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Roenis Elías Signs With KBO’s SSG Landers

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The SSG Landers of the KBO League announced that they have signed left-hander Roenis Elías, hat tip to Dan Kurtz of MyKBO.net. Elías will take the roster spot of fellow lefty Enny Romero and make a salary of $540K. Jeeho Yoo of Yonhap News had previously reported that these moves were close.

Elias, 34, has made 133 major league appearances dating back to the 2014 season, spending time with the Mariners, Red Sox and Nationals. He has a 3.96 ERA in 395 2/3 career innings, striking out 19.6% of batters faced, walking 9% and getting grounders at a 42% clip.

The lefty signed a minor league deal with the Cubs this winter but didn’t make the club out of camp. He made four starts in Triple-A this year, posting a 5.48 ERA, but will now get a chance to test himself overseas, earning a larger salary than he would have garnered if he stayed in the minors.

He’ll take the place of Romero, who signed with the Landers back in December. However, he injured his shoulder back in March, per Kurtz, and hasn’t pitched in an official game yet this season. KBO teams can only carry two foreign pitchers on their roster and the Landers have one spot taken by Kirk McCarty. Romero’s unfortunate injury will open the door for Elías to get an opportunity.

Nationals Sign José Ureña To Minor League Deal

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The Nationals have signed right-hander Jose Ureña to a minor league deal, per Bobby Blanco of MASNsports.com, relaying word from the Triple-A Rochester Red Wings.

Ureña, 31, was signed by the Rockies this winter, securing himself a $3.5MM guarantee in the form of a $3MM salary for this year and a $500K buyout on a $4MM club option for 2024. Unfortunately, he was torched for a 9.82 ERA in his first five starts, getting designated for assignment and then released. The Rockies will still be on the hook for the majority of that money. If Ureña eventually earns his way onto the Nats’ roster, they will only have to pay him the prorated league minimum, with that amount being subtracted from what the Rockies dish out.

The righty has some good seasons on his ledger, but they are a bit in the rearview mirror now. He posted an ERA under 4.00 with the Marlins in both 2017 and 2018 but has seen it finish north of 5.00 in each season since then. He’s bounced from the Marlins to the Tigers, Brewers and Rockies in that time. For his career, he has a 4.92 ERA, 15.4% strikeout rate, 8.7% walk rate and 48.1% ground ball rate.

The Nationals have a bit of rotation uncertainty right now, with Stephen Strasburg on the injured list with no return in sight, Cade Cavalli set to miss the entire season due to Tommy John surgery and Chad Kuhl recently hitting the IL due to a toe injury. That’s left them with a rotation consisting of Josiah Gray, MacKenzie Gore, Patrick Corbin, Trevor Williams and Jake Irvin. Gray, Gore and Williams are posting good results so far but Corbin has a 5.74 ERA and hasn’t been below 5.00 in a full season since 2019. Irvin is just making his major league debut tonight.

Ureña will head to Rochester to try to get into a good groove and perhaps get himself in line to get called the next time the club needs a starter. The Nats also have depth options on the 40-man roster in Cory Abbott, Paolo Espino and Joan Adon.

Athletics Recall JJ Bleday

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The Athletics announced today that outfielder JJ Bleday has been recalled from Triple-A Las Vegas, with fellow outfielder Conner Capel optioned to Vegas in a corresponding move. Bleday is in tonight’s lineup, batting fifth and playing left field.

This will be the first appearance as an Athletic for Bleday, who came over from the Marlins this winter in a one-for-one trade with A.J. Puk going the other way. The fourth overall selection of the 2019 draft, Bleday has been considered one of the top prospects in the league but has had an inconsistent professional career thus far. He struggled in Double-A in 2021 but hit well enough in Triple-A last year to get a 65-game audition in the big leagues. He walked in 12.6% of his plate appearances in the majors but also struck out 28.2% of the time and slashed .167/.277/.309 for a wRC+ of 72.

The Marlins decided to move on from him and flipped him for Puk, but Bleday is making some noise so far this year. In 119 plate appearances in Triple-A, he’s walked more than he’s struck out, a 16.8% rate of free passes compared to just a 12.6% clip for the punchouts. His .316/.429/.643 batting line needs to be taken with a grain of salt because he’s playing in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League, but it’s still 50% above league average, as shown by his 150 wRC+.

Bleday will now see if he can fare better against major league pitchers this year than he did last year. If he’s able to play well enough to stick around, it could have ramifications on the business side of things. Bleday earned 75 days of service time with the Marlins last year, meaning he’s 97 shy of the 172 that are required to get to the one-year mark. With about five months left in the season, there’s still a chance for him to get over the line and be on track for arbitration after 2025 and free agency after 2028. However, future optional assignments could push those targets back.

If Bleday does hit the ground running and emerge as a key piece for the A’s, it doesn’t currently seem like the Marlins will have too much regret. Puk has been absolutely lights out so far this year, posting a 0.75 ERA through 12 innings pitched, striking out 27.1% of batters faced while walking just 4.2%. That performance seems to have vaulted him into the closer’s seat, as he’s racked up five saves on the year so far.

Turning back to Bleday, he’ll jump into the outfield mix in Oakland next to some other players looking to prove themselves. Rookie Esteury Ruiz is getting most of the playing time in center while Ramón Laureano is the regular in right, looking to get back into a groove after his PED suspension and shaky return last year. Brent Rooker is also in the mix, having a tremendous season at the plate thus far, but has been frequently in the designated hitter slot of late.

Cubs Trade Luis Torrens To Orioles

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The Orioles have acquired catcher Luis Torrens from the Cubs in exchange for cash, per a team announcement. Right-hander Joey Krehbiel was designated for assignment in order to open a spot on the 40-man roster.

Torrens, 26, signed a minor league deal with the Cubs in the offseason. He appeared in 13 games for them this season but tallied only 22 plate appearances, going 5-for-20 with a double, a walk and eight strikeouts in that time (.250/.318/.300).

Prior to that brief run in Chicago, Torrens spent two years with the Mariners after coming over alongside Ty France and Andres Munoz in the trade sending Austin Nola, Austin Adams and Dan Altavilla to the Padres. In 799 Major League plate appearances, he’s a .227/.289/.352 hitter with 19 long balls, a 26% strikeout rate and a 7.8% walk rate. While he wasn’t especially productive in his time with Seattle, he did make a fair bit of hard contact, averaging 91 mph off the bat and putting 45.7% of his batted balls in play at an exit velocity of at least 95 mph.

Defensively, Torrens has drawn below-average grades from Defensive Runs Saved and most pitch-framing metrics. He has a career 21.7% caught-stealing rate that’s below the league average, and he came up empty in his only attempt to throw a runner out with the Cubs. He did throw out nine of 28 attempted thieves (32.1%) as recently as last season.

Torrens is out of minor league options, so the Orioles will carry him on the big league roster. That’ll give them three catching options, as he’ll join 2022 Rookie of the Year runner-up Adley Rutschman and veteran James McCann on Baltimore’s roster.

Krehbiel, 30, hasn’t pitched in the Majors this season but logged 57 2/3 innings out of Baltimore’s bullpen in 2022, notching a solid 3.90 ERA with a below-average 18.4% strikeout rate but a sharp 7.4% walk rate. Overall, her has a 3.78 ERA in 69 Major League frames between the D-backs, Rays and O’s.

The 2023 season has been rough for Krehbiel, however. While he’s sporting a 2.00 ERA in nine Triple-A frames, he’s also walked more batters (seven) than he’s struck out (six) and has plunked another hitter. That’s nearly 22% of Krehbiel’s opponents that have either drawn a free pass or reached via hit-by-pitch. Even beyond those command woes, Krehbiel’s broader numbers in Triple-A (5.34 ERA in 175 1/3 innings) are actually worse than his big league output.

The Orioles will have a week to trade Krehbiel or attempt to pass him through outright waivers. He’s been outrighted once before, so even if he goes unclaimed, he’d have the right to elect free agency if he chooses.

Royals Select Austin Cox

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The Royals announced Wednesday that they’ve selected the contract of left-hander Austin Cox from Triple-A Omaha. Righty Jose Cuas was optioned to Omaha to open a spot on the active roster, and southpaw Kris Bubic was transferred from the 15-day IL to the 60-day IL to clear space on the 40-man roster.

Cox, 26, was Kansas City’s fifth-round pick out of Mercer University back in 2018. He’s opened the season with 20 1/3 innings of 2.21 ERA ball but a 22-to-11 K/BB ratio in Omaha. Cox is currently sporting a career-best 53.5% ground-ball rate in this year’s small sample of innings — a stark increase from the 37.5% mark he posted in 147 2/3 innings of Triple-A ball in 2022. Last season, Cox worked to a 4.21 ERA in Omaha, fanning just 16.2% of opponents but posting a strong 7.7% walk rate.

During the Royals’ most recent rebuilding effort, they spent a couple years putting an emphasis on college pitchers early in the draft, and Cox is a product of that strategy. It hasn’t panned out yet for Kansas City, however, as they’ve yet to produce a reliable big league starter from the experiment. Brady Singer certainly looked to be that during a breakout 2022 season, but he’s been torched for 28 earned runs in 29 2/3 innings this season. Other notable college draftees include Bubic, Daniel Lynch, Jackson Kowar, Asa Lacy, Alec Marsh, Grant Gambrell and Jonathan Bowlan, among others, but the development on that group simply hasn’t gone as hoped, whether due to injury or poor performance.

The Royals didn’t announce Cox as a starter for any of their upcoming games, so he could well head to the bullpen for his initial MLB assignment. That said, Kansas City starting pitchers have combined for a ghastly 5.80 ERA on the season, so there ought to be ample opportunity for Cox to eventually break into the group. Brad Keller and the injured Bubic —  who’ll miss the rest of the season following Tommy John surgery — are the only Royals starters with ERAs under 6.00. Zack Greinke (6.10), Jordan Lyles (6.11), Singer (8.49) and Ryan Yarbrough (7.40) have all struggled enormously to begin the year.

Rays Place Pete Fairbanks On Injured List, Select Chase Anderson

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The Rays have placed right-hander Pete Fairbanks on the 15-day injured list due to inflammation in his right forearm and selected the contract of veteran righty Chase Anderson, whom they acquired from the Reds in exchange for cash earlier this morning. Right-hander Zack Burdi was designated for assignment in order to open a spot on the 40-man roster for Anderson.

Fairbanks has been unavailable for the past couple of days due to symptoms of Raynaud’s disease, which can trigger circulatory issues and slow bloodflow. That’s presented itself in the form of numbness in Fairbanks’ fingers. However, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times tweets that the forearm injury is not related to those symptoms but rather has been something that’s bothered Fairbanks on and off this season. Fairbanks tells Topkin he expects to return after a minimal stay on the injured list.

While Fairbanks hasn’t allowed an earned run in 7 2/3 innings this season, he hasn’t been nearly as dominant as he was in 2022, when he averaged 99.2 mph on his heater and fanned 43.7% of his opponents against a brilliant 3.4% walk rate. We’re looking at a much smaller sample in 2023, of course, but Fairbanks’ velocity is “down” to an average of 98 mph, and he’s sporting just a 19.4% strikeout rate against an ugly 12.9% walk rate. The Rays will hope that some downtime can get him closer to his ’22 form sooner than later.

Anderson, 35, was with the Rays’ Triple-A club last year but didn’t pitch for the big league squad. He opened the year with a 4.30 ERA in 23 innings for Cincinnati’s Triple-A club in Louisville, though his 19-to-13 K/BB ratio is obviously troublesome. Anderson had an opt-out clause in his minor league deal with the Reds that he’d either already exercised — giving the Reds 48 hours to add him to the active roster or release him — or planned to exercise. The Reds clearly didn’t want to displace anyone from their roster to bring Anderson back to the big leagues, but the Rays saw him differently.

It’s possible it’ll be a brief stint with Tampa Bay for Anderson, just was it was for Burdi and for veteran reliever Heath Hembree before him. The Rays have been regularly cycling names through the final spot of their bullpen in an effort to have as many fresh arms as possible available to complement their core relievers. With nearly eight years of MLB service time under his belt, Anderson brings plenty of experience to the table. He’s struggled mightily since 2020 but from 2014-19 was a solid fourth starter with Arizona and Milwaukee, pitching to a 3.94 ERA in 857 innings.

Burdi, 28, is a former first-round pick whose career has been derailed by injuries, most notably Tommy John surgery in 2018 and a torn patellar tendon in 2019. The former Louisville standout has been tagged for 15 earned runs in just 20 1/3 Major League frames.

That includes a sharp couple outings with the Rays during this most recent stint. He fired three shutout innings, allowing just one hit and one walk with four punchouts. That wasn’t enough to keep him on the roster for a larger look, however.

In Triple-A, Burdi carries a 4.81 ERA in 86 career innings. He’s fanned 32.5% of his opponents at the top minor league level, thanks in part to a blistering fastball, but he’s also issued walks at an untenable 13.5% clip. The Rays will have a week to trade him or attempt to pass him through outright waivers.

Marlins Designate Johan Quezada, Select Devin Smeltzer

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The Marlins announced a handful of roster moves Wednesday, designating righty Johan Quezada for assignment and selecting the contract of lefty Devin Smeltzer (who’d cleared outright waivers earlier today) in his place. Miami also placed first baseman Garrett Cooper on the injured list due to an inner ear infection and recalled outfielder Peyton Burdick from Triple-A.

The Quezada/Smeltzer swap is a swift reversal of the Marlins’ transaction earlier this week, wherein Smeltzer was designated for assignment and Quezada was selected from Triple-A. Quezada was tagged for three runs and issued five walks in just two-thirds of an inning during his lone appearance before the DFA. Smeltzer, meanwhile, would’ve had the right to reject that outright assignment, but the promise of an immediate call back to the big leagues surely made it easy for him to accept and remain with the organization.

The 27-year-old Smeltzer posted a 6.75 ERA in 12 innings with the Marlins prior to his DFA, though the bulk of that damage came in one mop-up relief outing. He’s tossed seven innings of one-run ball prior to his initial removal from the 40-man roster and carries an overall 4.20 ERA in 152 career innings at the MLB level, most of which came with the Twins. He’s never missed many bats (career 16.4% strikeout rate) but has good command (6.4% walk rate) and has worked as both a starter and reliever in his career.

Cooper, 32, got out to a productive start but has slumped of late. He’s still hitting a respectable .272/.306/.413 on the season, but that’s a ways off the quietly strong .274/.350/.444 he’s turned in over the past four seasons. Cooper’s production at the plate would surely garner more attention if he were able to stay in the lineup with a greater degree of regularity, but trips to the injured list are nothing new for him. Just dating back to the 2021 season, he’s missed time due to a broken finger, a concussion, an elbow sprain, a lumbar strain and a wrist injury. Since 2019, he’s played in just 61.6% of the Marlins’ total games.

Burdick made his big league debut last year but struggled, batting .207/.284/.380 in his first 102 big league plate appearances. The 26-year-old is on a blistering hot streak in Triple-A Jacksonville, however, hitting .293/.381/.636 overall and an even gaudier .365/.429/.810 with eight homers over his past 15 games. For a Marlins club that could badly use some more offensive production — particularly in right field, where Avisail Garcia has again struggled — it’s worth finding out if he can carry any of that over to the big league level.

Diamondbacks Designate Seth Beer For Assignment

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The D-backs announced Wednesday that they’ve designated first baseman/designated hitter Seth Beer for assignment. His spot on the 40-man roster will go to top pitching prospect Brandon Pfaadt, whose previously reported promotion has now been formally announced by the team. Righty Peter Solomon was optioned to Triple-A Reno to clear a spot for Pfaadt on the 26-man roster. Pfaadt will make his MLB debut and start today’s game for Arizona.

Beer, 26, was acquired from the Astros alongside Josh Rojas, Corbin Martin and J.B. Bukauskas in the 2019 deadline trade that sent Zack Greinke to Houston. He’s seen brief MLB time in the past two seasons but posted a .208/.294/.292 batting line in a total of 136 plate appearances.

Broadly speaking, Beer has a much more productive track record in Triple-A, where he’s batted .260/.370/.460 with 32 home runs, 55 doubles, an 18.2% strikeout rate and a 9.7% walk rate in 916 trips to the plate. That said, the year-to-year breakdown of Beer’s Triple-A production is less encouraging. After posting a strong .287/.398/.511 batting line there in 2021 (128 wRC+), his numbers dipped to about league-average in 2022 and have fallen all the way to a .200/.266/.314 slash in 79 plate appearances to begin the current season.

Beer, the No. 28 overall pick in the 2018 draft, was always viewed as a bat-first prospect who’d need to hit at a very high level to justify his lack of speed and defensive upside. He did that up through the 2021 season, but the past two years have brought about a downturn. That said, he still has a minor league option remaining beyond the current season, so a team in need of a left-handed bat with some power potential could view the 26-year-old as an intriguing buy-low candidate. The D-backs will have a week to trade Beer or attempt to pass him through outright waivers. If he were to go unclaimed, he wouldn’t have the ability to decline the assignment, as he has neither three years of MLB service nor a prior outright assignment in his career.

Dodgers Select Gavin Stone, Option Alex Vesia

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May 3: The Dodgers have formally selected Stone’s contract, per a team announcement. He brings their 40-man roster up to a count of 39 players. Lefty Alex Vesia was optioned to Triple-A Oklahoma City in order to open a spot on the active roster.

Vesia has been hit hard in 13 appearances this season, yielding a 7.84 ERA in 10 1/3 innings with a 25.4% strikeout rate that’s better than league-average but vastly worse than the 34% he posted in 2021-22. Vesia’s average fastball velocity has held steady at 94.2 mph, but he’s giving up more hard contact than he ever has with the Dodgers; after yielding an 87.2 mph average exit velocity and 34.6% hard-hit rate in 2021-22, he’s at 91 mph and 44.7% so far in the young 2023 season.

April 30: According to MLB.com’s Juan Toribio, the Dodgers are planning on selecting the contract of right-hander Gavin Stone to start Wednesday’s game against the Phillies. Stone is not currently on the 40-man roster, and so a corresponding move will be required to clear space for the youngster.

Stone, 24, is ranked 49th on MLB Pipeline’s top 100 prospect list, 60th over at Fangraphs, and 51st at Baseball America. A fifth round pick from the 2020 draft by the Dodgers, Stone broke out in a big way last season with a 1.48 ERA in 121 2/3 innings of work that saw him strike out 33.8% of batters faced alongside a solid 8.9% walk rate.

That performance saw Stone get promoted twice, with just 25 innings at High-A before moving to the upper minors. After a 23 1/3 inning stint at Triple-A to close out the 2022 season, Stone impressed in spring training with 14 strikeouts in just 6 2/3 innings, but struggled to open the 2023 season when he returned to Triple-A, allowing six runs while recording just eight outs in his season debut. He’s posted a 2.86 ERA in 22 innings since that blowup outing, however, showing more than enough talent to justify a start in the big leagues.

It’s not currently clear if Stone’s call to the majors will last beyond Wednesday’s start. The Dodgers currently sport a five man rotation of Clayton Kershaw, Julio Urias, Tony Gonsolin, Dustin May, and Noah Syndergaard. With no one in that group currently known to be injured, it’s possible that, should Stone stick in the rotation, LA opts to use a six-man rotation for awhile.

That being said, Syndergaard has struggled mightily to a 6.58 ERA over five starts to this point in the season. That ugly top-level run prevention number is supported by a 5.06 FIP, a well-below average 18.3% strikeout rate, and a groundball rate of just 37.2%. Given his struggles, it’s possible that Stone could replace Syndergaard in the rotation if the youngster excels and the 30-year-old right-hander continues to struggle.

In heading to the majors on Wednesday, Stone joins a youth movement in LA that has seen both infielder Miguel Vargas and outfielder James Outman in the lineup on a regular basis and Michael Grove take four starts to open the season before heading to the injured list with a groin strain. 24-year-old right-hander Ryan Pepiot was meant to break camp with the club as well, but suffered an oblique strain at the end of the spring that has sidelined him to this point in the season.

Even with Stone now poised to reach the big leagues, the Dodgers still have multiple top prospects who could make their major league debuts sometime this year, including right-hander Bobby Miller, outfielder Andy Pages, and catcher Diego Cartaya.

Rays Acquire Chase Anderson

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10:20am: The Rays announced that they’ve acquired Anderson from the Reds in exchange for cash.

7:52am: The Rays have reportedly acquired right-hander Chase Anderson from the Reds, according to the New York Post’s Jon Heyman. The return headed the Reds’ way is not currently known, though it’s unlikely to be substantial.

Anderson, 35, is a veteran of nine MLB seasons who has yet to make his 2023 debut in the majors. For the first six seasons of his career, Anderson was more or less a solid back-end start in the majors with a 3.94 ERA (106 ERA+) and 4.54 FIP along with a 20.2% strikeout rate and 7.8% walk rate in 857 innings of work. A propensity for giving up homers has limited Anderson’s production throughout his career, with 12.8% of his fly balls leaving the yard over the first six seasons of his career. That rate was above 10% in each of those years except for 2017, which was unsurprisingly a career year for Anderson where he pitched to a phenomenal 2.74 ERA that was 60% better than league average by measure of ERA+.

In the years following that stretch, however, Anderson has struggled badly. In 105 2/3 innings of work, Anderson has posted a 6.81 ERA (64 ERA+) and 5.78 FIP over 105 2/3 innings for the Blue Jays, Phillies, and Reds. During these three seasons, Anderson’s strikeout rate has stayed roughly the same (20.3%). While  his walk rate has ticked up slightly (9.5%), the main culprit of Anderson’s struggles has been the long ball once again, as Anderson has watched an astounding 19.2% of his fly balls result in home runs.

Anderson re-signed in Cincinnati on a minor league deal back in February and competed for a spot on the big league roster during Spring Training, but was ultimately re-assigned to minor league camp. Anderson has posted a decent 4.30 ERA in his 23 innings of work at Triple-A this year. As an Article XX(B) free agent, Anderson had the right to opt-out of his deal with the Reds on Monday.

Despite their phenomenal 24-6 record, the Rays have struggled to field a full rotation in the early going this season after weathering injuries to Jeffrey Springs and Tyler Glasnow. Anderson, should he pitch in the majors for the Rays, seems likely to fill a bulk role alongside the likes of Yonny Chirinos and Josh Fleming as the Rays mix and match options behind Shane McClanahan, Drew Rasmussen, and Zach Eflin. The Rays, of course, have a long track record of helping struggling arms on the fringe of the majors establish themselves and maximize their performance. They’ll surely try to do the same with Anderson, given not only his previously demonstrated ability to be a serviceable back-end rotation member, but the flash of potential beyond that he showed in 2017.

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