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Padres’ Relievers Drawing Trade Interest

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The Padres, unsurprisingly, have already been receiving trade inquirieson their relievers, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic in his latest notes column (subscription required). Not only is Brad Hand garnering a strong bit of interest, but setup men Kirby Yates and Craig Stammen are each drawing inquiries from rival clubs, as are some of the team’s younger relievers.

Most notably, Rosenthal suggests that the interest in Hand is different than in recent years, owing both to his newly signed contract extension and the fact that he has now more emphatically cemented himself as a proven, elite lefty reliever.

Each of the listed relievers has an ERA south of 2.50 on the season, and each boasts strong K/BB numbers in addition to a ground-ball rate of 50 percent or better. More appealing than any of that, however, could be the simple fact that each of the three is both affordable and under control for multiple seasons.

Hand, who turned 28 in March, is the most notable of the bunch. Despite his relative proximity to free agency, he signed surprising three-year, $19.75MM contract extension in the offseason — a deal that also gives the Padres affordable a $10MM club option over the 2021 season. A waiver claim by the Padres out of the Marlins organization, Hand has improved each year in San Diego. He’s currently sitting on a 1.78 ERA with 13.3 K/9, 3.6 BB/9, 0.76 HR/9 and a 50 percent ground-ball rate in 35 1/3 innings.

Overall, since joining the Friars, he’s pitched to a superlative 2.43 ERA and averaged nearly 12 strikeouts per nine innings. With an average annual value just barely north of $6.5MM, his contract would fit into the majority of teams’ budgets — even those close to the luxury tax threshold (with, perhaps, the notable exception of the Giants, though a San Diego/San Francisco swap of this magnitude seems unlikely anyhow).

Hand, though, is hardly the only waiver claim who has reinvented himself in San Diego. The 31-year-old Yates pitched well for the Padres after being claimed from the Angels last season, but he’s taken his game to a new level in 2018, tossing 27 innings with a flat 1.00 ERA, a 32-to-8 K/BB ratio and a 52.3 percent grounder rate.

San Diego encouraged Yates to ditch his slider in favor of a splitter (as he recently discussed with MLB.com’s AJ Cassavell), and the righty has transformed himself completely. That ground-ball rate is nearly 20 points higher than his career mark, and the formerly homer-prone Yates has now surrendered only one home run in 2018 with his new ground-focused attack. Yates, who has a 2.83 ERA in 82 2/3 innings and an average of 13 strikeouts per nine innings pitched since joining the Padres, is earning just $1.0625MM in 2018 and is arbitration-eligible through the 2020 season.

Stammen, meanwhile, parlayed a minor league deal with the Padres prior to the 2017 season into a two-year, $4.5MM deal spanning the 2018-19 seasons. And after posting a 3.14 ERA with 8.3 K/9, 3.1 BB/9, 1.34 HR/9 and a 51.6 percent ground-ball rate in 80 1/3 innings of relief last year, Stammen has further elevated his status in 2018.

So far, the 34-year-old has logged a 2.30 ERA with a career-best 9.5 K/9 against 1.4 BB/9 and 0.29 HR/9 with a 50 percent ground-ball rate through 31 1/3 frames. Stammen’s velocity remains in the low 90s (91.2 mph average fastball), but his 12.2 percent swinging-strike rate and 35.6 percent chase rate resemble his peak form with the Nationals from a few years back. Beyond that, he’s pounding the zone more than ever, evidenced not only by his walk rate but his superb 69.1 percent first-pitch strike rate. At $2.25MM both this year and next (plus up to $1MM worth of incentives each season), he’s a bargain that any team could afford.

Rosenthal notes, too, that some of the Padres’ younger relievers have also attracted interest. While specific names aren’t listed, it stands to reason that clubs may have checked in on rookie Adam Cimber, who went from an afterthought to a potential All-Star seemingly overnight. Former starter Robbie Erlin has displayed the best control of his career while working as a multi-inning lefty, while right-hander Phil Maton has impressed since joining the club as well.

[Related: San Diego Padres depth chart]

Of course, it’s hardly certain what route the Padres will take this summer. Preller has surprised onlookers in the past by holding onto Hand at multiple trade deadlines, and he opted not to trade Tyson Ross in 2016 and Jhoulys Chacin last season. With an emerging young core, perhaps Preller and his staff would prefer to hang onto their impressive collection of controllable bullpen arms with an eye toward contending in the future.

It’s also not out of the question that the Padres end up viewing themselves as at least fringe contenders during the current season. While such a notion will elicit plenty of eye-rolling, the Friars are 11-4 over their past 15 games and now sit 5.5 games back in the NL West. They’re still four games under .500, so a serious run seems far-fetched, though they’re also on the verge of getting Joey Lucchesi, Wil Myers and Franchy Cordero back from the disabled list, as well.

Latest On Shohei Ohtani’s Injury

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June 14: FanRag’s Jon Heyman reports that the Grade 2 strain in Ohtani’s UCL is new and is not related to the previous Grade 1 strain that he was reported to have shortly after signing. There’s been no update from the medical experts who’ve evaluated Ohtani, as doctors are waiting to see how his UCL responds to the injections he’s already received. As per the timeline originally put forth by the Angels at the time his injury was announced, that reevaluation is set to come at the end of this month (June 29).

June 11: Following an on-air report from ESPN’s Pedro Gomez in which Gomez suggested that Angels ace Shohei Ohtani “probably will need Tommy John surgery,” Halos GM Billy Eppler opposed the notion in a statement to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (Twitter links).

“There have been no changes in Ohtani’s diagnosis and neither our physicians nor medical staff have recommended (Tommy John surgery) or said it’s likely,” said Eppler on Monday.

As with any UCL injury, of course, the possibility remains that surgical repair will ultimately be proven necessary. Notably, Eppler doesn’t definitively state that Ohtani will not require Tommy John surgery, likely because he and the team’s medical staff genuinely do not know whether Ohtani will avoid surgery at this point. When the Angels made the announcement that Ohtani was DL-bound, the team said that he had already received platelet-rich plasma and stem cell injections and would be re-evaluated in three weeks.

Eppler, then, simply seems to have been motivated to speak out against a report that was based on something other than conclusive medical evaluations. While some with the club are likely bracing for the worst and may even pessimistically be considering it the likeliest outcome, there’s no clear way to know exactly what treatment is in store for Ohtani until later this month when doctors make their recommendations following the initial wave of treatment. To that end, it’s worth noting that two of Ohtani’s current teammates, Garrett Richards and Andrew Heaney, attempted similar treatment methods in order to avoid Tommy John surgery themselves. Heaney ultimately required the surgery anyway, but Richards did indeed manage to avoid the operation.

For the Angels, there’s little downside in attempting PRP and stem cell injections in addition to rest and rehab. As a theoretical example, even if Ohtani underwent Tommy John surgery tomorrow, he would still be likely to miss the majority of the 2019 season anyhow. While some pitchers have returned from Tommy John in 11 to 12 months in the past, the Halos would certainly err on the side of caution in Ohtani’s rehabilitation process. A best-case scenario might see him sidelined into next August, so the harm in trying to avoid the procedure entirely is somewhat minimized when viewed through that lens.

Nationals Ownership Transfers Control To Mark Lerner

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After a dozen years as the front-man in the Nationals’ ownership, Ted Lerner is transferring control of the organization to his son, Mark, reports Barry Svrluga of the Washington Post. The move has already been unanimously approved by the other 29 owners, per the report. Both Ted, 92, and Mark, 64, have issued statements to Svrluga regarding the transfer, and the column is full of quotes from Mark on his new role as well as the organization’s future.

While many ownership changes and transfers are followed by shakeups on the baseball operations side of the equation, that doesn’t sound to be the case in this instance. The younger Lerner notes that most of the team’s larger decisions have been a collaborative family effort. Ted Lerner, his three children (Mark and sisters Marla and Debra), and their spouses have all been weighing in on major ownership-level decisions, even if Ted ultimately had final say. “I don’t think you’ll see much difference in the way Dad and the family running it vs. myself and the family,” said Mark.

Of course, many will wonder exactly what this means for the Nationals’ future with Bryce Harper. The 25-year-old is set to become a free agent following the season, and the rapport between Harper’s agent, Scott Boras, and Ted Lerner has been well-documented. Svrluga notes that Boras negotiated contracts for Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg and Jayson Werth (presumably, among others) directly with Ted Lerner. The Nats have no shortage of Boras clients on their roster, with Anthony Rendon, Juan Soto, Matt Wieters, Jeremy Hellickson and Gio Gonzalez all repped by the Boras Corporation (as can be seen in MLBTR’s Agency Database).

Mark calls the relationship between Boras and his father both “interesting” and “successful,” adding that he expects his father to be involved in future negotiations with Boras (i.e. the Harper negotiations) as long as he wants to be. Regarding Harper, specifically, Mark says the outfielder “feels like a member of the family” and speaks optimistically about being able to retain the outfielder on a deal that “makes sense for the long-term vision of the club.”

Nationals ownership already resolved one key issue earlier this season, extending general manager Mike Rizzo through the 2020 season and thus ensuring that he’ll continue to serve as the primary voice overseeing baseball operations, having already done so since 2009. Manager Dave Martinez, meanwhile, is in the first season of a three-year deal that contains a club option for the 2021 season.

The manner in which the Nationals handle the managerial and coaching staff following today’s transfer will be an interesting scenario to follow in the coming years. The organization has become notorious for having short leash on its field staff; Dusty Baker, for instance, was surprisingly cut loose after consecutive NL East titles, and Martinez is somewhat incredibly the seventh manager of the team dating back to 2009. That’s long been attributed to ownership rather than Rizzo, who reportedly fought to keep Baker at the helm before ownership made the call to dismiss him. There’s likely no way to know exactly how (or if) that’ll change in the short-term, with Martinez in his first season as skipper. The 2019 and 2020 seasons figure to be more telling in that regard, though, especially if the Nationals either fail to make the postseason or endure yet another NLDS exit.

Generally speaking, however, it doesn’t sound as if the transfer will bring about radical change in the operation of the club in the near future. Furthermore, it sounds as if the Lerner family plans on retaining control of the organization for years to come. Svrluga notes that a third generation of Lerners is already becoming involved in the business, and Mark Lerner spoke candidly about the fact that he and his siblings have had zero thoughts about selling the team. “We well never sell the Nationals,” said Mark. “…[C]ertainly while I’m alive and my sisters and brothers-in-law are alive — nobody’s going to sell this team.”

Injury Notes: Richards, Cozart, Bleier, Pomeranz, Padres

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The Angels announced tonight that right-hander Garrett Richards exited the game due to tightness in his left hamstring, while Zack Cozart departed early due to a strained left shoulder. As Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register writes, Richards’ fastball velocity was down nearly three miles per hour from its usual levels before he exited the game following a two-run second inning for the Mariners. Richards is slated for an MRI tomorrow. Cozart, meanwhile, incurred his injury while making a diving attempt at shortstop and said after the game that his shoulder “separated or popped out a little bit” upon hitting the ground. It’s not the first time he’s had that type of issue happen, he adds, and he’ll be examined further tomorrow.

Some more injury news from around the game…

  • Orioles lefty Richard Bleier suffered an arm injury in Wednesday night’s game, which manager Buck Showalter suggested could be related to his left lat muscle (link via MASNsports.com’s Roch Kubatko). The injury was immediately apparent, as Bleier winced on his follow-through, dropped his glove and immediately began clutching at his shoulder (video link). Bleier already had an x-ray taken Wednesday night, and he’s headed for an MRI on Thursday. While there won’t be an update until that test is complete and the results have been viewed by doctors, but Bleier said that there was “no question” that he was unable to make another pitch, calling the pain “severe” and adding that he’s never experienced that type of injury. While the 31-year-old lefty is hardly a household name, he has a superlative 1.93 ERA on the season and, in fact, has a sub-2.00 ERA for his entire career — a span of 119 innings dating back to his 2016 debut with the Yankees.
  • Drew Pomeranz has been on the shelf for nearly two weeks, but the Red Sox lefty doesn’t sound especially close to returning. WEEI’s Rob Bradford tweets that Pomeranz says the pain in his arm has mostly dissipated, but he has limited mobility in his neck, which is still preventing him from even throwing. Pomeranz, 29, originally hit the DL due to tendinitis in his left biceps, though it would appear that he’s experiencing additional discomfort at this point. Knuckleballer Steven Wright has stepped into Pomeranz’s spot in the rotation and tossed 13 2/3 shutout innings in two starts.
  • The Padres announced tonight that outfielders Wil Myers and Franchy Cordero and left-hander Joey Lucchesi are all set to begin minor league rehab assignments tomorrow. San Diego has been without Myers since April 29 due to a left oblique strain, while Cordero has been out since late May due to a forearm strain. In the absence of both corner outfielders, the Friars have been utilizing a mix of Travis Jankowski, rookie Franmil Reyes, Manuel Margot, Hunter Renfroe and Matt Szczur in the outfield, though the impending return of both Myers and Cordero will shuffle that arrangement. Myers has taken just 40 plate appearances with the big league club this season, hitting .300/.300/.450, while Cordero hit .237/.307/.439 through 154 PAs and began to draw some notoriety for his prodigious home run distances and exit velocities on Statcast. As for Lucchesi, he was among the most impressive rookie pitchers in all of baseball through his first nine starts, pitching to a 3.23 ERA with a 48-to-15 K/BB ratio and a 43.8 percent ground-ball rate in 47 1/3 innings. He’s been out since May 15 due to a hip strain.

Diamondbacks Notes: Lackey, Shipley, Souza

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The Diamondbacks made a minor league offer to right-hander John Lackey this offseason, writes USA Today’s Bob Nightengale, but the veteran righty passed on the opportunity. Coincidentally, Lackey’s friend and former teammate, Clay Buchholz, ultimately wound up in the D-backs organization on a similar deal and is now thriving in a rotation that has been hit hard by injuries. “I don’t bring that up to him now,” joked Buchholz, who still keeps in touch with Lackey, “because he’s a lot bigger than me. I don’t want to make him mad. But Lackey is a bulldog. I fully expect him to be with some club at some point this year. I know for a fact that he still works out and keeps his body ready.” Both Lackey and Buchholz, of course, are known commodities to D-backs GM Mike Hazen and assistant GMs Amiel Sawdaye and Jared Porter, each of whom has previously worked in the Boston front office.

More out of Arizona…

  • Braden Shipley is being asked to work as a reliever for the time being, writes Zach Buchanan of The Athletic (subscription link), but the organization hasn’t closed the door on him as a rotation option. Shipley had actually been set to step into the rotation last month when an elbow injury sent him to the disabled list. In the interim, Buccholz stepped up and seized that spot, however. Shipley acknowledged some frustration at how the scenario unfolded, though he took a positive approach to his new role, viewing it as a chance to ease up on his arm and get some experience at the big league level before hopefully getting another starting opportunity down the line. A former first-round pick, Shipley has just a 5.23 ERA in 98 Major League innings, though the 26-year-old is still just two years removed from ranking among the game’s top 100 prospects and could yet thrive in the big leagues — especially in a new role.
  • Steven Souza Jr. began a throwing program Wednesday as he works back from a recurrence of the pectoral injury he incurred during Spring Training, writes Katherine Fitzgerald of the Arizona Republic. Souza threw from 45 feet today and will play catch again Friday before a Monday MRI to determine the progress he’s made in his recovery. He’ll return to a different outfield mix than the one he left, of course, as the Snakes have since acquired Jon Jay in a trade with the Royals. The presence of Souza, Jay, David Peralta, Jarrod Dyson, Chris Owings and, eventually, a healthy A.J. Pollock will lead to some decisions for the D-backs, although that’s a theoretical situation that may or may not present itself, depending on the health of that group as a whole.

Rangers Move Matt Moore To Bullpen

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The Rangers are moving veteran left-hander Matt Moore from the starting rotation to the bullpen, tweets Jeff Wilson of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Fellow left-hander Yohander Mendez will start for Texas in Moore’s place on Friday.

It’s a disappointing outcome for both team and player, though Moore received perhaps a longer leash than his early results would’ve otherwise dictated. Through 56 innings with the Rangers, Moore has been hammered for a 7.88 ERA, averaging 6.6 K/9 against 4.2 BB/9 and 1.29 HR/9. To be sure, there’s been some degree of poor fortune at play, as Moore’s .394 BABIP and 59.9 percent strand rate look fluky. But his K/BB numbers are still the worst of his career, and fielding-independent metrics like FIP, xFIP and SIERA all still peg him north of 5.00.

The brutal start to the season for Moore is the continuation of a rather precipitous decline for the once-vaunted prospect. Prior to the 2012 season, each of Baseball America, MLB.com and Baseball Prospectus considered Moore among the top two overall prospects in all of baseball, and he lived up to the hype early on, making the All-Star team and earning some Cy Young votes in an excellent age-24 season back in 2013.

Moore, though, required Tommy John surgery in 2014 and has never recaptured his front-of-the-rotation form since returning. He did toss 198 1/3 frames of 4.08 ERA ball between Tampa Bay and San Francisco in 2016 — a solid season that looked to set him back on track at the very least as a serviceable mid-rotation piece — but he’s followed that up with 230 1/3 innings of a 6.10 ERA and 4.83 FIP.

[Related: Texas Rangers depth chart]

Shortly after making his MLB debut, Moore agreed to a five-year, $14MM deal with the Rays that included club options for both the 2018 and 2019 seasons. While that deal long looked to be one of the best bargains in baseball, it now suddenly looks unlikely that Texas will even exercise its $10MM club option over Moore for the ’19 season. The Rangers didn’t give up much to acquire Moore and some international bonus allotments from the Giants, sending minor leaguers Israel Cruz and Sam Wolff back to the Giants in exchange. The addition was one of several low-cost pickups for the rotation this winter, but the majority of those moves have failed to pay dividends.

As for Mendez, he’s a former top 100 prospect whose star has dimmed a bit in recent years. Though he posted respectable numbers in Double-A last season, he’s off to a miserable start in Triple-A Round Rock, where he’s struggled to a 5.26 ERA with 7.0 K/9, 4.0 BB/9, 1.75 HR/9 and a 41.4 percent ground-ball rate. That said, Mendez only turned 23 back in January and has pitched better over his past five appearances (4.00 ERA, 25-to-9 K/BB ratio in 27 innings), and frankly, Moore’s persistent struggles simply make it difficult to keep trotting him out there as a starter.

Astros Sign First-Rounder Seth Beer

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June 13: The Astros have announced the signing. MLB.com’s Jim Callis tweets that Beer receives a $2.25MM signing bonus, which checks in a bit south of the No. 28 slot value of $2.399MM.

“Seth Beer has been college baseball’s premier slugger for the past three years; his resume speaks for itself,” assistant GM Mike Elias said in a statement announcing the signing. “We feel his productivity will translate well to the professional game and see him as a potential impact bat for our lineup. We are delighted to add Seth to what is already one of baseball’s strongest farm systems.”

June 9: The Astros have reportedly agreed to terms with first-rounder Seth Beer; FOX 26’s Mark Berman tweets that Beer himself has said so. The outfielder was the 28th overall pick in this year’s draft, and adds that he’ll fly to Houston on Tuesday to sign and head off to short-season ball.

Beer was ranked 45th and 46th among draft prospects by MLB.com and Baseball America, respectively. BA described him as “one of college baseball’s brightest stars”, citing his 70-grade power, exceptional pitch recognition, and .277/.421/.561 batting line this spring. MLB.com, meanwhile, writes that “few college players can match his combination of strength and patience at the plate.” It’s believed that, while it’s no certainty that the slugger’s power will translate at the major league level, it has the potential to be a carrying tool.

Beer was the consensus Freshman of the Year as a Clemson rookie, when he hit .369/.535/.700 with 18 home runs. His contact has fallen off a bit since then, but the power remained strong throughout his college tenure. Detractors will point to Beer’s speed and poor routes in the outfield as concerns that he won’t stick at the position, along with a swing that can hardly be described as “smooth”. Indeed, it appears that he’s somewhat of a polarizing player among scouts; at points he was mentioned as a potential number one overall pick, while some believed him to be a fringe second-rounder. If he rides to the major leagues, it’ll be on the coattails of his great power/patience potential and even more excellent surname.

Nationals Re-Sign Rafael Bautista

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The Nationals have re-signed outfielder Rafael Bautista to a minor league contract after releasing him over the weekend, reports Jorge Castillo of the Washington Post (via Twitter).

The 25-year-old Bautista had been occupying a spot on the 40-man roster but suffered a torn ACL and LCL while playing in Triple-A. In order to open the 40-man spot but also retain him, the Nats released him and quickly brought him back on a new minor league pact that’ll let him rehab with the organization while creating additional roster flexibility.

Bautista made a brief cameo in the Majors this season, going hitless in six plate appearances, and he also had a quick cup of coffee with the 2017 Nats, going 4-for-25 in 17 games. He’d been off to a fine start in the minors this year, hitting a combined .303/.345/.376 with a homer, three doubles, a triple and six steals (in eight attempts) through 121 plate appearances between Double-A and Triple-A.

While he’s never had much power in the minors and drew 30-grade power in his most recent scouting report at Fangraphs, Bautista does boast excellent speed and solid contact skills. He’s swiped 239 bases in 534 career minor league games, and he’s struck out at just a 15.6 percent clip in Double-A and a 17.5 percent clip in Triple-A. Baseball America, Fangraphs and MLB.com all rated him inside the organization’s top 20 prospects recently, and he has the upside of eventually functioning as a speed- and defense-oriented fourth outfielder at the big league level, assuming, of course, that he can recover from that serious knee injury.

Rockies Agree To Terms With First-Rounder Ryan Rolison

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The Rockies have agreed to terms with first-round pick Ryan Rolison, reports Jim Callis of MLB.com (via Twitter). The left-hander out of Ole Miss will receive the full slot value of $2,912,300 for his No. 22 overall selection. He was advised by and is now a client of CAA Baseball.

Rolison entered the 2018 draft as one of the top-ranked college arms in the class. Callis and colleague Jonathan Mayo ranked him the most aggressively, placing him 17th among his draft-eligible peers. Baseball America, meanwhile, ranked Rolison 21st in the class, while Kiley McDaniel and Eric Longenhagen of Fangraphs tabbed him 30th and ESPN’s Keith Law listed him 33rd.

A draft-eligible sophomore, the 20-year-old Rolison tossed 97 1/3 innings for the Rebels in 2018, posting a 3.70 ERA with 120 strikeouts against 45 walks in that time. Scouting reports peg his fastball in the 91-94 mph range and note that it can top out 96 mph, and Rolison is also said to have one of the draft’s best curveballs and the potential for an average changeup. Law and BA note that he began throwing across his body during his sophomore season, resulting in diminished control, though that wasn’t an issue in a stronger freshman season or this past summer in the Cape Cod League. If he can get back to his old mechanics, most reports agree he has mid-rotation upside.

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