Griffin Jax Requested Trade From Twins
The Twins traded right-hander Griffin Jax to the Rays in the final moments before the trade deadline last week, with right-hander Taj Bradley going the other way. Dan Hayes of The Athletic reports that Jax requested a trade once he saw the extent of the selloff in Minnesota.
Things in Minnesota have changed rapidly in a short amount of time. They hung around the playoff race for most of the year and it wasn’t even clear that they would do any selling at all as of a few weeks ago. On July 22nd, it was reported that they were warming to the idea of selling rental players, but would need to be bowled over by the offers to move controllable guys like Jax, Jhoan Durán, Joe Ryan and others.
In the end, their deadline selloff wound up being far more extensive than anticipated. In addition to trading all several rental players, they flipped Durán to the Phillies, Jax to the Rays, Louis Varland to the Blue Jays and, most surprising of all, infielder Carlos Correa to the Astros.
According to the report from Hayes, Jax got wind of the Correa situation from the infielder himself. Jax and manager Rocco Baldelli got into a dispute on July 30th, the day before the deadline, about Jax being removed from that day’s game. Correa offered to be present for a meeting between the two. After that meeting, Correa informed Jax about conversations he’d had with president of baseball operations Derek Falvey about the team’s direction.
Then on Thursday, the extent of the teardown became clear to everyone. Durán had already been traded on Wednesday but reports of the Correa deal came out about two hours prior to the deadline. The Varland deal and the Jax deal were both reported right around the deadline on Thursday. Hayes reports that Jax asked his representative to request a trade at some point on Thursday, once he saw the writing on the wall.
From the righty’s perspective, it’s an understandable request. He is controllable for two years after this one and is about to turn 31 years old. The Twins could perhaps compete again in 2026 or 2027 but the trading of controllable pieces sends a message that they also might not have high hopes about the possibility.
There’s plenty of uncertainty beyond the roster as well. The Pohlad family is actively trying to sell the club. It’s unknown exactly when a sale will be finalized. Once a sale takes place, it’s anyone’s guess who the new owners will be or what kind of plans they would have for the payroll.
While the Pohlad family is still in charge, the safe bet is on minimal investments. In the most recent offseason, the Twins spent a combined $10.25MM on one-year deals for Harrison Bader, Danny Coulombe and Ty France. Ahead of the deadline, sending out payroll commitments seemed to be a priority. The Twins included Randy Dobnak in the Paddack deal, seemingly to save a few million. Money also may have been a factor in sending France to the Jays alongside Varland. Shipping out Correa also scrubbed millions of dollars from the future books. That deal brought back one prospect but is generally viewed as a salary dump.
The Twins do still have lots of talented players on the roster but the future outlook has darkened in recent days. “Now no one wants to stay if they are selling like this,” an unidentified player said to Hayes on deadline day.
That sentiment is perhaps extra true for Jax, given his age. He presumably would rather not spend his age-31 and -32 seasons pitching for a rebuilding club. He didn’t wind up in a vastly superior situation. The Rays are 55-58 and only two games ahead of the Twins in the standings. They also don’t spend tons of money. However, they generally find ways to be in the playoff race even without big budgets. They also tend not to hold players all the way to free agency, so perhaps Jax will end up being traded again in the offseason or at next year’s deadline.
For the Twins, more clarity on their plans will still need to emerge. Time will tell when the sale of the franchise will pick up real steam. The identity of the buyer or buyers and their plans will presumably have a big impact on the near-term future of the Minnesota club.
Photo courtesy of Jay Biggerstaff, Imagn Images
Rays Claim Jesse Scholtens
The Rays announced that they have claimed right-hander Jesse Scholtens off waivers from the White Sox and sent him to Triple-A Durham. Chicago designated him for assignment yesterday. The Rays also announced that catcher Matt Thaiss, who was designated for assignment a few days ago, has cleared waivers and accepted an outright assignment to Triple-A Durham. Scholtens effectively takes the 40-man spot recently vacated by Thaiss.
Scholtens, 31, made his major league debut in 2023 but hasn’t pitched in the big leagues since then. He underwent Tommy John surgery in February of 2024, which led to him missing that entire season. He spent a decent chunk of 2025 on the injured list as well. Once he was ready to come off the IL, the Sox optioned him to the minors.
His major league track record consists of 85 innings tossed in a swing role a couple of years ago. He made 11 starts and 15 relief appearances for the Sox with a 5.29 earned run average, 15.4% strikeout rate, 8% walk rate and 41.3% ground ball rate.
Since those numbers don’t jump off the page, the Rays are presumably more interested in his minor league work. From 2021 to 2023, he tossed 231 2/3 innings at the Triple-A level. Most of that was in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League, as Scholtens was in the Padres’ system through the end of 2022. Over those three years, he had a 4.58 ERA but his 24.3% strikeout rate and 7.9% walk rate were both better than average.
He hasn’t yet been able to get back to that level. This year, he has thrown 36 minor league innings with a 5.25 ERA, 19.4% strikeout rate and 7.7% walk rate. But as mentioned, he’s coming back from Tommy John and is perhaps still ramping up. Scholtens still has options and hasn’t yet qualified for arbitration, so he’ll give the Rays some cheap Triple-A pitching depth for now. The club has a decent track record of helping pitchers maximize their results, so perhaps they can sprinkle some of their magic dust on Scholtens in the coming years.
Thaiss, 30, was also acquired by the Rays from the White Sox. Chicago had a bit of a squeeze behind the plate and sent Thaiss to the Rays in May for minor league outfielder Dru Baker. Thaiss got into 25 games for the Rays, backing up Danny Jansen, but he slashed just .225/.304/.282 for a wRC+ of 69.
Tampa shook up their catching spot recently. They traded Jansen to the Brewers but also acquired Nick Fortes and Hunter Feduccia, squeezing Thaiss out of the picture. Since he’s out of options, he got pushed off the 40-man.
His offense has occasionally been intriguing since he draws so many walks but he also strikes out a lot and his defense behind the plate isn’t especially well regarded. There has been enough interest for him to bounce around the league in the past year, going from the Angels to the Cubs, White Sox and Rays in small deals, but every club declined to give him a roster spot this week.
Thaiss has a service clock between three and five years. That means he has the right to reject an outright assignment but has to forfeit his remaining salary commitments in order to do so. He is making $1MM this year, with roughly $300K still to be paid out. Understandably, he had accepted this assignment to keep collecting the rest of that money. He’ll give the Rays some non-roster catching depth for now.
If he’s not added back to the 40-man by the end of the season, he’ll have the right to elect free agency, as is the case for all players with at least three years of service who are removed from a 40-man roster during a season.
Photo courtesy of David Reginek, Imagn Images
AL Notes: Thornton, Buxton, Rays, Vargas
The Mariners placed Trent Thornton on the 15-day injured list on Friday, and announced that the right-hander will miss the rest of the season due to a torn left Achilles tendon. Thornton had to be carted off the field after he suffered the injury in the ninth inning of Thursday’s 6-0 M’s win over the Rangers, as the reliever fell while leaving the mound to cover first base on an Adolis Garcia grounder. Follow-up tests revealed the unfortunate and expected news of an Achilles tear, and while a specific recovery timeline isn’t yet known, Thornton could be in jeopardy of missing some time at the start of the 2026 season.
Thornton has a 4.68 ERA over 42 1/3 innings for Seattle this season. A few particularly rough blowups have inflated his ERA, but his 17.8% strikeout rate is well below Thornton’s 26.2 K% from 2024. Owed a raise from his current $2MM salary in his final year of salary arbitration, Thornton will probably still be inexpensive enough that he won’t be non-tendered this winter, barring an unwelcome injury diagnosis. Since coming to the Mariners in a trade from the Blue Jays prior to the 2023 deadline, Thornton has been a workhorse out of Seattle’s pen, with a 3.65 ERA over 140 2/3 innings.
More from around the American League…
- Byron Buxton firmly denied any possibility of a trade away from the Twins back in mid-July, stating that he would use his contract’s no-trade provision to remain “a Minnesota Twin for the rest of my life.” It probably isn’t surprising that Buxton hasn’t changed course just a few weeks later, but in the wake of the Twins’ deadline selloff, Buxton reiterated to the Athletic’s Dan Hayes and other reporters that “nothing’s changed. It’s just part of baseball. It’s the business side of it. Just cause we go through these tough roads or whatever, it is what it is. We’ll be better once we get on the other end of it and figure things out a little bit more….But I ain’t going nowhere.” Buxton is owed roughly $49.6MM through the end of the 2028 season, and he has full no-trade protection until the end of the 2026 campaign.
- Most of the Rays’ deadline moves saw the team obtain either big leaguers or big league-ready talent in return, which was the team’s stated goal in any deal involving controllable talent heading out of Tampa. President of baseball operations Erik Neander told Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times that the Rays received “a lot of interest” in some veteran players, but “that wasn’t going to happen for A-ball prospects this time around.” The intention is to keep the team competitive for 2026 but also not robbing this year’s team of a chance to make a late run. The Rays have dug themselves into a hole with their dismal play over the last five weeks, as the club is now 55-58 and sit five games back of the final AL wild card berth.
- Miguel Vargas was a late scratch from Saturday’s White Sox lineup, and the team placed the corner infielder on the 10-day injured list today due to a left oblique strain. While oblique problems are difficult to diagnose in terms of a timeline, Vargas’ strain is believed to be mild, so he could only miss a couple of weeks. A very streaky season has evened out to a 97 wRC+ for Vargas over 439 plate appearances, with 13 home runs and a .229/.305/.402 slash line in Vargas’ first full season in Chicago.
Rays Place Jonathan Aranda On IL With Broken Wrist
The Rays announced a number of roster moves before tonight’s series opener against the Dodgers (relayed by Marc Topkin of The Tampa Bay Times). Most notably, first baseman Jonathan Aranda is headed to the 10-day injured list with a left wrist fracture.
Tampa Bay reinstated Ha-Seong Kim from his own IL stint and recalled infielder Tristan Gray from Triple-A Durham. Deadline acquisitions Griffin Jax and Hunter Feduccia have reported to the team and will be active tonight as well. The Rays designated previous backup catcher Matt Thaiss for assignment and optioned lefty Joe Rock and recently acquired outfielder Everson Pereira to Triple-A.
Aranda was injured in yesterday’s game against the Yankees. He was playing first base when Giancarlo Stanton hit a chopper to third base. Junior Caminero double clutched, then threw wildly to first. Aranda reached the ball and collided with Stanton. He went down in pain. Aranda told reporters (including Mark Skol Jr. of Fox 13) that he won’t be able to do any kind of activity for three weeks. The All-Star said he hopes to return this year.
It interrupts a fantastic year for the lefty-swinging Aranda. He’s hitting .316/.394/.478 with 22 doubles and 12 home runs. Aranda has somewhat quietly emerged as one of the best hitters in MLB. It’s a major blow for a Tampa Bay team that has fallen two games under .500 and sits four games out of the last Wild Card spot. Yandy Díaz moved from his usual designated hitter spot to play first base tonight. Christopher Morel is in the lineup as the DH with an outfield of Jake Mangum, Jonny DeLuca and Josh Lowe.
Kim makes his return at shortstop. He’s back from a minimal IL stay due to a lower back strain. Kim had missed the first few months of the season rehabbing last year’s elbow surgery. Tonight’s game is his 11th of the season. The defensive stalwart is in the first season of a two-year contract. He can opt out in the fall, making his final couple months significant for the upcoming free agent market.
Jax and Feduccia are in line for their team debuts. The Rays acquired the hard-throwing Jax in a one-for-one swap for former top pitching prospect Taj Bradley. He’ll anchor the back of the bullpen. Feducca, meanwhile, was the key piece of Tampa Bay’s return in the three-team trade that sent Zack Littell to Cincinnati. He’d been in Triple-A with the Dodgers but jumps right onto the big league roster with the Rays. Feduccia will back up another deadline pickup, Nick Fortes, in a completely revamped catching group.
That pushed Thaiss off the roster. Tampa Bay had acquired him from the White Sox in May. The 30-year-old Thaiss had carried a .382 on-base percentage with Chicago but hit .225/.304/.282 in 25 games for Tampa Bay. The Rays clearly prefer Feduccia and are willing to risk losing Thaiss, who is out of minor league options. They’ll need to place him on waivers in the next few days.
Rays, Twins Swap Griffin Jax For Taj Bradley
The Rays and Twins orchestrated a fascinating one-for-one swap at the deadline. Minnesota traded setup man Griffin Jax to Tampa Bay for young starting pitcher Taj Bradley.
Jax, 30, is one of a staggering five relievers whom the Twins traded in the past two days. He followed Jhoan Duran, Brock Stewart, Danny Coulombe and Louis Varland out the door. Minnesota dismantled what had been one of the best bullpens in the game. Of course, that doesn’t even address their biggest deal of the day.
A former third-round pick out of Air Force, Jax has developed into a high-end reliever. This year’s 4.50 ERA may not reflect that, but he misses bats an elite rate. Jax has punched out 36.4% of opposing hitters while running a 19.5% swinging strike rate. He ranks comfortably among the top 10 relievers in MLB in both categories. Jax posted very similar underlying numbers across 72 appearances a year ago. Last season’s ERA reflected that dominance, as he turned in a 2.03 mark through 71 innings.
Opposing hitters have a .389 average on balls in play against Jax. That’s the highest against any pitcher in MLB with at least 40 innings. Jax had allowed a sub-.300 BABIP in each of the previous three seasons. This season’s mark is a clear outlier, and teams continue to view him as a weapon at the back of the bullpen. Jax has the ability to run his fastball to 97 MPH on average, but his best two offerings are his sweeper and changeup. It’s a plus three-pitch mix.
Jax joins Pete Fairbanks, Bryan Baker and Garrett Cleavinger towards the back of a revamped Tampa Bay bullpen. He’s likely to work in a setup role in front of Fairbanks for the remainder of the season. The Rays opted not to trade their closer despite what appeared to be significant interest. Fairbanks could be the subject of trade chatter again during the offseason. If Tampa Bay pulls the trigger on a deal at that point, Jax would have a good chance of stepping into the ninth inning.
The Rays control Jax for two seasons beyond this one. He’s playing on a $2.365MM salary in his first arbitration year. Duran kept him from accruing many saves in Minnesota that would’ve built his arbitration earnings. He’ll likely land a salary in the $4-5MM range next season and could get between $6-8MM for his final run through the process. Tampa Bay straddled the line between buying and selling this summer, but they didn’t abandon hope of erasing what is currently a three-game deficit in the Wild Card picture. Even if they don’t make the playoffs, they’ll have Jax for another couple seasons.
It’s appealing enough that the Rays were willing to move on from Bradley. A former top prospect, the 6’2″ righty has held a rotation spot in Tampa Bay for most of the past three seasons. He has never really put it all together, allowing an ERA of 4.11 or higher in each season. Home runs were the biggest culprit over the first two years, but he missed bats at plus rates with league average control. It has been a different story in 2025. Bradley’s strikeout rate has dropped to a career-low 20.2% as he’s getting fewer swinging strikes. He has upped his ground-ball rate and gotten the longball under control, but his 4.61 ERA across 21 starts is right in line with his career mark.
Around the All-Star Break, it was reported that the Rays were open to offers on Bradley. It seemed clear that he’d fallen out of favor when they optioned him to Triple-A last week after he gave up four runs without escaping the second inning against the White Sox. That didn’t mean they’d trade him for whatever they could get, of course, but there was presumably a growing frustration with Bradley’s inconsistent results. Tampa Bay traded a pair of starting pitchers in Bradley and Zack Littell, but they’re giving the former’s rotation spot to hard-throwing righty Joe Boyle. They replaced the latter by acquiring Adrian Houser from the White Sox.
Coaxing more out of Bradley now falls on the Twins. He figures to return to the rotation in Minnesota. He’ll slot behind Joe Ryan, Zebby Matthews and eventually Pablo López in the starting staff. Minnesota also landed talented rookie right-hander Mick Abel from the Phillies in the Duran return. They’re clearly looking ahead to a 2026 season that might be under new ownership and hoping to build around young starting pitching.
Bradley may not have had sustained MLB success, but it’s easy to see the appeal. Controllable starting pitching is the most difficult asset to acquire. Minnesota has Bradley under team control for four seasons after this one. He has a four-pitch mix led by a 96 MPH fastball with the command to start. If the Twins can marry this year’s batted ball results with the swing-and-miss ability he has shown in prior seasons, Bradley would be a more valuable long-term asset than a reliever — even one as good as Jax.
ESPN’s Jeff Passan first reported the Rays were acquiring Jax. Dan Hayes of The Athletic had Bradley’s return. Images courtesy of Lon Howedel and Jonathan Dyer, Imagn Images.
Rays Acquire Adrian Houser For Curtis Mead and Pitching Prospects
The Rays are acquiring starting pitcher Adrian Houser from the White Sox, according to MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand. Infielder Curtis Mead will head to Chicago in return, according to Joel Sherman of the New York Post. Bruce Levine of 670 The Score adds that the White Sox will also receive right-handed pitchers Duncan Davitt and Ben Peoples.
Houser, 32, had a rough 2024 season with the Mets but spent the offseason training at “at PitchingWRX, a facility in Oklahoma City where former Sox pitcher Lane Ramsey is the chief of operations,” according to James Fegan of Sox Machine. Houser landed a minor league deal with the Rangers in December, then inked a Major League one with the White Sox on May 20th. Houser had added over a mile per hour to his fastball due to his offseason training, and posted a stellar 2.10 ERA in 11 starts for the Sox.
Somehow, Houser has had this level of success despite a 17.1 K%. He’s had success preventing barrels, and Statcast’s xERA supports a sub-4 mark. Houser, a free agent after the season, joins a Rays rotation that also includes Ryan Pepiot, Shane Baz, Drew Rasmussen, and Joe Boyle. Houser, a free agent after the season, can serve as something of a replacement for Zack Littell, who the Rays dealt to the Reds yesterday. The Rays optioned Taj Bradley to Triple-A a week ago, but today shipped him to the Twins for elite reliever Griffin Jax.
It’s been an interesting month for Rays president of baseball operations Erik Neander, who also shipped out Danny Jansen and acquired Bryan Baker earlier this month. The Rays simply aren’t afraid to make trades (including during a game with their opponent) and serve as both buyers and sellers. The Rays took a painful loss in New York against the Yankees today, with Yandy Diaz, Jonathan Aranda, and Chandler Simpson all departing early with injuries. The club still has a fighting chance at 3.5 games out in the Wild Card.
Mead, 25 in October, hasn’t done much with Major League pitching in stints in each of the last three seasons. Nor has he been all that impressive in Triple-A in the last few years. Still, Mead has spent ample time on Baseball America’s top 100 prospects list, peaking at #36 prior to the 2023 season. He garnered a 55/medium risk grade at that time, at which point Baseball America considered him “one of the best pure hitters in the minors.” Though the Rays are considered a dangerous trading partner, Mead represents a rare misstep for the club, as they acquired him for Cristopher Sanchez back in November 2019.
Not known for his defense, Mead can fit at first, second, or third base. Those spots are occupied in Chicago by Miguel Vargas, Lenyn Sosa, and Colson Montgomery of late, with Andrew Benintendi taking a fair number of DH at-bats. Mead can likely work his way into the playing time mix. As Jim Margalus of Sox Machine notes, Mead bears some similarities to Vargas.
Davitt, a 25-year-old righty, earned a promotion to Triple-A earlier this month. Eric Longenhagen and James Fegan of FanGraphs described him in February as “a funky low-slot guy at Iowa who has successfully been turned into a backend starter prospect in pro ball.” Peoples, a 24-year-old righty, has spent the entire season as a reliever at Triple-A, posting a 2.65 ERA with a 12.3 K-BB%. The FanGraphs team wrote, “We’re betting on Peoples’ athleticism and delivery here, and still think he has a future as a fastball-heavy up/down reliever who has a chance to entrench himself in a more regular big league role if one of his secondary pitches improves.”
Rays, Yankees Swap Jose Caballero For Everson Pereira
The Yankees have acquired utilityman Jose Caballero from the Rays in exchange for outfielder Everson Pereira and a player to be named later, per announcements from both clubs. Both players were on their respective teams’ 40-man rosters, so no corresponding 40-man moves were needed.
The versatile Caballero adds plenty of speed and defensive flexibility to the Yankees’ bench mix. The 28-year-old is hitting just .226/.327/.311 on the season but is tied for a share of the major league lead with 34 stolen bases (in 44 attempts). He’s played second base, third base, shortstop and all three outfield positions this season.
Caballero draws plus defensive grades all over the infield and in the outfield corners as well. He’s controllable for another four years beyond the current season but will be arbitration-eligible as a Super Two player in the offseason.
The 24-year-old Pereira ranked among Baseball America’s top-100 prospects in the 2022-23 and 2023-24 offseasons. His path to the majors has been slowed by injury, most notably a UCL repair surgery performed last June. Because of injuries and the shortened 2020 season, the Yankees were granted a fourth option year over the Venezuelan-born outfielder. He’ll be out of options next season.
Pereira got a brief big league debut with the 2023 Yankees but looked overmatched as a 22-year-old who’d only played 35 games above the Double-A level. He hit .151/.233/.194 and fanned 40 times in 103 trips to the plate (38.8%). He’s now in his third partial season at the Triple-A level and hitting .254/.357/.507 with 19 homers and nine steals in 314 plate appearances. Pereira has gone down on strikes in 29.5% of his plate appearances but walked at a stout 12.1% clip. He’s averaging 92.1 mph off the bat and sporting a huge 50% hard-hit rate.
Pereira can play all three outfield spots and brings some upside to the Rays, though he’s continually shown a worrying lack of contact skills in the upper minors. He’ll give Tampa Bay some depth in the outfield. Notably, speedy outfielder Chandler Simpson exited today’s game with a hand injury, so the acquisition of Pereira could be tied to concerns that Simpson will miss time. Josh Lowe, Jake Mangum, Jonny DeLuca and Kameron Misner are among the other Rays options on the 40-man roster.
Jack Curry of the YES Network first reported the trade.
Latest On Rays’ Deadline Possibilities
The Rays remain one of the tougher teams to pin down around five hours until the trade deadline. Last night, they shipped out impending free agent starter Zack Littell to the Reds in a three-team trade that netted catcher Hunter Feduccia from the Dodgers. While that could be the beginning of a broader sell-off, it’s also possible they viewed Littell — their only pure rental — as a unique case.
Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reported in the early-morning hours that the Rays, at least to that point, had put talks involving Yandy Díaz and Brandon Lowe on the back burner and were focused on other pursuits. While it’s possible things have changed in the roughly 12 hours since Rosenthal’s report, Franycs Romero describes the Rays’ talks on Díaz as “currently stalled.” He suggests the club is holding to a high asking price on the veteran first baseman/designated hitter.
The Red Sox have been mentioned most frequently as a potential Díaz suitor. Even if the Rays were willing to trade the 2023 AL batting champ, talk with Boston would be complicated by the divisional factor. The Red Sox currently occupy the second Wild Card position in the American League. The Rays have played terribly this month but remain within three games of a playoff spot. They’re hardly buried.
Díaz is signed for next season at a $12MM rate; his deal contains a $10MM club option for 2027 that could vest at $13MM depending on his plate appearance tally next year. Lowe is in the final guaranteed year of his deal but under club control on a bargain $11.5MM option that comes with a $500K buyout. Tampa Bay reinstated him from a minimal 10-day IL stint (left ankle tendinitis) yesterday.
Joel Sherman of The New York Post tied the Astros and Mets to Lowe earlier in the week. Houston has since added the righty-swinging Ramón Urías to handle third base but presumably remains in the mix for left-handed bats. The Mets are now focused on offense after making a trio of late-inning additions: Ryan Helsley, Tyler Rogers and Gregory Soto. This morning, ESPN’s Jorge Castillo listed Lowe as a hitter the Mets are considering.
Beyond Díaz and Lowe, the Rays have gotten a lot of hits on closer Pete Fairbanks. He’s playing on a $3.667MM salary and has a club option for next season. Lefty reliever Garrett Cleavinger, who is eligible for arbitration for another two years, is a player to watch. The Rays were also reportedly listening on 24-year-old starter Taj Bradley earlier this month.
Reds Acquire Zack Littell In Three-Team Trade
The Reds announced the acquisition of starting pitcher Zack Littell from the Rays in what’ll reportedly be a three-team trade. Righty Brian Van Belle is headed from Cincinnati to Tampa Bay. The Reds are reportedly sending pitching prospect Adam Serwinowski to the Dodgers, who’ll trade catcher Hunter Feduccia to Tampa Bay. Reliever Paul Gervase and minor league catcher Ben Rortvedt are headed from the Rays to the Dodgers. As of Wednesday night, only the Littell for Van Belle/Serwinowski portion of the trade has been finalized.
Littell tossed five scoreless innings tonight against the Yankees in his final appearance with the Rays. That lowered his earned run average to an impressive 3.58 mark across 22 starts. Littell turned in a very similar 3.63 ERA in 29 appearances a season ago. He has led the Rays in innings in each of the past two seasons while putting together steady mid-rotation results.
It’s excellent work for a player whom the Rays snagged off waivers from the Red Sox a little over two years ago. Littell had bounced around the league mostly as a middle reliever before Tampa Bay built him up as a starter. His fantastic control played well in a rotation role. Throwing strikes is the 29-year-old’s standout trait. Littell has walked fewer than 5% of opposing hitters in consecutive seasons. He issued four free passes tonight in the Bronx, but that’s only the second time he has done so in the past two years.
Littell doesn’t have eye-popping stuff. He sits in the 91-92 MPH range with both his four-seam fastball and sinker. Neither his slider nor splitter are huge swing-and-miss offerings. Littell had roughly average strikeout and whiff rates a season ago. This year’s 16.6% strikeout rate and 9.1% swinging strike percentage are each subpar. Littell surrenders a lot of hard contact and has had issues with the home run ball throughout his career. That includes an MLB-high 26 longballs allowed this season.
That profile seems a suboptimal fit for a pitcher who’ll now call the extremely hitter-friendly Great American Ball Park home. Littell’s consistency was clearly a plus for Cincinnati. He has worked at least five innings in all but one start this year. He has allowed three or fewer runs in 18 of 22 appearances. Littell has had a better season than Nick Martinez and Brady Singer have managed. Rookie Chase Burns has also been up and down over his first six starts.
Adding Littell will push Martinez to the bullpen. Ace Hunter Greene is on a rehab assignment as he works back from a groin strain. That’ll presumably push Burns back to Triple-A. Cincinnati would have a starting five of Greene, Nick Lodolo, Andrew Abbott, Littell and Singer at that point.
Littell is playing on a $5.72MM salary for his final year of arbitration. The Reds are taking on a little more than $1.8MM for the final two months. He’ll be a free agent at season’s end. Tampa Bay wasn’t going to make him a qualifying offer. They’ve played terribly this month and dropped below .500 with tonight’s loss. Their 3.5 game deficit in the Wild Card race isn’t insurmountable, but the team’s performance coming out of the All-Star Break discouraged the front office enough that they’re at least soft sellers.
Trading Littell, their only true impending free agent, is the obvious starting point. Closer Pete Fairbanks and second baseman Brandon Lowe are controllable for next season via club options. Shortstop Ha-Seong Kim has a $16MM player option. Yandy Díaz and Drew Rasmussen are each signed through 2026 with team options covering the ’27 campaign. Lefty reliever Garrett Cleavinger is arbitration controlled through 2027. It remains to be seen how aggressively they’ll shop players whom they control beyond this season, but the Rays have the potential to make a significant impact on the deadline.
The Reds part with a couple controllable players to land Littell. Serwinowski, a 6’5″ left-hander, is the more significant loss. The Reds drafted him out of high school in 2022. He has developed into one of their more intriguing low minors pitchers. Serwinowski ranked 10th in the Cincinnati system at MLB Pipeline and 12th at Baseball America. Eric Longenhagen of FanGraphs had him as high as sixth in the organization in May. Scouting reports praise his plus fastball-slider combination, crediting him with a mid-90s heater that can touch 97. Like many tall young pitchers, he has below-average command. Serwinowski also doesn’t have a great third pitch, raising questions about his ability to turn a lineup over multiple times.
There’s a decent chance the 21-year-old will end up as a reliever, but it’s easy to see the appeal of a pitcher with this kind of stuff and physical projection. Serwinowski has spent the season in High-A, allowing a 4.84 ERA across 74 1/3 innings. He has punched out an above-average 27.7% of batters faced while walking nearly 12% of opponents. He’s the headliner of the return from the Dodgers’ perspective as a low minors development flier.
Van Belle, 28, has yet to make his MLB debut. The Red Sox called him up in June but designated him for assignment a few days later without getting him into a game. Cincinnati added him on a cash deal and has kept him on optional assignment to Triple-A Louisville. A former undrafted free agent out of the University of Miami, Van Belle has combined for 81 1/3 innings of 3.21 ERA ball at the top minor league level this year. That comes with a below-average 20.2% strikeout rate but a sterling 3.2% walk percentage. His fastball barely scrapes 90 MPH, but he’s a fantastic strike-thrower who relies mostly on a mid-80s changeup to stay off barrels. He’ll provide the Rays a depth starter or long relief type who is in his first of three minor league option seasons.
Feduccia is the bigger get from Tampa Bay’s perspective. He’s a 28-year-old catcher who had a limited path to playing time behind Will Smith and Dalton Rushing in L.A. Feduccia has held a spot on the 40-man roster for two seasons but has only gotten into seven MLB games. He has been forced to bide his time in Triple-A, where he owns a .277/.387/.450 batting line in more than 1200 plate appearances. A left-handed hitter, he takes plenty of walks and has decent contact skills with minimal power.
Eric Longenhagen of FanGraphs slotted Feduccia 31st among Dodger prospects in his writeup of the farm system in April. Longenhagen wrote that he struggles to control the running game but is a plus receiving catcher. Tampa Bay has cycled through catchers for years. They swapped out Danny Jansen for Nick Fortes in separate trades with Milwaukee and Miami earlier this week. Feduccia could push the out-of-options Matt Thaiss for the backup job immediately. He’s in his second of three option years and could be assigned to Triple-A Durham if the Rays don’t want to risk losing Thaiss on waivers.
Landing him required sending the 25-year-old Gervase to Los Angeles. A 6’10” righty reliever, Gervase was acquired from the Mets last July. Tampa Bay promoted him a few weeks ago. He has made five appearances, giving up three runs across 6 1/3 innings. He has posted monster strikeout numbers in Durham, fanning nearly 40% of opponents while pitching to a 3.12 ERA across 28 appearances. Gervase has paired that with a 7.5% walk rate that represents dramatically improved control relative to his early minor league work. The LSU product leans mostly on a 93-94 MPH fastball and mixes in a slider and cutter. He’s in his first option year and will begin his Dodger career as middle relief depth.
Rortvedt, who is not on the 40-man roster, backfills L.A.’s lost catching depth at Triple-A. At age 27, he’s actually younger than Feduccia but has far more MLB experience. He’s a .186/.276/.265 hitter in 209 big league contests. Rortvedt hit .095 in 26 big league games this year before Tampa Bay ran him through waivers. He is hitting .183 in 19 Triple-A games. He’ll be a minor league free agent at the end of the season if the Dodgers don’t call him up before then.
Jeff Passan of ESPN first reported that the Reds were closing in on a deal for Littell. Gordon Wittenmyer of The Cincinnati Enquirer reported that Cincinnati was giving up Van Belle and Serwinowski. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale first mentioned the three-team trade, with C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic relaying that the Rays were flipping Serwinowski elsewhere. Passan had the Dodgers’ involvement and the full breakdown.
Images courtesy of Imagn Images.
Dodgers Interested In Pete Fairbanks, Shane Bieber
The Dodgers have been connected to a number of high-profile bats this summer, ranging from Guardians outfielder Steven Kwan to Cardinals utility man Brendan Donovan. The focus has primarily been on upgrading the club’s bullpen, however, and while the L.A. has reportedly been connected to everyone from Ryan Helsley to David Bednar, those aren’t the only bullpen arms they could pursue. Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic writes that the club is seeking “at least one” right-handed reliever on the trade market, and adds that they’ve shown interest in Rays closer Pete Fairbanks. Aside from that, it seems as though the Dodgers have at least some cursory interest in dabbling in the rotation market, with MLB Network’s Jon Morosi reporting that L.A. brass has spoken to Cleveland about right-hander Shane Bieber.
Fairbanks, 31, has a 20.2% strikeout rate that’s down relative to previous years but hasn’t seen his results impacted as he’s pitched to a 2.75 ERA and 2.89 FIP. His solid 47.8% ground ball rate helps to explain that to some extent, although some advanced metrics are still skeptical considering that his 3.98 SIERA this year is the worst of his career. With that being said, Fairbanks had a 34.1% strikeout rate and a 2.66 ERA over a four year stretch from 2020 to 2023, and given that he’s just two years removed from those heights it would hardly be surprising if some suitors hope to unlock that elite production from him again in the future. Further helping Fairbanks’s value is that he’s controllable through the 2026 season by way of a club option valued at $7MM.
That combination of strong recent results, an impressive track record, and additional team control beyond this season has made Fairbanks a hot commodity on the trade market. The Rangers and Cubs have both been directly connected to him in recent days in addition to the Dodgers, while a number of other teams like the Phillies, Blue Jays, and Tigers are known to be on the prowl for bullpen help. With that said, there’s reason to wonder if the Dodgers might bow out if the market gets too hot on Fairbanks. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic notes that the Dodgers are not currently in the “high-end” relief market. With that being said, Rosenthal specifically mentions Twins closer Jhoan Duran and A’s closer Mason Miller. Both Duran and Miller are even more well-regarded than Fairbanks while also coming with more team control, so it’s entirely possible that Fairbanks is someone the Dodgers would still be willing to pay a relative premium given that his acquisition cost would likely still be incomparable to the likes of Duran and Miller.
Moving on to Bieber, the Guardians are known to be “trying to move” the right-hander. He’s not yet pitched this year after undergoing Tommy John surgery early in the 2024 season, but figures to be ready to pitch at some point in August. A former Cy Young award winner with a 2.91 ERA and 2.96 FIP since the start of the 2020 season, Bieber is a legitimate front-of-the-rotation starter when healthy and could offer a huge boost to any club down the stretch and into the playoffs this year. The Cubs have been connected to Bieber already in the rumor mill, and a number of other teams like the Yankees and Blue Jays would also make sense for his services. A $16M player option ($4M buyout) for the 2026 season could complicate negotiations in theory, but it’s extremely unlikely that Bieber would exercise an option at that price point barring a significant injury given the ability of starters with his upside and track record to command far more than that even when coming off poor seasons.
The Dodgers are nonetheless a somewhat curious fit for his services given that they already have a stacked rotation that features Shohei Ohtani, Tyler Glasnow, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, and Blake Snell along with a bevy of viable back-end depth options. On the other hand, the club had a rash of injuries that left them struggling to field a full rotation earlier this year, and after suffering that same fate in the playoffs last season it would be understandable if the club decided to add yet another high-end arm to the mix in order to safeguard themselves ahead of a postseason where they’ll be looking to defend their World Series title. Los Angeles already has six MLB starters on the 60-day injured list, and while Snell is expected to be activated in the near future that just goes to demonstrate the fragility of modern pitchers and the importance of having excess depth.