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Offseason In Review: Arizona Diamondbacks

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Despite coming off an NL-worst 2021 showing, the D-Backs declined to tear things down. They made a couple veteran additions to the bullpen, but they’re mostly rolling things back with last year’s group in hopes of a better showing. They’re not likely to contend this season, but it’ll be an evaluative year for the front office. Perhaps some young players will step in alongside their recently-extended second baseman as core pieces of the future.

Major League Signings

2022 spending: $12MM
Total spending: $20.5MM

Option Decisions

Trades and claims

Extensions

  • Signed 2B Ketel Marte to five-year, $76MM extension (deal also contains $13MM club option for 2028 and buys out up to four free agent seasons)
  • Signed RHP Merrill Kelly to two-year, $18MM extension (deal also contains $7MM club option for 2025 and buys out up to three free agent seasons)

Notable Minor League Signings

Notable Losses

The D-Backs entered the offseason faced with a decision: rebuild, or try to add and be more respectable than they were last year? They chose the latter, declining to move any notable players. It wasn’t an especially active offseason, but the only big leaguer the D-Backs dealt away was out-of-options utilityman Josh VanMeter, who presumably wasn’t going to break camp and would otherwise have been exposed to waivers.

Arizona’s front office has maintained throughout the past few months they don’t believe the roster is anywhere near as bad as last season’s 52-110 record would suggest. To some extent, that’s a justifiable interpretation. The D-Backs were hit hard by injuries to their starting rotation last year. They’ve also got a fairly young, inexperienced position player group, one from which they certainly expect some members to take steps forward.

As is the case with their division counterparts, the Rockies, it’s nevertheless difficult to see the Diamondbacks hanging around in a top-heavy NL West. That leaves the Snakes in something of a middle ground, reluctant to tear down but without a real path to immediate contention. Arizona brass is mostly treating 2022 as an evaluation season after adding on the margins of the roster but declining to make any especially noteworthy splash.

That includes in the manager’s chair. Shortly before the end of the season, the D-Backs signed Torey Lovullo to a one-year extension with a 2023 option. It wasn’t a massive show of faith in the sixth-year skipper, but it nevertheless marked some continuity when other organizations may have been tempted to shake things up after the disastrous 2021 results.

The club did make some notable changes on Lovullo’s staff, however. They hired longtime Astros’ pitching coach Brent Strom in the same role. Strom is generally regarded as one of the sport’s best pitching minds and should be a welcome addition for a staff that had MLB’s second-worst ERA (5.15) last season. Arizona also brought in former big league skipper Jeff Banister as bench coach and Joe Mather as hitting coach.

The organization surely hopes that new voices can coax better production out of holdover players, but the D-Backs also had to make some changes to the roster. Early in the offseason, it became apparent they were looking for relief help — a logical target area since they had the league’s third-worst bullpen ERA (5.08). Arizona’s two biggest free agent investments of the winter would be additions to the late-inning mix.

The Snakes signed reigning saves leader Mark Melancon to a two-year, $14MM deal. There’s risk inherent in a multi-year investment for a 37-year-old reliever, but Melancon has been one of the league’s most reliable pitchers for some time. He has seven sub-3.00 ERA seasons on his resume, including a 2.23 mark in 64 2/3 frames with the Padres last year. Melancon isn’t the overpowering strikeout specialist teams typically love late in games, but he’s elite at generating ground-balls and brings far more stability than any of the Snakes’ in-house relievers.

That’s also true — albeit to a lesser extent — of Ian Kennedy. A mid-rotation starter with the D-Backs earlier in his career, Kennedy was moved to the bullpen full-time while with the Royals in 2019. Over the next three seasons, he posted a 3.91 ERA with better than average strikeout and walk numbers over 133 2/3 innings. Kennedy isn’t an elite arm, but he’s solid, and for a fairly modest $4.75MM price tag, the Diamondbacks happily installed him as a high-leverage option.

Melancon and Kennedy were the two most notable additions to the bullpen, although the D-Backs also brought in a pair of left-handed options. Arizona claimed Kyle Nelson off waivers from the Guardians and signed veteran southpaw Oliver Pérez to a minor league deal. Pérez cracked the Opening Day roster for his 20th and final season in the majors. The bullpen should be better than it was last season, although Arizona will still need improvements from internal options like J.B. Wendelken or former top prospect Corbin Martin to have an average group.

Luke Weaver isn’t an addition to the team, but he’s a new entrant into the bullpen mix. A former top prospect, Weaver has shown flashes of mid-rotation potential but has been inconsistent as a starting pitcher. He’s coming off two straight below-average seasons and found himself squeezed out of the starting staff come Spring Training. Perhaps working in shorter stints can help Weaver — who has struggled to turn lineups over multiple times in a game — find more success. The righty is currently on the injured list after experiencing elbow inflammation but should get an opportunity to pitch his way into an important relief role if healthy.

Weaver’s move to the bullpen set the stage for what could be a revolving door at the back of the rotation. Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly are locked in as the top two starters. Madison Bumgarner’s five-year deal over the 2019-20 offseason went off the rails almost immediately, but the team isn’t in position to seriously consider bumping him out of the rotation at the moment. The final two spots, though, are real question marks.

Arizona aimed to address that a bit with their last MLB free agent signee, Zach Davies. The righty is coming off a 5.78 ERA with some of the league’s worst strikeout and walk numbers for the Cubs. Virtually nothing in his 2021 performance was encouraging aside from the fact that he stayed healthy and took the ball 32 times. Davies at least has some success in his recent history, which can’t be said for many of the other rotation possibilities.

The D-Backs initially broke camp with Caleb Smith as their #5 starter, but he was optioned last weekend. Humberto Castellanos, Tyler Gilbert and Taylor Widener are also on the 40-man roster. Arizona signed veteran Dan Straily to a minor league deal on the heels of a strong two-year run in the Korea Baseball Organization. Straily surprisingly didn’t make the Opening Day roster, but he’s another candidate for starts at some point.

All three of Arizona’s big league free agent deals were to add to the pitching staff. The D-Backs elected to run things back with last season’s position player crop, more or less. Carson Kelly returns as the starter behind the plate. He looked like he was on an All-Star trajectory in the first half of last year, but his production dipped considerably after he fractured his right wrist on a hit-by-pitch in June. He’s backed up by rookie José Herrera, who won the season-opening #2 job over minor league signees Grayson Greiner, Juan Graterol and Juan Centeno.

The D-Backs elected to tender Christian Walker an arbitration contract on the heels of a subpar showing. His $2.6MM price tag is far from exorbitant, but he’ll need to do more offensively to hold onto his first base job. Star Ketel Marte moved back to the middle infield — where he began his career — after rating poorly in center field last season. He’s the regular second baseman, where he figures to pair with defensive stalwart Nick Ahmed up the middle. Ahmed’s name was floated throughout the offseason as a (largely speculative) trade candidate, but he didn’t perform well enough to have much appeal — particularly as he’s due $18.25MM over the next two seasons. Ahmed opened the season on the injured list as he deals with shoulder pain, leaving prospect Geraldo Perdomo to handle shortstop early on.

Injuries are also a factor at third base, where the D-Backs will be without presumptive starter Josh Rojas for some time due to an oblique strain. Acquired as part of the Zack Greinke return from Houston in 2019, the lefty-hitting Rojas offered roughly league average offense in 550 plate appearances last year. He’s a bat-first player who can cover multiple positions but may not excel defensively anywhere. Those limitations aside, Rojas should at least be a solid option off the bench long-term and figures to get an opportunity to carve out an everyday role at the hot corner.

D-Backs’ brass seems to prefer Rojas as a utility option, as they spoke a few times over the offseason about a desire to acquire third base help. Arizona added a couple utility infielders in Spring Training deals but didn’t pick up an obvious regular. The D-Backs brought back Sergio Alcántara for cash considerations after he’d been designated for assignment by the Cubs. On Opening Day, they picked up Yonny Hernández in a deal with the Rangers. Neither player performed well in fairly limited time last season, but they were both low-cost fliers to backfill around the infield after the injuries to Ahmed and Rojas. Arizona also selected Matt Davidson, whom they’d signed to a minor league deal, to the big league club this week.

As they played out the string in a lost 2021 season, the D-Backs began to work some of their younger outfielders into the mix more regularly. That’ll continue, particularly after they predictably bought out Kole Calhoun’s option. Daulton Varsho, Pavin Smith and Jake McCarthy are all former well-regarded draftees who have reached the MLB level. Varsho, who’s athletic enough to play center field but also has experience at catcher, is the most promising of the group on both sides of the ball. Smith and McCarthy haven’t shown as much in their careers, but they’ll get opportunities in the corners.

D-Backs stalwart David Peralta is back as the everyday left fielder. He’s making $7.5MM this season and will hit free agency at the end of the year. Each of Varsho, Smith, McCarthy and Peralta hit left-handed, so the D-Backs brought in a righty bat in a minor trade with the Rays. Jordan Luplow has made a career of mashing against southpaws and will soon rotate into the corners as a platoon option. He’s currently on the injured list but expected to make his team debut soon.

Luplow could also see some time at designated hitter, spelling another lefty bat and former first-rounder, Seth Beer. The implementation of the universal DH gives Arizona a chance to evaluate Beer, whom they didn’t like defensively at first base. The 25-year-old has been an excellent hitter both in college and in the minors, and he’ll get a chance to carry that success over against big league pitching now that he doesn’t have to worry about playing the field.

That’s a lot of options but very little certainty. Most probably won’t pan out as anything more than role players, but the front office is surely hoping they’ll find a couple members of the long-term core. Other than Peralta, every position player on the roster is controllable beyond this season. That’s only meaningful if some take steps forward and become building blocks for the future. How many of them do is the biggest question for the D-Backs in 2022.

In resisting a rebuild, general manager Mike Hazen has spoken of a desire to “anchor” the next contention window around a few core pieces. They took a major step in that direction this spring, hammering out a long-term deal with Marte. The 28-year-old was already controllable through 2024 under the terms of the last extension he’d signed, but they finalized a new agreement that could keep him in the desert through 2028. The extension saw the Snakes essentially lock in $11MM and $13MM club options for 2023 and ’24, then tack on three additional seasons at a total of $49MM. That’s an eminently reasonable price for a player of Marte’s caliber, and the deal gives the D-Backs an affordable 2028 option as well.

That extension cemented Marte as the face of the franchise. When healthy, he’s blossomed into an excellent offensive player with a rare combination of bat-to-ball skills and power. His center field experiment didn’t go well, but they’ll hope for a better showing with the glove now that he’s back in the middle infield.

The D-Backs’ other spring extension — a two-year, $18MM pact with Merrill Kelly — doesn’t quite fit Hazen’s “anchoring” mold, but it’s an affordable enough move to keep a capable rotation piece around. Kelly is 33-years-old and not overpowering, so he’s not about to develop into a future ace. Yet he throws strikes, gets a fair amount of ground-balls, and has gotten roughly league average results since coming over from the KBO in 2019. It’s not the most exciting profile, but there’s something to be said for Kelly’s stability — particularly for an Arizona team that otherwise doesn’t have much of that in the starting staff.

Hazen and company headed into the 2022 season without making especially meaningful changes to the organization in either direction. They’re not rebuilding, but their efforts to solidify the bullpen and add modest depth on the position player side aren’t going to completely turn things around relative to last year. The Diamondbacks are mostly biding their time, waiting to see whether there’s enough of a young core here for a more aggressive push in 2023. Baseball America credited the team with the league’s 10th-best farm system this winter, so it’s not out of the question they graduate enough young talent to move quickly towards competitiveness.

That’s contingent on many of the players already at the big league level playing to their potential, though. The early results have been putrid, and they’ll need players like Carson Kelly, Varsho and Smith to perform better than they have of late. There’s still plenty of time, and the team has been willing to give those players some room for failure. Still, at some point, the D-Backs are going to have start showing better results, or they may force the front office’s hand on a rebuild the organization has been trying to avoid.

Padres To Place Pierce Johnson On Injured List

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7:05pm: The Padres have announced the move, with Johnson’s IL placement being retroactive to April 21.

6:20pm: Padres manager Bob Melvin told reporters, including Dennis Lin of The Athletic, that right-hander Pierce Johnson is going on the injured list with elbow tendinitis. Lefty Ray Kerr will be recalled to take his spot on the roster.

After an excellent stint in Japan in 2019, Johnson was signed by the Padres to a two-year deal with a club option for 2022. Over the 2020 and 2021 seasons, Johnson provided the Friars with 78 2/3 innings, with a 3.09 ERA, 32.1% strikeout rate and 11.1% walk rate. With that quality production, it was a fairly easy decision for the Padres to pick up Johnson’s $3MM option instead of the $1MM buyout. He’s thrown six innings in the young season so far, with 11 strikeouts, four walks and three earned runs. Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune relays word from the club that Johnson had already been battling the issue for a week and the club is hoping for a minimum 10-day absence.

Kerr was an undrafted free agent signee of the Mariners in 2017 and showed enough promise in the minors to be added to the club’s 40-man roster in November. Just over a week later, he was traded to the Padres as part of the Adam Frazier deal. He began his professional career as a two-way player but has focused more on pitching, garnering attention for his ability to reach triple-digit velocity. In 4 2/3 innings in Triple-A so far this year, he’s struck out six but also walked six, leading to four earned runs. He’ll make his major league debut as soon as he gets the call to take the hill. Taylor Rogers and Tim Hill are the other lefties in the bullpen, though Rogers has been serving as the team’s closer since coming over in a trade with the Twins. That means Kerr and Hill will be the two arms available for situations where a southpaw would be preferred.

Francisco Mejia Tests Positive For Covid-19

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The Rays announced that catcher Francisco Mejia has been placed on the Covid-related injured list after a positive test. Fellow catcher Rene Pinto was recalled to take his place on the roster.

Under the league’s 2022 health-and-safety protocols, players who test positive are subject to a 10-day absence from the club, though it’s possible to be reinstated in less time if the player has gone 24 or more hours without a fever, received a pair of negative PCR tests, and been given approval from a team physician and the MLB/MLBPA joint committee (a panel of one league-appointed and one union-appointed physician).

Acquired by the Rays as part of the deal that sent Blake Snell to the Padres, Mejia has been excellent in his time in Florida. Although he was considered one of the best prospects in baseball while in the minors, he struggled in his first tastes of the big leagues with the Indians and Padres. As a member of the Rays last year, however, he hit .260/.322/.416 for a wRC+ of 108 and 1.4 wins above replacement, in the estimation of FanGraphs. This year, he was off to a blistering start, hitting a pair of home runs in seven games and slashing .348/.333/.652, 193 wRC+.

Although that type of production would be impossible to sustain over a larger sample, it’s still a blow for the Rays to lose a hot bat. Mike Zunino will likely get the bulk of the playing time behind the dish in Mejia’s absence, though he’s started 2022 with a line of .040/.074/.080. That’s a tiny sample of eight games, however, and Zunino’s line from last year was a healthy .216/.301/.559.

Pinto, 25, was just added to the club’s 40-man roster in November and will make his MLB debut as soon as he gets into a game. In 12 Triple-A games so far this year, he’s hitting .268/.388/.341, with an excellent 16.3% walk rate in that small sample.

Cubs Place Clint Frazier On Injured List, Outright Greg Deichmann

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The Cubs have placed outfielder Clint Frazier on the 10-day injured list due to appendicitis, reports Meghan Montemurro of the Chicago Tribune. (Twitter links) First baseman/outfielder Alfonso Rivas has been recalled to take his place on the active roster. Additionally, outfielder Greg Deichmann has cleared waivers and been outrighted to Triple-A Iowa.

Prior to this year, Frazier had spent his entire big-league career with the Yankees, from his debut in 2017 through 2021. Although he showed the potential to stick around and be a regular feature of the their lineup, he was frequently slowed by injuries and often struggled to get back on track. The Yanks finally gave up on him in November, designating him for assignment. Frazier didn’t linger on the open market for long, signing with the Cubs just about a week after being released. His tenure in Chicago is off to a slow start, as he’s hitting .143/.250/.238 in his first ten games.

Deichmann, who will turn 27 next month, was acquired from the Athletics in the trade that sent Andrew Chafin to Oakland. He made his major league debut for the Cubs with 31 plate appearances after the trade, but struggled mightily to the tune of .133/.161/.133. He’s also gotten off to a rough start in Triple-A this year, hitting .207/.207/.241, though in a small sample of just eight games. Having now cleared waivers, the Cubs can keep him in the system without Deichmann occupying a spot on the 40-man roster. He will now try to earn that roster spot back by showing some of the form that made the club acquire him in the first place. In Triple-A before the trade last year, he hit .300/.433/.452, 131 wRC+.

Giants Place Anthony DeSclafani On 10-Day IL, Steven Duggar On 60-Day IL

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The Giants announced a series of roster moves today, with right-hander Anthony DeSclafani going on the 10-day injured list with right ankle inflammation. Outfielder Steven Duggar is going on the 60-day injured list with an oblique strain. Right-hander Jakob Junis has been recalled to take one of the spots on the active roster, with the other going to outfielder Luis Gonzalez. Gonzalez wasn’t on the 40-man roster, but Duggar’s placement on the 60-day IL has opened a slot for him. (Twitter links from Susan Slusser of The San Francisco Chronicle)

Duggar left yesterday’s game with the injury and his placement on the injured list isn’t surprising. Comments from president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi yesterday made it a certainty. However, there was little indication of Duggar requiring a trip to the 60-day list. “That’s an injury that usually puts a guy on the sidelines for a few weeks,” Zaidi said, prior to Duggar undergoing an MRI. The results of that MRI must have been more serious than anticipated, with Duggar now unable to return before late June.

With Duggar out for an extended stretch, the club will have to figure out a center field replacement, as Duggar started 11 of the club’s first 13 games there. Mauricio Dubon and Austin Slater each took one of the others. Both of them will surely be in the mix, but they are also both right-handed hitters. Since Gonzalez is a lefty, their may be a path for him to earn the strong side of a platoon.

Gonzalez was in the minors with the White Sox last year when he required season-ending shoulder surgery. Since injured players cannot be placed on outright waivers and the team needed a roster spot, they had the choice of either placing him on the 60-day IL or on release waivers. Since the former option would require Gonzalez earning an MLB salary and service time, the White Sox opted for the latter, hoping he would clear and quickly re-sign with the club. However, the Giants claimed him and placed him on the 60-day IL, giving him the pay and service time the White Sox wouldn’t. Although Gonzalez was non-tendered at the end of the year, he seems to have appreciated that gesture from the Giants, as he re-signed with them on a minor league deal. In 11 Triple-A games so far this year, he’s hitting .283/.389/.500, 129 wRC+.

As for DeSclafani, he went on the IL with the same ankle inflammation last year, though he only required a minimum 10-day stint before returning. The severity of the injury this time around isn’t clear, but will be a challenge for the Giants regardless. Alex Cobb was just placed on the IL two days ago, meaning the club’s rotation is now doubly short-handed. Sam Long is taking the ball tonight, though he’s been in the bullpen for the club this year. He last pitched on Tuesday, throwing 25 pitches in relief, meaning he’s unlikely to take on a traditional starter’s workload tonight. Alex Wood, Logan Webb and Carlos Rodon made up the core of the rotation for now, as they try to carry the team to off-days on April 28 and May 2, with Cobb and DeSclafani hopefully able to return after that.

Tigers Place Victor Reyes On Injured List

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The Tigers announced today that they have placed outfielder Victor Reyes on the injured list with a left quad strain. Fellow outfielder Derek Hill has been recalled to take his place on the roster.

Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic relays word from Reyes, who says he’s been battling the injury all season. Despite that, he was off to a fairly strong start to the year. Reyes has a strikeout rate of 16% so far this year, well below his career mark of 22.1%. Similarly, his walk rate is at 8% on the young campaign, more than double his 3.9% career rate. His 112 wRC+ is also quite healthy, compared to the 82 he’s put up in his career so far. Of course, this is a tiny sample of just ten games and it would be unwise to draw sweeping conclusions from it, though there are positive signs in his Statcast profile as well, with his .394 xBA easily outpacing his numbers from previous years. It’s surely discouraging for the 27-year-old to have to sit out the next little while after a promising start to the year. Evan Woodbery of MLive relays word from manager A.J. Hinch, who apparently had a challenging time giving Reyes the news. Based on the fact that Reyes wanted to keep playing, it shouldn’t be a lengthy absence.

In more positive news for the Tigers, a couple of their offseason acquisitions could be returning from injuries shortly. Hinch told reporters that shortstop Javier Baez and reliever Andrew Chafin should be back in the coming days. (Twitter links from Woodbery) Baez played in five games for the Tigers, hitting .316/.350/.526, before being placed on the IL with thumb soreness. Chafin was signed by the Tigers to a two-year, $13MM deal but has yet to appear for the team due to a groin strain. Whenever they return, they will bolster the lineup and the bullpen, respectively. In the absence of Baez, the Tigers have been relying on two Castros, Willi and Harold, to fill the shortstop position. Gregory Soto is the only lefty in the club’s bullpen right now, but he has been deployed in the closer role, leaving the club a bit short-handed in the southpaw department.

Injury Notes: Gray, Treinen, Urias, Herrera

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The Rangers are placing starter Jon Gray back on the 10-day injured list, tweets Levi Weaver of the Athletic. The right-hander just returned after a minimal IL stint due to a blister on Tuesday, but he’s now suffered an MCL sprain in his left knee. General manager Chris Young didn’t sound concerned, suggesting this next stint might also be a minimal absence and could cost Gray just one start. Texas announced that righty Glenn Otto is being recalled from Triple-A Round Rock to make his first MLB start of the season this evening. Gray, signed to a four-year deal over the offseason, has made two starts in Arlington thus far, allowing seven runs in nine innings.

The latest on some other injury situations around the game:

  • The Dodgers announced this afternoon that reliever Blake Treinen has been placed on the 10-day IL due to right shoulder discomfort. Treinen hasn’t pitched in eight days after experiencing some soreness in his arm. The team didn’t announce a timetable for his return, though that they elected against placing him on the IL for over a week indicates they were initially of the belief he wouldn’t miss more than a few days. Treinen is among the top arms in the L.A. bullpen, coming off a stellar 2021 campaign in which he posted a 1.99 ERA with a 29.7% strikeout rate and a 52.6% grounder percentage. He has made three appearances this season, serving up a game-winning homer to the Rockies’ Connor Joe on April 9 but otherwise not allowing a baserunner and punching out five.
  • Brewers third baseman Luis Urías began the season on the injured list due to a left quad issue. He’s moving closer to a return, as Adam McCalvy of MLB.com tweets that the 24-year-old is set to begin a rehab assignment with Double-A Biloxi over the weekend. Urías is coming off a solid 2021 season, hitting .249/.345/.445 with 23 homers and a strong 11.1% walk rate across 570 plate appearances. The righty-hitting infielder posted excellent minor league numbers during his days as one of the sport’s most promising prospects, so the Brewers can reasonably expect him to build off last year’s showing when he’s healthy. In the meantime, Milwaukee has relied on a Jace Peterson – Mike Brosseau platoon at the hot corner. That duo has combined to hit just .108/.233/.108 in 43 trips to the plate.
  • The Phillies announced they’ve reinstated center fielder Odúbel Herrera from the injured list. Fellow outfielder Simón Muzziotti was optioned to Double-A Reading in a corresponding move. Herrera, re-signed to a modest one-year deal after the club declined a pricer option, entered Spring Training as the presumptive favorite for the center field job. He suffered a right oblique strain in late March that wound up costing him a month, though. After also losing Mickey Moniak to injury before the start of the season, the Phils have turned to Matt Vierling and Muzziotti through the season’s first two weeks. That hasn’t gone well, as Phils’ center fielders are hitting .118/.205/.147 through 40 plate appearances.

Matt Adams Signs With American Association’s Kansas City Monarchs

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The Kansas City Monarchs of the independent American Association announced yesterday they’ve signed first baseman Matt Adams. “We are very excited to have Matt as a part of our ball club for the 2022 season,” Monarchs manager Joe Calfapietra said as part of the team’s press release. “His ability, experience and presence is going to be extremely valuable to our organization.  We are anxious to get started toward taking the steps to reach our 2022 goals.”

Adams released a statement of his own, via the team. “I am very excited to play in Kansas City – what drew my interest in the Monarchs was that Kansas City is a great sports town close to my home with great fans and the level of baseball the Monarchs play is top level. …  I wanted to continue to play the game I love and show that I can still be an impactful big-league player and get back to a major league club.”

Now 33 years old, Adams has appeared at the MLB level in each of the past ten seasons. The bulk of that time was spent with the Cardinals, where he emerged as a fairly regular option at first base between 2013-16. Adams had an excellent .284/.335/.503 showing in 319 plate appearances in 2013, and he topped 20 homers as a part-time player every year between 2017-19 with the Cards, Braves and Nationals.

Adams has seen sporadic big league time with Atlanta in 2020 and the Rockies last season. He didn’t produce in very brief looks with either team, and he didn’t catch on with an affiliated club after being released by Colorado in July. Nevertheless, Adams owns a slightly above-average .258/.306/.463 slash in more than 2500 MLB plate appearances, serving primarily as a power bat against right-handed pitching. He’ll try to earn a return to the affiliated ranks with a strong showing in the American Association.

Rangers Release Joe McCarthy To Pursue NPB Opportunity

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The Rangers released outfielder Joe McCarthy this week, according to his transactions log at MLB.com. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News tweets that McCarthy was granted an out after agreeing to a deal with a team in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball. Last week, Sports Hochi in Japan reported McCarthy had agreed to terms with the Orix Buffaloes. The team has yet to announce the move, but it seems the 28-year-old will head to the Osaka-based club, which has started the season 10-12.

McCarthy, the older brother of D-Backs outfielder Jake McCarthy, is a former fifth-round draftee of the Rays. Traded to the Giants at the 2019 deadline, he played in four games and tallied 10 plate appearances with San Francisco in 2020. McCarthy otherwise spent his Giants’ tenure in the minors, including a 2021 campaign where he posted an impressive .305/.384/.542 mark with 15 homers in 74 games with Triple-A Sacramento last season.

After electing free agency at the end of the year, the University of Virginia product signed a minor league deal with Texas. Despite an 8-14 showing in Spring Training, he didn’t crack the Opening Day roster. Rather than head back to Triple-A, McCarthy will make the jump to Japan’s highest level.

It’s not uncommon for players on minors deals or even at the fringes of an MLB 40-man roster to explore opportunities in other pro leagues. McCarthy’s salary has yet to be reported, but he’ll certainly make more with the Buffaloes than he would’ve spending the entire season with the Rangers’ top affiliate in Round Rock. McCarthy doesn’t have much big league experience, but he’s a career .255/.355/.464 hitter in three Triple-A seasons. If he performs well in NPB, it stands to reason he could again draw interest from MLB teams a year or two down the line.

Giants To Place Steven Duggar On IL, Likely To Select Luis Gonzalez

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Giants center fielder Steven Duggar left yesterday’s game against the Mets in the second inning after feeling soreness in his left oblique area. After the game, manager Gabe Kapler indicated Duggar was likely to wind up on the injured list, a sentiment echoed by president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi.

During an appearance on KNBR radio in San Francisco (h/t to KNBR’s Danny Emerman), Zaidi said Duggar was headed for an MRI today but conceded early indications are “that’s an injury that usually puts a guy on the sidelines for a few weeks.” It’s not uncommon for oblique strains to require a month or more of recovery. The team will know more about the severity of Duggar’s injury and be able to provide a more specific timetable for his return once the imaging results come back.

Duggar has been San Francisco’s primary center fielder this season, starting 11 of their first 13 games. Like many of his teammates, the 28-year-old had a quietly solid showing in 2021, when he hit .257/.330/.437 with eight homers and seven stolen bases over 297 plate appearances. That offensive production was reliant on a probably unsustainable .355 batting average on balls in play, though, with Duggar’s 29.6% strikeout rate and 73.4% contact percentage raising questions about his ability to continue producing at an above-average level.

The Giants were confident enough in his abilities not to bring in external center field help this past offseason. Duggar had gotten off to a slow start to the year, collecting just seven hits in 36 at-bats with two walks and 16 strikeouts. His efforts to work through that rough stretch will be put on hold, with the Giants looking for other options to cover the position in his absence.

The immediate replacement seems as if it’ll be Luis González, as Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area reports (on Twitter) the Giants are planning to select González onto the big league club. San Francisco claimed the 26-year-old off release waivers from the White Sox last August. González was on the minor league injured list at the time, and the Giants stashed him on the major league 60-day IL for the remainder of the season. By doing so, they added a player whom Baseball America had named a top 15 prospect in the Chicago farm system each year from 2018-21. That required paying him an MLB salary for the season’s final couple weeks, but the Giants evidently valued him enough to do so if it meant bringing him to the organization.

San Francisco non-tendered González at the start of the offseason, when teams are required to activate players from the IL and carry them on the 40-man roster. They quickly brought him back on a minor league deal, and he’s gotten off to a .283/.389/.500 start in 11 games with Triple-A Sacramento.

González only has nine games of big league experience under his belt, but he’s a .267/.346/.416 hitter in the minors. He can cover all three outfield spots and adds a left-handed bat to replace the lefty-swinging Duggar. The healthy center field options on San Francisco’s 40-man roster — Austin Slater, Luke Williams, Mauricio Dubón and prospect Heliot Ramos — all hit right-handed, and Zaidi spoke on KNBR about his desire to get another left-handed option in the mix for Kapler. The lefty-hitting LaMonte Wade Jr. is on the IL due to left knee inflammation; he’s set to begin a rehab assignment with Sacramento today, and the team won’t reinstate him earlier than anticipated in response to Duggar’s injury (via Andrew Baggarly of the Athletic).

The Giants’ baseball ops leader also downplayed the possibility of recalling Ramos, who tallied seven plate appearances over four games during his first call-up earlier this season. “It was great seeing him up earlier, but not sure we want to bring him up to be in sort of a part-time role,” Zaidi said of the 22-year-old. “I think the next time he comes up, we want him to be in a situation where he can get everyday at-bats.”

For now, it seems the Giants are content to rotate a few players through center field based on match-ups. González isn’t yet on the 40-man roster, so there’ll be another move forthcoming to accommodate his selection.

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