Andrew Miller will require surgery to repair ligament damage in his left foot and will miss the rest of the season, Red Sox manager John Farrell told reporters (including Sean McAdam of CSNNE.com) today. Miller had pitched well out of the Boston bullpen this season, posting a 2.64 ERA, 2.82 K/BB ratio and a whopping 14.1 K/9 in 30 2/3 relief innings, though control continued to be an issue for the southpaw as he issued 17 walks. With Miller out, the Red Sox could well look into some of the left-handed relief options available on the trade market.
Here's some more news from around the AL East…
- Also from McAdam, Red Sox owner John Henry said that the team had room to add payroll at the trade deadline, if necessary. "I can't see it being an issue," Henry said. "I suppose there might be some (larger) salaries that we couldn't take on, but it just doesn't come up as an issue." The blockbuster trade with the Dodgers last summer helped the Red Sox avoid any potential payroll tax issues and left the team with financial room to maneuver this year, Henry explained.
- Jacoby Ellsbury figures to be one of the top free agents of the 2013-14 offseason and agent Scott Boras will no doubt keep his client in the headlines this winter, but Ellsbury tells WEEI.com's Rob Bradford that he and his agent haven't discussed the future as Boras has let Ellsbury just focus on baseball. Bradford also talked to notable Boras clients Michael Bourn and Stephen Drew about their own forays into free agency and how Boras dealt with their situations.
- The Orioles have avoided "the mega-contract business" since the Albert Belle signing, though CBS Sports' Jon Heyman wonders what the team will do to lock up Chris Davis and Manny Machado. Davis will go through the arbitration process for the second time this winter and is controlled through 2015 while Machado is controlled through 2018 and is still two years away from arb-eligibility. Davis, for his part, hasn't heard of any extension talks between the team and his agent, Scott Boras. While the O's have generally avoided big signings, I'd argue that the Adam Jones extension shows that the team won't hesitate to extend its key building blocks. A multiyear deal for Davis wouldn't be a surprise this winter, though the O's can probably wait for a year or two to explore an extension for Machado.
- A scouting director tells Bob Elliott of the Toronto Sun that his team considered Phil Bickford to be the top high school pitcher available in this year's amateur draft but the right-hander carried signability issues. "The family wouldn’t meet with us until 48 hours before the draft and they wanted $3MM," the scouting director said. The Blue Jays took Bickford with the 10th overall pick, a position that carries an assigned value of a little over $2.921MM, and since the team has saved a lot of bonus pool money, the Jays could afford to meet Bickford's $3MM asking price.
- We covered some Yankees items as part of a New York Notes post earlier today on MLBTR.
