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Looking Ahead To Club Options: AL East

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MLBTR wraps our division by division look at next year’s team/mutual option class with the AL East. Virtually all of the mutual options will be bought out by one side. Generally, if the team is willing to retain the player at the option price, the player will decline his end in search of a better free agent deal.

Previous installments: player options/opt-outs, NL West, AL West, NL Central, AL Central, NL East

Baltimore Orioles

Baltimore signed Kittredge to a one-year, $10MM free agent deal over the winter. He’s making $9MM this season and has a matching club option or a $1MM buyout for 2026. Kittredge was supposed to be a key setup man in front of Félix Bautista, but he suffered a left knee injury early in camp and required a debridement surgery. He began a rehab stint at High-A Aberdeen on Sunday. While there’s plenty of time for Kittredge to turn things around, it hasn’t been the start to his O’s tenure that he envisioned.

Laureano, who was non-tendered by the Braves, signed a $4MM contract with Baltimore in February. That came with a $6.5MM team option without a buyout, giving the Orioles an extra season of club control. Injuries to Tyler O’Neill and Colton Cowser have pressed him into everyday work, mostly in left field. He hasn’t provided much through his first 24 games. Laureano is hitting .185 with a .237 on-base percentage through 59 plate appearances. He has hit a trio of home runs but struck out 18 times while drawing only four walks. Laureano has generally been a below-average hitter since being suspended following a positive PED test in 2021. He’ll need much better production over the next few months for the Orioles to exercise the option.

Boston Red Sox

Buehler signed a one-year, $21.05MM free agent deal to match the price of the qualifying offer — which the Dodgers had declined to issue when he hit the market. It’s a relatively expensive pillow contract. Buehler was coming off a dismal regular season, in which he’d posted a 5.38 ERA with a career-worst 18.6% strikeout rate over 16 starts. He finished his Dodger tenure on a high note, though, closing out the World Series while pitching to a 3.60 earned run average in 15 playoff innings.

An ace-caliber pitcher early in his career, Buehler hasn’t looked the same since undergoing the second Tommy John surgery of his career in August 2022. His stint in Boston has gotten out to a shaky start. While his 4.28 ERA through 33 2/3 innings is serviceable, he’s striking out just 20.7% of opponents while averaging a personal-low 93.5 MPH on his fastball. Shoulder inflammation sent him to the injured list last week. The mutual option was always an accounting measure designed to push the $3MM buyout to the end of the year rather than disbursing it throughout the season as salary. The team seems likelier to decline its end than the pitcher does.

Giolito signed a two-year, $38.5MM deal during the 2023-24 offseason. He negotiated an opt-out clause after the first season and hoped to retest the market after one strong year. Instead, Giolito’s elbow gave out during Spring Training and he required UCL surgery that cost him the entire season. The veteran righty made the easy decision to stick around for year two.

By exercising his player option, Giolito unlocked a 2026 option for the team. It’s valued at $14MM and comes with a $1.5MM buyout. If Giolito pitches 140 innings this year, it’d convert to a $19MM mutual option (still with the $1.5MM buyout). That’d give him a chance to test free agency if he wants. Giolito has an uphill battle to 140 frames. A hamstring strain cost him the first month of the season. He finally made his team debut last week, working six innings of three-run ball with seven strikeouts in a no-decision against Toronto. The Rangers tagged him for six runs on 10 hits in just 3 2/3 frames tonight.

The Red Sox added Hendriks on a two-year, $10MM deal over the 2023-24 offseason. They knew they wouldn’t get much in year one, as Hendriks had undergone Tommy John surgery the prior August. He attempted to make a late-season return last year but was shut down after a minor flare-up of elbow discomfort. Elbow inflammation shelved him for a couple weeks to begin this season, though he made his team debut in mid-April.

Hendriks allowed two runs on three hits in one inning during his first appearance. He has rattled off five straight scoreless outings since then, albeit with four walks in five frames. His 95 MPH average fastball is solid but below the 97-98 range at which he sat during his elite seasons with the White Sox.

Note: Jarren Duran’s arbitration deal contains a ’26 club option with an $8MM base salary. He’d remain eligible for arbitration if the Sox decline the option.

New York Yankees

  • Tim Hill, LHP ($3MM club option, $350K buyout)

Hill finished last season with the Yankees after being released by the White Sox in June. He’d allowed nearly six earned runs per nine with Chicago but managed a tidy 2.05 ERA over 44 frames for New York. He’s out to a similarly productive start to the ’25 season. Hill has surrendered five runs through 17 1/3 innings (2.60 ERA).

While the soft-tossing lefty has managed just 11 strikeouts, his game has always been built around ground-balls. He’s getting grounders at a massive 81.6% clip thus far. Only nine of the 40 batted balls he’s allowed have been hit into the air. It’s easily the highest grounder rate in the majors. The Yankees value this skillset as much as any team, and the $2.65MM option decision is a drop in the bucket for them.

Loáisiga is still working back from last April’s elbow surgery. The righty has generally been a productive reliever when healthy, but he’s only once managed even 50 MLB innings in a season. He’s on a rehab stint with Low-A Tampa and will need another few weeks before he’s built into MLB game shape. Loáisiga is making $5MM this season. The option has a matching base value and could climb by another $500K if the Yankees exercise it. He’d earn $100K each at reaching 50, 55, 60, 65 and 70 innings in 2026.

Tampa Bay Rays

Fairbanks is in the final guaranteed season of the three-year, $12MM extension that he signed before the 2023 campaign. That includes a $1MM buyout on a club option that comes with a $7MM base value. That’s a bargain for a quality high-leverage reliever, but the deal includes various escalators that could push the option price above $12MM.

The option value would climb by $500K if he gets to 125 combined appearances between 2023-25 and another $1MM apiece at 135, 150 and 165 combined outings. Fairbanks made it into 95 games over the first two seasons. He’d trigger the first $500K escalator at just 30 appearances this year and would max it out if he makes it into 70 games. He can boost the option price by another $2MM based on this year’s games finished total: $500K apiece at 25, 30, 35 and 40.

Fairbanks has never reached 50 appearances in a season because of various injuries, but he’s already at 14 games through this season’s first six weeks. Fairbanks has finished 11 of those contests while working as Kevin Cash’s primary closer. He has recorded 13 strikeouts against six walks while allowing three runs over 13 1/3 innings. The option price should remain solid value, though the escalators might eventually push it to an area where Tampa Bay would rather explore deadline or offseason trades rather than having a reliever projecting as one of the highest-paid players on the roster.

Jansen seemed to be pulling away from the rest of a weak free agent catching class early last season. His production tanked from June onwards, leaving him to sign an $8.5MM pillow contract with Tampa Bay. He’s making an $8MM salary and will collect a $500K buyout on a $12MM mutual option at year’s end. Last summer’s offensive drought has carried into 2025. Jansen has only one home run with a .147/.301/.221 batting line through 83 plate appearances. He remains a very patient hitter, but the Rays would have an easy decision to decline their end of the option if he doesn’t find the double-digit home run power he showed during his best seasons in Toronto.

Lowe has had a rare extended run with a Tampa Bay team that is almost always willing to trade any player. He’s in his eighth big league season and in year seven of the extension he signed in Spring Training 2019. Lowe collected $24MM for what would have been his standard six seasons of team control. The Rays exercised a $10.5MM option for this year and can retain him once more at an $11.5MM price. It’s an $11MM decision after accounting for the $500K buyout.

While injuries have been a recurring issue, Lowe has been one of the better offensive middle infielders in the sport when healthy. His 39-homer season in 2021 is an outlier, but he has tallied 21 longballs in each of the past two seasons. He’s out to a much slower start this year, batting .203/.258/.305 with four homers across 128 plate appearances. The batted ball metrics are still solid, but his career-worst 20.1% swinging strike rate is the fifth-highest among hitters with at least 50 PAs.

This one can still go a few different ways. If Lowe hits like this all season, he’d be bought out. If he finds something like his 2023-24 form (.238/.319/.458), then $11MM is reasonable. It’d keep him as one of Tampa Bay’s highest-paid players, though, so there’s a decent chance he’ll be traded at some point this year. The 16-18 Rays look like fringe Wild Card contenders for a second consecutive year. They could again try to walk the line between buying and selling come deadline season.

The Rays signed Waguespack to a restructured deal early last offseason. He’s making $1.3MM this season and has a $1.5MM club option for next year. That’d escalate to $2MM if he reaches 20 “points” this season. Waguespack would receive one point for each MLB relief appearance and two points per big league start. He has spent the ’25 season to date on optional assignment to Triple-A Durham.

Working as a pure reliever for the Bulls, Waguespack has reeled off 14 innings of two-run ball. He has fanned 15 hitters against three walks while getting ground-balls at a lofty 60% clip. It hasn’t earned him a major league call yet, but he should be up before too much longer if he keeps performing at that level. Waguespack spent the 2022-23 seasons with the Orix Buffaloes in Japan. He made four MLB appearances with Tampa Bay last year but lost a good portion of the season to a rotator cuff injury.

Note: Taylor Walls’ arbitration deal contains a ’26 club option with a $2.45MM base salary. He’d remain eligible for arbitration if the Rays decline the option.

Toronto Blue Jays

  • None

Yankees Re-Sign Tim Hill

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TODAY: The move has been officially announced by the Yankees.

February 4: The Yankees are bringing left-hander Tim Hill back on a one-year, $2.85MM contract, reports ESPN’s Jeff Passan. Hill, a client of Paragon Sports International, will be paid $2.5MM in 2025 and has a $350K buyout on a $3MM club option for the 2026 season.

Hill, 34, opened the 2024 season with the White Sox but was released in June after being tagged for a 5.07 ERA in 23 innings with the South Siders. He turned his entire season around upon signing with the Yankees, for whom he posted a pristine 2.05 earned run average in 48 innings from mid-June through season’s end. He tossed another 8 1/3 innings during postseason play and held opponents to one run during that time.

The veteran Hill is a sidearming sinker specialist who relies far more on grounders than on missing bats. A whopping 68.2% of batted balls against Hill were grounders. Conversely, his paltry 10.7% strikeout rate was the second-lowest among all pitchers who tossed at least 40 innings in 2024. No pitcher allowed a higher contact percentage than Hill’s 88.7%, and none had a lower swinging-strike rate than Hill’s 5.7% mark. Even with the lack of missed bats, that huge ground-ball rate and a terrific 6.5% walk rate (5.2% with the Yankees) helped Hill to mitigate damage.

As one might expect from a player who so rarely misses bats, Hill yielded quite a few hits in 2024. Opponents batted .290 against him — an average of 10.3 hits per nine innings pitched. However, the overwhelming majority were singles. Hill faced 291 hitters and only yielded nine extra-base hits (seven doubles and two homers). He was more effective against lefties than righties, but neither hit for any power against him. Southpaw swingers hit .273/.321/.322, while righties hit .303/.352/.352. Hill’s penchant for allowing contact could theoretically get him into trouble, but with so many singles, so few walks and so many grounders, he saw eight double plays induced behind him; only 11 relievers in all of MLB generated more (five of whom also simply pitched more innings).

Prior to their agreement with Hill, the Yankees didn’t have a lefty projected to be in the bullpen. They didn’t even have a left-handed reliever on the 40-man roster. He’ll now join a relief corps headlined by trade acquisition Devin Williams but also featuring Luke Weaver, Ian Hamilton, Fernando Cruz (another trade pickup), Mark Leiter Jr. and JT Brubaker. Jonathan Loaisiga, on the mend from last year’s April UCL procedure, will join the group eventually but could open the season on the 60-day injured list.

The bullpen could expand further if and when the Yankees trade Marcus Stroman, who they’ve been shopping throughout the winter. The roster would have six starters if the season began today, but a trade of Stroman will thin out the rotation and perhaps free up some money to bring in another lefty and/or add the infielder the Yankees have sought this offseason.

Adding Hill’s guarantee to the books pushes the Yankees’ projected cash payroll to just over $285MM, per RosterResource. They’re already in the top tier of luxury penalization, which means Hill will come with a 110% tax against the $2.85MM AAV of his contract. That weighs in at a $3.135MM tax hit, bringing the total expenditure for re-signing Hill to $5.985MM. RosterResource now has the Yankees’ luxury ledger at a bit more than $305MM. Of course, trading Stroman could reduce that bill substantially, though there’s no feasible way that the Yankees would duck the tax entirely (or even scale their overages back to less than $40MM, which would be required to avoid the penalty that drops next year’s top draft pick by 10 spots).

Mets Interested In Tim Hill

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The Mets have “been interested lately” in left-hander Tim Hill, Newsday’s Tim Healey reports.  Hill has now drawn some looks from two different New York boroughs, as the Yankees were also linked to Hill’s market last month.

Adam Ottavino, Jake Diekman, Phil Maton, Drew Smith, Brooks Raley, and Ryne Stanek are all free agents, and the Mets have largely looked to replace this relief depth with an influx of minor league signings and waiver claims.  Griffin Canning was signed to a big league deal and looks to be part of the bullpen mix, as well.  Amidst all of these moves, however, Danny Young is the only southpaw bullpen option on the 40-man roster, so the Mets certainly have a need for more left-handed pitching help.

Signing Tanner Scott would certainly address the bullpen balance in a major fashion, yet regardless of whether or not the Mets’ pursuit of Scott pans out, a veteran arm like Hill would also help.  Hill got a taste of the New York spotlight last season, when he posted an outstanding 2.05 ERA over 44 regular-season innings with the Yankees and then a 1.08 ERA in 8 1/3 playoffs innings.

A .238 BABIP certainly contributed to that success in the pinstripes, and for an extreme groundball pitcher like Hill, batted-ball luck has largely contributed to his ebbs and flows over his seven MLB seasons.  Hill has a 3.99 ERA across 322 1/3 career innings with the Royals, Padres, White Sox, and Yankees, with an excellent 61.8% grounder rate.  He was an average strikeout pitcher at best in the early part of his career, but Hill’s strikeout rate has dropped to just 11.8% over the last three seasons.  The decrease in strikeouts has also generally coincided with a dropoff in home runs, as keeping the ball in the park was also an issue for Hill earlier in his career.

Hill turns 35 in February, and given how two rough months with the White Sox preceded his strong showing in the Bronx, the left-hander will surely land just a one-year contract in free agency.  That might fit well with David Stearns’ usual approach to investing in relief pitching, as the Mets president of baseball operations has rarely spent much on bullpen arms, instead preferring to develop relievers from within or to find hidden gems on minor league deals.

Yankees Interested In Tim Hill

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Starters Max Fried and Carlos Rodon are the only left-handed pitchers on the Yankees’ 40-man roster, leaving the Bronx Bombers in clear need of some southpaw depth for the bullpen.  Jon Heyman of the New York Post reports that the team is considering a few left-handed relief options, including a possible reunion with Tim Hill.

After posting a 5.87 ERA in 23 innings with the White Sox, Hill was released by Chicago in June and quickly scooped up by the Yankees on a new contract.  The change of scenery worked wonders for Hill in terms of bottom-line results, as he posted a 2.05 ERA in 44 frames with New York during the regular season and then a tiny 1.08 ERA over 10 appearances and 8 1/3 innings in the playoffs.

Hill’s status as an extreme groundball pitcher can lead to such big swings in performance, as one often needs to look behind just the ERA to fully gauge the veteran lefty’s effectiveness.  Hill had an enormous .436 BABIP with the White Sox and then a .238 BABIP with the Yankees, perhaps explaining why the gap in SIERA (3.33 with New York, 4.04 with Chicago) isn’t quite as large as Hill’s ERAs would suggest.  The biggest change was improved control, as Hill had an 8.5% walk rate with the Sox and then only a 5.2% walk rate in the Bronx.

Now entering his age-35 season, Hill has a 3.99 ERA over 322 1/3 career innings across seven MLB seasons, with a 61.8% grounder rate helping overcome only a 17.3% career strikeout rate.  Those numbers naturally include a lot of success against left-handed batters, as Hill has held same-sided hitters to a .614 OPS (while right-handed hitters have a .788 OPS).  The home run ball has been an issue for Hill in the past, though he allowed just two homers over his 75 1/3 total frames in the regular season and postseason in 2024.

It was almost exactly a year ago that Hill signed a one-year, $1.8MM contract with the White Sox, on the heels of being non-tendered by the Padres.  His late-season success in the Yankees very likely means that Hill will land another guaranteed deal this winter, though his age and somewhat inconsistent track record will limit him to a one-year pact.  This limited price tag is surely a plus for a Yankees team already projected to be over the highest level of luxury tax penalization.  From Hill’s perspective, one would imagine he would also have interest in returning to the Yankees given his post-trade success, and getting another crack at winning a World Series ring.

Yankees Sign Tim Hill

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The Yankees announced that they have signed left-hander Tim Hill to a one-year deal. Fellow lefty Clayton Andrews has been designated for assignment in a corresponding 40-man move. Andrews was on optional assignment, so the club will still need to make a move to get Hill onto the active roster once he reports to the team. Jeff Passan of ESPN reported Hill’s impending signing on X prior to the official announcement. Hill was released by the White Sox earlier this week, meaning the Yanks will only have to pay him the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the roster.

Hill, 34, is a veteran ground ball pitcher who signed with the White Sox in the offseason. That one-year deal guaranteed him $1.8MM as the Sox were surely hoping to have him serve as a solid veteran presence in a relief corps that had been thinned out by trades.

But the topline results were poor, as Hill made 27 appearances for Chicago with a 5.87 earned run average. The Sox decided to move on, designating him for assignment last week. Since Hill had more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment while keeping his money, he was released and went to the open market.

Despite the poor ERA, there are reasons why the Yankees would still be intrigued. Hill has always been a ground ball guy, with a 60.5% rate of wormburners in his career. For context, the major league average is usually around 43% or so and is at 42.6% this season. Hill’s numbers in that department have actually been better than ever, as he has had 65.6% of balls in play go into the dirt while with the Sox.

But a lot of them were finding holes, as he has a massive .436 batting average on balls in play for the year. That’s well beyond his .310 career BABIP and this year’s .287 league average. That might have something to do with the poor defenders on the White Sox. That club has a collective -19 Outs Above Average on the year, which is better than just four other teams. Defensive Runs Saved is way more pessimistic, as the Sox are in dead last with a score of -49. The second-worst club by that metric is the Rays at -28.

Hill’s 11% strikeout rate is subpar but it’s understandable that the Yankees perhaps expect some better results going forward. If he can keep making opponents pound the ball into the ground but with some better defense and better luck, the ERA should come down. It’s for those reasons that his 3.45 FIP and 3.89 SIERA are far more attractive.

It’s a fairly low-risk gamble for the Yankees to take. Since the Sox released Hill, they remain on the hook for most of what’s left of his salary. The Yanks will pay him the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the roster, with that amount subtracted from what the Sox pay, and easily can move on at any point if it doesn’t work out.

As noted by Passan, the Yankees’ bullpen could use some help. They have had Scott Effross, Lou Trivino and Jonathan Loáisiga on the injured list for most or all of the season, while Nick Burdi and Ian Hamilton recently joined them. Last night, Gerrit Cole came off the injured list and tossed 62 pitches over four innings against the Orioles. The game eventually went to ten innings with the Yanks using six different relievers. They don’t have another off-day until Monday, so Hill will give the club a fresh arm for a fairly weary bullpen.

Andrews, 27, has only been a Yankee for a short time. He came up as a Brewers prospect but that club designated him for assignment in February. The Yankees acquired him in a small trade and then passed him through waivers in early April, though he was added back to the roster just over a month later.

In between those transactions, the lefty has made just one appearance at the big league level. Back on May 21, he was put into a game against the Mariners and then proceeded to allow a Luke Raley home run, hit Cal Raleigh with a pitch and strike out Mitch Haniger before being replaced.

He’s spent most of his time in Triple-A, tossing 24 2/3 innings with a 5.84 ERA. His 25.9% strikeout rate and 51.8% ground ball rate at that level are both strong but he’s also given out walks at an awful rate of 20.4%, as well as hitting two batters and throwing two wild pitches. That lack of control has been an issue for Andrews before and has likely contributed to bumping him off the Yankees’ roster.

They will now have a week to trade him or pass him through waivers. Despite the wildness, some other club might be enticed by the strikeouts and ground balls like the Yankees were, especially since Andrews can still be optioned for the rest of this year and one more season. If he were passed through waivers unclaimed, he would have the right to elect free agency by virtue of his previous outright.

White Sox Release Tim Hill

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The White Sox have released left-hander Tim Hill, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. They will remain on the hook for what’s left of his $1.8MM salary. Any other club could now sign him and would only have to pay the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the roster, with that amount subtracted from what the Sox pay.

Hill, 34, was signed in the offseason to a one-year deal. The White Sox kicked off a rebuild in 2023 and had traded away many established players, including relievers like Joe Kelly, Reynaldo López, Kendall Graveman and Keynan Middleton. When the offseason began, they continued the job by sending Aaron Bummer and Gregory Santos out of town.

The hope was that Hill could serve as a solid veteran presence in a relief corps with a lot of uncertainty and perhaps turn himself into a trade candidate prior to the deadline. Unfortunately, he allowed 5.87 earned runs per nine innings over his 27 appearances for the Sox and got designated for assignment last week. Since he has over five years of major league service time, he has the right to reject an outright assignment and elect free agency while keeping all of his salary intact. Those circumstances made it fairly inevitable that he would find himself back in free agency.

Now that he’s on the open market and can be signed for cheap, teams may be willing to overlook his ERA and find encouraging signs in his other numbers. He has always been a ground ball guy, with a 60.5% rate in that department for his career. He has actually been even better than ever at keeping the ball on the dirt this year with a 65.6% grounder rate, well beyond the 42.6% league average for 2024. His 11% strikeout rate is incredibly low, but he only punched out 12.6% in 2022, a season in which he managed to have a 3.56 ERA with the Padres.

Hill may not be as exciting as a fire-breathing closer but he’s a solid veteran with 347 major league appearances and a 4.30 ERA in those. The results this year haven’t been great so far but he had a .436 batting average on balls in play while pitching for the club with arguably the worst defense in the majors. The Sox have a collective -20 Outs Above Average this year, slightly ahead of the Pirates and Marlins, while their -52 is easily the worst in baseball with the Rays second-last at -31. His 3.46 FIP and 3.90 SIERA paint a much more flattering picture than his ERA.

Since Hill can be signed for cheap and so many clubs around the league are battling pitching injuries, perhaps one of them will take a chance on him finding better results in a different environment.

White Sox Designate Tim Hill For Assignment

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The White Sox announced today that outfielder Andrew Benintendi and right-hander Steven Wilson have been reinstated from the injured list. In corresponding moves, outfielder Duke Ellis was optioned to Triple-A Charlotte while left-hander Tim Hill was designated for assignment.

Hill, 34, signed with the White Sox in the offseason on a one-year deal with a guarantee of $1.8MM. The Sox were surely hoping that the experienced groundballer could provide a veteran presence to the club while also perhaps turning himself into a midseason trade chip.

Unfortunately, the results haven’t quite been there for Hill so far this year. He has made 27 appearances for the Sox but has an earned run average of 5.87. That’s obviously not a great number, but it’s possible that Hill has been more unlucky than bad.

His 11% strikeout rate is less than half the league average, but that’s not terribly unusual for him. He only struck out 12.6% of batters faced with the Padres in 2022, a season he finished with a 3.56 ERA. His 8.5% walk rate this year is right around league average while his 65.6% ground ball rate would actually be a career high, as his previous best was a clip of 61.8% in his rookie season.

The major difference in Hill this season seems to be a .436 batting average on balls in play. That’s well beyond the .286 league average and Hill’s career number of .310. ERA estimators like FIP and SIERA have Hill at 3.44 and 3.87 respectively, suggesting it’s possible he’s been closer to his previous form than it would appear at first glance, as he had a 3.72 ERA from 2020 to 2022. His exit velocity and hard hit numbers are roughly in line with previous seasons as well.

It’s possible the club’s poor defense isn’t doing him any favors, as the Sox have a collective -51 Defensive Runs Saved this year and -20 Outs Above Average. That DRS tally is the worst in the league while the OAA number in tied for last with the Marlins.

The Sox will now have one week to trade Hill or pass him through waivers. It’s possible that he could garner interest if some clubs are willing to overlook the earned runs this year and focus more on the underlying metrics. If he were to pass through waivers unclaimed, he has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment while retaining his salary.

White Sox Open To Offers On Luis Robert, Garrett Crochet

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The White Sox are baseball’s worst team by a long shot and seemed to acknowledge that likelihood even before the season began when they traded Dylan Cease to the Padres in spring training. San Diego is already reportedly interested in yet another Sox pitcher, lefty Garrett Crochet, and ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports that the Sox are open to offers not only on Crochet but on center fielder Luis Robert Jr. Passan categorizes the ChiSox as “open for business” and lists Robert, Crochet, Erick Fedde and virtually all of the team’s short-term veterans as players who could be moved between now and the trade deadline.

Fedde, Tommy Pham, Paul DeJong, Mike Clevinger, John Brebbia, Tim Hill and other players who aren’t signed long-term — Fedde is signed through next season, the others are all free agents this winter — all stood as obvious trade candidates to begin with. I wrote about Fedde’s trade candidacy for MLBTR Front Office subscribers a couple weeks back. DeJong recently said on 670 The Score in Chicago that he and Pham both fully expect to be traded. That anyone from that group is viewed as likely to change hands is only logical.

Names like Robert and Crochet being available is far less certain, even for a rebuilding club like the Sox, given the amount of club control each has remaining. In Robert’s case, he’s signed through the 2027 season in the form of a $12.5MM salary this season, a $15MM salary in 2025 and a pair of club options valued at $20MM apiece (both with a $2MM buyout). Crochet entered the 2024 campaign with three years of big league service, meaning he’s in his first arbitration season and has another pair of seasons of club control beyond 2024.

It bears emphasizing that the Sox being “open” to offers or “willing to trade” either player is far different from the team actively shopping said players. That open-minded approach is also far from a guarantee that either will be moved. The substantial control remaining beyond the current season means Chicago GM Chris Getz will set an enormous asking price on both players, and both will still retain tremendous trade value into the offseason and even into next year’s deadline if a deal doesn’t come together this summer.

Robert, still just 26 years old, returned from the injured list yesterday after an absence of nearly two months. He suffered a Grade 2 strain of his hip flexor early in the season and was sidelined for the bulk of April and the entirety of May. He wasted little time in reminding the type of impact he brings to a game, going 2-for-4 with a homer in his return effort. The Cuban-born five-tool standout has played in only eight games and taken just 33 plate appearances this season but carries a .250/.273/.594 batting line with three homers.

Last year saw Robert take his always tantalizing game to new heights. The dynamic center fielder stayed healthy for a career-high 145 games and posted a stout .264/.315/.542 batting line with a career-high 38 home runs, 36 doubles, a triple and 20 stolen bases (in 24 tries). Robert ranked in the 84th percentile of MLB players in terms of sprint speed, per Statcast, and was among the league leaders in barrel rate. He’s a premium outfield defender with plus range and an above-average arm — evidenced both by gaudy Statcast percentile rankings and by career marks of +13 Defensive Runs Saved and +24 Outs Above Average in 3116 innings of work.

Durability and an over-aggressive approach at the plate are the primary knocks on Robert, who is two months into his fifth MLB season and already has five career IL placements for injury (plus another shorter stay on the Covid-related injured list). Robert played in 56 of 60  games during his rookie showing in the Covid-shortened 2020 season, but he logged just 68 and 98 games in 2021 and 2022, respectively, and he could finish the 2024 season with fewer than 100 games played as well, thanks to one already lengthy absence. He’s now had significant strains of his left and right hip flexors, in addition to an MCL sprain and a wrist strain in his career.

In terms of Robert’s approach at the plate, the results are strong so it’s hard to be too critical. But Robert rarely walks (career 5.3%) and chases pitches off the plate more than nearly any player in the sport. Since his 2020 debut, only Salvador Perez, Harold Ramirez and Javier Baez swing at more balls out of the strike zone than Robert’s massive 46.3% (at least among qualified hitters). His 54.6% contact rate on such swings is well below average, and his career 83.2% contact rate on pitches in the strike zone is also a couple points south of par. It hasn’t led to an exorbitant strikeout rate just yet — Robert has fanned in 25.5% of his career plate appearances — but it’s a less-than-ideal trend that could worsen if Robert loses what Statcast currently measures as elite bat speed (seventh fastest in the majors, on average).

There’s little precedent for a player of this quality with this level of affordability and team control being traded. Robert is owed just under $8MM through season’s end as of this writing plus another $45MM over the next three seasons. Three-and-a-half years of an MVP-caliber talent at a maximum rate of $63MM is a raucous bargain by today’s contractual standards. Teams may be wary of Robert’s injury history and free-swinging ways, but he’s signed for the remainder of his 20s and would be a legitimately franchise-altering deadline acquisition if a team can put together an impressive enough trade offer. Robert might not quite command the type of haul the Padres sent to the Nats for Juan Soto a couple years back, but he’s closer to that level of value than the standard deadline trade candidates. Getz alluded to as much in the offseason, calling Robert “one of the best players in baseball” and noting that he was a “difficult player to trade.”

There are similarities, in terms of trade value, when it comes to Crochet. It’s rare to see a high-end pitcher with two and a half seasons of club control traded at the deadline. Crochet is extra appealing given that his injuries and former role in the bullpen have tamped down his first-year arbitration price. He’s being paid only $800K this season. He’ll be due a pair of notable raises in each of the next two offseasons but still isn’t likely to command even $15MM in salary over those two years.

The 24-year-old Crochet’s transition from reliever to starter hit a brief snag with a trio of rough outings in mid-April, but he’s on an absolute tear right now and looks the part of a frontline starter, as one might expect for a former first-round talent who has long been touted to have ace upside. In 13 starts, Crochet is sitting on a 3.49 earned run average with vastly better fielding-independent marks (2.87 FIP, 2.48 SIERA). That’s due largely to his elite strikeout and walk numbers; Crochet has punched out 33.7% of his opponents against just a 5.4% walk rate — all while keeping the ball on the ground at an above-average 45.9% clip and averaging a blazing 96.9 mph on his heater.

Since that set of consecutive rough outings in April, Crochet has been on another planet. Arguably baseball’s best pitcher in that time, he’s logged a 1.35 ERA with a 53-to-7 K/BB ratio over his past 40 innings. Crochet allowed five, seven and five earned runs in his run of three straight rocky April outings. He’s yielded two or fewer runs in each of his ten other starts this season.

Rival clubs might be wary of how well he’ll hold up over the course of a full season in the rotation. It’s a fair qualm, as Crochet pitched just 25 innings last season and didn’t pitch at all in 2022 while recovering from Tommy John surgery. This year’s 69 2/3 innings are already a new career-high for the lefty, who entered 2024 with only 85 1/3 professional innings total (majors and minors combined). That said, even if there are concerns about Crochet fading down the stretch, there’s considerable long-term upside, as one would imagine the effects of a full starter’s workload will be more normalized for him in 2025 and 2026. If he wears down later this year, he’s also quite familiar with pitching in short relief.

Any trepidation about how he’ll hold up this year hasn’t stopped the Padres from reaching out to the White Sox. They’ve reportedly inquired on the lefty and have strong interest in him, which makes sense given not only Crochet’s dominance and San Diego’s need for arms, but also his minimal salary and the Friars’ relative proximity to the luxury tax barrier. Adding one of the game’s most dominant pitchers while barely even advancing your luxury tax line ought to hold overwhelming appeal for the majority of the team’s highest-spending clubs. At the same time, Crochet’s minimal salary also makes him appealing to small-market clubs with payroll concerns. Short of the innings worries, he’s an ideal trade target.

Because of that, the asking price on Crochet figures to be extreme, just as it will be with Robert. If Getz and his team genuinely make both available and play some bidders against one another, the Sox could genuinely overhaul the entire farm system with this pair of trades — to say nothing of deals involving Fedde, Pham and the other previously mentioned veterans. It’s going to take an enormous package of prospects to pry either player from the Sox, but with widespread mediocrity permeating the National League and leaving few teams in position to truly wave the white flag on the 2024 season, it could be a seller’s market. There’s no salvaging this lost season for the South Siders, but getting one or both of these trades right could wildly accelerate their rebuilding efforts.

White Sox Sign Tim Hill To One-Year Deal

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The White Sox announced Thursday afternoon that the club has signed lefty reliever Tim Hill to a one-year, $1.8MM contract, as first reported by Jeff Passan of ESPN (X link). A client of Paragon Sports International, Hill became a free agent when he was non-tendered by the Padres.

That ended a four-year run in San Diego. The Padres had acquired the sidewinder from the Royals just before the 2020 season, sending outfielder Franchy Cordero to Kansas City. As one would expect for a lefty pitching from a low arm angle, he worked largely as a situational bullpen option. The Padres leveraged him heavily against same-handed hitters, against whom he runs huge ground-ball tallies.

Hill posted decent results from 2020-22, combining for a 3.72 ERA over 125 2/3 innings. Things went off the rails last season. He was tagged for a personal-high 5.48 earned runs per nine over 48 appearances. That’s in part a reflection of a career-high .349 average on balls in play, but Hill’s strikeout rate has plummeted over the past two seasons.

After punching out nearly a quarter of opponents early in his career, he has fanned just under 13% of batters faced in each of the last two years. That combined with a spike in hard contact last season for the worst results of his career. San Diego let him go in lieu of a $2.4MM salary projection for his final year of arbitration.

It didn’t turn out too much worse for Hill in the end, as his salary with the White Sox is only $600K below the arbitration forecast. With over five years of major league service, the 33-year-old (34 in February) can no longer be sent to the minors. He’ll open the year in Pedro Grifol’s bullpen.

Hill offers a different look from hard-throwing Garrett Crochet, who projects as Chicago’s top southpaw. Despite fastball velocity that sits around 90 MPH, Hill has kept left-handed batters to a modest .228/.313/.328 slash over the past four seasons. Lefty batters have put the ball on the ground on nearly 65% of their batted balls over that stretch. Righties have predictably given him far more trouble, running a .298/.361/.475 batting line during Hill’s time in San Diego.

Chicago already has a full 40-man roster. Once they finalize their contract with Hill and a $4MM deal for catcher Martín Maldonado, they’ll need to create a pair of vacancies. The low-cost signings bring their 2024 payroll projection to roughly $149MM, as calculated by Roster Resource.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Five Non-Tendered Relievers To Keep An Eye On This Offseason

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Every year, MLB’s non-tender deadline sees club’s allow players under team control to head for the open market early, whether it be due to an increasing price tag in arbitration or a need for additional space on the club’s 40-man roster. While being cast aside in this manner is often a bad omen for a player’s prospect, the likes of right-hander Kevin Gausman and center fielder Cody Bellinger have gone on to find considerable success after being non-tendered.

Relief arms are among the players most commonly cut loose at the non-tender deadline. Though it’s elite players on the level of Bellinger and Gausman aren’t found among the relievers non-tendered each year, teams find quality bullpen pieces among the pile of discarded players fairly frequently. Rays right-hander Jason Adam, Orioles lefty Danny Coulombe and Phillies righty Jeff Hoffman are among the pieces non-tendered in recent years who went on to have strong seasons out of the bullpen.

Now that we’ve discussed five hitters and starters to keep an eye on this coming winter, let’s turn our attention to bullpen arms. Though this offseason’s crop of free agent relievers has plenty of interesting options, headlined by relief ace Josh Hader, all 30 clubs are constantly on the lookout for additional bullpen help, more so than they are for any other position. Without further ado, let’s take a look at five relievers who hit free agency following last week’s non-tender deadline and could be worth keeping an eye on throughout the offseason. Players are listed in alphabetical order, with their age for the 2024 season in parentheses.

Adam Cimber (33)

A ninth-round pick by the Padres in the 2013 draft, Cimber made his big league debut with San Diego during the 2018 season but was almost immediately shipped to Cleveland alongside Brad Hand in a deadline deal that sent catching prospect Francisco Mejia to the Padres. Cimber remained in Cleveland through the end of the 2020 season, acting as an adequate middle reliever with a combined 4.30 ERA (108 ERA+) and 4.70 FIP across 110 appearances. The sidearming righty had a breakout season in 2021, with a 2.26 ERA and 3.07 FIP in 71 2/3 innings of work between the Marlins and Blue Jays.

His excellence continued for Toronto last year, as he posted a 2.80 ERA with a 3.47 FIP while appearing in 77 contests, the most in the big leagues that season. Unfortunately, things came off the rails for Cimber in 2023 as he was sidelined for much of the year by multiple shoulder injuries. That being said, it’s easy to see how Cimber could positively impact a club’s bullpen in 2024 if healthy, given the late-inning potential he flashed in recent years.

Trevor Gott (31)

Gott was drafted by the Padres in the same year as Cimber, with San Diego selecting the righty in the sixth round of the 2013 draft. He didn’t stick in the Padres organization long, however, as he was quickly shipped to Anaheim before making his big league debut with the Angels in 2015. Though he posted a strong 2.85 ERA and 3.68 FIP across his first 57 big league appearances with the Halos and Nationals, the 2017-20 seasons saw Gott struggle with injuries and under-performance as he posted a ghastly 6.36 ERA and 5.18 FIP in 89 big league appearances. Those struggles saw Gott spend the entire 2021 campaign in the minor leagues.

Since then, however, Gott has fashioned himself into a solid middle relief option with peripherals that could hint at something more. Gott has been roughly league average by the results the past two seasons, with a 4.17 ERA across 103 2/3 innings of work split between Milwaukee, Seattle, and Queens. During that time, Gott has posted 23.7% strikeout rate against a 6.9% walk rate, both better-than league average marks. If Gott can replicate his 2023 campaign while getting his sky-high .343 BABIP under control in 2024, he could prove to be a valuable relief arm for a contending club.

Tim Hill (34)

The oldest entrant on this list, Hill was a 32nd-round pick by the Royals in the 2014 draft and made his debut with the club in 2018 at the age of 28. Hill was a steady if uninspiring left-handed relief option for Kansas City and San Diego from 2018-22, with a 3.88 ERA and 3.98 FIP that both clocked in slightly better than league average in that time. Unfortunately, his 2023 campaign saw him post a brutal 5.48 ERA and matching 5.49 FIP in 44 1/3 innings of work.

While Hill posted a well-below league average 12.9% strikeout rate and allowed a massive 1.033 OPS to right-handers this year, his fantastic 61.2% groundball rate in 2023 and strong .223/.302/.304 slash line allowed against lefties for his career suggest he could be a solid option against left-handers out of the bullpen next year for a club lacking depth in that area.

Brandon Hughes (28)

A 16th-round pick by the Cubs in the 2017 draft, Hughes began his professional career as an outfielder before converting to left-handed relief prior to the 2019 season. He posted solid numbers in the lower levels of the minors in that first season as a bullpen arm before breaking out in a big way during the 2021 campaign, with a 1.71 ERA in 42 innings between High-A and Double-A. After 16 2/3 scoreless innings of work at the Double- and Triple-A levels in 2022, Hughes got the call to the majors and fashioned a strong rookie campaign, with a 3.12 ERA and 4.64 FIP in 57 2/3 innings of work for Chicago while picking up eight saves.

Hughes appeared poised to be a key piece of the Cubs’ bullpen in 2023 after his strong 2022 debut. While he managed a strong 27% strikeout rate, he struggled badly with his control (12.7% walk rate) and surrendered 11 runs in 17 appearances before seeing his 2023 cut short by knee surgery. That said, he’s expected to be ready for Spring Training in 2024, and could be an interesting left-handed relief option for clubs thanks to his youth and recent late-inning success.

Penn Murfee (30)

Murfee stands out somewhat from the rest of the options on this list thanks to his consistently excellent results at the big league level. Initially drafted by the Mariners in the 33rd round of the 2018 draft, Murfee debuted in the big leagues during the 2022 season and fashioned an excellent rookie campaign with a 2.99 ERA, 3.10 FIP, and 27.9% strikeout rate across 69 1/3 innings of work. He followed that up with even better results in 2023, as the right-hander posted a sterling 1.26 ERA across his first sixteen appearances this year. Unfortunately, those would prove to be his only appearances in 2023 as he underwent UCL surgery in late June.

Murfee was cut loose by the Mariners but found himself claimed by both the Mets and Braves before being non-tendered by Atlanta at the deadline earlier this month. Though Murfee figures to miss most, if not all, of the 2024 campaign, the right-hander is under team control through at least the 2028 season. That long-term team control could make the late-blooming righty an interesting pickup for a team willing to take a chance on him as he continues his rehab process.

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