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Archives for April 2022

Deolis Guerra Undergoes Tommy John Surgery

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The A’s announced this evening that reliever Deolis Guerra underwent Tommy John surgery today. That’ll obviously end his season and seems likely to sideline him for a decent chunk of the 2023 campaign as well.

Guerra left a late-spring appearance after feeling some forearm tightness, an ominous development that often proves a precursor to Tommy John. Martín Gallegos of MLB.com reported earlier this month that Guerra would require a procedure of some kind, but it hadn’t been clear whether he’d need a full UCL reconstruction. Unfortunately, that has proven to be the case.

Coming into the year, the 32-year-old (33 this weekend) looked as if he’d take on a notable role for first-year manager Mark Kotsay. Among returning relievers, only Lou Trivino (73 2/3) worked more innings for the A’s than Guerra, who tossed 65 2/3 frames. He posted a capable 4.11 ERA, striking out an average 23% of opponents on a 12.3% swinging strike rate. It wasn’t an overwhelming performance, but the Venezuela native showed the ability to work more than one inning and pounded the strike zone en route to decent numbers.

Guerra has appeared in the majors in each of the past six seasons (albeit just once in 2019), suiting up with the Pirates, Angels, Brewers and Phillies before landing in Oakland. He has worked 168 2/3 innings of 4.54 ERA ball altogether, compensating for a 20.4% strikeout percentage with a stingy 6.2% walk rate.

The A’s and Guerra agreed to an $815K salary over the offseason to avoid arbitration. He’ll collect that salary and service time while on the injured list, bringing him up over four years of service by the end of the season. Guerra remains controllable for another two years, but it’s possible the A’s non-tender him rather than carry him on the 40-man roster throughout next offseason.

Mariners Select Matt Koch

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The Mariners announced they’ve selected righty Matt Koch onto the big league roster. Veteran reliever Sergio Romo has been placed on the 10-day injured list, retroactive to April 12, due to shoulder inflammation. To create space on the 40-man roster, Seattle transferred Casey Sadler to the 60-day IL.

Koch is back in the majors for the first time since 2019. A former 3rd-round pick of the Mets, he was traded to the Diamondbacks in August 2015. Koch made his MLB debut the following season, the first of four straight in which he’d pick up some big league time. The majority of his work came in 2018, when Koch started 14 of his 19 outings and tossed 86 2/3 innings of 4.15 ERA ball for the Snakes.

Underlying numbers didn’t support Koch’s capable run prevention figure that season, though, and he couldn’t replicate it in nine outings as a multi-inning reliever the following year. The Louisville product allowed eight home runs in 20 2/3 innings in 2019, and Arizona outrighted him off the 40-man roster that May.

Koch spent the 2020 season with the Yakult Swallows in Japan before returning to affiliated ball last season. He worked 63 1/3 frames as a long relief option for the Indians’ top affiliate in Columbus, posting a 5.83 ERA with a subpar 18.8% strikeout rate. Cleveland never gave him an MLB look, but he signed a minors pact with the M’s this past offseason. Assigned to Triple-A Tacoma to open the year, the 31-year-old has punched out five of the six batters he faced to earn a return call to the big leagues. Koch is out of minor league option years; now that he’s back on the 40-man roster, Seattle has to keep him in the majors or designate him for assignment.

The Mariners signed Romo to a $2MM deal in March. The reliable veteran has tossed a pair of scoreless outings to start his tenure in the organization, but that’ll be put on hold while he recovers. The team didn’t provide a timetable for his return. Sadler, meanwhile, is out for the season after undergoing shoulder surgery last month. His eventual placement on the 60-day IL was a mere formality.

Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times first reported the move.

Reds’ COO Phil Castellini Discusses Payroll Reduction

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One of the major storylines of this past offseason was the extent to which the Reds would cut spending. General manager Nick Krall’s November quote about “aligning our payroll to our resources” became oft-repeated as Cincinnati parted with notable players like Sonny Gray, Wade Miley and Jesse Winker in money-saving moves while making virtually no effort to retain free agent slugger Nick Castellanos.

The Reds did reinvest some of the saved funds into modest one-year deals with free agents Tommy Pham, Donovan Solano, Hunter Strickland, and Colin Moran, plus took on more than $7MM of payroll expenses in the Amir Garrett–Mike Minor swap with the Royals. These present-minded moves, coupled with a Cincinnati farm system that has seen its stock rise over recent years, factored into Reds President and COO Phil Castellini’s March decree for fans to “have a little bit of faith in what we’re doing with your Cincinnati Reds.”

Fans were none too pleased with Castellini’s comments, as the on-paper unit the Reds are rolling out in 2022 houses considerably less star power than the 2021 team. The team also entered the new season with a payroll $9MM lighter than the previous year (per Cot’s Baseball Contracts). With several young pitchers forcing their way onto the team’s roster at eminently affordable rates, an argument can be made to have kept at least one of the team’s departed stars.

Early Tuesday, Phil Castellini joined WLW 700’s Scott Sloan and Mo Egger and was asked why fans should maintain trust in Reds leadership. Addressing this question, as well some fans’ calls to sell the team, Castellini replied:

“Well where are you gonna go? Let’s start there. I mean, sell the team to who? That’s the other thing – you want to have this debate? If you want to look at what would you do with this team to have it be more profitable, make more money, compete more in the current economic system that this game exists – it would be to pick it up and move it somewhere else. And so be careful what you ask for […] we’re doing the best we can do with the resources that we have.”

It’s bizarre to see an ownership figure take such a defensive stance to criticism and all but threaten the fans, particularly on Opening Day when the Reds sold more than 43,000 tickets. (Wednesday’s attendance, per Charlie Goldsmith of the Cincinnati Enquirer, was 10,976 — though weather surely impacted that total.)

Castellini’s comments also come on the heels of a second straight offseason punctuated by transactions more oriented toward cutting payroll than toward improving the on-field product. Asking Reds fans for patience is particularly brazen given that the team’s most recent rebuilding effort is still fresh in the minds of fans. The Reds, from 2015-16, traded away the likes of Aroldis Chapman, Todd Frazier, Johnny Cueto and Mike Leake — generally coming up empty on the vast majority of those deals.

What followed was a series of three straight last-place finishes in the National League Central from 2016-18, followed by a fourth-place finish in 2019. The Reds averaged a $95MM payroll during that string of last-place finishes, ranking 25th, 25th and 22nd in leaguewide payroll along the way. Cincinnati emerged from that rebuild/retooling process and spent aggressively in the 2019-20 offseason, signing Mike Moustakas, Nick Castellanos, Shogo Akiyama and Wade Miley. The stage appeared set for the Reds, buoyed by a strong rotation and a collection of impressive sluggers, to shift back into a prolonged win-now mindset.

Instead, the Reds went 31-29 during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, got swept in the postseason without scoring a run, and immediately began taking another step back. Raisel Iglesias was traded to the Angels in a pure salary dump, and the Reds non-tendered their two main trade-deadline acquisitions: Archie Bradley and Brian Goodwin. Krall spoke of reallocating those resources to other areas of need. Months later, on Opening Day, Sean Doolittle proved to be the Reds’ lone Major League signing — at one year and $1.5MM. The 2021-22 offseason subsequently commenced with the aforementioned “align payroll to resources” comments from Krall that preceded further payroll reduction.

Despite that frustrating sequence, Castellini further preached fan patience and loyalty throughout the day yesterday, drawing comparisons to the NFL’s Cincinnati Bengals who surprisingly emerged from a string of losing seasons en route to a Super Bowl appearance (and ignited fanbase) two months ago. In regards to the team’s payroll, Castellini also added that it “is still significantly more than the revenues we’re generating to produce it. […] For the last 16 years [we’ve] invested beyond our market size every single year.”

Those comments caused a stir among Reds fans who haven’t seen their team win a playoff series since 1995, and Castellini has since walked them back. They also come in conjunction with comments from Castellanos to ESPN’s Jesse Rogers, wherein he blasts Reds ownership for “suffocating” baseball in a “great city like Cincinnati.” Castellanos made those comments for a piece that ran before Castellini made his comments Tuesday, but even though they’re not a direct reaction, the timing is nevertheless impeccable.

Beyond riling the fanbase though, the club president’s comments potentially shed some light onto the team’s plans moving forward. If the team is indeed operating at a deficit while in Cincinnati, then it’s unlikely the payroll is set to rise much any time soon. Of course, there’s no way to verify the veracity of Castellini’s claims, as teams choose not to open their books to the public. But it’s worth noting that following MLB’s offseason streaming agreements with Apple and Peacock, each club is now set to receive roughly $65MM in national television/streaming revenue alone. That doesn’t account for gate revenue, local broadcast deals and myriad other revenue sources for Major League clubs.

Perhaps further signaling the organization’s future direction, Castellini name-checked the club’s “Big Red Machine” days of the 1970’s, indicating the way to best emulate that successful era of Reds baseball was to invest in the team’s talent pipeline and grow from within. Placing an emphasis on internal development is certainly a practical approach, but it’s sure to draw skepticism from the fanbase in context of the Reds curtailing payroll at a time when they’d already graduated a significant amount of young talent to the majors. Cincinnati has just $44.5MM on the books in 2023 and does not have any guaranteed contracts for the 2024 season.

Luke Jackson Undergoes Tommy John Surgery

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The Braves announced Wednesday that right-hander Luke Jackson underwent Tommy John surgery this morning. It was a widely expected move after Atlanta’s prior announcement that their longtime reliever had been diagnosed with a damaged ulnar collateral ligament in his pitching elbow. The Braves had already placed Jackson on the 60-day injured list, but today’s surgery formally closes the book on his 2022 season and, potentially, on his time with the organization. Jackson will be a free agent at season’s end.

Jackson’s loss is a notable one for the Braves, as the 30-year-old righty bounced back from a career-worst campaign in 2020 to post a career-best season in 2021. In 63 2/3 frames out of Brian Snitker’s bullpen last season, Jackson logged a a career-low 1.98 ERA with a 26.8% strikeout rate against an 11.1% walk rate. He yielded just six home runs on the season and racked up 31 holds on the year — second-most in all of Major League Baseball (behind Los Angeles’ Blake Treinen).

Notably, the Braves and Jackson haven’t even agreed on the right-hander’s salary for the 2022 season. A strange wrinkle from the 99-day lockout this offseason, there are still a handful of players throughout the league who exchanged figures with the team but have not yet settled on a deal. Jackson is among them, filing for a $4MM salary against the Braves’ filing of a $3.6MM sum. Arbitration salaries are based entirely on prior performance — they’re typically sorted in the offseason — and a potential arbitration hearing would only factor in Jackson’s prior performance rather than his current injury status.

Of course, one might wonder whether the Braves would try to now reengage on the possibility of a multi-year deal aimed at keeping Jackson at a lower price point in 2023 (and perhaps into 2024) than he’d have otherwise commanded. That’s purely speculative, but the Braves did put together a similarly structured deal for veteran reliever Kirby Yates this past winter.

If Jackson indeed simply reaches free agency as scheduled, he’d hit the open market at a time when teams know he could very well miss a month or two of the 2023 season. That doesn’t necessarily stop a Tommy John pitcher from securing a solid contract (as Yates and many others have proved), but it’d be an obvious dampener on what could’ve been some notable earning power for Jackson.

Even without Jackson, the Braves still ought to have a strong bullpen. Newcomers Kenley Jansen and Collin McHugh will join holdovers Will Smith, Tyler Matzek and A.J. Minter as experienced late-inning options. The aforementioned Yates is expected to rejoin the club at some point this summer, adding another All-Star-caliber arm to the mix. That’s not to diminish the importance Jackson held, but the Atlanta front office is surely glad to have bolstered the relief corps over the winter now that last year’s top setup option is done for the year.

Rays Select Dusten Knight, Transfer Luis Patino To 60-Day Injured List

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The Rays announced Wednesday that they’ve selected the contract of right-hander Dusten Knight from Triple-A Durham and opened a spot on the 40-man roster for the by transferring righty Luis Patino from the 10-day injured list to the 60-day injured list. Patino is currently out with a strained left oblique, and he’ll now be ineligible to return until early or mid-June. Tampa Bay also optioned Ralph Garza Jr. to Durham to open a spot on the active roster for Knight.

The loss of Patino for upwards of two months is particularly notable for the Rays, who had hoped that the former top prospect could hold down a critical rotation job in 2022. Acquired in the trade that sent Blake Snell to San Diego, Patino worked to a 4.31 ERA in 77 1/3 frames. Still just 22 years of age, Patino ranked as highly as the game’s No. 18 prospect (per Baseball America) back in 2020, and it was hard to argue that based on his dominant minor league performance. Patino graduated to the Majors at just 20 years of age but nevertheless climbed as high as Double-A and, in 263 1/3 minor league frames, has a 2.43 ERA with a 29.9% strikeout rate.

With Patino sidelined, Shane Baz still recovering from arthroscopic elbow surgery, and Ryan Yarbrough on the shelf owing to a groin injury, the Rays’ rotation doesn’t look quite like they drew it up. Shane McClanahan, Corey Kluber and Drew Rasmussen are locked into spots, but the Rays could now lean on prospect Tommy Romero and lefty Josh Fleming more than anticipated — at least for the time being. Tampa Bay, of course, has a deep farm and a knack for developing out-of-the-blue success stories on the mound, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise if they’re able to weather the early storm of injuries.

Knight, 31, made his big league debut with the Orioles this past season after spending parts of eight seasons in the minors. A former 28th-round pick by the Giants (2013), Knight parlayed a strong Triple-A showing — 1.30 ERA, 27-to-12 K/BB ratio in 27 2/3 frames at the time of his promotion — into his first call to the big leagues. Things didn’t go as smoothly in Baltimore, however, as Knight yielded a pair of runs in one inning during his debut effort. He appeared in a total of seven games and was ultimately tagged for 10 runs (nine earned) on 11 hits and five walks with 11 strikeouts through 8 2/3 frames.

Rocky showing in his debut season notwithstanding, Knight has a solid track record in Triple-A, where he’s posted a 3.11 ERA with a 23% strikeout rate and 10.6% walk rate in parts of three seasons — a total of 104 1/3 innings. On the whole, in Knight’s eight minor league seasons, he’s surrendered just 32 home runs in 397 innings of work while whiffing more than 27% of his opponents against an 8.5% walk rate.

Tigers Acquire Jamie Westbrook From Brewers

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The Tigers announced Wednesday morning that they’ve acquired minor league infielder/outfielder Jamie Westbrook from the Brewers in exchange for cash. Westbrook, who is not on the 40-man roster, will report to Triple-A Toledo.

It’s a straightforward minor league trade for a Tigers club that has lost some outfield depth early in the season with injuries to top prospect Riley Greene (broken foot) and Derek Hill (strained hamstring). Detroit is also facing a potential absence for Robbie Grossman, who exited last night’s game with a groin injury. Grossman tells reporters this morning that an MRI did not reveal a strain (Twitter link via Evan Woodbery of MLive.com), and while that’s certainly good news, it’s still possible that the ensuing tightness/discomfort will lead to a brief IL stint. Daz Cameron was added to the taxi squad, Woodbery notes, and could be called up if Grossman does require a 10-day absence to heal up.

Westbrook, 26, isn’t strictly an outfielder and has actually spent more time at second base than in the outfield, but he’s still no stranger to playing on the grass. He missed time last season to suit up for Team USA in the Olympics, but Westbrook split the rest of the season between Milwaukee’s Double-A and Triple-A affiliates, where he slashed a combined .281/.353/.456 with a dozen homers, 16 doubles, a pair of triples and three steals in 365 plate appearances.

It was a solid all-around year for Westbrook, who has consistently been an above-average hitter in the upper minors. Despite a generally solid performance throughout his minor league career, Westbrook has yet to get a call to the Majors either in Arizona or in Milwaukee. Listed at 5’9″, he’s been labeled as an “undersized” player and been questioned by scouts due to his diminutive nature. The fact that he’s been limited to left field and second base on the defensive spectrum hasn’t helped his prospect stock much.

That said, Westbrook is out to another good start in Triple-A — 5-for-10 with a double, a walk and no strikeouts — and he’ll bring a righty bat with a track record of performing in the upper minors to his new organization. In 446 Triple-A plate appearances, Westbrook is a .308/.380/.510 hitter. He’s also slashed .270/.324/.411 in a more pitcher-friendly Double-A setting (1786 plate appearances) and .319/.357/.510 in Class-A Advanced (527 plate appearances).

It’s primarily a depth acquisition for the Tigers, but if Westbrook continues to perform at an above-average offensive level, it’s possible he’ll finally break through to the big league level in his ninth professional season.

Reds Select Nick Lodolo, Designate Riley O’Brien For Assignment

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The Reds formally announced top pitching prospect Nick Lodolo’s widely expected promotion to the big leagues yesterday, and they’ve now officially added him to the Major League roster by selecting his contract from Triple-A Louisville. Right-hander Riley O’Brien was designated for assignment in a corresponding 40-man move, and Cincinnati optioned righty Daniel Duarte to Louisville to open a spot on the active 28-man roster.

The 27-year-old O’Brien will now be traded or placed on outright waivers within a week’s time. An eighth-round pick by the Rays back in 2017, O’Brien came to the Reds in a 2020 trade that sent southpaw Cody Reed to Tampa Bay. He made his big league debut in 2021 but pitched just 1 1/3 innings in his lone start before being sent back to Louisville, where he otherwise spent the entirety of his 2021 season.

In 112 2/3 innings with Louisville last season, O’Brien pitched to a 4.55 ERA with generally similar marks from fielding-independent pitching metrics. He fanned a solid 24.7% of his Triple-A opponents and induced grounders at a similarly sound 45% clip, but O’Brien walked 11.2% of his opponents and plunked 10 more. O’Brien also walked three of the nine big league hitters he faced last year and allowed a pair of homers, illustrating that he’ll need to refine his command if he’s to find success at the big league level.

That said, O’Brien only turned 27 a couple months ago and has a pair of minor league option years remaining (2022 included). He’s shown an ability to miss bats in the minors and, as Eric Longenhagen and Tess Taruskin wrote when ranking him 29th among Cincinnati prospects, he’s shown three pitches that have all, at times, looked like potential plus offerings: his fastball, curveball and changeup. A club with some 40-man flexibility and a need for pitching depth could certainly take him on as a project.

As covered in greater detail yesterday, Lodolo will join fellow top prospect Hunter Greene in a youthful and high-upside Cincinnati rotation. The No. 7 overall pick in the 2019 draft, Lodolo is widely considered to be among the sport’s 100 best prospects and will give Reds fans a pair of young hurlers on which to dream.

Lodolo, Greene, 2021 Rookie of the Year Jonathan India and promising young backstop Tyler Stephenson could well be integral parts of the Reds’ core moving forward, and the organization undoubtedly still has high hopes for former No. 2 overall draft pick Nick Senzel, whose career to date has been continually derailed by injuries. Cincinnati surely still hopes to contend in 2022, but in order to do so they’ll need big performances from several young players, as the club also subtracted a number of productive veterans over the winter while cutting payroll (e.g. Jesse Winker, Sonny Gray, Wade Miley).

Offseason In Review: Pittsburgh Pirates

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It was a quiet winter in Pittsburgh, to be expected for a team still firmly in the midst of a rebuild. The Bucs made a couple low-cost additions on the margins, but it’s another evaluative season for the front office. The biggest move for the franchise: a Spring Training extension with a player they expect to be an integral part of their next core, one that marked the largest investment in the organization’s history.

Major League Signings

2022 spending: $16.025MM
Total spending: $16.225M

Trades and claims

Extensions

  • Signed 3B Ke’Bryan Hayes to an eight-year, $70MM extension (deal also includes 2030 club option and potentially buys out four free agent seasons)

Notable Minor League Signees

Notable Losses

The Pirates are still firmly in rebuild mode, one of a handful of teams that enters the 2022 season with no real hope of contending. As with Ben Cherington’s first two years as general manager, the Bucs entered the winter looking as if they’d be one of the league’s least active teams. They again shied away from any long-term commitments to players outside the organization, but Pittsburgh was comparatively more aggressive this time around than they’d been in recent seasons. After spending just $7.25MM in free agency over the prior two winters combined, the Bucs exceeded $16MM in open market expenditures this year to bring in a handful of veteran role players.

The first of those acquisitions was southpaw José Quintana, a former All-Star who has fallen on hard times. Quintana hasn’t posted a full season out of the rotation since 2019, as he missed the bulk of the 2020 campaign with injury and was kicked to the bullpen last June after a dreadful beginning to the year. The 33-year-old had by far the worst ERA of his career (6.43) in 63 innings with the Angels and Giants last season, surprisingly struggling to throw strikes. Yet he also missed bats at a personal-best rate, and he’s a perfectly sensible flier for a modest $2MM.

Quintana steps into an otherwise very young rotation as a veteran stabilizer. The Bucs hope his acquisition will turn out as last winter’s Tyler Anderson signing did. Anderson was a competent starter for the season’s first half, took the ball every fifth day, then netted the Pirates a couple prospects at the trade deadline. Quintana will need to be better this season than he was in 2021 to attract interest from contenders, but there’s little harm in trying.

Not long after bringing Quintana aboard, the Pirates worked out a one-year deal to keep Yoshi Tsutsugo around. Pittsburgh signed the former NPB star after he was released by the Dodgers in August and watched him turn in the best month and a half of his MLB career down the stretch. That late-season showing earned Tsutsugo a few million dollars and an everyday first base job, as Pittsburgh then jettisoned their previous lefty-hitting first baseman Colin Moran. The Pirates couldn’t trade Tsutsugo last fall (and his impressive showing was probably in too small a sample to merit much interest anyhow), but he’d intrigue contenders if he continues to perform at that level in this season’s first half.

Small pickups aside, the Pirates obviously remained amenable to moving veteran players off the roster. The most straightforward trade candidate of the bunch was catcher Jacob Stallings. The 32-year-old has blossomed into a Gold Glove defender and is still plenty affordable, but his age made him an unlikely long-term fit in Pittsburgh. The Bucs moved him to the Marlins for righty Zach Thompson and prospects Kyle Nicolas (a 2020 second-rounder) and Connor Scott (the No. 13 overall pick in 2018) shortly before the lockout.

Structurally, that deal made sense for both teams. The Marlins were aggressive in rebuilding their lineup in an effort to contend immediately. Pittsburgh grabbed a pair of minor leaguers and a depth arm in Thompson who had been squeezed out of Miami’s loaded starting pitching mix. The Pirates have more opportunity to take a look at Thompson, a 28-year-old who was available in minor league free agency a season ago but pitched to a 3.24 ERA with a solid 11.7% swinging strike rate as a rookie. He didn’t accrue a full year of service in 2021, meaning he can be controlled another six seasons.

With Stallings gone and backup catcher Michael Pérez previously outrighted off the 40-man roster, the Pirates had to bring in two catchers. The starter is former Cleveland backstop Roberto Pérez, inked to a $5MM deal shortly after the Stallings trade. Pérez doesn’t offer much at the plate, but he’s a gifted defender who was lauded for his work with Cleveland’s young pitchers. As with Quintana and Tsutsugo, he could be a deadline trade candidate, but Pittsburgh may value his intangible presence enough to hold onto him all year rather than recoup a minimal prospect return. Just before Opening Day, the Bucs brought in former Phillie Andrew Knapp to back Pérez up.

Pittsburgh took a couple more low-cost shots to round out the infield. First baseman/DH Daniel Vogelbach signed for $1MM after being non-tendered by the Brewers. He adds an on-base oriented lefty bat to the mix and is controllable for multiple seasons; Vogelbach has a cheap club option in 2023 and would be arbitration-eligible in 2024. Also controllable for multiple seasons is lefty-swinging utilityman Josh VanMeter, who was acquired from the D-Backs in Spring Training. Pittsburgh gave up a minor league pitcher to land the out-of-options VanMeter, suggesting they believe he’s capable of sticking on the active roster all year (and maybe beyond).

VanMeter joins young players like Diego Castillo, Hoy Park and Michael Chavis in the mix at second base. He could also see some time in the outfield, where holdovers Ben Gamel and Cole Tucker have jobs. The Pirates claimed Greg Allen (who’ll miss the first couple months of the season with a hamstring injury) and signed Jake Marisnick to fill out the depth on the grass.

The left side of the infield figures to eventually be manned by two of the Pirates’ most promising young players. Ke’Bryan Hayes will be around at third base for the long haul (more on that in a minute), while shortstop prospect Oneil Cruz is one of the sport’s most electrifying young talents. Cruz is opening the season in the minors after being optioned to Triple-A Indianapolis, a move that looked to be motivated by service time considerations. He doesn’t have much experience at the minors’ top level, to which the Pirates can point as justification. Yet it’s difficult to argue he’s not a better player than the light-hitting Kevin Newman already, and a non-competitive 2022 season should give the team plenty of time to live with any growing pains the 6’7″ Cruz experiences on either side of the ball.

Newman will hold down shortstop for now, as he has for a few seasons. The Pirates would probably be amenable to dealing him as well, although there may not be enough interest in a glove-only player to generate a ton of demand. It’s possible Newman just kicks over to second base or the bench whenever Cruz returns to the majors.

There’s no question, on the other hand, that rival teams would love to get their hands on star outfielder Bryan Reynolds. The switch-hitting Reynolds has been an excellent hitter in both full seasons of his MLB career. He’s drawn attention from teams like the Marlins, Mariners, Yankees, Brewers and Padres (and doubtless many more) since last summer’s deadline alone. Pittsburgh has maintained they’re more inclined to build around Reynolds than trade him, made all the more evident by the reported asking price they’ve floated in talks.

Barry Jackson and Craig Mish of the Miami Herald reported last month that the Pirates wanted both Kahlil Watson and Max Meyer, each of whom are generally ranked among the game’s top 75 or so prospects, in any Reynolds deal. Pittsburgh’s demand from the Padres hasn’t been reported, but Dennis Lin of the Athletic wrote that San Diego considered it “prohibitive.” Cherington more or less confirmed the Bucs would only move Reynolds for a king’s ransom last week (link via Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette). “Bryan is a really good player,” Cherington said. “He’s also young, and we’re not winning yet. You combine all those things, teams are gonna call. … Those calls are incoming calls. They’re not outgoing calls.”

Those calls will keep coming, at least unless the Pirates and Reynolds work out a long-term deal. The team controls him through 2025 via arbitration. Reynolds reportedly turned down an extension offer from the Bucs prior to the 2021 season, and he told Mackey that talks about a long-term deal never seriously arose this spring. The sides figure to revisit discussions at some point down the road, but for now, they’ll presumably proceed through arbitration with their star outfielder.

That’s a path they won’t have to take with Hayes, as they agreed to terms with their franchise third baseman on an eight-year extension on Opening Day. The deal guarantees him $70MM, setting a new high-water mark for a franchise commitment to a single player. Nevertheless, it’s a more than reasonable price to pay for essentially the entirety of Hayes’ prime. The deal buys out as much as four free agent years and could keep him around through his age-33 season. For a player who ranked No. 15 on Baseball America’s top prospects list heading into 2021, it’s a sensible investment.

Interestingly, Pittsburgh front-loaded the Hayes deal. That’s an unconventional tack for an early-career extension, which typically align with the standard year-by-year process of progressively paying players more later in the deal for what would’ve been their arbitration and free agent seasons. Instead, the Bucs will pay Hayes $10MM apiece in each of the next two years before paying him $7-8MM per season through the rest of the decade. That gets the young third baseman some noteworthy money up front while allowing the Pirates to keep a fair bit of cash in reserve for future seasons when they anticipate being more competitive.

Who’ll join Hayes as part of the core remains to be seen. Reynolds seemingly will, barring a Godfather-style offer from another team. The Pirates no doubt hope Cruz breaks through, while recent first-round draftees Henry Davis and Nick Gonzales are among the other hitters coming up the pipeline. Much of the attention will again be focused on the minor leagues, but the Pirates have a few arms in the majors trying to pitch their way into the long-term picture.

Mitch Keller and Bryse Wilson are former top prospects who have struggled thus far in their MLB careers. It very well could be a make-of-break year for both righties, but they should get another extended look in 2022. Thompson and JT Brubaker are older and don’t have the prospect pedigree of Keller or Wilson, but they’ve each flashed enough against major league hitters to intrigue. Roansy Contreras and Miguel Yajure each came over from the Yankees in the January 2021 Jameson Taillon deal and could be long-term starting options. Contreras, in particular, is a consensus top 100 prospect whom many evaluators suggest has mid-rotation upside. Not everyone in that group will develop, but the Bucs have plenty of innings to go around in hopes that a couple cement their places on the 2023 pitching staff.

That’s true of the bullpen as well, where Contreras and Yajure are currently stationed. David Bednar broke out as a late-game weapon last season and is controllable through 2026. Reliever performance is volatile enough the Bucs would probably still be open to trade calls on the hard-throwing righty, but he seems likelier to stick around for a few years. Veterans Chris Stratton and Heath Hembree — the latter of whom signed a one-year deal this winter after striking out 34.2% of opponents in 2021 — are more obvious midseason trade candidates.

In aggregate, 2022 will be another rough season for the Pirates and their fans. The club is still firmly in “evaluation” mode of the rebuild, although the hoped-for light at the end of the tunnel is coming closer into view. The time hasn’t yet come for the Pirates to make particularly meaningful pickups on the open market or via trade, but they’ve locked up Hayes as a key piece of the future and declined to move Reynolds for anything more than a massive return. Some of this offseason’s stopgap adds could be dealt away in the coming months, but the Bucs have begun to lay the foundation for what they hope to be their next competitive teams.

White Sox Place Lucas Giolito, AJ Pollock On Injured List

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1:25pm: It’ll be Lambert starting in place of Giolito this week, GM Rick Hahn tells reporters (Twitter links via Scott Merkin of MLB.com). Hahn added that the Sox are “not necessarily expecting him to go out there and get us deep into the game” but rather to open the game with a few quality innings before turning things over to the ’pen.

10:40am: The White Sox announced Tuesday that right-hander Lucas Giolito and outfielder AJ Pollock have both been placed on the 10-day injured list. Giolito left his season debut with an abdominal strain, and the Sox had already revealed that he’s expected to miss at least two starts. Pollock, meanwhile is dealing with a hamstring strain that forced him from Saturday’s game. The ChiSox recalled right-hander Jimmy Lambert and lefty Anderson Severino from Triple-A Charlotte in a pair of corresponding moves.

Giolito hurled four shutout frames before exiting his debut tilt, and he’ll now be sidelined for at least his next two turns through the rotation. His placement on the 10-day IL is retroactive to April 9, so he’s eligible for return beginning on April 19. Giolito joins right-hander Lance Lynn on the shelf, though Lynn is expected to miss considerably more time than him after undergoing knee surgery.

With their top two starters out of action, the White Sox will likely look to Dylan Cease, Dallas Keuchel, Michael Kopech, Vince Velasquez and Reynaldo Lopez to shoulder the workload in the rotation for the time being. Lambert worked three innings in his lone Triple-A appearance thus far, so he could be an option to provide some length along with Velasquez and Lopez at the back of the rotation. Chicago also inked veteran Johnny Cueto to a minor league deal earlier in the month, but he’s still building up toward game readiness after lingering as a free agent throughout the majority of Spring Training.

It’s not yet clear how much time Pollock will be expected to miss, though it’s certainly worth noting that his placement on the IL is retroactive to April 10. Acquired in a straight-up swap that sent Craig Kimbrel to the Dodgers, the 34-year-old Pollock has gotten out to a 4-for-7 start in his brief White Sox tenure so far. His absence will open the door for some additional at-bats in the outfield for Gavin Sheets, Andrew Vaughn and Adam Engel. Both Sheets and Vaughn were getting some early outfield work in just minutes after the announcement, tweets James Fegan of The Athletic.

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