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Phillies, Jose Ruiz Agree To Minor League Deal

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The Phillies and right-handed reliever Jose Ruiz have agreed to a minor league contract, reports Tim Dierkes of MLB Trade Rumors. He’ll be invited to major league spring training this year and compete for a spot on the roster. Ruiz is repped by the OL Baseball Group.

Ruiz, 29, split the 2023 season between the White Sox — for whom he pitched from 2018-23 — and the D-backs, who acquired him for cash in April after Chicago designated the hard-throwing righty for assignment. He was rocked during the season’s first week in Chicago, yielding nine runs in just 3 2/3 innings, but Ruiz pitched decently with Arizona for much of the season.

In 40 2/3 frames with the eventual NL champions, Ruiz logged a 4.43 ERA with a 19.8% strikeout rate, 9.3% walk rate and 42.4% ground-ball rate. He averaged 96.6 mph on his heater along the way and notched a healthy 12.5% swinging-strike rate against a roughly average 31.5% chase rate on pitches off the plate. He also managed hard contact fairly well in Arizona, with better-than-average marks in exit velocity (88.5 mph) and hard-hit rate (34.4%).

Command was an issue for Ruiz throughout the year, as it has been more often than not in his career. While the 9.3% walk rate he posted with the Snakes was better than his ugly 10.9% career mark, it’s also still higher than the league-wide 8.6%. Beyond that, Ruiz’s command within the zone was lacking, which contributed to the hefty 1.55 home runs he allowed for every nine innings pitched this season.

The D-backs could’ve retained Ruiz through arbitration by adding him back to the 40-man roster, but they instead opted to let him become a free agent, which led the Phillies to pick him up on what amounts to a no-risk commitment. If he’s able to round back into form, he could be controlled for as many as three more seasons. Ruiz’s 2022-23 campaigns don’t stand out, but as recently as 2021 he racked up 65 innings of 3.05 ERA ball over 59 appearances with the ChiSox, striking out 23.2% of his opponents against a more palatable 9.2% walk rate.

Ruiz is out of minor league options, so if the Phillies do add him to the roster at some point, they won’t be able to send him down without first passing him through outright waivers.

Submit Your Questions For This Week’s MLB Trade Rumors Podcast!

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On the MLB Trade Rumors podcast, we’ll frequently answer questions from our readers and listeners.  With the next episode set for Wednesday, we’re looking for MLBTR’s audience to submit their questions and we’ll pick a few to answer.

Whether it’s a question about a recent transaction, a future transaction or anything else related to the offseason, we’d love to hear from you!  You can send your questions to mlbtrpod@gmail.com.

Also, if you want to hear your voice on the podcast, send us your question in audio form and we might play it.  iPhone users can find instructions on how to do so here.

In the meantime, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Dodgers, Cubs, Angels Among Clubs Interested In Robert Stephenson

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Free agent right-hander Robert Stephenson is proving to be quite popular this offseason, reports Jon Morosi of MLB.com. He is drawing interest from the Dodgers, Cubs and Angels, but other unnamed clubs as well.

Stephenson, 31 in February, was one of the lesser known names on MLBTR’s list of the Top 50 Free Agents published earlier this month, where Stephenson was pegged for a four-year, $36MM deal. The righty had struggled with injuries and underperformance at various times in his career but had a well-timed breakout just before he hit the open market.

He was traded from the Pirates to the Rays in early June and then started throwing a cutter instead of a slider, with phenomenal results. He went on to make 42 appearances after heading to Tampa, posting an earned run average of just 2.35 in 38 1/3 innings. He struck out an incredible 42.9% of batters faced while walking just 5.7%. Among pitchers with at least 30 innings pitched in that time, that strikeout rate was fourth in the majors, trailing only Félix Bautista, Aroldis Chapman and Pete Fairbanks. Stephenson had a lower walk rate than all three of those guys, making his 37.1% K-BB% ratio tops in the majors in that time frame.

That’s a fairly small sample of work, but Stephenson once had a strong prospect pedigree. He was a first-round pick of the Reds back in 2011 and was on Baseball America’s top 100 list in four straight years from 2013 to 2016, getting as high as #19 in 2014. He reached the majors as a starter and posted fairly lackluster results, with an ERA of 5.47 at the end of 2018, having thrown 133 1/3 major league innings in that time.

A move to the bullpen seemed to help, as he made 57 appearances in 2019 with an ERA of 3.76. But in 2020, he missed roughly a month due to a mid-back strain and allowed 11 earned runs in the 10 innings he was able to pitch in the shortened season. He was traded to the Rockies prior to 2021 and managed to get back on track, despite making Coors Field his home, posting a 3.13 ERA in 49 appearances that year. But 2022 saw him struggle with a 6.04 ERA in 45 appearances for the Rockies before getting claimed off waivers by the Pirates in August.

The most recent season got off to a slow start, as he had some right arm discomfort in the spring and started the season on the injured list. He eventually made 18 appearances for the Pirates this year but showed some rust, walking 13.1% of opponents and allowing 5.14 earned runs per nine. But as mentioned, a midseason trade to the Rays preceded a tremendous step forward.

Now Stephenson seems positioned to cash in. Though his big breakout was just a few months of work, he was one of the best relievers in the league for that time. It didn’t come completely out of nowhere, as he had once been a highly-touted youngster and had a couple of seasons of decent relief work recently. Teams have made huge gambles on relievers based on small samples before, with Drew Pomeranz getting four years and $34MM, Robert Suarez five years and $46MM, while Rafael Montero got three years and $34.5MM. All three of those guys had fairly limited or inconsistent track records but some flashy underlying numbers that the signing club was betting on.

It would take a change in strategy for the Cubs to be seriously in on Stephenson. Since Jed Hoyer was promoted to president of baseball operations, they have stuck to one-year deals for relievers, signing guys like Mychal Givens, Michael Fulmer, David Robertson, Andrew Chafin, Brad Boxberger, Chris Martin, Ryan Tepera and others with mixed results. None of those guys got more than $5MM and getting Stephenson will surely take more than that on an annual basis and for multiple years. But the Cubs have been rebuilding for much of that time and may be willing to push a little farther after just missing the playoffs in 2023. The club’s relievers had a collective ERA of 3.85 in 2013, which placed them 13th in the league.

The Dodgers’ bullpen had a 3.42 ERA in 2023, which was third-best in the league, and most of their key relievers are still under club control for 2024. Adding another high-octane arm there would seemingly be more of a luxury buy than a necessity, especially when they have needs in the rotation and could potentially give a massive contract to Shohei Ohtani. But per Roster Resource, they are roughly $80MM below the competitive balance tax and well below previous franchise highs, so maybe they have enough powder dry to address everything on their to-do list and go after Stephenson.

The Angels have often struggled to put together a decent bullpen and that was again the case in 2023, with a collective ERA of 4.88 that was better than just five clubs. They tried to spend some money to address that issue a few years ago by signing Raisel Iglesias to a four-year deal but he was flipped to Atlanta after just a year and a half. The club has been struggling to get above .500 in recent years but has no plans of rebuilding this winter, even if Ohtani winds up going elsewhere.

Braves, White Sox Have Discussed Dylan Cease Trade

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The Braves are among the teams in ongoing trade talks with the White Sox regarding right-hander Dylan Cease, reports USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. Atlanta had been connected to a pair of notable free agent starters, Aaron Nola and Sonny Gray, but Nola re-signed in Philadelphia last week and Gray is reportedly wrapping up a deal with the Cardinals today.

With their ostensible top two free-agent targets off the board, it’s not a surprise to see the Braves being more prominently connected to the trade market. Cease’s White Sox are generally open for business on the heels of a catastrophic 2023 season that led to the firing of longtime baseball ops executives Rick Hahn and Kenny Williams. Assistant GM Chris Getz has since been elevated to the GM’s chair, and Getz plainly stated following the season that there are no untouchables on his roster. Cease, with two remaining years of club control, is among the likelier and most appealing trade candidates Getz has at his disposal.

Cease, 28 next month, was the American League Cy Young runner-up in 2022 but had a down season in 2023 — one of the myriad factors which contributed to the disastrous season on Chicago’s south side. His 2022 campaign featured 184 frames of 2.20 ERA ball with a dominant 30.4% strikeout rate against a 10.4% walk rate, but that version of Cease appeared far too infrequently for the Sox’s liking in 2023. This past season saw the righty post a pedestrian 4.58 earned run average in 177 innings, showing diminished fastball velocity (95.8 mph, down from 96.9 mph a year prior) and a lesser strikeout rate (27.3%).

[Related: Looking for a Match in a Dylan Cease Trade]

Cease made a nominal improvement in his walk rate (10.1%), but virtually every other aspect of his profile backed up in ’23. His opponents’ average exit velocity and hard-hit rates exploded, jumping from 86.8 mph and 31.2% in 2022 to 90 mph and 41.5% in 2023. Both his swinging-strike and opponents’ chase rate dropped sharply as well, and Cease allowed an average of 0.97 homers per nine frames after yielding 0.76 HR/9 in 2022. He had some obvious struggles due to the poor defense behind him, with a career-high .330 average on balls in play (up from .260 the previous year), but that alone is not the driving force behind his struggles. Some of the BABIP spike was likely of his own doing anyhow; the uptick in hard contact he yielded certainly contributed to more balls finding their way through an already porous defense.

Although Cease’s 2023 season wasn’t a particularly strong year in terms of run-prevention, he still boasts well above-average velocity and bat-missing capabilities. Fielding-independent metrics (3.72 FIP, 4.10 SIERA) felt he was better than that lackluster ERA, even if he wasn’t as sharp as he was in 2022. He’s also proven himself a durable and reliable arm, as he’s made a full slate of starts in each of the past four seasons. Add in a reasonable $8.8MM projected salary from MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz, and it’s abundantly clear that Cease still possesses plenty of trade value. Consider that Lance Lynn and Kyle Gibson, a pair of innings eaters in their late 30s who don’t have the same upside as Cease’s 2022 campaign, signed for $11MM and $12MM, respectively, with the Cardinals. Cease’s projected $8.8MM salary is a clear bargain — particularly with another year of arbitration set to follow.

As things stand, the Atlanta rotation projects to consist of Spencer Strider, Max Fried, Charlie Morton and Bryce Elder, with a fifth-spot competition headlined by AJ Smith-Shawver, Dylan Dodd and (eventually) a returning Ian Anderson, who underwent Tommy John surgery early in the 2023 season. The Braves have prioritized adding a playoff-caliber arm to that group, both to safeguard against injury for the top of the rotation and also to protect against the potential departure of Fried, who’ll be a free agent following the season. Cease would accomplish both of those goals.

In many ways, a trade is the more sensible route for the Braves to go in terms of their rotation need anyhow. Atlanta’s projected payroll is already just shy of $207MM, per Roster Resource, but their luxury-tax obligations are far more consequential. The Braves project at around $241MM of luxury considerations, which already has them north of the $237MM luxury tax barrier. This is the second straight year they’ll be paying the luxury tax, so they’ll be penalized at a 30% rate for the first $20MM by which they exceed the tax and a 42% rate for the next $20MM. Signing a free agent like Nola or Gray would’ve come with around $7-9MM in luxury penalties this year — on top of the player’s actual salary. And, since the Braves are set up to be third-time payors in 2024, they’d be facing even steeper tax percentages next season.

Cease, of course, will come with those same penalties, but a 30% tax on his projected $8.8MM salary would bring the total outlay for acquiring him (speaking strictly financially) to around $11.5MM — a far more palatable price point than the free-agent market has to offer. Atlanta would also have the offseason to explore a possible extension with Cease — an Atlanta-area native (Milton, Ga.). The Braves have had plenty of success both acquiring and extending players with local ties, be it through the draft or through trades.

The Braves’ farm system has been stripped down by previous trades to acquire names like Matt Olson, Sean Murphy and several relievers (Joe Jimenez, Pierce Johnson, Aaron Bummer, Raisel Iglesias). They still have some appealing young talent, particularly in the upper minors or even some young big leaguers who’ve already gotten their feet wet. Smith-Shawver, Dodd and infielder Vaughn Grissom, for instance, would all hold appeal to the White Sox (and to other potential trade partners with pitching to peddle). The Sox and Braves already lined up on one swap this offseason, with Chicago sending the aforementioned lefty reliever Bummer to Atlanta.

Atlanta figures to face steep competition with regard to Cease, who offers one of the most tantalizing blends of raw talent, affordable salary and remaining club control on this offseason’s trade market. MLBTR ranked Cease sixth on our original list of the offseason’s top 25 trade candidates.

The Dodgers are already known to be interested, and just about any other team in need of starting pitching figures to check in — particularly those that may not want to spend top-of-the-market dollars to augment their starting staffs in free agency. That group could include the Reds, Pirates, D-backs, Padres and Orioles, to list a speculative few.

The Opener: Gray, Maeda, Twins, FA Market

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After a busy morning on the hot stove, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day today:

1. Gray, Maeda finalizing deals:

It was reported earlier this morning that the Cardinals are finalizing a deal with veteran right-hander Sonny Gray worth a reported $75MM over three years. That leaves Gray poised to become the second free agent who placed in the top 10 of MLBTR’s Top 50 free agents list to sign this offseason following righty Aaron Nola, who re-upped with the Phillies earlier in the month. Gray isn’t the only free agent starter in the process of finalizing a deal, however. Per reports last night, the Tigers inking veteran right-hander Kenta Maeda to a two-year deal worth $24MM. That contract is pending a physical, which is expected to happen later today. Both Gray and Maeda will require 40-man roster spots upon their deals with St. Louis and Detroit becoming official, though both clubs have spots available meaning no corresponding transaction will be necessary to finalize either pact.

2. How will the Twins address their rotation?

Both Gray and Maeda pitched for the Twins in 2023. Maeda provided the club with 104 1/3 innings of back-of-the-rotation production following his return from Tommy John surgery this year, posting a 4.23 ERA and 4.02 FIP over 21 appearances (20 starts). Gray, meanwhile, had a career year with Minnesota and posted a 2.79 ERA across 32 starts. The return of right-hander Chris Paddack to the rotation in 2024 should help alleviate the losses, though 25-year-old youngster Louie Varland, who posted a 4.63 ERA and 5.02 FIP in 68 major league innings this year, likely represents the club’s internal fifth starter.

Given that, an external addition who can join Pablo Lopez, Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober, and Paddack in the rotation could make plenty of sense. While the club is expected to reduce payroll this offseason, the club’s interest in a reunion with Maeda prior to the righty signing in Detroit suggests Minnesota can afford to add a mid-tier free agent arm this offseason. There’s plenty such starters available, with Michael Wacha, Nick Martinez, and Mike Clevinger among the names expected to fall in a similar tier to Maeda this winter.

3. When will the hitting, relief markets start heating up?

As the hot stove has begun to heat up, the focus has largely been on starting pitching. Maeda and Gray join Nola, Kyle Gibson, and Lance Lynn as free agent rotation arms who have signed big league deals this month. Meanwhile, right-hander Reynaldo Lopez inked a three-year deal with an Atlanta club who intends to stretch the reliever out for a rotation audition of his own come Spring Training.

All of that buzz on the rotation market stands in sharp contrast to the position player and relief markets, which have been relatively quiet in the offseason’s first month. Joe Jimenez’s three-year deal with the Braves on the first day of free agency still represents the most significant relief contract of the offseason, while infielder Paul DeJong’s one-year agreement with the White Sox represents the lone positional signing of significance of the winter to this point.

NPB’s Yokohama BayStars Post Shota Imanaga

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The Yokohama BayStars of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball formally posted top left-hander Shota Imanaga for Major League clubs on Monday, per the Kyodo News. It’s been known for months that Imanaga would be posted for big league clubs, but the timing of the move wasn’t clear until last Wednesday, when MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand reported that Imanaga would be posted today.

Once MLB approves the posting and notifies teams that Imanaga is indeed available (a formality), that will kick off a 45-day negotiation window. One week ago today, NPB’s Orix Buffaloes posted ace and reigning three-time Sawamura Award winner (NPB’s Cy Young equivalent) Yoshinobu Yamamoto for MLB clubs. His negotiation window officially commenced the following morning. Imanaga will likely follow an identical pattern, with his negotiation window formally opening Tuesday morning.

Imanaga, who turned 30 in September, just wrapped up a second straight season with a sub-3.00 ERA and his third in the past five seasons. He tossed 148 innings of 2.80 ERA ball for the BayStars in 2023, punching out 29.5% of his opponents against a sensational 3.8% walk rate. Since 2019, he’s posted a collective 2.79 earned run average, 26.2% strikeout rate and 5.9% walk rate. A 2022 no-hitter headlines that five-year run of excellence.

While he may not bet the unusually young power arm that his countryman Yamamoto is, Imanaga is nonetheless viewed as a potential mid-rotation starter in MLB. Back in September, MLBTR contributor Dai Takegami Podziewski noted that he’d added some life to his fastball and was sitting in the 92-93 mph range. He also has a splitter, curveball and cutter/slider, as examined in Brandon Tew’s breakdown of that 2022 no-hitter over at Sports Info Solutions

Any team that agrees to sign Imanaga will also be agreeing to pay a posting/release fee to the BayStars — the size of which is dependent on the size of Imanaga’s contract. In addition to the guaranteed money owed to the pitcher himself, his new team will need to pay a release fee equal to 20% of the contract’s first $25MM, plus 17.5% of the next $25MM and 15% of any dollars thereafter. MLBTR predicted a five-year, $85MM contract for the lefty, which would come with a $13.875MM release fee owed to the BayStars on top of the contract itself. Future club/player options and earnings unlocked via incentives/bonuses are also subject to that system (and, in this hypothetical instance, would come with a 15% fee owed to the Yokohama club).

To this point, Imanaga has been linked to several MLB clubs — most recently the Cubs but also the Dodgers and Red Sox. It stands to reason that virtually every mid- or large-market club with a need for pitching will have some degree of interest. Imanaga has been one of the steadiest performers in Japan for the better part of a half decade and has thus been heavily scouted by MLB teams for quite some time now. He’ll likely be on the radar for other bigger-spending teams like the Mets, Yankees, Cardinals, Giants, Angels and Blue Jays (to name a few) over the next six-plus weeks.

Giants Re-Sign Cole Waites To Minor League Contract

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The Giants have brought back Cole Waites on a minor league contract, according to the team’s official transactions page.  Waites was non-tendered last week, and the new minor league pact means that the Giants won’t need to use a 40-man roster spot on the 25-year-old righty.

Waites had Tommy John surgery in mid-September, making it all but certain he’ll miss the 2024 season unless he can complete rehab in time for an inning or two right at the end of the regular-season schedule.  The transactions page didn’t indicate that Waites’ deal is anything more than a standard one-year minors contract, but it wouldn’t be surprising if it was a two-year deal or if the Giants signed him to another type of extension at some point in 2024 once they get a better read on how his rehab is progressing.

An 18th-round pick for the Giants in the 2019 draft, Waites has appeared in the big leagues in each of the last two seasons, totaling eight innings over 10 games and a 6.75 ERA with six walks and strikeouts apiece.  Waites fits the clasic profile of the hard-throwing but wild reliever, with a 15.32% walk rate over his 103 career minor league innings but also a fastball that routinely hits the upper-90s (and can reach 100mph).  When Waites has been able to find the plate, he has been deadly — he has a 37.61% strikeout rate against minor league hitters.

The potential is obvious if Waites can pair that heater with even average control, though his injury history now adds another obstacle to his future.  Waites also missed a big chunk of the 2021 season due to knee surgery, and between his injuries and the canceled 2020 minor league season, he has played in only 102 games (and thrown 103 innings) as a professional.

Angels Sign Adam Kolarek

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The Angels announced (via their X feed) that they have signed left-hander Adam Kolarek to a one-year contract worth $900K.  Kolarek elected to become a free agent after finishing the season in the Braves’ minor league system.

While $900K isn’t much by MLB standards, it is somewhat surprising that Kolarek landed a guaranteed deal at all given his shaky results and even a lack of overall big league playing time over the last three seasons.  That said, the Angels were thin on left-handed relief pitching, so locking in Kolarek provides one initial step over what might be a wider-scale revamp of a bullpen that struggled badly last season.

Since Opening Day 2021, Kolarek (who turns 35 in January) has thrown 32 2/3 innings over 32 appearances with the A’s, Dodgers, and Mets, with a 4.58 ERA.  Most of those struggles were contained to his 2021-22 seasons in Oakland, but even when posting better results in 2023, Kolarek still found himself as a sudden journeyman.

Kolarek signed a minor league deal with the Dodgers last winter and was designated for assignment after just a lone MLB appearance with the team in June.  He chose to remain with the organization after being outrighted off the 40-man roster, and was then dealt to the Mets at the deadline and tossed 4 2/3 innings in a New York uniform.  Another DFA soon followed, and this time Kolarek did elect free agency rather than accepting another outright assignment, and he then landed with the Braves on a minors deal without seeing any time on the Major League roster in September.

As noted, Kolarek did show flickers of a turnaround in 2023.  He didn’t allow any runs (and only two hits and walk) over his six total MLB innings last year, and he had a 3.80 ERA in 42 2/3 frames at the Triple-A level.  That minor league ERA comes with the significant red flag of a 16.13% walk rate, as the control problems that hampered Kolarek in 2021-22 continued to be a problem.

The walks have crept up on Kolarek at earlier stages of his career, yet he got things under control during his prime years of 2018-20.  The lefty posted a 3.07 ERA in 108 1/3 innings for the Rays and Dodgers during those years, highlighted a World Series ring with Los Angeles in 2020.

While his results have been inconsistent, the one constant throughout Kolarek’s career has been his ability to induce ground balls.  Since the start of the 2017 season, only five pitchers with more than 140 innings pitched have a higher grounder rate than Kolarek’s elite 63.9% total.

Reds Sign Reiver Sanmartin, Alex Blandino To Minor League Deals

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The Reds signed left-hander Reiver Sanmartin and infielder Alex Blandino to minor league deals within the last week, according to Cincinnati’s official transactions page.  Sanmartin was assigned to Triple-A Louisville, while Blandino was assigned to Double-A Chattanooga.

Sanmartin was cut loose by the Reds just prior to the non-tender deadline, and he’ll now return to the team while no longer part of the 40-man roster.  It doesn’t seem like he’ll be available for most or even all of the 2024 season after undergoing UCL surgery back in July, if that surgery was indeed a standard Tommy John procedure.  However, Sanmartin’s prognosis improves if he underwent an internal brace procedure, which carries a more fluid but perhaps significantly shorter recovery timeline depending of the nature of the injury.  Should Sanmartin fall within that 6-9 month range for a brace surgery, he might be ready to go for the start of Spring Training.

There wasn’t any mention whether or not Sanmartin’s minor league deal was for one or two years, as the longer deal would’ve hinted at a longer recovery.  Such two-year pacts at either the minor league or Major League levels aren’t uncommon for pitchers recovering from major arm surgeries, as teams get to lock up a player with the acknowledgement that they’ll miss most or all of that first year.  Just earlier today, the Red Sox inked a two-year minor league pact with Wyatt Mills, who had TJ surgery last July.

Sanmartin came to the Reds from the Yankees as part of the Sonny Gray trade in January 2019.  Making his MLB debut in 2021 and then appearing for Cincinnati in each of the last three seasons, Sanmartin has a 5.77 ERA over 82 2/3 innings in the Show, working primarily as a reliever.  With underwhelming walk and strikeout rates, Sanmartin’s 53.5% groundball rate is a highlight, though batters have been fortunate with a .339 BABIP against Sanmartin’s grounder-heavy approach.  The 27-year-old southpaw has had better strikeout and control numbers down on the farm, en route to a 3.39 ERA over 446 career minor league innings.

Blandino is another former Red, as he was selected 29th overall by the team in the 2014 draft and then played all three of his MLB seasons (2018-21) in Cincinnati.  However, a torn ACL and other injuries hampered his time in the big leagues, as Blandino had a penchant for drawing walks but not much else over the course of a .226/.339/.291 slash line in 279 plate appearances.  After the Reds outrighted Blandino following the 2021 season, he spent some time in the minors with the Giants and Mariners, and his only pro experience in 2023 was playing with Team Nicaragua in the World Baseball Classic.

The 31-year-old Blandino has a lot of experience at both middle infield positions and at third base, plus a handful of appearances as a first baseman, corner outfielder, and even four mop-up pitching appearances in blowouts during the 2021 campaign.  This versatility makes him a useful depth option to have on hand in the minors, especially since the Reds’ influx of young star prospects coming to the majors has thinned out the position-player ranks in their farm system.

Tigers Re-Sign Garrett Hill

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The Tigers and right-hander Garrett Hill have reunited, as Hill’s MLB.com profile page indicates that he signed a new minor league deal earlier this week.  It’s a quick reunion for the two sides, as the Tigers just non-tendered Hill last week to open up some space on their 40-man roster.

A 26th-round pick for Detroit in the 2018 draft, Hill made his MLB debut in 2022 on the fourth of July and started his first eight Major League games before moving into the bullpen.  The result was a respectable 4.03 ERA over 60 1/3 innings, even if a .247 BABIP helped cover up for some uninspiring secondary numbers.  Hill’s fortune turned last season, as he was tagged for a 9.19 ERA over 15 2/3 relief innings in the majors and even a 6.02 ERA in 46 1/3 frames for Triple-A Toledo.  While Hill’s control had only been decent earlier in his career, walks became an increasingly big problem in 2023, with a 14.3% walk rate over his time in Toledo.

Hill also spent little over a month on the Triple-A injured list, so it was a tough year all around for the righty.  He’ll look for a fresh start in his age-28 season, and it makes sense why the Tigers would want to keep Hill in the fold.  Beyond his swingman potential, Hill has consistently missed a lot of bats over his minor league career — even amidst his struggles, Hill still posted a 28.7% strikeout rate at Triple-A in 2023.  That strikeout potential has yet to translate at the big league level, but there’s no risk for Detroit in bringing him back for another look on a minors contract.

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