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Latest On Michael Conforto

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The 2022 MLB season is now more than two weeks old, yet there’s one significant free agent that’s still unsigned. Outfielder Michael Conforto was ranked 32nd on the MLBTR list of the top 50 free agents, the only one of that group still without a team.

The last report on Conforto, from about three weeks ago, was that his market had been slowed by an injury suffered during the lockout. Conforto’s agent Scott Boras explained the delay, telling reporters that the outfielder suffered a right shoulder strain while training in January.

At the time of that report in late March, Joel Sherman of the New York Post relayed that Conforto had been hitting for five weeks, meaning that he was taking hacks weeks before the lockout ended on March 10. That seemed to at least cast a bit of doubt on the report from Boras, though the health issue seems to be lingering, despite the fact that Conforto has been hitting for about two months now. Mike Puma of the New York Post relays that the shoulder injury was significant enough that surgery was considered, although Conforto opted to forgo that and try to let the shoulder heal. Although Puma doesn’t provide any specific diagnosis of the injury, he reports that Conforto has still not resumed throwing and even suggests it’s possible Conforto may not be able to return to the field at all this season.

If that ends up being the case, it would be another step in a string of bad luck for the outfielder, who already had the misfortune of having a down year just as he was about to qualify for free agency. From 2017 to 2020, he hit 97 home runs and slashed .265/.369/.495. In the estimation of FanGraphs, that production was about 33% better than league average (133 wRC+) and helped him produce 14.9 wins above replacement. However, his offense slipped in 2021 to .232/.344/.384, a wRC+ of 106, still above average but well below his previous level.

He was already going to be challenged to find a contract to his liking after that dip, and after declining an $18.4MM qualifying offer. MLBTR predicted that Conforto would settle for a one-year deal in the $20MM range and then return to the open market without the QO attached, hoping for better offers. This was a route previously taken by players like Yasmani Grandal and Marcell Ozuna, who each took one-year deals and eventually got four-year contracts worth over $60MM. How it will play out for Conforto now will be largely determined by the eventual timeline of his recuperation, which is currently quite murky.

If this injury is as serious as reported, Conforto might just linger on the market long enough to follow that Grandal/Ozuna plan, just without the one-year deal. If he’s able to heal his shoulder and get back into game shape over the next few months, this year’s draft is scheduled to take place July 17-19. Once the draft is completed, any team signing Conforto won’t have to worry about the draft pick forfeiture. Although his extended absence will likely dim the enthusiasm clubs will have for signing him, it’s also possible that a contender suffers an outfield injury of their own that spurs them towards taking a chance. For Conforto’s part, he will surely want to show his health, if he’s able to, in order to improve his earning power after the 2022 season. Even a contract with a modest financial outlay for the season’s final months could be enough to get him onto the field as an audition for his next job. The Marlins, Yankees, Padres, Rockies, Blue Jays and Rangers were known to be interested in him before this injury was revealed.

Trade Rumors Front Office Survey

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As you probably know, in July 2020 we launched a paid subscription serviced called Trade Rumors Front Office.  Today, I’m looking to gather some information and opinions from both subscribers and non-subscribers.  If you can spare a few minutes, please take the survey below.  Click here for a direct link to the survey.  Thanks!

Create your own user feedback survey

MLB Hires CC Sabathia As Special Assistant

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Major League Baseball announced this afternoon they’ve hired six-time All-Star CC Sabathia as a special assistant to commissioner Rob Manfred. According to the league, the role was specifically created for Sabathia and will see the 41-year-old work in “player relations, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, social responsibility, youth participation, and broadcasting.”

Since hanging up his spikes, Sabathia has served as a vice president with the Players Alliance, a nonprofit organization aimed at increasing accessibility within the sport for Black athletes. He has also appeared on the MLB Network and co-hosts a baseball podcast with Ryan Ruocco for The Ringer.

“We are excited to have CC Sabathia join the Commissioner’s Office to work on some of our most important initiatives,” commissioner Rob Manfred said in a press release. “We welcome CC’s positive energy, strong character, creative mind, and civic-minded approach in building on our efforts to strengthen the game, diversify the sport, and give back to the community. CC has a powerful voice in Baseball and we value the perspective he will bring to our office.”

Sabathia made a statement of his own in the aforementioned release. “I’m looking forward to sharing my viewpoint as a former Major League player with the Commissioner’s Office,” Sabathia said. “I want to be able to continue to give back to the game that I love so much. This new role gives me the opportunity to continue the work I’m passionate about, be an advocate for players and be able to contribute to the decision-making process of the league office after 19 years on the field. I can’t wait to get started.”

Sabathia, of course, is one of the most accomplished pitchers in recent memory. He spent 19 seasons in the big leagues, suiting up with the Indians, Brewers and Yankees. The southpaw eclipsed 3,500 career innings and fanned more than 3,000 batters. Sabathia finished in the top five of Cy Young balloting on five separate occasions, taking home the award with Cleveland in 2007. He posted an ERA below 3.50 in every season from 2006-12, surpassing 190 frames in all seven years. Sabathia will add a decorated resume and, of greater import, a respected voice to the league office in a variety of roles.

Three Free Agents Suspended 80 Games After Testing Positive For PED

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Major League Baseball announced this afternoon that three players — reliever Richard Rodríguez, utilityman Danny Santana and infielder José Rondón — have each been suspended for 80 games after testing positive for the performance-enhancing substance Boldenone. All three are currently free agents. PED testing had been suspended during the lockout, but Jared Diamond of the Wall Street Journal reports (0n Twitter) that the trio tested positive before the work stoppage.

Rodríguez was one of the higher-profile remaining free agents, and today’s suspension offers insight into why he’s yet to sign. The 32-year-old isn’t far removed from being an excellent late-game option for the Pirates. Over three and a half seasons in Pittsburgh, he posted a 2.98 ERA in 196 1/3 innings of relief. Along the way, he punched out a strong 27.2% of batters faced while walking just 6.5% of opponents.

The rebuilding Bucs traded Rodríguez to the Braves at this past summer’s trade deadline. The 32-year-old’s performance dipped at the end of the year. While he managed a respectable 3.12 ERA in 26 innings as a Brave, he surrounded six home runs and struck out only nine batters in that time. Atlanta non-tendered Rodríguez at the end of the year. The Pirates were reported to have interest in a reunion in December, but it stands to reason the failed PED test put a damper on that pursuit.

Santana, 31, has appeared in the majors in each of the last eight seasons. Known for his speed and defensive versatility, the switch-hitting Santana has mixed in some solid showings at the plate but has an up-and-down overall track record. He’s coming off a tough year in which he hit just .181/.252/.345 with five homers and four steals over 38 games with the Red Sox.

Rondón has played in parts of four seasons, never tallying more than 157 plate appearances in a year. A right-handed hitting utility infielder, he owns a .216/.274/.353 slash in 380 career trips to the dish. Rondón had a respectable .263/.322/.413 showing in limited playing time with the Cardinals last season, but St. Louis non-tendered him in November.

Trevor Rosenthal Drawing Interest

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Trevor Rosenthal is drawing a lot of interest, per Jon Heyman of MLB Network. After serving as one of the best relievers in baseball for many years, Rosenthal suffered a major setback when he required Tommy John surgery in 2017. That wiped out the remainder of that season and also prevented him from pitching at all in 2018. When he finally made it back to the hill in 2019, he didn’t seem to resemble his former self, registering a 13.50 ERA in 15 1/3 innings that year, a showing which included an ugly 30.6% walk rate.

While many people considered him cooked, he had a tremendous return to form in 2020. After signing a minor league deal with the Royals, he eventually had his contract selected and threw 13 2/3 innings with a 3.29 ERA and excellent 37.5% strikeout rate, though the walks were still present at a rate of 12.5%. After being traded to the Padres, he pitched another 10 innings without allowing a single earned run. His strikeout rate shot up to an incredible 48.6% and his walk rate dropped down to 2.9%.

In February of last year, the Athletics quite surprisingly outbid the field and gave Rosenthal a one-year, $11MM deal, a huge sum for a typically low-spending club. Unfortunately, the gamble backfired in a big way, as shoulder inflammation sent him to the IL in April, leading to surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome. Though he was hoping for a midseason return, hip surgery in July wiped out any chance of that. In the end, he wasn’t able to make a regular season appearance at all last year.

Despite that litany of injuries, it’s not surprising that Rosenthal is garnering plenty of interest, as he’s already shown himself capable of returning from the injury wilderness. His final line on the 2020 season between the Royals and Padres was 23 2/3 innings with a 1.90 ERA with a 41.8% strikeout rate and 8.8% walk rate. While a pessimist could say that he has only had a couple of good months over the past four seasons, there’s no denying that he was elite the last time he was healthy. After missing another full season due to injuries, he surely won’t be able to land a significant commitment in either years or dollars, meaning there should be plenty of teams interested in taking a low-cost flier that he can pull off a repeat of 2020.

MLB Umpires To Begin Announcing Replay Decisions

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Major League Baseball announced this morning that beginning in the 2022 season, Major League umpires “will conduct in-park announcements during the replay review process.”

It’s an overdue update to a replay system that has often been confusing for fans viewing at home and, particularly, for fans at the the park. The NFL-style announcements regarding the nature of the challenge and the reasoning behind the umpires’ rulings will lend some clarity for all spectators. The league announced that training for this process is already underway both in Arizona and in Florida, where Spring Training games are being held. All indications are that the practice will be in place come Opening Day next week.

Under the prior system, viewers were at times unclear as to what specifically was being challenged, and it was not always immediately clear to viewers (particularly those at the park) whether a call had been confirmed or simply not overturned due to a lack of sufficient video evidence. The additional transparency provided by simply giving the umpiring crew with a microphone to explain the review and its outcome should be a welcome addition moving forward.

Michael Conforto Suffered Shoulder Injury In January

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Michael Conforto is the last unsigned player who appeared among MLBTR’s Top 50 free agents at the start of the offseason. Easily the best player still available on the open market, Conforto has nevertheless remained without a team with just a week until Opening Day.

Agent Scott Boras offered an explanation for Conforto’s delay in signing this evening, telling Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic and Joel Sherman of the New York Post the outfielder suffered a right shoulder strain while training in January. Boras says Conforto is now healthy and is again hitting but that the issue slowed down both his offseason training routine and his hunt for a club. According to Rosenthal, negotiations with teams were on hold but resumed last week.

Conforto’s injury could partially clarify the hold-up in his finding a new club, although it doesn’t seem to completely explain the delay. After all, he suffered the strain in January, a time when MLB free agents were barred from communicating with teams anyhow. Sherman writes that Conforto has been hitting for five weeks, indicating he’d returned to batting practice well before the lockout was lifted on March 10. The delay in his resuming throwing ostensibly kept Boras from negotiating with teams in the immediate post-lockout signing spree, although that he’s been in contact with clubs for about a week suggests that only set back discussions around 10-14 days.

Unsurprisingly, Boras claimed that a now-healthy Conforto is drawing strong interest. However, he declined to project a timetable for the 29-year-old to sign. At the very least, that negotiations are ongoing would seem to reduce speculation among some fans that Conforto could wait until after the draft to put pen to paper. The left-handed hitter rejected a qualifying offer from the Mets at the start of the offseason, entitling New York to draft pick compensation if he signs elsewhere and costing a signing club a draft choice.

Waiting to sign until after the draft would remove that compensation from the equation, and a few qualified free agents like Stephen Drew and Dallas Keuchel have taken that approach in past offseasons. However, this year’s draft is scheduled to take place from July 17-19, later than the early-June drafts of the Drew/Keuchel era. That’d require Conforto sitting out more than half the season, a course of action which never seemed likely.

Conforto is coming off a down season from a results perspective, but his strikeout and walk rates were customarily strong. The left-handed hitter also posted better batted ball marks than his 14 homers and .153 ISO (slugging minus batting average) would indicate. He looks like a strong bounceback candidate, one who could upgrade most lineups around the league.

Nevertheless, it’s tough to pin down top suitors for Conforto, even at this stage of the offseason. The Marlins, Yankees, Padres and Rockies were linked to him before the lockout. Miami and Colorado have since gone in different directions to upgrade their outfields, while San Diego is reportedly reluctant to take on another big move that could push them above the luxury tax threshold. New York hasn’t addressed the outfield, but they’ve since added Anthony Rizzo and Josh Donaldson to the payroll.

The Blue Jays more recently checked in as part of their search for a lefty-hitting outfielder, but they acquired Raimel Tapia from Colorado last week. No other team has been definitively tied to Conforto throughout the winter, but Jon Heyman of the MLB Network suggested on his Big Time Baseball podcast last week the Rangers could jump into the mix.

League Makes Proposals To MLBPA Restricting Sign-Stealing, On-Field Information

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Major League Baseball has made a series of proposals to the players union about measures meant to restrict sign-stealing, and the use of information during games, The Athletic’s Britt Ghiroli reports (Twitter thread).  It isn’t yet known how the MLB Players Association will respond to these proposals, whether they accept or reject the league’s idea, or perhaps make some counter-proposals with some tweaks.

One proposal involves the PitchCom system currently being tested during Spring Training games, as the league is now offering that players can continue to use the system on a voluntary basis during the regular season.  PitchCom is an electronic method for a catcher to communicate signs to the pitcher — the catcher enters the desired pitch (or pickoff throw, pitchout, etc.) on a specialized wristband, while the pitcher is wearing an audio device in his hat that tells him the pitch call via an automated voice.  The catcher and as many as three other fielders can also be wearing the audio device, to ensure accuracy and to make the information known around the diamond.

Ideally, PitchCom is a way of addressing sign-stealing by simply removing signs altogether.  The system also theoretically speeds up play by removing the need for some mound visits.  Early reviews have varied from individual to individual, and it remains to be seen how many players (or the MLBPA as a whole) would be open to continuing the PitchCom tech during the season.  The voluntary nature of the usage could be an obstacle, as a competitive advantage could be gained by some teams.

The league’s other proposals relate to the in-game use of scouting information.  Under these new rules, a player at the plate couldn’t (to use Ghiroli’s example) review any information on a scouting card within his helmet, for instance.  Also, team staff wouldn’t be allowed to print and deliver and new information to any on-field personnel during the game, whether on the actual diamond or in the dugout.

Specifying the use of printed information relates to how the league has already restricted the use of some electronic devices during a game, in the wake of the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal.  Still, while it would seem fairly easy to monitor whether or not a batter is using a “cheat sheet” during an at-bat, it would seem more difficult to completely police the flow of information between the on-field personnel and front office personnel over the course of a game.  Of course, there may never be an entirely airtight way to prevent teams finding loopholes, though having direct rules in place could at least act as some kind of deterrent.

MLB Tightening Crackdown On Foreign Substances

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Major League Baseball’s efforts to root out pitchers’ usage of foreign substances was one of the biggest stories in the sport last summer. Beginning in early June, the league made clear that it was planning to crack down on grip enhancers, concerned pitchers were using sticky stuff to enhance the quality of their raw arsenals as opposed to merely trying to improve their control.

That decision wasn’t without backlash. Rays ace Tyler Glasnow claimed the timing of the midseason enforcement contributed to an injury that eventually required Tommy John surgery. Phillies manager Joe Girardi and then-Nationals star Max Scherzer had an on-field squabble after Girardi asked for umpires to check Scherzer. A pair of pitchers — Héctor Santiago and Caleb Smith — were suspended for ten games apiece.

However, the foreign substance controversy mostly faded from public view after the first few weeks of its enforcement. Umpires continued to examine pitchers’ hats, gloves and belts frequently, but Smith was the only pitcher to fail a substance check in the second half of the season.

Tom Verducci of Sports Illustrated reports that MLB sent a memo to teams today informing them that foreign substance inspections will become more rigorous this season. Beginning with Spring Training contests this weekend, umpires will check pitchers’ hands directly, according to the memo. They may also continue to examine players’ equipment. Starting pitchers will be checked between random innings, while every reliever will be inspected at least once, as was the case last season.

Verducci obtains a copy of the memo, quoting MLB senior vice president of baseball operations Michael Hill as saying “If an umpire’s inspection reveals that the pitcher’s hand is unquestionably sticky or shows unmistakable signs of the presence of a foreign substance, the umpire will conclude that the pitcher was applying a foreign substance to the baseball for the purpose of gaining an unfair competitive advantage.” As was the case last season, that’d lead to an automatic ejection and suspension.

Position players aren’t subject to foreign substance inspections, but they would also be ejected and suspended if found to be harboring sticky stuff for pitchers. Verudcci writes that the league is tightening inspections in response to a fear that pitchers began carrying foreign substances on areas of their body besides their hat, belt and glove late last season. He notes that leaguewide fastball and slider spin rates and velocity-adjusted spin rates starting to trend upwards late in the year (albeit not to pre-enforcement levels) after falling dramatically in the immediate aftermath of the crackdown. Directly examining the pitcher’s hand should theoretically make it harder to skirt the substance checks and curtail whatever portion of that increase was due to pitcher subversion of the sticky stuff ban.

There remains the possibility that foreign substance checks won’t need to be as prevalent at some point in the future. MLB began to test pre-tacked baseballs in the minors late last season. In November, commissioner Rob Manfred told reporters the pre-tacked ball could be put in circulation during regular season action at some point in 2022.

The NHL Trade Deadline Is Today

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What’s already been a hectic week of trades and transactions is set to culminate today, as the NHL’s 2022 Trade Deadline is at 2:00 p.m. CT. Make sure to follow our coverage on Pro Hockey Rumors (@prohockeyrumors on Twitter!) to see what happens as teams have their last chance to move talent in and out before the end of the regular season.

We’ve already seen some gigantic waves this week, such as the Florida Panthers acquiring longtime Philadelphia Flyers captain Claude Giroux for an unexpectedly low price, and the Boston Bruins shoring up their defense by trading for and extending former Anaheim Ducks defenseman Hampus Lindholm.

There’s still the potential for blockbusters today, though. All eyes are on the Arizona Coyotes and defenseman Jakob Chychrun, as the 23-year-old defenseman is now the best man on the market, but it’s not a given that he gets moved out. The Anaheim Ducks may not be done yet after dealing away a good portion of their defense, as two-time 30-goal scorer Rickard Rakell is also on the market.

Make sure to continue to follow Pro Hockey Rumors throughout Deadline Day as all the action wraps up. You can also keep up with all of the trades on our Twitter.

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