Phillies Claim Ryan Cusick, Designate Kyle Tyler
The Phillies announced that right-hander Ryan Cusick was claimed off waivers from the White Sox and optioned to the Florida Complex League. In the corresponding roster move, Philadelphia designated right-hander Kyle Tyler for assignment.
In less than two weeks’ time, Cusick is now joining his fourth different team after a whirlwind series of waiver claims. The odyssey started when he was designated for assignment by the Athletics on May 27, and he has since gone from the A’s to the Tigers to the White Sox and now to the Phils. Cusick will now head not to Philadelphia’s Triple-A affiliate but to the FCL for what might be a mechanical tune-up in the wake of a difficult minor league season.
The 25-year-old Cusick was the 24th overall pick of the 2021 draft, selected by the Braves but then quickly flipped to the Athletics that offseason as part of the trade package that brought Matt Olson to Atlanta. Cusick has struggled to live up to that first-round potential, as his career 5.20 ERA over 238 2/3 minor league innings hasn’t resulted in any Major League playing time.
A starter for most of his career, Cusick appears to have moved into the bullpen on a full-time basis this season, but the results haven’t been there, as he has more walks (14) than strikeouts (11) while posting a 6.32 ERA over 15 2/3 combined innings with the Athletics’ and Tigers’ Triple-A affiliates in 2025. The Phillies will become the latest team to see if they can solve Cusick’s control problems and turn him into a playable big league reliever.
Tyler can relate to Cusick’s waiver wire travels, as Tyler also changed teams four times on waiver claims within a month’s span in March-April 2022. His MLB resume consists of a 4.31 ERA over 48 innings with the Angels, Padres, and Marlins, with the bulk (31 2/3 IP) of that work coming with Miami last year.
Tyler started seven of his eight games with the Marlins, and has mostly worked as a starter over the last three seasons in the minors after working in more of a swingman capacity earlier in his career. All 12 of Tyler’s outings with Triple-A Lehigh Valley came as a starter, though he had only a 4.31 ERA, 15.6% strikeout rate, and 7.6% walk rate. The Phillies are deeper than most teams when it comes to starting pitching, while Tyler’s numbers don’t jump off the page, another club in need of rotation depth could be motivated to put in a claim.
Brewers Claim Drew Avans
The Brewers announced that outfielder Drew Avans has been claimed off waivers from the Athletics and assigned to Triple-A. The A’s designated Avans earlier this week.
A 33rd-round pick for the Dodgers in 2018, Avans had spent his entire career in the L.A. organization before he signed with the Athletics this past offseason. The move paved the way for Avans’ Major League debut, as he appeared in seven games for the A’s after his contract was selected to the active roster in late May. Avans had only two hits in his 15 trips to the plate, but filled in as a spare outfielder when Tyler Soderstrom was moved from left field to first base to fill in for the injured Nick Kurtz.
Avans has a .275/.374/.408 slash line over 2226 PA at the Triple-A level. All of Avans’ Triple-A experience has come in the Pacific Coast League, so those seemingly solid numbers are perhaps a little below average given the PCL’s hitter-friendly nature. It will be interesting to see how his bat translates to a more normalized hitting environment with Triple-A Nashville of the International League, but perhaps more importantly, Avans will also give the Brewers some depth at all three outfield positions. The Crew have been a little thin in the outfield with Blake Perkins and Garrett Mitchell on the IL, and Christian Yelich primarily being used as the everyday DH.
White Sox Sign Tyler Alexander, Place Jared Shuster On 15-Day IL
The White Sox announced that left-hander Tyler Alexander has been signed to a Major League contract, worth the MLB minimum salary. To create roster space, the Sox placed left-hander Jared Shuster on the 15-day injured list (retroactive to June 5) due to a blister on his throwing hand, and southpaw Fraser Ellard was moved from the 15-day to the 60-day IL.
Alexander’s stint on the open market didn’t last long, as it was just two days ago that the southpaw rejected the Brewers’ outright assignment in favor of free agency. Milwaukee signed Alexander to a one-year, $1MM contract in February, but designated him for assignment last week after he posted a 6.19 ERA over 36 1/3 innings and 21 appearances for the Brew Crew. His 4.26 SIERA is more forgiving, as Alexander’s ERA was inflated by a .331 BABIP and an absurdly low 47.2% strand rate (far below the 71.7% league average). He also had a respectable 7.3% walk rate, but struck out batters at only an 18.3% clip.
A team with fewer pitching options might have kept Alexander around as a swingman or long relief arm, but the Brewers have gone from being drastically thin on rotation options to a borderline surplus of arms now that some of their injured hurlers have returned to action. While Alexander’s results weren’t much to speak of, his ability to eat some innings and make a few spot starts helped the Brewers navigate that early-season pitching shortage.
Alexander will now take on a depth role with his hometown team, as the left-hander was born in Chicago in 1994 before moving on to play his high school and college ball in Texas. Alexander joins Brandon Eisert and Cam Booser as the southpaw options in the White Sox bullpen, and he might be in line for the occasional start as the Sox continue to try and solidify their rotation. Jonathan Cannon went on the 15-day IL earlier this week due to a back strain, and Chicago has cycled through a number of rotation candidates while trying to fill the void left by Martin Perez‘s possibly-season-ending flexor strain.
Shuster technically made two “starts” working as an opener in his most recent two appearances before going on the IL. Shuster has struggled to an 8.04 ERA over 15 2/3 innings and 12 games for the Pale Hose this season, with the caveat that eight of his 14 earned runs allowed came in just two of those appearances. In some echoes of Alexander’s season, Shuster has a 4.21 SIERA, with a 55.9% strand rate and a .429 BABIP spoiling his bottom-line numbers.
Ellard had a 6.75 ERA in 6 2/3 relief innings for Chicago this season, as his season has been largely spent on the sidelines due to two separate IL stints. A hamstring strain cost Ellard most of April, and he returned to pitch in only two games before he was placed on the 15-day IL in early May due to a lat strain. The shift to the 60-day IL means that Ellard can’t return to action until at least July.
Orioles Designate Matt Bowman For Assignment
The Orioles announced that right-hander Matt Bowman has been designated for assignment. The move opens up a roster spot for fellow righty Scott Blewett, who was acquired from the Braves in a cash deal two days ago.
Bowman is no stranger to the waiver wire, as this is the second time the Orioles have DFA’ed him this season, and he bounced around the league several times in 2024 and ended up pitching for four different teams at the MLB level. His previous designation and outright back in May saw Bowman accept the outright assignment off the 40-man roster, though he has the right to reject any future outright in favor of free agency.
It remains to be seen if Bowman will again stay put if he clears waivers and is outrighted this time. Bouncing up and down between Triple-A and the big leagues within one organization might carry more appeal for Bowman than his four-club experience in 2024, and since Bowman is out of minor league options, he isn’t likely to gain more roster security on other team.
In between the roster moves, Bowman has a 4.57 ERA over 21 2/3 innings and 18 relief appearances for Baltimore this season, posting a solid 5.3% walk rate but also an uninspiring 16.8% strikeout rate. Bowman’s latest stint on the O’s roster ended on a high note, as he tossed 2 1/3 innings of hitless shutout ball in the Orioles’ 7-4 win over the Athletics yesterday.
Diamondbacks Select Kyle Backhus, Designate Aramis Garcia
The Diamondbacks announced that they have selected the contract of left-hander Kyle Backhus from Triple-A Reno. Catcher Aramis Garcia was designated for assignment in the corresponding move on both the 26-man and 40-man rosters.
Due to a suspended game on Friday, the D’Backs and Reds played a shortened version of a doubleheader on Saturday, and Arizona used five pitchers in a 13-1 loss in the full game of the twin bill. Backhus will therefore join the roster as a fresh arm for the beleaguered D’Backs pen, and is now in line to make his Major League debut.
Though Backhus wasn’t drafted when his college career at Sam Houston State came to a close, he signed a free agent deal with the Diamondbacks in 2021 and has posted some solid numbers over five seasons in the Arizona farm system. Pitching almost exclusively out of the bullpen over the last four years, Backhus reached Triple-A for the first time in 2023, and might have reached the majors last season if injuries didn’t limit him to just 35 2/3 total innings in 2024.
Backhus has a 2.22 ERA and a 33% strikeout rate over 24 1/3 innings and 24 games in Reno this season — impressive numbers in any case, but even more noteworthy coming in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League. Backhus’ 9.2% walk rate is on the high side but it represents an improvement from the larger control issues that hampered Backhus earlier in his career.
This may be just a cup of coffee for Backhus in the majors, but considering how the Diamondbacks’ bullpen has struggled this year, there’s not much to lose in giving the 27-year-old more of an extended look. Jalen Beeks is the only other left-hander in Arizona’s bullpen, so Backhus can add some more balance to the relief corps while A.J. Puk continues to be sidelined on the injured list.
Garcia’s contract was selected just yesterday, as the D’Backs wanted an extra catcher available since Gabriel Moreno was nursing a hand injury suffered in Friday’s game. Moreno didn’t play Saturday but is ready to go in at least a backup capacity today, as per reporter Jody Jackson, so Garcia will now head to DFA limbo after a single game in an Arizona uniform. That lone appearance means that Garcia has now appeared in six of the last eight Major League seasons, with only four of his 120 career games coming since the end of the 2022 campaign.
Garcia has hit .211/.248/.325 over 327 plate appearances during his journeyman career, and he landed in Arizona last November on a minors contract. Garcia is out of minor league options, so the D’Backs had to designate him before trying to move him back to Triple-A, and he’ll be outrighted off the 40-man roster if and when he clears waivers. Since Garcia has been outrighted in the past, he has the right to reject another outright assignment and instead become a free agent.
Athletics Acquire Austin Wynns
The A’s announced that they have picked up catcher Austin Wynns in a trade with the Reds, with cash considerations heading back to Cincinnati in return. To clear roster space for Wynns, the Athletics designated right-hander Carlos Duran for assignment.
Wynns was designated for assignment two days ago, as he had become the odd man out of the Reds’ catching mix when Tyler Stephenson returned from a season-opening stint on the injured list. Wynns signed a minor league deal with Cincinnati during the offseason, and that contract was selected on Opening Day as Wynns and Jose Trevino went on to handle the catching duties for the next five weeks while Stephenson recovered from an oblique strain.
Ironically, another oblique strain has now opened the door to Wynns’ latest opportunity. Shea Langeliers was placed on the Athletics’ 10-day IL with a strained left oblique on Friday, leaving the West Sacramento team with just Jhonny Pereda (36 career MLB games) and Willie MacIver (seven career games) as the top catching options. Tyler Soderstrom has some catching experience but has suited up behind the plate just once in the last two seasons, so it makes sense that the A’s preferred to just bring in a veteran backstop rather than disrupt Soderstrom’s routine as a first baseman/left fielder.
The Athletics will be the seventh different organization Wynns has been part of during his career, and he has seen action with five of those clubs at the MLB level over his seven seasons in the bigs. A .241/.287/.354 hitter over 716 career plate appearances, Wynns has quietly been extremely productive over his limited action with the Reds, as he posted an eye-opening .390/.429/.661 slash line in 63 PA since Opening Day 2024. This gives Wynns a unique distinction, as he has the best wRC+ (198) of any Reds player in the entire 156-year history of the franchise, minimum 60 plate appearances in a Cincinnati uniform.
It is probably safe to assume that the 34-year-old Wynns won’t continue this kind of production with the A’s, even notwithstanding Sutter Health Park’s hitter-friendly nature. Still, Wynns will provide the Athletics with some help behind the plate for however long Langeliers will be on the IL. Manager Mark Kotsay didn’t give reporters (including MLB.com’s Martin Gallegos) a specific timeline for Langeliers’ recovery, citing the “tricky” nature of oblique injuries.
Astros Designate Forrest Whitley For Assignment
The Astros announced that right-hander Forrest Whitley has been designated for assignment. Left-hander Brandon Walter was called up from Triple-A Sugar Land in the corresponding move.
Selected 17th overall in the 2016 draft, Whitley was once viewed as one of baseball’s top pitching prospects, and he was a fixture on top-100 prospect lists even as injuries and a 50-game drug policy suspension in 2018 hampered his career. Due to the canceled 2020 minor league season and a Tommy John surgery, Whitley went over 21 months (from September 2, 2019 to June 16, 2022) between a proper in-game appearance in the minor leagues.
That long layoff was the turning point in Whitley’s career, as he only showed flashes of his prior form once he returned to the mound. A lat strain limited him to 30 Triple-A innings in 2023, but a move to full-time bullpen work in 2024 seemed to put Whitley on the right track, as a 1.89 ERA over 33 1/3 relief innings for Round Rock earned Whitley his first taste of MLB action in the form of three appearances for the 2024 Astros.
More injuries arose this year, as a left knee bone bruise and left knee sprain resulted in two separate trips to the IL for Whitley. It is quite possible his health issues impacted his performance, as the righty struggled to a 12.27 ERA over 7 1/3 innings for the Astros, with two home runs and six walks allowed within that small sample.
Whitley’s lack of effectiveness didn’t leave Houston with much choice beyond a DFA, as Whitley is out of options and can’t be sent to the minors without first being exposed to waivers. Should he clear waivers, Whitley can be outrighted off the Astros’ 40-man roster and returned to Sugar Land, though it is worth wondering if the Astros might be ready to simply move on from Whitley entirely.
Given Whitley’s past pedigree, it wouldn’t be a shock if another team claimed him away to see if a change of scenery could finally unlock the right-hander’s potential. The pure stuff still seems to be there, as Whitley’s fastball (96.3mph) and slider (96.7mph) have plenty of velocity even if his walk rates have spiraled upwards. Whitley is still only 27 years old, and might yet be able to join the long list of former top prospects who became late bloomers in terms of big league success.
Rays Promote Ian Seymour
The Rays have called left-hander Ian Seymour up from Triple-A Durham, with right-hander Cole Sulser optioned to Triple-A in the corresponding move. No 40-man move was required, as Tampa already added Seymour to its 40-man roster last November in advance of the Rule 5 Draft.
The 26-year-old Seymour will be making his Major League debut whenever he makes his first appearance for the Rays. A second-round pick for Tampa Bay in the 2020 draft, Seymour’s pro career hit some immediate roadblocks when flexor soreness and then a Tommy John surgery limited him to just 114 innings over the 2021-23 seasons. If it wasn’t for these health issues, Seymour might well have been in the bigs years ago, as he had already been promoted up to the Triple-A level before the 2021 campaign was over.
Seymour kept the momentum going after his return from TJ rehab. He posted a 2.35 ERA over 145 1/3 combined Double-A and Triple-A innings in 2024, and this season has a 2.95 ERA, 32.7% strikeout rate, and 5.8% walk rate over 61 frames with Durham (starting 11 of 12 games). Baseball America ranks Seymour 15th on their list of the Rays’ top 30 prospects, while MLB Pipeline has him 19th in their ranking of the Tampa Bay farm system.
If these rankings seem a little modest for a starter with Seymour’s numbers, it could be because Seymour’s average fastball velocity only sits in the low-90s. That said, the pitch is still effective, and acts as a nice secondary offering to Seymour’s plus changeup. As Baseball America’s scouting report puts it, Seymour relies on a “combination of command and deception” more than pure stuff, and his results in the minors “will be hard to fully replicate” against big league hitters. Seymour has started 69 of his 71 career games, though evaluators feel he might be more suited to a swingman or bulk pitcher role at the MLB level.
Given their long history of pitcher development and creative usage of their arms, the Rays are ideally suited to manage Seymour’s entry into the Show. Seymour looks to be working as a reliever at first, since Tampa Bay could use a fresh arm after using seven different pitchers in yesterday’s 11-10 extra-innings loss to the Marlins. The steady Drew Rasmussen is starting today but hasn’t gone beyond six innings in any of his 12 starts this season, and the Rays’ next off-day isn’t until Thursday. Seymour joins Garrett Cleavinger and Mason Montgomery as the left-handed options in Tampa’s pen.
Mets Sign Julian Merryweather To Minor League Deal
The Mets signed right-hander Julian Merryweather to a minor league deal this evening, as relayed by MLB.com’s Anthony DiComo.
Merryweather, 33, was a fifth-round pick by Cleveland back in 2014. Traded to Toronto as part of the Josh Donaldson deal, he made his big league debut with the Blue Jays during the shortened 2020 season. The right-hander showed some promise with a 4.15 ERA and 2.27 FIP across 13 innings in that rookie season, but he never quite lived up to it in future seasons after he was derailed by elbow and oblique issues among other injuries over the years. He put together a 5.64 ERA and 4.36 FIP in 47 appearances with the Blue Jays overall before being designated for assignment in January of 2023.
The right-hander was promptly plucked off waivers by the Cubs, and enjoyed the best season of his career that year. In 72 innings of work as a high leverage arm for Chicago, Merryweather posted a 3.38 ERA with a 3.52 FIP and struck out a fantastic 32.3% of his opponents. Those huge strikeout numbers were enough to overcome a career-high 11.9% walk rate, and Merryweather entered the 2024 season firmly in the Cubs’ late inning mix alongside closer Adbert Alzolay and offseason addition Hector Neris. Unfortunately, Merryweather was part of a bullpen implosion early in the season that proved fatal to Chicago’s chances last season. He spent most of the season sidelined by a knee injury that ultimately required surgery, and even when he was healthy enough to pitch he struggled to a 6.60 ERA with a strikeout rate that had plummeted to just 18.9%.
It was easy enough to blame Merryweather’s struggles in 2024 on his injuries, which may have thrown him off mechanically and contributed to his fastball velocity losing two ticks relative to the prior season. To whatever extent that may have been the case, however, a healthy offseason clearly wasn’t all it took to fix Merryweather’s issues. His velocity remained down this year, and 2025 proved to be more of the same as he pitched to a subpar 5.79 ERA while striking out a career-low 17.0% of his opponents and walking a career-high 12.5%. The right-hander’s 21 outings for Chicago this year were clearly too much for the club to stomach, as he was designated for assignment as the team turned to more reliable late-inning options like Brad Keller, Drew Pomeranz, and Daniel Palencia who had emerged in recent weeks.
Merryweather eventually went unclaimed on waivers, and the Cubs had the option to outright him to the minors as a non-roster depth option for the remainder of the year as he was a few days shy of the ability to reject the assignment while retaining his full salary. Chicago chose to grant the righty his release, however, and he returned to free agency late last month. Now, he’s on to New York to join a Mets club that is tied with Chicago for the best record in the National League. The Mets will try to recapture what made Merryweather so effective with the Cubs in 2023 while he gets to work at Triple-A Syracuse as a potential depth piece alongside arms like Justin Garza and Colin Poche.
Giants Outright Sam Huff
Catcher Sam Huff cleared waivers and was assigned outright to Triple-A Sacramento, according to a report from Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area. Huff had previously been designated for assignment by the club earlier this week.
Huff, 27, was a seventh-round pick by the Rangers back in 2016 who was a consensus top-100 prospect in baseball back in 2020 and 2021. He made his big league debut during the shortened 2020 season and looked utterly sensational in a ten-game sample, slashing .355/.394/.742 in his brief call-up to the majors that year. That strong start to Huff’s career combined with his prospect status to create huge expectations, but he was sidelined by injury for much of the 2021 season and posted pedestrian numbers at Double-A when he was healthy enough to play. He turned things around after arriving at Triple-A, however, and his .260/.336/.533 slash line at the level in 2022 was enough to earn him another shot in the majors.
The backstop was generally a solid but unspectacular hitter in the majors during both the 2022 and ’23 campaigns. He got into 65 games in total for the club those years, and across his 177 plate appearances he hit .244/.299/.409 with a 98 wRC+. That’s just 2% below league average, and slightly better than the average catcher slash line. Even so, Huff was never a particularly robust defender behind the plate, so as a bat-first catcher who was only league average he quickly fell behind other options on the Rangers depth chart like Jonah Heim. Even so, he continued to rake at Triple-A and showed enough offensive talent that the club continued to hold out hope for an eventual breakout.
Things took a turn for the worse in 2024, as Huff barely found use in the majors (appearing in just three games with four total plate appearances) and stopped hitting even at the Triple-A level. After years of raking for the organization’s Round Rock affiliate, Huff slashed just .246/.310/.416 in 111 games at Triple-A last year. That’s not a terrible slash line in a vacuum, but when one factors in both Huff’s status as a then-26-year-old at Triple-A and the inflated offensive environment of the Pacific Coast League, it’s easy to see that an 82 wRC+ at Triple-A wouldn’t cut it. With Huff out of options entering 2025, the Rangers gave up on their longtime prospect and designated him for assignment.
That led him to join the Giants, for whom he entered the season as the backup to defensive stalwart Patrick Bailey. Ultimately, Huff appeared in 20 games with San Francisco but hit just .208/.259/.340 with a wRC+ of 68 in 58 plate appearances. While he’s always been prone to swing and miss, Huff’s 43.1% strikeout rate in a Giants uniform was downright alarming. Given that lackluster performance, it’s hardly a shock that the Giants decided to go in another direction for their backup to Bailey. With that being said, the club clearly still valued Huff as a potential depth option behind the plate. He’ll return to Triple-A for the time being as a non-roster depth piece for the Giants, and if he goes through the end of the season without being added back to the 40-man roster he’ll be able to elect minor league free agency and hit the open market for the first time in his career.