Rockies Agree To Minor League Deal With David Holmberg
The Rockies have agreed to a minor league pact with left-hander David Holmberg, reports SB Nation’s Chris Cotillo (via Twitter). The Meister Sports Management client will give Colorado some additional depth both in the rotation and bullpen after spending the bulk of the 2017 campaign with the White Sox.
Holmberg, 26, appeared in 37 games (seven starts) for the ChiSox last year and totaled 57 2/3 innings of work — a career-high for him at the big league level. The former second-round pick (White Sox, 2009) posted a 4.68 ERA but struggled mightily with his control, as he walked more batters (34) than he struck out (33) in that time. Righties and lefties alike hit Holmberg hard in 2017, and fielding-independent pitching metrics were more bearish than his ERA (6.80 FIP, 6.02 SIERA).
The southpaw has had considerably more success in Triple-A, however, where he’s logged a total of 299 2/3 innings in his career and worked to a 4.23 ERA with 5.5 K/9 against 2.9 BB/9. Holmberg was more of a fly-ball pitcher for most of his time in the mid and upper levels of the minors, but he’s recently begun to induce quite a few more grounders, notching a ground-ball rate just south of 49 percent over the past two seasons in Triple-A.
[Related: Colorado Rockies depth chart]
The Rockies are largely set on lefty relievers in the Majors, with Chris Rusin, Mike Dunn and Jake McGee all slotted into manager Bud Black’s bullpen. There’s no immediate opportunity in the big league rotation, either, where Jon Gray, German Marquez, Chad Bettis, Kyle Freeland and Tyler Anderson are starting as Jeff Hoffman mends his shoulder on the disabled list. But Holmberg could conceivably slot into either the rotation or bullpen for Triple-A Albuquerque as he hopes to earn another look at the big league level.
Rays Place Brad Miller On DL, Select Ryan Weber’s Contract
The Rays have placed first baseman Brad Miller on the 10-day disabled list, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times tweets. The club selected the contract of right-hander Ryan Weber from Triple-A Durham in a corresponding move, thus giving it a full 40-man roster.
Miller suffered a groin injury while running the bases Sunday against the Red Sox, who overcame a 7-2 deficit in the eighth inning to post six runs and pull out an 8-7 win over the Rays. It was the most disappointing defeat yet in a slow start for Tampa Bay, which is a major league-worst 1-8 through the first week-plus of the season. Miller hasn’t exactly helped the Rays’ cause, having hit a so-so .222/.300/.370 (96 wRC+) through 30 plate appearances. However, that’s better production than Miller logged in 2017, a season in which he slashed .201/.327/.337 (83 wRC+) in 407 PAs. C.J. Cron stands out as the most logical replacement for Miller on the Rays’ 25-man roster.
Weber, a Tampa Bay native who signed a minor league pact with the Rays in the offseason, has thrown 68 1/3 innings (22 appearances, eight starts) since debuting with the Braves in 2015. The 27-year-old has registered a 5.00 ERA/4.47 FIP with 5.53 K/9, 1.45 BB/9 and a 55.7 percent groundball rate between Atlanta and Seattle. Weber has been far better at preventing runs at the Triple-A level (2.16 ERA, 5.1 K/9, 1.5 BB/9 in 167 innings), and he’ll hope for that type of success with the Rays, whose bullpen took a beating Sunday.
Latest On Kevin Siegrist
April 8: Siegrist doesn’t want to pitch in the minors for the Pirates or anyone else, general manager Neal Huntington told Liz Bloom of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and other reporters Sunday. Conversations between the Pirates and Siegrist’s side have been “very respectful,” per Huntington, but: “His agent was very clear: This is not about the Pirates. This is about minor league baseball. … This is about not wanting to pitch in the minor leagues, period, so I’m not sure how that solves itself without him pitching.”
Huntington added that Siegrist could be part of the solution for the Pirates sometime this year, though that’s probably not going to happen if he doesn’t work his way back via the minors. “He’s a good pitcher, and we wanted him to go to triple-A to build up arm strength, to get back to Kevin Siegrist because that guy can help us,” Huntington said. “We would love to keep that door open and hope that there will be a change of mind at some point in time.”
April 6: The Pirates have issued another statement clarifying Siegrist’s status (Twitter links via Rob Biertempfel of The Athletic). It seems that Siegrist is not a free agent and has instead been placed on the team’s suspended list for failing to report to Triple-A.
As Biertempfel explains, the left-hander’s minor league contract allowed him to opt out at the end of Spring Training if another club was willing to place him on its MLB roster. If not, he’d be assigned to Triple-A Indianapolis. No club offered Siegrist a 25-man roster spot, but the left-hander subsequently chose not to report to Indianapolis and has been suspended by the team. Biertempfel notes that Siegrist does have a full opt-out on June 1, at which point he can become a free agent. It’d be a surprise to see Siegrist ultimately sit out until that point, but it’s not clear at this time if he intends on reporting to Indianapolis at all.
April 5: Left-handed reliever Kevin Siegrist, who was in camp with the Pirates on a minor league contract, has refused an assignment to Triple-A in favor of free agency, the team announced on Thursday (Twitter link via MLB.com’s Adam Berry). Siegrist’s deal came with a clause that allowed him to opt out if he did not make the Opening Day roster, and he’d reportedly been mulling over whether to take the assignment to Indianapolis or pursue other opportunities.
The 28-year-old Siegrist posted sub-3.00 ERAs with the Cardinals in 2015-16 before struggling to a 4.81 ERA last year in season during which he logged DL time for both a forearm issue and a spinal sprain. Siegrist averaged a career-worst 5.03 walks per nine innings pitched last season, and his 92 mph average fastball was down noticeably from his peak, when his heater averaged 93.7 mph.
That said, Siegrist has a fairly long track record of missing bats at the big league level. He’s averaged 10.5 strikeouts per nine innings since debuting with the 2013 Cardinals and has been largely effective against both left- and right-handed hitters — albeit with somewhat curious reverse splits. Lefties have batted .233/.344/.357 in 381 plate appearances against Siegrist, while righties have been stymied to the tune of a .192/.276/.349 slash. And while the five runs he allowed in 5 2/3 spring frames with the Pirates makes for an unappealing ERA, Siegrist also posted a substantially more encouraging 9-to-1 K/BB ratio in that tiny sample of appearances.
Siegrist finished out the 2017 season with four years, 116 days of big league service time, meaning that any club which signs him would have the option of controlling him through at least the 2019 season via arbitration. As we noted late last week, the free agent market is hardly flush with left-handed bullpen options — Antonio Bastardo and Eric O’Flaherty are currently the two most notable names available — so Siegrist should generate some interest elsewhere.
Brewers Place Christian Yelich on 10-Day DL
After letting him sit out a few games with a minor oblique injury, the Brewers have elected to place outfielder Christian Yelich on the 10-day DL. In a corresponding move, the team has recalled right-hander Taylor Williams from Triple-A Colorado Springs.
During Yelich’s absence, it seems likely that Domingo Santana will fill in for him in the outfield. Yelich was off to a hot start for the 2018 season; he’s hit .385/.407/.577 across 27 plate appearances for the Brew Crew with one long ball and five runs driven in. The 26-year-old has played at least 155 games in consecutive seasons, a streak that will now officially come to an end with the news that he’ll miss at least the ten-day minimum.
Yelich, of course, was perhaps the Brewers’ biggest offseason addition. The club sent top prospects Lewis Brinson and Isan Diaz, along with two other minor-leaguers, to Miami in order to bring the young slugger to Milwaukee. He sports a career .291/.366/.433 batting line across his first 2,839 plate appearances, with 60 homers and a 121 wRC+.
White Sox Select Bruce Rondon’s Contract
The White Sox announced that they’ve selected the contract of right-hander Bruce Rondon in advance of today’s game against the Tigers, Rondon’s former team.
One of few players capable of reaching 102 MPH on the radar gun, the Tigers had lofty expectations for Rondon from the outset. A 2013 debut in which he pitched to a 3.45 ERA with 9.42 K/9 was certainly encouraging as well. However, Tommy John surgery prevented him from taking the mound for the entire 2014 season, and though he racked up the strikeouts big time the following year, his 2015 campaign ended with him being sent home due to “effort level“.
The righty’s tumultuous tenure with Detroit came to a close this past December, when the club elected to non-tender him rather than pay him a projected $1.2MM arbitration salary. Rondon sat on the market until February 1st, when the South Siders elected to pick him up on a minors pact. All told, Rondon’s upside lies in his velocity and his strikeout ability, but he’ll have to harness his control in order to be effective with his new team.
Marlins Select Tyler Cloyd’s Contract, Designate Jacob Turner
The Marlins announced (via the team’s media info account on Twitter) that they’ve selected the contract of right-hander Tyler Cloyd from Triple-A New Orleans. In a corresponding move, the team has designated right-hander Jacob Turner for assignment.
The 30-year-old Cloyd joined the Marlins this offseason on a minors pact. He made just a single relief appearance for the Mariners in 2017. Prior to that, he hadn’t appeared in the majors since the 2013 season, during which he pitched 60 1/3 innings across 13 appearances (11 stats). Cloyd’s season stats were ugly overall; he gave up more earned runs more often than he struck out hitters, ending the year with a 6.56 ERA. Since then, he’s bounced around with the Triple-A affiliates of the Indians, Yankees and the aforementioned Mariners.
Turner, 26, has never quite lived up to his pre-2009-draft billing, which prompted the Tigers to select him ninth overall. Fangraphs pegs him as performing below replacement level in each of the past three seasons, while Baseball Reference believes him to have been roughly replacement level last year but worth nearly two wins below replacement in the two seasons prior combined. Though he made Miami’s opening day roster out of spring training, the righty gave up a startling ten earned runs across just 5 2/3 innings spanning four relief appearances to start the year.
Mariners Sign Chris Herrmann To Minors Deal
The Mariners have signed catcher/outfielder Chris Herrmann to a minor league contract, Tacoma Rainiers broadcaster Mike Curto reports. Curto broke the news yesterday that Herrmann was working out with the Mariners’ Triple-A affiliate, and it may be a couple of days before Herrmann is officially activated in order to give him time to get fully ramped up.
Herrmann will take over from the just-released Tuffy Gosewisch as the primary Triple-A depth catcher for the Mariners, as Curto notes. The M’s are thin at the position at the big league level, with Mike Marjama and David Freitas handling duties behind the plate while Mike Zunino is on the DL with an oblique injury, so there’s a chance Herrmann could get a promotion sooner rather than later. (Especially since Seattle is being cautious with Zunino’s recovery.)
The Diamondbacks designated Herrmann for assignment and ultimately released him prior to Opening Day, thus saving themselves three-quarters of the $1.3MM owed to Herrmann in an arbitration-avoiding deal over the winter. Herrmann is coming off a rough .181/.273/.345 performance over 256 plate appearances with Arizona last season, a major dropoff from the impressive .284/.352/.493 slash line he posted over 166 PA in 2016. Herrmann can also fill in at first base and in the corner outfield, giving him more versatility than the average backup catcher.
Minor MLB Transactions: 4/7/18
Here are the latest minor moves from around baseball, with the newest moves at the top of the post…
- The Angels have outrighted Juan Graterol to Triple-A after the catcher cleared waivers, the team’s communications department announced (Twitter link). Graterol was designated for assignment earlier this week to create 40-man roster space for the newly-acquired Miguel Almonte. Graterol appeared in 48 games for the Halos last season but their offseason signing of Rene Rivera pushed Graterol down to the level of a minor league depth piece. Graterol has a .493 OPS over 102 MLB plate appearances in his career, and a .271/.321/.336 slash line over 1912 PA in the minors.
Athletics Claim Trayce Thompson
SATURDAY: Thompson has officially joined the 25-man roster, with the A’s announcing that righty Daniel Gossett has been optioned to Triple-A to make room.
THURSDAY: The Athletics have claimed outfielder Trayce Thompson off waivers from the Yankees, per a club announcement. Thompson had only recently joined the New York organization after being claimed from the Dodgers.
Oakland has bumped righty Paul Blackburn to the 60-day DL to open a roster spot. Because he is out of options, Thompson will need to join the active roster, unless the A’s decide to try to squeeze him through waivers — as the Yanks just did, unsuccessfully.
Thompson, 27, could fulfill a reserve outfielder role for an Oakland organization that is currently sporting a three-man bench. He struggled quite a bit in 2017, of course, and followed that up with a miserable stint in the Cactus League. But Thompson was an effective player in the 2016 campaign, when he turned in 262 plate appearances of .225/302/.436 hitting with good glovework and top-of-the-line baserunning.
Yankees Right-Hander Ben Heller Undergoes Tommy John Surgery
Yankees right-hander Ben Heller underwent Tommy John surgery yesterday, according to a team media release. Dr. Christopher Ahmad performed the surgery, and Heller also had a bone spur removed from his throwing elbow as part of the procedure. Heller will now miss all of the 2018 season and most of the 2019 season recovering from the surgery, as per the usual 12-15 month timeline for TJ patients.
It’s a very tough blow for Heller, who was emerging as one of the many promising young arms in the Yankees’ system. Originally a 22nd-round pick for the Indians in the 2013 draft, Heller came to New York as part of the Andrew Miller trade package in July 2016 and made his MLB debut that same season. Heller tossed 18 Major League innings in 2016-17, to go along with a strong minor league career that saw him post a 2.76 ERA, 12.1 K/9, and a 3.42 K/BB rate. All but one of Heller’s 197 career minor league appearances came out of the bullpen, as his upper-90s fastball and solid slider made him a very intriguing relief prospect.
Heller was already on the 60-day DL due to the bone spur issue, which unfortunately proved to be the harbinger to a much more serious problem once doctors examined his arm. The Yankees had planned to send Heller down to Triple-A, though the transaction was voided when he was placed on the DL. As a result, Heller will continue to earn Major League service time for the entire season as he recovers from the Tommy John surgery.