Raisel Iglesias’ four-year, $58MM deal).

It’s been a questionable strategy for them, given the team’s results over the years. And this year’s group is already off to a somewhat dubious start. As Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register reports, Stephenson — who signed a three-year, $33MM deal this winter — is dealing with shoulder soreness and is behind schedule in camp. The right-hander believes he’ll be able to pitch at some point this spring but might not be ready for Opening Day.

It’s a suboptimal start to his Angels tenure after the team made a weighty three-year investment on the heels of Stephenson’s four-month breakout with the Rays. The hard-throwing righty was long viewed as an interesting prospect and has had flashes of excellence in his big league career. He’d never put together any kind of run like he did with Tampa Bay last year, though.

After being acquired from the Pirates in a trade sending infielder Alika Williams to Pittsburgh, Stephenson snapped off 38 1/3 innings of 2.35 ERA ball with a gaudy 42.9% strikeout rate against just a 5.7% walk rate. Beyond the eye-popping strikeout rate, Stephenson posted a superhuman 28.9% swinging-strike rate (nearly triple the 11.1% league average) and induced chases on pitches off the plate at a stunning 47.2% clip that topped the league-average 31.9% rate by nearly 16 percentage points.

The Angels are surely envisioning Stephenson as a critical part of their high-leverage relief corps, but word of an early shoulder issue that’s slowed his progression is obviously somewhat ominous. To this point, there’s no indication of a serious issue, but given the magnitude of the team’s investment in the righty, it’s understandable if the Halos want to proceed with caution. Stephenson played catch yesterday and felt good after throwing, Fletcher notes.

Stephenson isn’t the only pitcher in camp who’s a bit banged up. Washington also revealed today (via Fletcher) that lefty Jose Suarez hasn’t pitched yet due to a “dead arm” following winter ball. He’s expected to get on the mound at some point this spring and could yet be ready for Opening Day, but that’s not a given.

It’s a tough way to start a pivotal spring for the 26-year-old Suarez. As recently as 2021-22, he looked the part of a controllable fourth starter who could hold a rotation spot in Anaheim for several years. The 2023 season was an unmitigated disaster for the southpaw, however. Shoulder trouble limited him to just 33 2/3 big league innings (plus another 3 1/3 frames of rehab work), and he was shelled for an 8.29 ERA in that time. Suarez served up a massive ten home runs in that small sample (2.67 HR/9), saw his strikeout rate plummet from 22.3% to 17%, and watched his walk rate spike from 7.1% to 12.1%.

A 2024 rebound for Suarez is particularly critical, given that he’s now out of minor league options. If he opens the season on the injured list, that’d actually give the Angels a few weeks to take a look at Suarez in the minors on a rehab assignment, but whenever he’s healthy, he’ll either need to be on the big league roster or else be traded to a team who’ll carry him or exposed to outright waivers.

MLBTR Podcast: The Broadcasting Landscape, Josh Hader and the Relief Market

By Darragh McDonald | January 24, 2024 at 11:59pm CDT

The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

The RSN model for MLB clubs (1:00)
The latest details on the Diamond Sports Group bankruptcy (4:05)
The Astros signed Josh Hader (12:35)
The Angels signed Robert Stephenson (19:05)
The Pirates signed Aroldis Chapman (21:50)

Plus, we answer your questions, including…

Does J.D. Martinez make sense for the Angels? (24:30)
With the Mets in rebuild/retooling mode and the Mariners in need of another infield bat (and a surplus of controllable young arms), is there a trade there? (27:55)
How odd is it that we are this late in January and have several players likely to get multi-year deals? (31:55)

Check out our past episodes!

The Cubs’ Activity, Marcus Stroman And Jordan Hicks – listen here
Teoscar Hernández Signs With L.A. And The Move-Making Mariners and Rays – listen here
Yoshi Yamamoto Fallout, the Chris Sale/Vaughn Grissom Trade and Transaction Roundup – listen here

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff. Check out their Facebook page here!

Angels Sign Robert Stephenson To Three-Year Contract

By Anthony Franco | January 21, 2024 at 10:25pm CDT

The Angels announced the signing of reliever Robert Stephenson to a three-year contract on Tuesday afternoon. Stephenson, a client of Apex Baseball, is reportedly guaranteed $33MM. There’s also a conditional team option for the 2027 campaign based on Stephenson’s elbow health. If the pitcher suffers an elbow ligament injury that causes him to miss 130 consecutive days, the Halos would have a $2.5MM option on his services for a fourth season. He will otherwise make $11MM annually over the next three years.

Stephenson, 31 next month, was the top remaining free agent reliever once Josh Hader came off the board. Within a couple hours of Hader agreeing to a five-year, $95MM pact with the Astros, Stephenson decided to join him in the AL West.

A three-year guarantee for Stephenson would have seemed outlandish six months ago. Until last summer, he looked like a volatile middle innings arm. A former first-round pick and highly-regarded prospect with the Reds, Stephenson struggled early in his career as a starter. He moved to relief full-time in 2019 and had an up-and-down trajectory.

The 6’3″ righty turned in a sub-4.00 ERA in 2019 and ’21 before a rough 2022 campaign. He split the year between the Rockies and Pirates, allowing a 5.43 ERA through 58 innings. Stephenson opened last season with 14 innings of nine-run ball in Pittsburgh.

An early June trade sending him to the Rays for infielder Alika Williams didn’t result in a ton of fanfare. It wound up being one of the more adept rental acquisitions of the summer, though, one that completely changed his fortunes in free agency.

Stephenson was arguably the most dominant pitcher in the majors for the season’s final four months. During his time in Tampa Bay, he worked to a 2.35 ERA across 38 1/3 innings. He punched out a laughable 42.9% of hitters while walking fewer than 6% of batters faced. Among relievers with 30+ innings after June 1, only Félix Bautista, Aroldis Chapman and Pete Fairbanks punched hitters out at a higher rate.

Even that doesn’t capture how overpowering he was on a pitch-for-pitch basis. Opponents whiffed more often than they made contact. Hitters put the bat on the ball on 49.3% of their swings against Stephenson in Tampa Bay. That wasn’t simply the best mark in MLB. It was almost 10 percentage points lower than anyone else over that stretch. Chapman, against whom batters made contact on 59% of their swings, was second.

It’s not hard to pinpoint a reason for that excellence. Before he went to Tampa Bay, he paired a near-97 MPH four-seam fastball with a mid-80s slider. With the Rays, he leaned mostly on an upper-80s breaking ball that Statcast classifies as a cutter. Opponents couldn’t do anything with that pitch. They swung through it nearly three-fifths of the time and hit .101 in 79 at-bats. By the season’s final month, he was using the pitch at a near-75% clip.

Whether Stephenson adopted the cutter from scratch or just found a way to add a couple ticks of velocity to his former slider isn’t clear. In any event, it’s a pitch he’ll surely lean on frequently in Orange County. The Angels can’t expect him to maintain quite the level he showed in Tampa Bay — that’d be a tough ask for anyone — but they’re surely anticipating him stepping in as a quality high-leverage arm.

That’s not without risk. Stellar as Stephenson’s finish was, his time in Tampa Bay comprised fewer than 40 innings. From his 2019 bullpen transfer through his stint in Pittsburgh, he tallied a 4.53 ERA in 192 2/3 frames between three teams. Some of that can be attributed to playing in hitter-friendly home venues in Cincinnati and Colorado, but he clearly wouldn’t have been a candidate for a three-year pact had he not finished the way he did. His 26.9% strikeout rate over those four-plus seasons was a solid but hardly elite number.

It’s the first significant acquisition of the offseason for the Halos. While Stephenson is their fourth bullpen pickup overall, the other three signings were modest one-year investments. Luis García landed a $4.75MM deal, while Adam Cimber inked a $1.65MM pact after being non-tendered by Toronto. Adam Kolarek, who signed for $900K, was already outrighted off the 40-man roster.

Stephenson will work in the late innings. He doesn’t have any closing experience, so the Halos could elect to leave last year’s key bullpen pickup, Carlos Estévez, in the ninth inning. The pair of righties should take the bulk of the most important work late in games. García and Cimber will occupy middle relief roles, while Ben Joyce and José Soriano could hold setup jobs.

It’s a high-octane group built around some of the hardest throwers in the sport. Joyce averaged nearly 101 MPH on his heater and famously was clocked as high as 105 MPH in college. Estévez and García sit north of 97 MPH on average. Soriano and Stephenson have upper 90s velocity in their back pocket as well, even if both lean more frequently on their breaking stuff.

New manager Ron Washington should appreciate the stable of power arsenals at his disposal, although the Halos likely need to add another left-hander to the mix. That could put the finishing touch on the bullpen, yet there’s still plenty of work for GM Perry Minasian and his front office.

The Halos haven’t made any acquisitions on the offensive side to compensate for Shohei Ohtani’s departure. That’s also true in the rotation. They’ve looked for ways to add a top-end starter. In addition to scouring the trade market, the Halos have reportedly shown interest in defending NL Cy Young winner Blake Snell.

There should still be plenty of payroll room at their disposal. Roster Resource projected the 2024 player payroll around $153MM before the Stephenson signing. Evenly distributing his salaries pushes that around $164MM. The Halos opened last season with a payroll at roughly $212MM, as calculated by Cot’s Baseball Contracts. They’ll still be almost $50MM shy of that mark. They’re also nowhere near next year’s $237MM base luxury tax threshold. Stephenson’s $11MM average annual value will push the Angels’ projected CBT number to roughly $179MM.

The contract comes in just below MLBTR’s prediction of four years and $36MM. It’s in line with the going rate for high-leverage relievers with some inconsistency in their career track record, as shown on MLBTR’s Contract Tracker. Stephenson’s deal generally aligns with those signed by Taylor Rogers (three years, $33MM), Rafael Montero (three years, $34.5MM), Joe Jiménez (three years, $26.5MM), former Angel Reynaldo López (three years, $30MM) and Jordan Hicks (four years, $44MM) over the last two offseasons.

@Jolly_Olive first reported the Angels and Stephenson had agreed to a three-year deal exceeding $30MM with a 2027 option. Sam Blum of the Athletic reported the $33MM guarantee. Jeff Passan of ESPN reported the $2.5MM conditional option based on Stephenson’s arm health. The Associated Press reported the 130-inning provision and the evenly distributed salaries.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

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