Headlines

Go To Pro Hockey Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

Transactions

Twins Acquire Isiah Kiner-Falefa For Mitch Garver

By | at

The Twins and Rangers are in agreement on a deal that will send infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa to Minnesota, reports Jeff Passan of ESPN. Kiner-Falefa and a prospect will head to Minnesota in exchange for catcher Mitch Garver, per Jon Heyman of MLB Network. Pitcher Ronny Henriquez is the prospect heading to Minnesota in the deal, per Betsy Helfand of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press.

For the Rangers, this is yet another headline-grabbing move in what has been a very busy offseason for the club. Prior to the lockout, they threw around big money to add various players, with the two biggest names being shortstop Corey Seager and second baseman Marcus Semien. The addition of those two infielders, along with the impending arrival of prospect Josh Jung, led to immediate speculation that Kiner-Falefa could be a trade candidate. But when Jung underwent shoulder surgery last month, that seemed to swing the pendulum towards Texas keeping Kiner-Falefa as their everyday third baseman. However, that has now proven not to be the case, as he is headed for Minnesota.

The Twins had Andrelton Simmons as their primary shortstop last year. Despite showing the defensive skills he has long been known for, Simmons had a dismal year at the plate, hitting .223/.283/.274, wRC+ of 56. Yesterday, he signed with the Cubs for a modest $4MM salary, showing that the Twins weren’t terribly motivated to bring him back into the fold. With Kiner-Falefa, they’ve brought in a player with a similar profile to Simmons, but more reasons to be optimistic about his future performance. Like Simmons, Kiner-Falefa is a glove-first player, winning a Gold Glove in 2020 and finishing third among MLB shortstops in the Fielding Bible’s voting this past season. His bat has been below average thus far in his career, having never put up a wRC+ higher than 94. However, he’s still relatively young, turning 27 later this month, compared to the 32-year-old Simmons. He also hit .271/.312/.357 last year for a wRC+ of 85, not great numbers but certainly better than what Simmons provided. He’s also projected for an arbitration salary of $4.9MM, per MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz, and comes with an extra year of control beyond that.

But in order to make that solid addition to their infield, the Twins have had to send a valuable player the other way. Garver had a tremendous breakout season in 2019, hitting .273/.365/.630, wRC+ of 155. That would be exceptional production for any player but was especially impressive for a catcher. Injuries limited him to just 23 games of anemic production in the shortened 2020 season, but he bounced back well last year. Despite still dealing with injuries and only playing 68 games, his 2021 line was .256/.358/.517, wRC+ of 137. Last year, the Rangers split the catching duties almost evenly between Jose Trevino and Jonah Heim, who put up wRC+ tallies of 60 and 64, respectively. Garver is capable of producing at a much higher rate, but comes with concerns given the injuries of the past few years, making him a high-risk, high-reward option for Texas. He won’t be a huge risk from a financial standpoint, however, as he’s projected for an arbitration salary of $3.1MM this year, with another year of control remaining after that.

The reason the Twins could afford to part with such a talented catcher as Garver was the emergence of Ryan Jeffers. Making his MLB debut in 2020, he played 26 games and hit .273/.355/.436, wRC+ of 120. In 2021, he got off to a rough start, hitting .147/.216/.176 before getting demoted at the end of April. After showing signs of improvement in Triple-A, he was recalled in June and hit .206/.277/.433 the rest of the way, good enough for a wRC+ of 92. Although that’s clearly a drop-off from Garver’s numbers, Jeffers is turning 25 years old in June and comes with five remaining years of control. The Twins clearly felt that it was worth taking the chance on the younger player as their regular catcher in order to upgrade their infield.

Of course, that’s not all the Twins added, as they also brought Ronny Henriquez over in the deal. The 21-year-old right-hander split last season between High-A and Double-A, making 16 starts in 21 total games. In 93 2/3 innings, his 4.71 ERA wasn’t especially impressive, but the Twins were surely intrigued by his 27.1% strikeout rate and 6.5% walk rate, both of those being better than average. The club certainly needs arms after losing Jose Berrios to trade, Kenta Maeda to injury and Michael Pineda to free agency. Henriquez likely won’t provide immediate help in that regard, given that he’s never pitched above Double-A, but he could potentially be a factor later in the season.

Circling back to the Rangers, with Kiner-Falefa out of the picture and Jung on the shelf for around six months, they will have to decide what do about third base for this season. In-house options include Andy Ibanez, Nick Solak, Yonny Hernandez and Sherten Apostel. They could also turn their attention towards outside addition, although a tweet from Jeff Wilson casts doubt about a pursuit of Kris Bryant.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Nationals To Sign Steve Cishek

By | at

The Nationals have agreed to a one-year contract with Steve Cishek, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. The contract comes with a $1.75MM guarantee, along with $500K in performance bonuses, per Mark Feinsand of MLB.com.

Signing a veteran like Cishek, who will turn 36 in June, is a fairly logical move for a club that underwent a massive fire sale at last year’s deadline. While the headliners of that selloff were Max Scherzer and Trea Turner, the bullpen also took a hit with the deals of Daniel Hudson and Brad Hand. That left the club with a reliever corps that largely consisted of unproven players with limited big league experience, with the exception of Will Harris. However, Harris turns 38 in August and only threw six innings last year before surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome ended his season, making him a question mark in his own right.

In contrast to that lack of reliability, Cishek has been remarkably consistent in his career. In each season since 2011, he has thrown at least 44 innings, with the exception of the shortened 2020 season, where he still logged 20 frames. Since his debut in 2010, he’s appeared in a total of 668 games, notching 644 1/3 innings with an ERA of 2.85, strikeout rate of 24.7%, walk rate of 9.6% and groundball rate of 49%. With the exception of 2020, he’s never had an ERA higher than 3.58 in a season.

Last year, Cishek signed a one-year deal with the Angels late in March for a salary of $1MM. He ended up making 74 appearances for the Halos, logging 68 1/3 innings with an ERA of 3.42, strikeout rate of 20.8% and walk rate of 13.3%. That walk rate was the worst of his career, and the strikeout rate just a hair above his previous career lows. That could perhaps be cause for some concern, but the Nationals still game him a modest raise on last year’s salary.

For a team that wiped millions from its books at the trade deadline last year, it’s still an incredible modest sum with little downside. If Cishek has yet another season like he’s had for the majority of his career, he could act as a stabilizing force on a pitching staff with high variance and perhaps be dealt to a contender at the deadline, as the team looks to bolster its farm and reload for their next competitive window.

Blue Jays To Sign Andrew Vasquez To Major League Deal

By | at

The Blue Jays are signing reliever Andrew Vasquez to a major league contract, reports Shi Davidi of Sportsnet (on Twitter). The southpaw has made twelve big league appearances spread across three seasons, including two outings with the Dodgers late last year.

It’s a bit of a surprise to see Vasquez land a guaranteed 40-man roster spot given his limited MLB track record. He’s tossed just 6 2/3 career innings at the highest level, five of them coming with the 2018 Twins. Yet the 28-year-old impressed a couple teams with a huge showing in Triple-A last season. Vasquez spent the bulk of the season with the Twins’ top affiliate in St. Paul, working to a 3.61 ERA over 42 2/3 innings. More importantly, he struck out an elite 37.4% of batters faced at that level.

The Dodgers were impressed enough with Vasquez’s form to acquire him late on the night of August 31. (Vasquez, who hadn’t been on the Twins’ 40-man roster all season, was eligible to be moved after the MLB trade deadline). That was just before the deadline for teams to add players to their organization in order for them to be eligible for the postseason roster, and L.A. quickly selected the UC Santa Barbara product onto their 40-man roster. They didn’t wind up activating him for any playoff contests, though, and Los Angeles non-tendered him last November.

In his two-game MLB cameo last season, Vasquez threw almost exclusively low-80s curveballs (26 curves, one sinker). He probably won’t continue with an approach quite so extreme over a larger body of work, but it seems the Jays’ front office is intrigued by that bread-and-butter offering. Tim Mayza, Ryan Borucki, Kirby Snead and Tayler Saucedo are among the left-handed bullpen options already on the Toronto 40-man roster. Vasquez still has a minor league option year remaining, though, so the Jays can shuttle him between Toronto and Triple-A Buffalo next season if he sticks on their 40-man all year.

Rangers, Brandon Workman Agree To Minor League Deal

By | at

The Rangers are signing reliever Brandon Workman to a minor league contract, reports Robert Murray of FanSided (Twitter link). Presumably, the 33-year-old will get a look in big league camp.

Workman, a UT-Austin product, has seven years of big league experience to his name. He worked in a swing capacity with the Red Sox from 2013-14, but he lost most of the following two seasons recovering from Tommy John surgery. Upon returning from that procedure in 2017, Workman moved full-time into relief and found a fair amount of success.

The right-hander worked at least 39 innings with an ERA below 3.30 in every season from 2017-19. He was an utterly dominant late-game option in 2019, when he pitched to a 1.88 ERA in 71 2/3 frames and saved 16 games. Few pitchers could match the combination of strikeouts (36.4%) and grounders (51.1%) Workman put up that season, although he did walk a fine line with his control (15.7% walk percentage).

Workman had been a capable strike-thrower for his career until 2019. But he’s continued to dole out plenty of free passes in recent seasons even as his strikeout and ground-ball numbers have fallen back to ordinary levels. Over the past two seasons, he’s suited up with three clubs (the Red Sox, Phillies and Cubs) and combined for 47 2/3 innings of 5.66 ERA ball. He’s been hit at a .330/.426/.522 clip, with a dramatically reduced 20.3% strikeout rate and an elevated 14.3% walk percentage.

Those past two years of struggles dictate that Workman will have to pitch his way back into the big leagues as a non-roster player. Still, it’s sensible for the Rangers to take a look at a reliever who’s not too far removed from finding major league success. Texas’ bullpen mix is almost entirely wide open, with Joe Barlow and Spencer Patton perhaps the only right-handed locks for season-opening spots.

Cubs To Sign Andrelton Simmons

By | at

The Cubs and shortstop Andrelton Simmons have agreed to a one-year contract that will pay Simmons $4MM plus incentives, according to MLB Network’s Jon Heyman (via Twitter).  The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal (Twitter link) was the first to report that the two sides were closing in on a deal.  Simmons is represented by ISE Baseball.

One of the best defensive players of all time, ankle injuries led to an uncharacteristically mediocre season of glovework for Simmons in 2020, but he looked much more like his old self this past season with the Twins.  Simmons posted a +16 Outs Above Average and +15 Defensive Runs Saved over 1091 2/3 innings at shortstop last year, though the UZR/150 metric (-1.1) took a dimmer view of his performance.

While Simmons’ age (32) and recent history of ankle problems are undoubtedly a concern, it would certainly seem like he should still be a defensive plus in the middle of the Cubs infield.  Such quality defense will be particularly important since it has been three years since Simmons has been even a league-average hitter, with only a .250/.302/.323 slash line to show for his last 1002 plate appearances since the start of the 2019 season.

Glovework has always been Simmons’ calling card, yet in the few seasons (2017 and 2018) where he has provided both a solid bat along with his excellent defense, Simmons looked like one of the game’s most valuable players.  It remains to be seen if he can get back to that all-around form, yet the Cubs would be satisfied if he can merely provide his usual stellar work at shortstop.

Simmons will be filling the defensive void left behind by another Gold Glove-winning shortstop in Javier Baez, who was dealt to the Mets last summer as part of the Cubs’ trade deadline fire sale.  As much as the Cubs tore things down pre-deadline, however, the team has been looking to build things back up to make at least some attempt at contending in 2022, adding Marcus Stroman, Wade Miley, and Yan Gomes prior to the lockout.

Of course, Chicago had been linked to another prominent shortstop in Carlos Correa, with the logic being that the Cubs could now afford Correa’s big asking price after clearing so much future salary off the books.  The Simmons deal could quite possibly indicate that the Cubs have opted out of the Correa sweepstakes, and yet as journalist Sung Min Kim speculates, Simmons’ $4MM salary “is not necessarily starter money.”  Theoretically, the Cubs could still sign Correa and then use the two players in a timeshare at shortstop, with the other perhaps moving to second base or third base.

This would allow the Cubs to juggle Nick Madrigal or Patrick Wisdom (the other incumbent infield starters) in and out of the lineup as the situation warrants, and the DH spot is also now available for Chicago to work with in 2022 and beyond.  Madrigal’s health is also a bit of a question mark, as he underwent season-ending hamstring surgery last summer, though reports from January indicated that the young infielder was making good progress in his recovery.  Nico Hoerner had been penciled into the starting shortstop job, but with Simmons now in the fold, the Cubs can continue experimenting with Hoerner as a multi-position player.

Twins Re-Sign Juan Minaya To Minor League Deal

By | at

The Twins are re-signing reliever Juan Minaya on a minor league contract with an invitation to big league Spring Training, reports Do-Hyoung Park of MLB.com (Twitter link). The righty made 29 appearances with Minnesota last season but hit free agency when the club non-tendered him in November.

Minaya put up a sterling 2.48 ERA in 40 innings last season. Still, the club declined to carry him on the 40-man roster over the winter. Minnesota clearly didn’t anticipate he’d repeat that kind of run prevention, which was propped up by an 85.3% strand rate and a .235 opponents’ batting average on balls in play. The Twins likely anticipate he’d perform somewhere nearer last season’s 4.00 SIERA moving forward.

Throughout his career, Minaya has struggled with control. He’s walked 11.7% of batters faced in parts of five big league seasons, and last year’s 12% mark fell right in line with that broader track record. Yet the 31-year-old also struck out a solid 25.7% of opponents and induced grounders on a huge 53% of balls in play against him. That was a massive spike relative to his early-career numbers, perhaps attributable to a drastic uptick in the usage of his changeup. Minaya went to the offspeed offering a career-high 45% of the time last season, per Brooks Baseball, and it induced grounders at an incredible 73% rate.

The Twins will bring Minaya back as a non-roster invitee, and he’ll try to pitch his way into the mix for a second consecutive season. Tyler Duffey, Jorge Alcalá and Cody Stashak look to be among the top right-handed setup options for manager Rocco Baldelli at the moment, although it’s possible the Twins add another arm on a guaranteed deal before Opening Day.

Angels Re-Sign AJ Ramos To Minors Deal

By | at

The Angels have signed right-hander AJ Ramos to a minor league deal, MLB Network’s Jon Morosi reports (via Twitter).  The contract contains an invitation to the Halos’ big league Spring Training camp.

Ramos first signed with the Angels on another minors contract just prior to Opening Day 2021, and the righty finally cracked the big league roster and appeared in four games over the final week of the regular season. Between his 4 2/3 innings with Anaheim last year and 2 2/3 innings with the Rockies in 2020, it at least represents some foothold back in the Show for Ramos after he missed most of the 2018 season and all of the 2019 season recovering from shoulder surgery.

Prior to that injury, Ramos was a standout member of the Marlins bullpen from 2013-16, posting a 2.62 ERA over 278 1/3 innings in those four seasons.  Ramos served as the team’s closer in the last two of those years, racking up 72 saves and earning an All-Star nod in 2016.

Ramos wasn’t great at in the minors last season, with a 5.26 ERA and 10.6% walk rate over 53 frames for Triple-A Salt Lake.  However, clearly the Angels liked enough of what they saw (perhaps in the form of a 31% strikeout rate) to bring Ramos back for another run in Spring Training, at the no-risk cost of a minor league contract.  Even if he doesn’t make the Opening Day roster, the Halos might again keep Ramos around as Triple-A depth.

Rangers To Sign Martin Perez

By | at

The Rangers have agreed to terms on a contract with free-agent lefty Martin Perez, reports FanSided’s Robert Murray (via Twitter). It’s a one-year, $4MM contract for Perez, MLB Network’s Jon Heyman adds. Perez, a client of Octagon, will return to the organization that originally signed and developed him. He made his big league debut with Texas in 2012 and spent the next seven seasons with the Rangers.

Perez, 31 next month, spent the 2019 season with the Twins and was with the Red Sox in 2020-21 before returning to Texas. In his three years away from his original club, the southpaw turned in 341 1/3 innings of 4.88 ERA ball with rather pedestrian strikeout (18.4%), walk (8.7%) and ground-ball (44.9%) rates. Boston declined a $6MM club option in favor of a $500K buyout on Perez after the 2021 season.

Once lauded as one of the sport’s premier pitching prospects, Perez has instead settled in as a back-of-the-rotation starter. Those 2019-21 rates represented a slight uptick over his career strikeout rate and a slight downgrade over his career ground-ball rate, but generally speaking, Perez’s output in three years away from Texas was roughly in line with his lifetime numbers at the big league level. He doesn’t necessarily work deep into starts, but Perez has avoided the injured list for the past three seasons, with the exception of a brief absence this past summer following a positive Covid-19 test. He’ll give the Rangers some needed stability at the back of a starting staff that was — and still is — in need of multiple arms.

Perez will join fellow offseason signee Jon Gray and right-hander Dane Dunning as one of the only three locks in the Texas rotation. Lefty Taylor Hearn could get another look, depending on other moves that are made, but he was hit hard in limited work out of the rotation while thriving in the bullpen this past season. Right-hander A.J. Alexy had a big year in the upper minors but a tepid 4.70 ERA in 23 big league frames. Prospects Spencer Howard and Glenn Otto, acquired at the trade deadline, both were hit hard in their brief MLB looks. Right-hander Yerry Rodriguez and southpaw Brock Burke are both on the 40-man roster but were both ineffective in Triple-A this past season.

Put another way, Perez figures to be one of multiple arms acquired by the Rangers, whether via free agency or trade. Texas has been strongly linked to hometown star Clayton Kershaw, and the general belief is that Kershaw will either return to the Dodgers this winter or sign with the Rangers to be close to his family. The Rangers are also known to be keenly interested in A’s first baseman Matt Olson, and Oakland has several arms who could be on the trade block alongside their All-Star first baseman (Sean Manaea, Chris Bassitt, Frankie Montas).

The Rangers’ hope is surely that 2021 No. 2 overall pick Jack Leiter and 2019 first-rounder Cole Winn — two of the sport’s most promising arms — will be able to factor into the big league rotation sooner than later. That may not be the case until 2023, however, so the veteran Perez will give them a bridge to those younger arms. His $4MM salary is a mere footnote in what’s been a massive offseason of spending for president of baseball operations Jon Daniels and general manager Chris Young. Texas has also signed Corey Seager (10 years, $325MM), Marcus Semien (seven years, $175MM), Gray (four years, $56MM) and Kole Calhoun (one year, $6.2MM), bumping their projected payroll to just under $134MM. That’s a notable increase from the past couple seasons but still a good bit shy of 2017’2 franchise-record $165MM payroll.

Cardinals Sign Drew VerHagen To Two-Year Deal

By | at

The first Major League free-agent signing following the MLB lockout went to an unexpected player, as the Cardinals announced Friday that they’ve signed right-hander Drew VerHagen to a two-year contract. VerHagen, a client of ISE Baseball, spent the past two seasons pitching in Japan. He’ll reportedly be guaranteed a total of $5.5MM — $2.5MM in 2022 and $3MM in 2023. He can further boost his earnings via incentives.

While the 31-year-old VerHagen probably wasn’t predicted by many as the first post-lockout domino to fall, he’ll head back to the big leagues not only on a guaranteed contract but on a multi-year arrangement. The 6’6″ righty struggled for much of his six seasons with the Tigers, pitching to a 5.11 ERA over the life of 199 big league frames. His two-year stint overseas changed his fortunes, however, as VerHagen broke out as a key member of the Nippon-Ham Fighters’ bullpen.

In two seasons with the Fighters, VerHagen notched a 3.51 ERA in 2017 1/3 innings while punching out a quarter of his opponents against a strong 7.2% walk rate. He’s long had decent velocity (94 mph average) on his sinker and has a track record of inducing grounders at a high rate (53.9% in the Majors) — which fits in well with the Cardinals’ otherworldy infield defense.

Broadly speaking, the Cardinals have a track record in signing players out of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball and the Korea Baseball Organization — both in terms of former big leaguers making a return and established NPB/KBO stars making their first jump to MLB. The Cardinals’ 2017 signing of Miles Mikolas (two years, $15.5MM) proved one of the better return pickups in recent memory, and KBO lefty Kwang Hyun Kim spent the past two seasons as a key member of the St. Louis pitching staff after signing at two years and $8MM. VerHagen is the latest to follow that path on a big league deal, though the Cards’ January signing of righty Aaron Brooks to a minor league contract could eventually enter that fold.

VerHagen worked out of the rotation with the Fighters, and Cards president of baseball operations John Mozeliak suggested today he’ll compete for a starting job in St. Louis as well (Twitter link via Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat). That said, a bullpen spot seems easier to carve out, given the already crowded nature of the team’s starting staff. The Cardinals’ rotation includes Jack Flaherty, Adam Wainwright, Dakota Hudson, Mikolas and lefty Steven Matz, who inked a four-year, $44MM deal earlier in the offseason. The Cards also have prospects Matthew Liberatore and Zack Thompson working their way toward the Majors, plus depth options like Jake Woodford and Johan Oviedo.

The addition of VerHagen gives them a potential long relief and spot-start option, but he could also find his way into a late-inning role if he can maintain some of his overseas success. Giovanny Gallegos is the current favorite to close games for newly minted manager Oliver Marmol, and there’s plenty of talent throughout the rest of the bullpen mix. Alex Reyes and Jordan Hicks have both closed games in the past, while Genesis Cabrera and veteran T.J. McFarland give the Cards a pair of solid left-handed options. It’s quite possible the Cards will make further bullpen additions, as they’ve been connected to higher-profile relievers such as Joe Kelly and Ryan Tepera throughout the duration of the lockout.

Mark Feinsand of MLB.com first reported the agreement and the terms.

Dodgers, Daniel Zamora Agree To Minor League Deal

By | at

Reliever Daniel Zamora has signed with the Dodgers, he announced this evening on Twitter. Fabian Ardaya of the Athletic reports that it’s a minor league contract.

Zamora, 28, has appeared in three of the past four big league seasons. He broke into the majors with the Mets in 2018, and saw some time as a situational left-hander for two years. Zamora made 33 combined appearances but tallied just 17 2/3 innings, facing 41 left-handed hitters and 37 righties. The Stony Brook product actually had more success against opposite-handed batters, but it’s unlikely teams will put any stock in those splits in such a limited sample of work.

New York assigned Zamora to their alternate training site for the entirety of the shortened 2020 season. He got off to a dismal start last year with Triple-A Syracuse, and the Mets designated him for assignment in May. The Mariners picked him up off waivers and gave him four big league appearances before designating him themselves the following month. Zamora cleared waivers that time around and spent the rest of the season with their top affiliate in Tacoma. Over 37 innings with the Rainiers, he worked to a 4.14 ERA, striking out an impressive 29.2% of opposing hitters.

Zamora owns a 4.50 ERA over 22 MLB innings. He’s flashed some decent bat-missing ability against top-level hitters, punching out 28.4% of batters faced on the strength of an 11% swinging strike rate. There’s no downside for the Dodgers in giving him a look in Spring Training, although they already have a fair amount of left-handed bullpen depth. Alex Vesia, Caleb Ferguson, Víctor González, Justin Bruihl, Garrett Cleavinger and Darien Núñez are all already on the Los Angeles 40-man roster.

Show all

MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com

hide arrows scroll to top