Red Sox Acquire Pablo Reyes
The Red Sox have acquired infielder Pablo Reyes from Oakland in exchange for cash considerations, the A’s have announced. Reyes had signed with Oakland on a minor league deal this past offseason.
The 29-year-old Reyes has appeared in parts of four seasons since making his MLB debut with the Pirates in 2018. That year, he hit well in 18 games for the Pirates, slashing .293/.349/.483 with a wRC+ of 126. That showing earned him an expanded role with the club in 2019, though he ultimately struggled over 157 plate appearances with the club to a slash line of just .203/.274/.322 that led the club to designate him for assignment in January of 2020. The following month, Reyes was served an 80-game suspension for PEDs, causing him to miss the entire pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
Reyes latched on with the Brewers on a minor league deal ahead of the 2021 season, ultimately sticking with the club for two seasons. During that time, he slashed .258/.330/.344 with a wRC+ of 85 in 103 plate appearances before electing free agency after the 2022 season and signing with the A’s, for whom he did not appear in a major league game.
In addition to his time in the majors, Reyes has spent parts of 11 seasons in the minor leagues, including 1,265 plate appearances at Triple-A, which have resulted in a slash line of .274/.350/.419 at the highest minor league level. Much of Reyes’s value comes from his versatility, as the journeyman has appeared at every position on the diamond except for catcher.
Reyes figures to serve as infield depth in the upper minors for a Red Sox club that has struggled to keep players healthy in the middle infield this season. Infielders Trevor Story, Adalberto Mondesi, Yu Chang, Christian Arroyo, and center fielder Adam Duvall are all currently on the injured list after being penciled in for regular playing time up the middle for the Red Sox at one point or another.
Braves Sign Justus Sheffield To Minor League Deal
Left-hander Justus Sheffield has found a new organization, as the former top prospect has signed a minor league deal with the Braves, per the transaction tracker on his MLB.com profile page.
Sheffield, who will celebrate his 27th birthday tomorrow, was the 31st overall pick in the 2014 draft, taken by Cleveland in the first round. Sheffield was long a staple of top 100 prospect lists as he made his ascent throughout the minors, appearing on Baseball America’s top 100 list as early as 2016 before eventually climbing to the 27th spot on the ranking ahead of the 2019 season. In addition to his prospect pedigree, Sheffield was a headliner in multiple significant trades: the Yankees acquired him in the 2016 deadline trade that sent Andrew Miller to Cleveland before sending him to Seattle in the deal that brought James Paxton to the Bronx ahead of the 2019 campaign.
Unfortunately for both Sheffield and the Mariners, the dream of Sheffield anchoring the rotation for the next competitive team in Seattle was never realized. Sheffield struggled badly during the 2019 season, posting a 5.50 ERA with a 4.71 FIP in his first 36 innings with his new club. While he would see a stretch of success during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, with a solid 3.58 ERA and an excellent 3.17 FIP in ten starts, he was unable to carry that success over into the 2021 season. In 92 innings between 2021 and 2022, Sheffield struggled mightily to a 6.46 ERA, 37% below league average by measure of ERA+.
Those struggles led the Mariners to outright Sheffield to Triple-A during the offseason. Unfortunately, Sheffield’s struggles grew even deeper in the early going of the 2023 campaign. In 10 outings with Seattle’s Triple-A affiliate in Tacoma, the lefty surrendered 17 runs in just 8 1/3 innings while walking more batters (11) than he struck out (4). That lead the Mariners to pull the plug on their former top prospect at the end of April, releasing him to pursue opportunities in another organization.
Two weeks later, Sheffield has found a home in the Braves organization. Atlanta has seen its rotation ravaged by injuries in recent days, with both lefty Max Fried and right-hander Kyle Wright expected to miss significant time due to injury. That said, Sheffield figures to be below Michael Soroka, Dylan Dodd, and Jared Shuster on the organization depth chart at the very least, and has worked primarily out of the bullpen in recent years.
While Sheffield seems unlikely to provide the Braves useful rotation depth that can solve their current conundrum at the big league level, a minor league deal for a player with Sheffield’s prospect pedigree is rarely a bad decision, given the lack of risk associated with such a deal and the massive potential upside Sheffield showed as a youngster. While it would be a surprise to see Sheffield rebound to the heights he was expected to reach as a prospect, it’s certainly possible that a change of scenery from the organization Sheffield spent the past four seasons with will help him recapture some of the talent that made him such a tantalizing prospect earlier in his career.
Pirates Outright Chase De Jong
Pirates reliever Chase De Jong has cleared waivers and been sent outright to Triple-A Indianapolis, according to the transaction log at MLB.com. He’s gone unclaimed on waivers multiple times in his career, giving him the right to elect minor league free agency.
De Jong has spent parts of three seasons with Pittsburgh. He started nine games with middling results in 2021 but found more success upon moving to the bullpen last year. De Jong threw 71 2/3 innings over 42 appearances for the Bucs, compiling a 2.64 ERA. It was mostly low-leverage work and De Jong’s peripherals weren’t aligned with his strong run prevention.
The right-hander struck out a below-average 20.1% of batters faced while walking 10.2% of opponents. De Jong’s run prevention and ability to work multiple innings nevertheless secured his 40-man roster spot throughout the winter. The Bucs kept the out-of-options De Jong in their season-opening bullpen, but he lost his roster spot with a slow start. Through 9 1/3 frames, he’s allowed 11 runs on 13 hits and five walks. De Jong’s swinging strike rate fell from a serviceable 10.5% rate to a modest 5.2% clip.
De Jong will now decide whether to report to Indianapolis or scour the market for other opportunities. He’d likely be limited to minor league offers as a free agent but could look elsewhere for clearer paths back to the MLB roster and/or a potential opt-out date in a non-roster contract. De Jong has pitched parts of seven seasons in Triple-A, working to a 5.59 ERA with a 19.3% strikeout percentage over 211 innings.
Angels, Meibrys Viloria Agree To Minor League Deal
The Angels have agreed to a minor league contract with catcher Meibrys Viloria, according to the transactions log at MLB.com. He’s been assigned to Triple-A Salt Lake. It’s their second non-roster deal of the day, as they also added reliever Reyes Moronta this morning.
It’s a sensible depth addition for Los Angeles. The Halos have been dealt a serious of injuries to their catching core. Rookie Logan O’Hoppe had his blistering start cut short by a labrum tear in his shoulder last month. He’ll miss most or all of the season. Expected backup Max Stassi opened the season on the injured list with a hip strain. Sam Blum of the Athletic wrote yesterday that Stassi has been attending to a family emergency and is without a timetable for his return.
That left the Angels counting on Matt Thaiss as their starter. They selected veteran backstop Chad Wallach from Triple-A but quickly lost him to concussion-like symptoms. The Halos then tabbed Chris Okey — a career .208/.283/.333 Triple-A hitter — as Thaiss’ backup. It’s understandable they’d look to add a player with upper level experience to the organization.
Viloria, 26, has appeared in parts of five major league seasons between the Royals, Rangers and Guardians. He’s functioned in a depth capacity for the majority of that time, tallying 280 cumulative plate appearances. He’s just a .198/.270/.279 hitter against big league pitching, but he’s been quite a bit better in Triple-A. The lefty-swinging backstop owns a .257/.395/.412 line over 430 trips at the top minor league level.
The Guardians carried Viloria on the MLB roster as their third catcher to start the season. He barely played, hitting just four times in roughly a month before being designated for assignment. Upon clearing waivers last week, he elected minor league free agency and quickly finds a new opportunity. The Halos’ injuries figure to give him a good shot at returning to the MLB roster. Viloria is out of minor league options, so if he’s promoted at any point, the Angels will have to keep him in the majors or DFA him themselves.
According to the transaction log, the Angels also optioned veteran first baseman Jake Lamb to Salt Lake. As a player with over five years of major league service, Lamb would ordinarily have the right to decline any minor league assignment in favor of free agency. However, Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register reports (on Twitter) that Lamb had agreed to a 45-day window from the start of season in which the Halos could send him down without exposing him to waivers.
That would have closed this weekend, so the Angels decide to send him down. The lefty-hitting Lamb is hitting only .216/.259/.353 through 54 plate appearances. He’ll remain on the 40-man roster but moves into a depth capacity as the Angels near the return of Jared Walsh. The 2021 All-Star will begin a minor league rehab assignment this weekend as he works back from insomnia that delayed his start to the season.
Athletics Select Zach Neal, Place Mason Miller On IL With Forearm Tightness
4:10pm: The A’s announced Neal’s selection, along with the recall of right-hander Luis Medina. In corresponding moves, righty Rico Garcia was optioned to Triple-A Las Vegas while righty Mason Miller was placed on the 15-day injured list. Catcher Manny Piña was transferred to the 60-day injured list to make room on the 40-man for Neal. Matt Kawahara of the San Francisco Chronicle relays that Miller’s IL placement is due to right forearm tightness. Pina has been on the IL all year due to a lingering wrist issue and was recently pulled off his rehab after suffering a setback. He won’t be eligible to return until 60 days from the initial IL placement, which would be late May.
10:04am: The A’s are set to select the contract of righty Zach Neal prior to tonight’s game, reports Martin Gallegos of MLB.com (Twitter link). He’s expected to make a spot start tonight against Nathan Eovaldi and the Rangers. Neal inked a minor league deal with the Athletics last month.
It’ll be the second stint with Oakland for Neal, who also pitched there in 2016-17, logging a combined 4.89 ERA in 30 appearances (six starts). That accounts for the vast majority of Neal’s big league experience, though he also tossed one inning for the Dodgers in 2018. Overall, he carries a 4.94 ERA, 10.5% strikeout rate and 2% walk rate in 85 2/3 innings at the MLB level.
Now 34 years old, Neal hasn’t pitched in the Majors since that one-off appearance with the ’18 Dodgers. He spent the 2019-21 seasons with the Seibu Lions of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball, working to a combined 4.49 ERA with a 12.4% strikeout rate against a 5.6% walk rate. Neal logged a 2.87 ERA in 100 1/3 innings in his first year with the Lions but was north of 5.00 in his second and third seasons in Japan.
Neal spent the 2022 season with the Rockies’ Triple-A affiliate but was tagged for a 6.87 ERA in that hitter-friendly setting. He’s opened the 2023 campaign with similarly shaky results in another hitter-friendly setting, Las Vegas, allowing seven runs on eight hits and five walks with 11 punchouts in 11 1/3 innings (5.56 ERA).
The A’s have a full 40-man roster, so they’ll need to make a corresponding transaction to get Neal onto the roster. They’ve already turned over nearly their entire bullpen since the season began and could make yet another move there to accommodate Neal’s addition. Righty Zach Jackson and lefty Sam Moll are the only two members of Oakland’s Opening Day relief corps who are still currently in the bullpen.
Rangers Designate Ian Kennedy For Assignment
The Rangers announced that they have recalled left-hander John King from Triple-A Round Rock while right-hander Ian Kennedy has been designated for assignment in a corresponding move.
Kennedy, 38, spent many seasons as an effective starter for the Diamondbacks, Padres and Royals. He’s moved to a relief role in recent years with inconsistent results. He posted an ERA of 3.41 with the Royals in 2019 but saw that figure spike to 9.00 in the shortened 2020 season. He got back on track in 2021 with a 3.20 ERA between the Rangers and Phillies, then parlayed that into a $4.75MM deal with the Diamondbacks for 2022. That led to another downturn, however, as he had a 5.36 ERA with the Snakes last year.
With his recent seasons alternating between good and bad, it would have seemed superficially like Kennedy were due for a rebound this year. He returned to the Rangers on a minor league deal and cracked the Opening Day roster but has a 7.20 ERA through his first 11 outings and has now lost his roster spot in Texas.
Looking under the hood, things might not be quite as bad as that ERA seems. Kennedy has struck out 28.3% of batters faced against a 6.5% walk rate. He’s allowed a .357 batting average on balls in play and has a 36.8% strand rate, both of which are on the unlucky side of average, particularly the latter figure. The league averages for those stats this year are .295 and 71.6%. Advanced metrics feel Kennedy deserved much better, including his 3.21 FIP, 3.36 xERA and 3.22 SIERA.
The Rangers will now have a week to trade Kennedy or pass him through waivers. There will likely be clubs willing to overlook the 7.20 ERA in a small sample, especially with many teams around the league dealing with various injuries amid their respective pitching staffs. Though in the event Kennedy clears waivers, he has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment and elect free agency.
Franmil Reyes Elects Free Agency
The Royals announced Thursday that outfielder/designated hitter Franmil Reyes went unclaimed on outright waivers following his DFA earlier this week. He’s rejected an outright assignment from the team in favor of free agency. He can now sign with any club.
Reyes, 27, signed a minor league deal with the Royals back in February and made the team’s Opening Day roster. He slugged a pair of homers early in the season but fell into a swoon that saw him fail to reach base in 20 straight plate appearances. The Royals optioned him to Triple-A at that point, with Reyes toting an ugly .186/.231/.288 batting line and a 36.9% strikeout rate.
That marks a continuation of a downturn that began in 2022, when Reyes hit just .213/.254/.350 with a 37.1% strikeout rate in Cleveland before being placed on waivers and claimed by the Cubs. He improved slightly in Chicago, slashing .234/.301/.389, but it wasn’t enough for the Cubs to keep him the roster. He was outrighted off the 40-man, elected free agency, and eventually signed this deal with Kansas City.
Prior to that ugly 2022 campaign, the 6’5″ Reyes was a feared middle-of-the-order hitter. He’s turned in a pair of 30-homer campaigns in his career, including a career-high 37 big flies in 2019. From 2018-21, he took 1540 plate appearances and batted .260/.325/.503 with 92 home runs between San Diego and Cleveland. Strikeouts were an issue even then, as he fanned in 29.5% of his plate appearances, but he had enough power and drew enough walks (9%) that he was still a well-regarded offensive player (19% better than league-average, by measure of wRC+).
Reyes’ struggles in 2022-23 figure to make it tough for him to land a big league deal that’d place him right back on a 26-man roster, but a team searching for some right-handed power could certainly take a flier on a minor league pact and hope to get Reyes trending back toward that 2018-21 form.
Pirates, Ryan Borucki Agree To Minor League Deal
The Pirates and left-hander Ryan Borucki have agreed to a minor league deal, per the team’s transactions log at MLB.com. Borucki elected free agency earlier in the week after the Cubs passed him through waivers unclaimed.
Borucki, 29, has logged big league time in each of the past five seasons — the vast majority coming as a member of the Blue Jays. He posted a 3.87 ERA in 17 starts as a rookie back in 2018 but has pitched almost exclusively out of the bullpen since, due in large part to elbow surgery that wiped out most of his 2019 season. Since returning, the left-hander has posted a 4.66 ERA in 65 2/3 big league innings, fanning 22.3% of his opponents against a 12% walk rate.
Borucki opened the 2023 season with the Cubs’ top affiliate in Iowa, where he was roughed up for a dozen runs on 13 hits and six walks with 11 strikeouts in nine innings. In need of a fresh arm for the bullpen, the Cubs selected Borucki’s contract in late April, but he was designated for assignment before even getting into a game.
It’s been a tough few years for Borucki, but even when struggling to a 5.68 ERA in 25 1/3 innings between Toronto and Seattle in 2022, the southpaw averaged 95.1 mph on his sinker and posted a strong 12% swinging-strike rate. He’s moved away from his changeup and begun to rely primarily on his sinker and slider over the past two seasons, which has helped him up his ground-ball rate to a hefty 54.3% in that time.
The Bucs currently have lefty relievers Jarlin Garcia and Rob Zastryzny on the injured list. Garcia, notably, is on the 60-day and does not have a timetable for his return. Rule 5 pick Jose Hernandez has been the only left-handed option in manager Derek Shelton’s bullpen for the past couple weeks. Borucki won’t immediately be added to the mix, but he gives the Pirates an experienced option to take a look at in Triple-A.
Yankees Select Ryan Weber
The Yankees announced Thursday that they’ve selected the contract of right-hander Ryan Weber from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. Fellow righty Jonathan Loaisiga was transferred from the 15-day injured list to the 60-day IL in order to open a spot on the 40-man roster.
It’s a familiar story for Weber, who spent the 2022 season with the Yankees and was selected to the Major League roster on four different occasions. Because he’s out of minor league options, Weber was designated for assignment and passed through outright waivers each time, opting all four times to briefly elect free agency but immediately re-sign with the Yankees on a new minor league deal.
For all of last year’s trips through the DFA carousel, Weber only got into five games with the Yankees. He pitched quite well, holding opponents to one run in 10 2/3 innings of work over that quintet of appearances. He was also sharp in Triple-A, sporting a 3.86 ERA in 39 2/3 frames for the RailRiders in 2022.
The 2023 season hasn’t begun as well for Weber. He’s made seven starts and compiled 34 1/3 innings with an ugly 5.77 ERA to show for it. He’s picked up the pace over his past four turns, however, yielding 10 runs through 22 2/3 frames (3.97 ERA) with a 13-to-3 K/BB ratio. Weber has never missed many bats, but he possesses good command and regularly posts above-average ground-ball rates — which has also been the case in these season’s handful of starts with Scranton.
The Yankees don’t need a starter in the next few days, but they’ve relied heavily on their bullpen this week. Weber will give them some length in the event of another high-scoring game. Last year’s usage of Weber tells us that this could be another brief stay on the roster, but Weber and the Yankees clearly have a good working relationship, so even if he’s designated for assignment in the near future, there’s a good chance he’d just wind up back in Scranton, be it via accepting an outright assignment or electing free agency and re-upping on a new minor league pact.
Angels, Reyes Moronta Agree To Minor League Deal
The Angels have agreed to a minor league contract with right-hander Reyes Moronta, MLBTR has learned. The 30-year-old righty had been in spring training with the Rangers but signed with the Mexican League’s Diablos Rojos after being cut loose by Texas. He posted a 2.35 ERA with a 13-to-5 K/BB ratio in 7 2/3 innings there before being picked up by the Halos.
Moronta was a high-end setup man for the Giants from 2017-19, pitching to a combined 2.66 ERA with a 29.8% strikeout rate and a fastball that averaged 97.1 mph over the life of 128 1/3 innings. Command was an issue for the big righty, evidenced by a 13.6% walk rate in that time, but his ability to miss bats still helped him move from lower-leverage spots into a position that allowed him to pick up a save and 27 holds during that time.
Shoulder surgery ended Moronta’s 2019 season a few weeks early and wiped out nearly all of his 2020-21 seasons, however. He returned to toss four innings with the Giants in 2021, allowing just one run in that time but also sporting a fastball that clocked it at an average of 94.3 mph — a nearly three mile-per-hour drop. The Giants removed him from the 40-man roster in September, and Moronta cleared outright waivers and subsequently elected free agency at season’s end.
The Dodgers signed Moronta to a minor league deal once the 2021-22 lockout was lifted, and less than three weeks into the season he’d made it up to their big league bullpen. He spent the next couple months as an up-and-down arm in L.A. before ultimately being designated for assignment and claimed off waivers by the D-backs. Overall, his 2022 campaign ended with 37 2/3 frames of 4.30 ERA ball, a 23.6% strikeout rate and an 11.2% walk rate. Moronta regained a bit of life on his heater, but last year’s 95.3 mph average was still a ways off from its peak levels.
The Angels have already lost Jose Quijada and Austin Warren to Tommy John surgery, and they’re also currently without veteran lefty Aaron Loup, who’s on the IL with a hamstring strain. They may also have to dip into their bullpen to stretch out Chase Silseth as a starter, with Jose Suarez on the shelf due to a shoulder strain.
Angels relievers still rank sixth in the Majors with a combined 3.24 ERA, but the group isn’t as deep as it was to begin the season. Adding Moronta, who has a career 3.02 ERA and 28.1% strikeout rate, to see if he can recapture some of his pre-surgery form makes for a sensible depth option.