Padres Place Eric Hosmer On 10-Day Injured List
4:52pm: Hosmer’s now on the 10-day injured list, San Diego announced. The team recalled outfielder Abraham Almonte to fill Hosmer’s roster spot.
3:14pm: Padres first baseman Eric Hosmer suffered a fractured left index finger on a bunt attempt against the Rockies on Monday, disrupting what has been his best season in San Diego. Fortunately for him and the Padres, though, there’s hope Hosmer will be able to return by the last week of the regular season, Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune reports.
When the Padres signed Hosmer to an eight-year, $144MM contract entering 2018, their hope was that the former Royal would be a consistently valuable contributor on a perennial playoff team. Both Hosmer and the Padres fell flat in the first two years of the contract, but their fortunes have turned around this season. With the 30-year-old Hosmer riding a newfound fly ball-oriented approach to a line of .288/.344/.542 (good for a career-high 137 wRC+) with eight home runs in 128 plate appearances, the Padres are 26-17 and in possession of the National League’s No. 1 wild-card spot.
While losing this version of Hosmer is less than ideal for the Padres, they did make contingency plans at first base before the Aug. 31 trade deadline, acquiring Mitch Moreland from the Red Sox. Moreland looks as if he’ll see the bulk of the work at the position until Hosmer’s back. Although Moreland has also seen time as a DH since joining the Padres, it appears they’ll have to shuffle multiple players into that spot for at least the next couple weeks.
Injury Notes: J. Ramirez, Hosmer, Stanton, A. Dickerson
Indians third baseman Jose Ramirez exited their win over the Royals on Monday with left thumb discomfort, Mandy Bell of MLB.com relays. The Indians replaced Ramirez, who Bell notes has been dealing with the issue for weeks, with Mike Freeman. Whether Ramirez will miss any more time remains to be seen, but the Indians can only hope he won’t, as he has played an important role in their 26-15 start. The 27-year-old Ramirez has followed up a so-so 2019 (by his standards) with a .248/.350/.478 start and nine home runs in 183 plate appearances this season.
- Padres first baseman Eric Hosmer departed their game Monday against the Rockies with a left finger injury, AJ Cassavell of MLB.com tweets. San Diego plugged in the just-acquired Mitch Moreland in place of Hosmer, who’s in the third season of an eight-year, $144MM contract and has easily enjoyed his best campaign as a Padre. Thanks in part to an increase in fly balls, Hosmer has slashed .291/.346/.547 (a career-high 138 wRC+) with eight home runs in 127 plate appearances. Hosmer’s rebound from a couple of mediocre seasons has contributed to the Padres’ 25-17 start.
- Yankees designated hitter Giancarlo Stanton “ran bases, hit off a machine and threw today,” Bryan Hoch of MLB.com tweets, but it remains unclear when or if he’ll return in 2020. Even if Stanton does play again this year, it will go in the books as the second straight injury-ruined season for the ex-NL MVP, as he missed almost all of 2019 with health issues and has been on the IL since Aug. 9 with a left hamstring strain. The Stanton-less Yankees have struggled over the past few weeks and are now fighting for their playoff lives.
- Giants outfielder Alex Dickerson had to leave their game against the Diamondbacks on Monday after fouling a ball off his right leg (video via Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area). The Giants called on Darin Ruf to take over for Dickerson. There’s no word on Dickerson’s status, but he’s someone the Giants can ill afford to go without for an extended stretch. They’re surprisingly in playoff contention, and Dickerson has followed up last season’s solid showing with a .264/.342/.528 line and seven home runs this year, making him one of the Giants’ most valuable players [UPDATE: Dickerson’s X-Rays came back negative. He has a knee contusion, Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic relays].
Padres Recall Jorge Ona
The Padres announced that they’ve called up outfield prospect Jorge Ona. They optioned righty Luis Patino to their alternate training site in a corresponding move. Ona will debut as the Padres’ designated hitter against Colorado on Monday, per AJ Cassavell of MLB.com.
As Cassavell notes, the hope is that Ona will give the Padres more power from the right side of the plate. They were counting on high-end prospect Luis Campusano, whom they promoted Friday, to provide that. However, Campusano went on the injured list on Sunday after three at-bats (and a home run) because of a left wrist sprain.
Unlike Campusano, Ona is not a top 100 caliber prospect, though the Cuba native did join the club for a pricey $7MM bonus in 2016. Ona was obviously regarded as an international gem at the time, but he hasn’t quite lived up to the hype yet. Still, four years after signing, he remains a promising part of the Padres’ loaded farm system, ranking as one of their top 30 prospects at MLB.com (No. 24), FanGraphs (30) and Baseball America (30). The 23-year-old was dominant last season in Double-A, where he slashed .348/.417/.539 in 102 plate appearances, but Ona saw his campaign come to an end in July when he underwent right shoulder surgery.
Padres Place Luis Campusano On IL
The Padres have placed rookie catcher Luis Campusano on the 10-day injured list with a left wrist sprain, reports AJ Cassavell of MLB.com. After homering in his Major League debut, Campusano was scratched from Saturday’s game—which would have been his first MLB start at catcher. San Diego has promoted RHP Taylor Williams, taking Campusano’s spot on the active roster.
As of now, there’s no word on the expected timeline for the return of the 21-year-old Campusano, who made his first Major League appearance just two days ago. A former second-round draft choice, Campusano is viewed as a consensus top-100 prospect in baseball—one who could have improved the Padres’ lackluster catching situation.
Of course, after a series of deadline deals that overhauled the catcher position in San Diego, it wasn’t clear how many opportunities Campusano would get behind the plate in the first place. With new additions Austin Nola and Jason Castro in place, the rookie would have plenty of competition for at-bats, both at catcher and at DH (with newly acquired Mitch Moreland on board as well).
Nonetheless, it’s disappointing that we’ll have to wait for a longer look at yet another promising youngster ascending the ranks of the San Diego organization. He gave fans plenty to dream on with a homer in his first Major League game, but we’ll have to table those expectations for the time being.
Meanwhile, Taylor Williams is set to make his Padres debut after spending the first half of the season with the Mariners. He was acquired by the Padres in one of this year’s low-profile trade deadline deals. He’s by no means a world-beating reliever, but he offers some upside as a depth contributor, and it was no secret the Padres sought exactly that as they hunt for the postseason. Despite a 5.93 ERA in 13 2/3 innings with Seattle, Williams has a solid 19:7 K:BB ratio, which points to a more promising 3.51 FIP.
Padres Promote Luis Campusano
The Padres announced that they have promoted young catcher Luis Campusano to the majors. He’ll serve as their designated hitter against the Athletics on Friday, Dennis Lin of The Athletic tweets. In other moves, San Diego transferred left-hander Jose Castillo to the 45-day injured list and placed righty Luis Perdomo on the 10-day IL with forearm discomfort.
The 21-year-old Campusano is one of many standout youngsters in the San Diego organization. Thanks in part to a consistently elite farm system, the Padres have finally begun to realize their vast potential this season. The club has stormed to a 23-16 record, good for the No. 1 wild-card spot in the National League, as it seeks to break a 13-year playoff drought.
While the Padres have been a pleasant surprise as a whole, they’ve received little production from their catchers, who rank toward the bottom of the majors in offense. As a result, general manager A.J. Preller has made a few notable changes to the position in recent days. Leading up to Monday’s trade deadline, the Padres shipped out the light-hitting Austin Hedges and acquired both Jason Castro and Austin Nola. So, it’s unclear how much time Campusano will receive behind the plate in 2020 (or at DH, for that matter, as the Padres also landed Mitch Moreland during an aggressive deadline), though the right-handed swinger at least looks capable of serving as a long-term weapon for the team.
A second-round pick of the Padres in 2017, Campusano reached High-A for the first time a season ago and slashed .325/.396/.509 with 15 home runs and nearly as many walks (52) as strikeouts (57). Since then, the likes of ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel (No. 33), FanGraphs (40), Keith Law of The Athletic (42), MLB.com (52) and Baseball America (85) have all ranked Campusano among the game’s 100 best prospects. McDaniel, the most bullish of the bunch, wrote that Campusano “has a plus arm” behind the plate and “plus contact skills” as a hitter, though he could trade some contact for more power as he progresses.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Player Pool Additions: Phillies, Brewers, Padres, Orioles
We’ll track the latest additions to teams’ 60-man player pools in this post…
- The Phillies added lefty Jeff Singer to their pool, Matt Breen of the Philadelphia Inquirer reports (via Twitter). The 26-year-old signed with the Phils as an undrafted free agent in 2016 and has steadily risen through their system, reaching the Double-A level in 2019. Last year, Singer tossed 61 2/3 frames with a 74-to-22 K/BB ratio, a 2.34 ERA and a 2.77 FIP. Singer isn’t considered to be among the club’s top-ranked prospects but will get some developmental reps in Allentown and could conceivably even be an option later this month, given his success in the upper minors.
- The Brewers announced three new additions to their player pool: infielder Gabe Holt, outfielder Carlos Rodriguez and righty Bowden Francis. Their 60-man group is up to 59 players. Holt, 22, was a seventh-round pick out of Texas Tech in 2019 and hasn’t played above Rookie ball, so his addition is purely developmental. That’s also true of Rodriguez, a 2017 international signee out of Venezuela who is considered among to be the organization’s top 20 prospects. Francis, meanwhile, was a 2017 seventh-rounder and split the 2019 season between Class-A Advanced and Double-A. In a combined 142 2/3 innings, Francis pitched to a 3.97 ERA with 10.4 K/9 and 3.5 BB/9. Francis seems like a viable candidate to debut over the final three-plus weeks of the 2020 season, as he’ll need to be added to the 40-man roster to be protected from the Rule 5 Draft this winter anyhow.
- Righty Justin Lange and catcher Blake Hunt have been added to the Padres‘ player pool, tweets Jeff Sanders of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Sanders adds that outfielder Jorge Ona was also quietly added to the pool “some time” ago. The 18-year-old Lange was taken with the No. 34 overall pick in this year’s draft, but as a high school draftee, he obviously won’t be considered for an MLB look this month. Hunt, 21, was the Padres’ second-rounder in ’17 and hit .255/.331/.381 in 376 Class-A plate appearances last year. The 23-year-old Ona was a high-profile signing out of Cuba. He was sidelined for much of the 2019 season but put together a huge .348/.417/.539 slash through 103 plate appearances in a pitcher-friendly Double-A environment last year. He’s already on the 40-man roster after having his contract selected last November.
- The Orioles announced that lefty Zac Lowther has been added to their player pool in Bowie. Lowther, 24, was the Orioles’ second-rounder in 2017 and posted a 2.55 ERA with 9.4 K/9, 3.8 BB/9, 0.49 HR/9 and a 40.1 percent ground-ball rate in 148 innings. He’s generally considered to be among the Orioles’ 15 best prospects.
Additional Context On Padres’ Flurry Of Trades
The Padres were the most active buyer at the 2020 trade deadline — arguably of any trade deadline in recent history — reshaping their roster with additions of Mike Clevinger, Austin Nola, Trevor Rosenthal, Mitch Moreland and Jason Castro, among others. The dizzying sequence of additions hearkened back to the days when Matt Kemp labeled A.J. Preller a “rock star” GM during Preller’s frenetic first offseason on the job, but the biggest trades swung by the Padres over the weekend didn’t necessarily come together in straightforward fashion.
Preller, in fact, was informed Sunday evening that his Padres were “out” of the Clevinger bidding, USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reports (via Twitter). The Indians told the Padres that they were sitting on a better offer and likely to proceed in another direction. That call prompted the club to reconvene and alter its package, ultimately adding infield prospect Owen Miller and catcher Austin Hedges early Monday morning. Those pieces put San Diego’s offer over the top, it seems, as word of Clevinger’s trade to the Friars was out several hours before the 4pm ET deadline.
Hedges and Miller, the final two pieces of the Padres’ six-player package, added quite a bit more near-term value to the arrangement. Hedges is considered one of the best defensive catchers (if not the best) in the game and is controlled through the 2022 season. The 23-year-old Miller has yet to make his big league debut, but he slashed .290/.355/.430 in a full season at the Double-A level last year while playing three infield positions. He’s in Cleveland’s player pool now and could conceivably be an option this month. If not, he’ll certainly be in consideration for a call to the big leagues come 2021. With Cesar Hernandez playing on a one-year deal, it’s possible that Miller could be in the mix for regular playing time next season.
But the Clevinger blockbuster wasn’t the only Friars swap that required some persistent iterations. Mariners GM Jerry Dipoto told reporters after trading Nola, Austin Adams and Dan Altavilla to the Padres that he didn’t expect to trade Nola this summer (as opposed to Taijuan Walker, whom the M’s fully anticipated moving).
“They had called repeatedly on Austin Nola and we had repeatedly rebuffed that interest until the return just became too big for us to pass up in our minds,” Dipoto said Monday (link via MLB.com’s Greg Johns).
The key element of the trade for the Mariners was getting both infielder Ty France and outfield prospect Taylor Trammell in the deal. Dipoto didn’t hide his affinity for either player, revealing that he’s contacted the Padres on France repeatedly over the past couple seasons and been similarly drawn to Trammell dating all the way back to the 2016 draft. “As many phone calls as A.J. made to me this last week about Austin Nola, I have made as many to him over the last couple of years regarding Ty France,” said Dipoto.
With Nola and Castro now on hand, the Padres have completely remade their catching tandem midseason, but changes could yet be coming. The Athletic’s Dennis Lin reports (subscription required) that the club is contemplating a September promotion for 21-year-old Luis Campusano — a top-ranked catching prospect who was an in-demand piece himself at this year’s deadline. Per Lin, both the Indians and Rangers asked the Padres about Campusano in trade negotiations, but the Friars clearly weren’t inclined to include him in a deal. Cleveland initially sought Campusano and Luis Patino as centerpieces in the Clevinger deal, while the Rangers were interested in that pair as well as shortstop CJ Abrams when discussing Lance Lynn and Joey Gallo with the Padres.
The 21-year-old Campusano has yet to play above Class-A Advanced, but he tore through the pitcher-friendly California League last year, slashing .325/.396/.509 (148 wRC+). If the Padres do bring him up, they could rotate him, Nola and Castro through the catcher slot while maximizing Nola’s versatility with reps at any of first base, second base, third base or the outfield corners.
Suffice it to say, we could’ve seen any number of permutations of the Padres’ deluge of deals this past week. Such is the nature of a win-now team with a deep farm system. The club’s minor league system undoubtedly took a hit with this wave of trades, but San Diego also managed to hang onto the majority of its top-ranked prospects while clearly placing themselves in a better competitive position both now and into at least the 2022 season, after which Clevinger is scheduled to become a free agent.
Padres Place Wil Myers, Emilio Pagan On Injured List
The Padres have announced a series of roster moves, including IL placements for outfielder Wil Myers and reliever Emilio Pagan. They also optioned David Bednar and Taylor Williams to their alternate site, and added new acquisitions Mike Clevinger, Greg Allen and Dan Altavilla to their 28-man roster.
The Padres didn’t provide a reason for placing Myers on the IL. Regardless, the 22-15 club can only hope he’ll return as quickly as possible. Myers performed poorly for the Padres over the previous three seasons, but he has rebounded this year to become an integral part of the franchise’s resurgence. The 29-year-old has slashed a marvelous .293/.365/.602 with nine home runs and 1.4 fWAR in 137 plate appearances, making him one of the NL’s best players in 2020. Myers has also played almost every one of the Padres’ games in right field. The only other players who have seen action there, Edward Olivares and Josh Naylor, departed during the team’s pre-deadline flurry of trades. The Padres are now left with Allen, Jurickson Profar, Jorge Mateo and Abraham Almonte as the healthy outfield options in their 60-man player pool alongside budding star center fielder Trent Grisham.
Pagan, meanwhile, is dealing with right biceps inflammation. There’s no word on how much time he’ll miss, but the issue continues what has been a rough season for a reliever who was a lights-out option for Rays last season. In his first season with the Padres, who swung a trade for him last winter, Pagan has managed a 5.40 ERA/5.81 FIP with 7.8 K/9 and 5.4 BB/9 in 15 innings. Owing in part to the Pagan acquisition, the team had designs on a dominant bullpen in 2020, but the unit has put up a disappointing 5.01 ERA thus far. The Padres did acquire Altavilla and Trevor Rosenthal before the deadline, though, and they reinstated Drew Pomeranz from the IL shortly before then. The hope is their relief corps will turn things around down the stretch, though they’ll have to do it without Pagan for the time being.
Indians Notes: Marte, White Sox, Clevinger, Padres
Before the Diamondbacks traded Starling Marte to the Marlins yesterday, “the Indians made a run at” acquiring the outfielder, The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reports (subscription required). Marte would’ve been a enormous boost to Cleveland’s long-struggling outfield, and it is interesting to wonder what it would have cost the Tribe to land Marte. Looking at what the D’Backs accepted from Miami, the Indians would have had to surrender a pitcher with some proven MLB-level ability (like Caleb Smith), another big-league ready young arm (like Humberto Mejia), and a lottery ticket of a long-term pitching prospect like Julio Frias.
Beyond the prospect cost, it’s fair to assume that Marte’s financial cost was also a factor for Cleveland — Marte has $1.71MM remaining this year, and a $12.5MM club option for the 2021 season. Giving up a big prospect package and then declining Marte’s option wouldn’t have made much sense, and it isn’t yet clear what kind of payroll capacity the Tribe will have going into next season.
Some more Tribe notes…
- Also from Rosenthal, he shares some details on the talks between Indians and White Sox about a possible Mike Clevinger trade. The idea of a Clevinger trade to an AL Central rival seemed surprising at the time, and one Chicago official feels “the Indians used the Sox as a stalking horse, never intending to trade him within the division.” The White Sox also denied that right-hander Michael Kopech was offered to Tribe as part of the Clevinger negotiations.
- Clevinger wound up being traded to the Padres as part of a major deadline-day swap that saw the Indians acquire six players. It was a trade born from a lot of “familiarity” between the two organizations, as president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti told MLB.com’s Mandy Bell and other reporters. “We’ve spent a lot of time on their system….We have asked about all of these players in the past. Every one of them,” Antonetti said. “I would comfortably say, at this point, we’ve had hundreds of iterations of deals with the Padres.” Cleveland and San Diego have combined for five trades since July 2018.
- In other Clevinger news, Terry Pluto of the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports that the right-hander turned down an extension offer from the Indians in the spring of 2019. Terms and contract length weren’t revealed, though the deal would have almost assuredly gone beyond the four years of control the Tribe already held over Clevinger. The righty was coming off an impressive 2018 season and heading into his age-28 campaign, so purely speculatively, I wonder if the Tribe’s offer was at least somewhat similar to the five-year, $38.5MM extension (with two club option years) reached with Corey Kluber prior to the 2015 season. Kluber had a similar amount of service time and was coming off a better platform of a Cy Young Award-winning season, though he was also a year older than Clevinger would have been at the time of his hypothetical early-2019 extension.
NL West Trade Deadline Recap
With the deadline in the rearview mirror, we’ll look back at each NL West team’s trade activity over the past month.
Arizona Diamondbacks
- Acquired cash considerations from Twins for INF Ildemaro Vargas
- Acquired LHP Travis Bergen from Blue Jays for LHP Robbie Ray
- Acquired a player to be named later from Cubs for LHP Andrew Chafin
- Acquired LHP Caleb Smith, RHP Humberto Mejia and a player to be named later (reportedly LHP Julio Frias) from Marlins for OF Starling Marté
- Acquired INF Josh VanMeter and OF Stuart Fairchild from Reds for RHP Archie Bradley
Colorado Rockies
- Acquired RHP Chad Smith from Marlins for RHP Jesús Tinoco
- Acquired RHP Mychal Givens from Orioles for IF Tyler Nevin, IF Terrin Vavra and a player to be named later
- Acquired OF Kevin Pillar from Red Sox for a player to be named later and international bonus pool space
Los Angeles Dodgers
- Acquired two players to be named later from Blue Jays for RHP Ross Stripling
San Diego Padres
- Acquired 1B Yonder Alonso from Braves for cash considerations
- Acquired cash considerations from Mariners for RHP Jimmy Yacabonis
- Acquired RHP Trevor Rosenthal from Royals for OF Edward Olivares and a player to be named later
- Acquired 1B Mitch Moreland from Red Sox for IF Hudson Potts and OF Jeisson Rosario
- Acquired C Jason Castro from Angels for RHP Gerardo Reyes
- Acquired C Austin Nola, RHP Austin Adams and RHP Dan Altavilla from Mariners for OF Taylor Trammell, INF Ty France, C Luis Torrens and RHP Andres Muñoz
- Acquired RHP Mike Clevinger and OF Greg Allen from Indians for OF Josh Naylor, RHP Cal Quantrill, C Austin Hedges, INF Gabriel Arias, LHP Joey Cantillo, and INF Owen Miller
- Acquired RHP Taylor Williams from Mariners for a player to be named later (reportedly RHP Matt Brash)
San Francisco Giants
- Acquired RHP Jordan Humphreys from Mets for OF Billy Hamilton
- Acquired OF Luis Basabe from White Sox for cash considerations
- Acquired INF Daniel Robertson from Rays for cash considerations
- Acquired cash considerations from Yankees for C Rob Brantly
- Acquired LHP Anthony Banda from Rays for cash considerations