Reds Claim Patrick Kivlehan
The Reds have claimed utilityman Patrick Kivlehan off waivers from the Padres, the Cincinnati organization announced. Kivlehan had been designated for assignment by San Diego.
Entering the year, the 26-year-old had spent his entire professional career in the Mariners organization, moving steadily up the ladder but never having earned a big league promotion. That all changed with a wild 2016 campaign for the former fourth-round draft pick.
Kivlehan is now on to his fourth team of the year with today’s claim. In between his time in Seattle and his forthcoming stint with Cinci, he saw action in the Rangers and Padres organizations. The latter of those afforded him his first big league opportunity, with Kivlehan logging four hits (including one home run) in his first 19 plate appearances.
For most of this year, Kivlehan has played at Triple-A with his various teams. In 397 total plate appearances, he owns a .254/.302/.416 batting line with 12 home runs. Since beginning his pro career as a third baseman, Kivlehan has increasingly spent time also in the corner outfield as well as at first base.
Indians Outright T.J. House
We’ll track today’s minor moves here:
- The Indians have outrighted southpaw T.J. House after designating him for assignment recently, the club announced. As the team notes, House is eligible to elect minor league free agency, meaning he could elect to test the open market. Though he has shown a fair bit of promise in his limited major league opportunities, House has struggled to return to form after losing much of his 2015 season to shoulder issues. He has pitched mostly at the Triple-A level this year, much of it out of the pen, with 72 1/3 innings on his ledger. Though House has posted a 3.98 ERA, he has done so while compiling just 6.2 K/9 against 5.4 BB/9.
Giants Designate Matt Reynolds For Assignment
The Giants have designated left-hander Matt Reynolds for assignment in order to clear a spot on the 40-man roster for Gordon Beckham, whose acquisition from the Braves is now official, tweets Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle. Additionally, the Giants have selected the contract of former Pirates catcher Tony Sanchez from Triple-A Sacramento and placed Mac Williamson on the 60-day DL with a quadriceps strain to clear another 40-man roster spot.
Reynolds, 31, signed a minor league deal with the Giants earlier this summer and had his contract selected back in July. He allowed five runs in six innings at the big league level but enjoyed a more successful run with San Francisco’s Triple-A affiliate, firing off 13 2/3 shutout innings with a 12-to-2 K/BB ratio. The veteran Reynolds tossed 153 1/3 innings of 3.58 ERA ball with with 8.3 K/9 against 2.5 BB/9 between the Rockies and D-backs from 2010-13, but he underwent Tommy John surgery in early 2014 and missed the season. He’s spent the past two seasons attempting to earn his way back into regular bullpen work at the Major League level and figures to be in line for another minor league pact and an invite to Spring Training this coming offseason.
Sanchez, 28, will give manager Bruce Bochy a third catcher over the final week of the regular season. The former No. 4 overall draft pick hit .259/.303/.378 in parts of three Major League seasons with the Pirates but has split the 2016 season between the Triple-A affiliates for the Jays and Giants, batting a disappointing .201/.298/.317 through 228 plate appearances.
Blue Jays Designate Brady Dragmire For Assignment
The Blue Jays announced that they have designated right-hander Brady Dragmire for assignment (hat tip: Sportsnet’s Ben Nicholson-Smith, on Twitter). Dragmire’s roster spot will go to fellow right-hander Chris Smith, whose contract has been selected from Triple-A, per the club. The Jays also added that infielder Andy Burns has been recalled for the final few games of the season as well.
The roster moves were necessitated by a pair of injuries sustained by Joaquin Benoit and Devon Travis in last night’s benches-clearing brawl. The scrum, seemingly, could have been entirely avoided, but the Blue Jays will now be without one of their top setup men for the remainder of the season and the duration of the postseason (assuming they advance into at least the Wild Card game), as Benoit has been diagnosed with a torn calf muscle. Travis, meanwhile, is day to day with a shoulder injury.
Beyond that, the Jays have had to make a 40-man roster move sooner than they may have preferred, though Dragmire’s spot was already in jeopardy following a rocky 2016 season at the Double-A level. In 72 innings with Toronto’s affiliate in New Hampshire, Dragmire logged a 4.38 ERA with 5.1 K/9 against 3.5 BB/9. He did post an excellent 63.6 percent ground-ball rate, though, and he won’t turn 24 until February, so there’s some reason for optimism.
Smith, meanwhile, joins Toronto after posting a 1.93 ERA with 12.0 K/9 and 3.3 BB/9 in 60 2/3 innings between the Jays’ Double-A and Triple-A affiliates. He’s been with the Blue Jays since 2015 and, prior to that, spent the 2014-15 seasons in the Yankees organization. Smith was an undrafted free agent who cut his teeth in the independent Frontier League and overseas in the Australian Baseball League before eventually signing with the Yankees. If he enters a game for Toronto, he’ll be making his big league debut after a lengthy and unique journey to the game’s top level.
Marlins To Extend Martin Prado
The Marlins have agreed in principle to a three-year, $40MM extension with third baseman Martin Prado, Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald reports. Assuming the deal goes through to completion, he’ll remain with Miami through 2019. Prado will earn annual salaries of $11.5MM, $13.5MM, and $15MM in sequence over the deal’s three seasons, Jon Heyman of Fan Rag reports (Twitter links), with a $1MM assignment bonus applying in the event of any trades.
While the Miami organization will obviously be glad to have retained a team leader, it’s hard to celebrate given that the team is still reeling from the death of star pitcher Jose Fernandez just days ago. Last night’s game was one of the most heart-wrenching experiences ever seen at a ballpark, with Prado among the Marlins players who took the field in extremely difficult circumstances. (You can find his emotional post-game interview here.)
Prado, 32, has long been respected as a hard-nosed, versatile performer. He joined the Marlins before the 2015 season in a trade that sent Nathan Eovaldi and Garrett Jones to the Yankees and also delivered breakout righty David Phelps to Miami.
Of course, Prado is also quite an accomplished hitter. Though he has never been an abundant source of home runs — even less so now than before — Prado continues to put up steadily above-average overall offensive production. This year, he owns a .305/.360/.415 batting line in 644 plate appearances over 149 games, which is just a shade better than his career mark of .293/.342/.423.
The strong 2016 season came at an opportune time for Prado, who hasn’t been quite as useful with the bat over the last several years as he was earlier in his career with the Braves. He ended up being dealt from Atlanta to the Diamodbacks and then on to the Yankees before moving back to the NL East.
Had he made it onto the open market, Prado figured to receive wide interest. That’s due not only to his sturdy bat and reputation as a leader, but also for the defensive flexibility he possesses. Prado has delivered well-regarded glovework at third for some time now, but also has shown himself plenty capable of playing second, first, the corner outfield, and even shortstop in a pinch.
The major question seemed to be whether the Marlins would issue Prado a $16.7MM qualifying offer. Instead, the sides obviated the need to consider that scenario. The club may have been a bit squeamish at the idea of paying such a large single-season salary to a good but not great player, while Prado himself would have been tempted by such an offer given the alternative of entering the free agent market with draft pick compensation tied to his signing.
This contract seems to serve purposes for both player and team, with the organization locking up the third base position for years to come and the latter limiting his risk while picking up a pretty nice payday. Prado will end up receiving a bit more than second baseman Daniel Murphy got last year from the Nationals in free agency, after he declined a QO. The new contract also dwarfs the $11MM guaranteed to David Freese by the Pirates to keep him from reaching the open market, while falling a fair sight shy of Chase Headley‘s relatively recent four-year, $52MM pact.
If there’s a beneficiary here outside of the two parties involved directly, it’s the remainder of the free agent market. In particular, Justin Turner and especially Luis Valbuena now have much stronger market standing, especially since the Marlins might not have made a major signing had Prado left. Perhaps the same applies to Ian Desmond, who could receive interest from some of the same organizations that might have valued Prado for his versatility.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Yankees Outright J.R. Graham
The Yankees announced this afternoon that they’ve outrighted reliever J.R. Graham to Triple-A, thus removing the 26-year-old right-hander from the 40-man roster.
New York claimed Graham off waivers from the Twins earlier this year after Minnesota designated the 2014 Rule 5 Draft pick for assignment. Graham stuck in the Twins’ bullpen all throughout the 2015 campaign, with manager Paul Molitor typically reserving him for low-leverage situations. Graham wound up logging 63 2/3 innings of 4.95 ERA ball and averaged 7.5 K/9 against 3.0 BB/9 to go along with a 49 percent ground-ball rate. However, he was also quite homer-prone in his rookie campaign and struggled to strand runners. The former Braves top prospect tossed just 1 2/3 innings in the Majors this season and spent the majority of the year with the Yankees’ Double-A affiliate. All told, he logged a 3.27 ERA with 9.6 K/9 against 3.3 BB/9 in 44 innings across three minor league levels.
Pirates Acquire Chris Bostick From Nationals
The Pirates announced that they have acquired infielder Chris Bostick from the Nationals in exchange for minor league catcher Taylor Gushue and cash. Bostick, who was designated for assignment by the Nats earlier this month, has been added to Pittsburgh’s 40-man roster but won’t join the team for the final few games of the season. He’ll take Josh Harrison‘s spot on the 40-man, with Harrison being transferred to the 60-day disabled list.
Bostick, 23, split his season between Double-A and Triple-A with the Nats, hitting a combined .250/.313/.386 with eight homers and 11 steals while playing second base, third base and left field. He was ranked as the organization’s No. 25 prospect by Baseball America last offseason, with BA noting that he’s an above-average runner who stands out for a line-drive approach to all fields but may lack a true defensive home. He’s consistently displayed the pop necessary to reach double-digit home run totals and also averaged 27 steals per season from 2013-15.
The 22-year-old Gushue was Pittsburgh’s fourth-rounder back in 2014 and spent the 2016 campaign with their Class-A Advanced affiliate in Bradenton, where he batted .226/.282/.357. At the time Gushue was drafted, BA wrote that he was a good receiver with an average or even above-average arm behind the dish despite difficulties he’d had throwing out runners in college. Their report called him a below-average overall hitter but did note that he has average raw power. Gushue did hit a career-high eight homers in 90 games this season, though his 25 percent caught-stealing rate still leaves something to be desired.
Minor MLB Transactions: 9/22/16
We’ll keep tabs on today’s minor moves right here:
- The Marlins announced that right-hander Bryan Morris has been outrighted to Triple-A New Orleans. Morris was designated for assignment two days ago after missing the majority of the season due to back surgery. Because of the Major League service time he’s accrued — four-plus year — Morris will be able to elect free agency this winter and hand-pick the best environment and the best offer from interested teams. The 29-year-old (30 next March) has a 2.30 ERA in parts of three seasons with the Fish and a 2.80 career ERA in 215 innings between Pittsburgh and Miami. He’s also sporting one of the league’s best ground-ball rates (58.4 percent) among pitchers with at least 200 innings dating back to the 2013 campaign.
- The Royals have released righty Chien-Ming Wang, MLB.com’s Jeffrey Flanagan reports on Twitter. Wang had been designated on Saturday, and with the minor league season in the books, that all but assured that the veteran would end up being released. It’s remarkable, really, that the once-excellent starter was able to last as long as he did in the big leagues this year given all the arm troubles and failed comeback attempts already in his past. Now 36, Wang managed to put up a 4.22 ERA with 5.1 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9 to go with a 49.3% groundball rate over his 53 1/3 innings in his first major league action since 2013. This was also his first season as a full-time reliever.
Rangers To Sign Yanio Perez
The Rangers have agreed to terms with Cuban third baseman Yanio Perez, reports Jorge Ebro of El Nuevo Herald. Perez, who rates 13th on Jesse Sanchez’s top 30 international prospect rankings at MLB.com, will receive a $1.1MM signing bonus.
The 21-year-old Perez was cleared to sign on May 20 and receives plus grades for his raw power, per Sanchez, though some scouts have questioned his athleticism and ability to stick at third base. He’s said to have a good makeup by scouts, according to Sanchez, and is also an above-average runner. Baseball America’s Ben Badler has a full scouting report up on Perez, noting that he was once a 45-grade runner (on the 20-80 scale) but is now up to roughly 70 speed once underway, based on his 60-yard dash time. Badler, too, spoke to some scouts who graded Perez’s power well, though he heard above-average as opposed to the more impressive 65 grade used by Sanchez in his report. Perez hasn’t played in Cuba’s top league since the 2014-15 season and was just a career .259/.335/.328 hitter in Serie Nacional, though those stats came in his age 18-19 seasons. Perez is now listed at 6’2″ and 205 pounds, so it seems reasonable to believe that he’s filled out a bit since his last bit of pro experience in Cuba. Badler writes that he could begin next season at the Class-A level.
While Texas has taken an aggressive approach to the international market in seasons past, they’ve been more measured thus far in 2016. Perez’s bonus is the largest they’ve issued, with the next-biggest bonus going to Venezuelan catcher David Garcia, who received an $800K signing bonus in early July, per Sanchez. Even with this notable signing on the books, the Rangers haven’t cleared their allotted pool, so they’re not facing any type of long-term penalization.
Pirates Acquire Phil Coke
The Pirates have acquired lefty Phil Coke from the Yankees for cash considerations, the teams announced. Pittsburgh will need to make a 40-man roster move to accommodate the acquisition.
Coke, 34, made three major league appearances earlier in the year for New York, but has spent the bulk of the season at Triple-A. Though he has pitched almost exclusively as a reliever for most of his big league career, Coke made 11 starts during his time at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
On the year, Coke threw to a 2.96 ERA over 70 frames at the highest level of the minors. He compiled 7.8 K/9 against 2.7 BB/9, with 68 hits and just three home runs recorded against him.
It’s a bit unclear what Pittsburgh plans to do with Coke, though he will indeed be headed for the major league roster. He could conceivably take a start or two in an effort at a Rich Hill-like metamorphosis, or may just log some frames from the pen. The Pirates are technically still alive in the Wild Card race, but only barely. Coke will again be a free agent at season’s end.