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21 Players Elect Free Agency

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With the offseason quickly approaching, a number of players elect minor league free agency on a regular basis. Separate from MLB free agents, who reach free agency five days after the World Series by accumulating six years of service time in the big leagues, eligible minor league players can begin electing free agency as soon as the regular season comes to a close. Each of these players were outrighted off of their organization’s 40-man roster at some point during the season and either have been outrighted previously in their career or have the service time necessary to reach free agency since they were not added back to their former club’s rosters. For these players, reaching free agency is the expected outcome, and there will surely be more in the coming weeks. Here at MLBTR, we’ll provide occasional updates as players continue to elect minor league free agency.

Here is the next batch, courtesy of the transaction tracker at MiLB.com:

Catchers

Infielders

Outfielders

Pitchers

Marlins Outright Sean Nolin

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Left-hander Sean Nolin has been outrighted by the Marlins to Triple-A Jacksonville, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. That indicates he cleared waivers after being designated for assignment last week. Since he has been previously outrighted in his career, he has the right to reject this assignment and elect free agency, though it’s not yet clear if he’s decided to do so.

Nolin, 33, has racked up a lot of miles in his career. Originally a draft pick of the Blue Jays, he briefly made it to the big leagues with them in 2013 and 2014, getting one appearance in each of those seasons. He then went to the Athletics in the Josh Donaldson trade but posted a 5.28 ERA in six starts in 2015 before getting designated for assignment prior to the following season.

He then missed the next five major league campaigns, bouncing around the minors and non-affiliated leagues, going to the Brewers, Rockies, White Sox, the Long Island Ducks of the Atlantic League, the Mariners and the Seibu Lions of Nippon Professional Baseball. He returned to the bigs in 2021, tossing 26 2/3 innings for the Nats in that season with a 4.39 ERA. He went to the Kia Tigers of the KBO League last year before returning to North America this offseason.

The southpaw signed a minor league deal with the Twins in February but was flipped to the Marlins a week ago, just before he was selected to the big league club. The Fish put him into Monday’s game when they were down 5-0, leaving him out for three innings of mop-up duty wherein he allowed six runs, designating him for assignment the day after he was selected. Nolin could decide to accept the assignment and join the Jumbo Shrimp but he could also opt for the open market to see if there are any opportunities out there for him.

Marlins Designate Sean Nolin For Assignment

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The Marlins have designated left-hander Sean Nolin for assignment, reports Jordan McPherson of the Miami Herald. He will be the corresponding move for the selection of righty Bryan Hoeing, a move that was reported on yesterday.

It’s a quick turnaround for Nolin, 33, who was just added to the club’s roster yesterday. The Fish needed a fresh arm, ideally one that could eat multiple innings, due to a couple of factors. Recent injuries to Johnny Cueto and Trevor Rogers thinned out the rotation, and then a Friday rainout led to a Saturday double-header which taxed the bullpen. In yesterday’s game, Miami were down 5-0 to Atlanta after five innings and put Nolin on the mound to soak up the last three innings. The southpaw allowed six earned runs on seven hits and two walks in that time, leading to the 11-0 final.

Nolin has had many twists and turns in his career, which started with the Blue Jays but has since seen him go to the Athletics, Brewers, Rockies, White Sox, the Long Island Ducks of the Atlantic League, the Mariners, the Seibu Lions of Nippon Professional Baseball, the Nationals, the Kia Tigers of the KBO League, the Twins and now the Marlins. He’s only seen MLB action with the Jays, A’s, Nats and Marlins, with a 6.34 ERA in 61 career innings scattered from 2013 to the present.

The Marlins will now have a week to trade Nolin or pass him through waivers. Since he has previous career outrights, he would have the right to reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency.

Marlins Select Sean Nolin

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The Marlins have announced to reporters, including Jordan McPherson of the Miami Herald, that they have selected the contract of left-hander Sean Nolin. Right-hander George Soriano was optioned to make room on the active roster while righty Jeff Lindgren was designated for assignment to open a spot on the 40-man.

Nolin, 33, is a journeyman to the extreme. A Blue Jays draft pick back in 2010, he then bounced around to the systems of the Athletics, Rockies, White Sox and Mariners, before expanding his range to independent ball and overseas. He spent the 2020 season with the Seibu Lions in Japan, returned to North America in 2021 for a stint with the Nationals and then went to the Kia Tigers in Korea last year. He posted a 2.47 ERA in 124 innings with the Tigers last year.

Nolin returned to North America this offseason, signing a minor league deal with the Twins in February. It was reported over the weekend that the Marlins had acquired him from the Twins and he’ll now join the big league club. He made one appearance in Triple-A, logging four innings on Wednesday. He’ll give a fresh arm to a pitching staff that has been taxed in a few ways of late. Injuries to Johnny Cueto and Trevor Rogers have dealt a few blows to the rotation. The club also had to play a doubleheader on Saturday, using nine different pitchers to get through that twin bill against the Guardians. Nolin has a career 5.74 ERA in 18 games, eight of those in the 2013-2015 period before getting 10 more with the Nats in 2021.

As for Lindgren, 26, this is the second time this year he has been selected to the roster and quickly designated for assignment, even though the season is just a few weeks old. Since he cleared waivers and was outrighted the first time, he’ll now have the right to reject a second outright and elect free agency if he clears waivers again. He got a five-inning emergency outing in his first stint but didn’t get into a game this time around. He posted a 4.21 ERA in the minors last year.

Minor MLB Transactions: 4/22/23

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Catching up on some minor league moves from around baseball, with a tip of the cap to Chris Hilburn-Trenkle of Baseball America….

  • The Yankees released catcher Nick Ciuffo earlier this month, according to Ciuffo’s MLB.com’s profile page.  Ciuffo signed a minor league deal in March but didn’t see any game action in New York’s farm system.  Ciuffo has played in three of the last five MLB seasons, last appearing with the Orioles in 2021 and amassing 21 total games in the big leagues (19 with Tampa Bay).  The Rays selected Ciuffo with the 21st overall pick of the 2013 draft, but he has posted only a .248/.294/.348 slash line over 2053 career plate appearances in the minors.
  • The Marlins acquired left-hander Sean Nolin from the Twins earlier this month, and Nolin made his debut with Triple-A Jacksonville last Wednesday.  Nolin signed a minor league deal with Minnesota in February, after spending the 2022 season in the Korea Baseball Organization.  Nolin pitched with the Blue Jays and A’s from 2013-15, and then with the Nationals in 2021, spending time bouncing around the minors, the independent leagues, the KBO League and in Japan with NPB amidst his brief stints in the majors.  The 33-year-old Nolin has a 5.74 ERA over his 58 career innings in the big leagues.
  • Sticking with the Marlins and their Triple-A affiliate, Jacksonville announced earlier this week that right-hander Enrique Burgos had been released.  Burgos signed a minors contract in the offseason but struggled to a 16.20 ERA over 3 1/3 innings with Jacksonville.  Burgos’ MLB resume consists of 68 1/3 innings with the Diamondbacks in 2015-16, and he has since mostly pitched in the Mexican League and in the independent Atlantic League, as well as regular appearances in winter ball.

Twins Sign Three Pitchers To Minor League Contracts

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The Twins have inked right-hander Connor Sadzeck and left-handers Tyler Webb and Sean Nolin to minor league deals, as per the team’s MLB.com transactions page.  It wasn’t specified if any of the deals contained invitations to Minnesota’s big league Spring Training camp.

Sadzeck is the only member of the trio who pitched in the majors in 2022, albeit in cup-of-coffee fashion — Sadzeck tossed three innings over two games with the Brewers last season.  The righty spent much of the season at the Triple-A level, with an impressive 2.20 ERA and 27.86% strikeout rate over 49 combined innings with the Brewers’ and Nationals’ top affiliates.  Perhaps most importantly, Sadzeck’s walk rate was a palatable 9.95%, which represents an improvement over the control problems that plagued him in his last few seasons in the majors and minors.

Prior to 2022, Sadzeck’s MLB experience consisted of 9 1/3 innings with the Rangers in 2018 and 23 2/3 innings with the Mariners in 2019, with the latter season cut short by elbow problems.  His 2.18 ERA over those 33 frames was perhaps a little lucky considering his elevated walk rate, though Sadzeck’s high velocity and ability to miss bats was enough to catch the eye of the White Sox, Brewers, and Nationals over the last two seasons.

Webb returns to affiliated baseball after posting a 2.93 ERA, 28.81% strikeout rate, and 5.5% walk rate over 55 1/3 innings with the independent Long Island Ducks in 2022.  It was a nice rebound for the southpaw after a very rough 2021, as Webb had more walks (19) than strikeouts (14) while posting a garish 13.22 ERA over 16 1/3 innings with the Cardinals.  More control problems followed Webb to Triple-A (a 14.33% walk rate and a 5.82 ERA over 21 2/3 innings with Louisville) after St. Louis outrighted him off its 40-man roster, and Webb chose to become a free agent after the season.

It wasn’t long ago that Webb seemed to be establishing himself as a fixture in the St. Louis bullpen, as he posted strong numbers after being claimed off waivers from the Padres in June 2018.  Over his first 92 innings with the Cardinals from 2018-20, Webb had a 3.03 ERA, though his secondary metrics were much less flattering.  Never much of a strikeout pitcher at the MLB level, Webb had limited the damage with strong hard-hit ball rates, but his big spike in walks (and a .362 BABIP) contributed to his brutal 2021 numbers.

Nolin had a 4.39 ERA over 26 2/3 innings with the Nationals in 2021, which represents his only MLB action since the 2015 season.  Injuries sidelined him entirely for the 2016-17 seasons, and Nolin has since bounced around the minors, indy leagues (Nolin also pitched for the Long Island Ducks in 2019), and international leagues.  The left-hander spent the 2020 season in Nippon Professional Baseball, and after returning to North America to pitch in the Nationals organization, Nolin headed back overseas for a one-year stint with the KBO League’s Kia Tigers.  Nolin had a strong 2.47 ERA in 124 frames with the South Korean club, but the Tigers moved on from pursuing another contract with Nolin for 2023.

Shaun Anderson Signs With KBO’s Kia Tigers

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NOVEMBER 29: The Tigers have finalized an agreement with Anderson on a one-year deal that guarantees him $700K (h/t to Ji-heon Bae). He’ll receive a $100K signing bonus on top of a $600K salary, and the deal contains $300K in potential incentives. Anderson is represented by Wasserman.

NOVEMBER 26: The Kia Tigers of the Korea Baseball Organization are in talks with free agent right-hander Shaun Anderson, according to Ji-heon Bae of Sports Chunchu (hat tip to MyKBO.net’s Dan Kurtz).

The 28-year-old Anderson has pitched in the last four Major League seasons, though his participation in the 2022 campaign was limited to a single inning of work with the Blue Jays.  The remainder of Anderson’s year was spent at Triple-A Buffalo, where he posted a 3.58 ERA, 20.6% strikeout rate, and 8.7% walk rate over 88 innings.  Anderson started 15 of 36 appearances, though some of those “starts” were as an opener.

Originally a third-round pick for the Red Sox in the 2016 draft, Anderson has bounced around quite a bit during his pro career, and he has already pitched for five different teams over his four MLB seasons.  After spending the 2019-20 seasons with the Giants, Anderson took the mound for the Twins, Orioles, and Padres in 2021, before his one-game cup of coffee with Toronto last year.  The right-hander was also briefly part of the Rangers organization for some of the 2021 campaign.

Anderson hasn’t had much success at the MLB level, posting a 5.84 ERA over 135 2/3 career innings.  He has a more solid track record in the minors (3.72 ERA in 416 2/3 frames) but he has never been a big strikeout pitcher, and Anderson’s grounder rates have also tailed off after topping the 50% threshold earlier in his career.

Multi-inning relief work might have been Anderson’s best way of finding a niche to stay on a big league roster, but he’ll now head to South Korea to try and revive his fortunes as a starting pitcher.  Former Major Leaguers Thomas Pannone and Sean Nolin pitched with the Kia Tigers in 2022, but Bae writes that the Tigers might not retain either hurler as they look to overhaul their rotation.

Felix Pena Signs With KBO’s Hanwha Eagles

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June 10: The Hanwha Eagles announced agreement with Pena on a deal that will pay him $500K for the remainder of the season (h/t to Jee-ho Yoo of Yonhap). He’ll take the roster spot of former Pirates and Blue Jays righty Nick Kingham, who was released last week due to an elbow injury.

June 8: Right-hander Felix Pena is exercising an opt-out in his minor league deal with the Mets in order to sign with a team in the Korea Baseball Organization, reports Anthony DiComo of MLB.com (Twitter link). It’s not clear yet which club Pena will sign with.

Pena, 32, signed with the Mets over the winter on the heels of an outstanding showing in the Dominican Winter League (1.91 ERA, 27-to-7 K/BB ratio in 33 innings). He’s appeared in eight games with the Mets’ Triple-A affiliate in Syracuse thus far — six starts and a pair of relief appearances — working to a 4.06 ERA with a 20.2% strikeout rate and very strong walk and ground-ball rates (7.0% and 53.3%, respectively).

A solid swingman with the Halos from 2018-20, Pena turned in a combined 215 2/3 innings of 4.34 ERA ball with a 23.6% strikeout rate, a 7.7% walk rate and a 43.4% grounder rate during that three-year run. He’s made 24 starts at the MLB level in addition to another 80 relief outings, though it’s likely he’ll work out of a rotation in the KBO.

Pena suffered an ACL tear with the 2019 Angels, rebounded with a solid 2020 effort and then posted disastrous results both in the Majors and in Triple-A during the 2021 season. A hamstring strain shelved him for the first six weeks last season, and he was clobbered for seven runs in just 1 2/3 frames upon returning. The Halos passed him through waivers and retained his rights, but he surrendered 61 innings in 68 1/3 Triple-A frames over the remainder of the year in Salt Lake.

That ugly sequence took him off the MLB radar, but Pena’s strong showing in winter ball and solid work in Triple-A look to have earned him a six-figure salary overseas. If he shows well enough in the KBO, he could potentially put himself back on the MLB map, as we’ve seen with increasing frequency in recent years.

Recapping The KBO League’s International Player Signings

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With the lockout slowing MLB-related transactions to a crawl of minor league deals, transactions involving Korean Baseball Organization teams have taken more of a spotlight on MLBTR’s pages since the start of December.  These moves have included the signings of several names familiar to North American baseball fans, as the KBO League’s clubs have looked to address their allocated three roster spots for non-Korean players.  International-born players can only sign contracts worth a maximum of $1MM in total salary, and players new to the KBO League can sign only one-year pacts.

Though the Doosan Bears have one signing that still isn’t yet official, the other 29 slots have been filled.  It is still possible this list could be adjusted in the coming weeks due to a number of factors — injuries, players returning to North America (for personal reasons or a deal with an MLB team), issues related to the pandemic, or teams just changing their minds after seeing the players in training camp.  Here is the rundown of this winter’s international signings for the 10 KBO League franchises….

Doosan Bears
Jose Miguel Fernandez (deal not yet finalized), Ariel Miranda, Robert Stock

NC Dinos
Nick Martini, Wes Parsons, Drew Rucinski

Hanwha Eagles
Ryan Carpenter, Nick Kingham, Mike Tauchman

Lotte Giants
Charlie Barnes, DJ Peters, Glenn Sparkman

Kiwoom Heroes
Tyler Eppler, Eric Jokisch, Yasiel Puig

SSG Landers
Kevin Cron, Wilmer Font, Ivan Nova

Samsung Lions
David Buchanan, Jose Pirela, Albert Suarez

Kia Tigers
Socrates Brito, Sean Nolin, Ronnie Williams

LG Twins
Casey Kelly, Adam Plutko, Rio Ruiz

KT Wiz
William Cuevas, Odrisamer Despaigne, Henry Ramos

KBO’s Kia Tigers Sign Sean Nolin

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The KBO League’s Kia Tigers have signed left-hander Sean Nolin to a one-year contract.  As per Jeeho Yoo of Yonhap News, Nolin will earn $600K in guaranteed money ($250K signing bonus, $350K salary) and up to $300K more in incentives.

Nolin had re-signed with the Nationals on a minor league contract back in November, but it appears as though the club released him so Nolin could pursue the opportunity in the Korea Baseball Organization.  This isn’t Nolin’s first time playing abroad, as he previously pitched in Japan with the Seibu Lions in 2020, tossing 21 1/3 innings with the NPB club.

The southpaw followed up that brief NPB stint with a return to North American baseball, via a minor league deal with the Nats that eventually led to a big league call-up.  With 26 2/3 innings of 4.39 ERA ball with Washington, Nolin banked his first Major League action since way back in 2015, when he pitched for the A’s.  Once a notable prospect in the Blue Jays farm system, Nolin pitched 31 1/3 MLB innings from 2013-15 before injuries waylaid his career, including a Tommy John surgery that sidelined him for all of the 2016 and 2017 seasons.

Over 670 1/3 career frames in the minors with six different big league organizations, Nolin has a solid 3.48 ERA and 24.11% strikeout rate.  He has worked as both a starter and a reliever, giving the Lions some flexibility in how they might deploy him on their 2022 roster.

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