Today: The Royals reinstated Lyles from the restricted list today, the team announced. He cleared release waivers and is officially a free agent.
July 20: The Royals have released veteran right-hander Jordan Lyles, according to Anne Rogers of MLB.com. Should he pass through waivers unclaimed, he will become a free agent in the coming days. Lyles, 33, was placed on the restricted list back in April due to an undisclosed personal matter. Per Rogers, Lyles reported to the organization last month, opening up a 30-day window for him to either be added back to the roster or released. Today was day 30 of that window, prompting the right-hander’s placement on release waivers.
A veteran of 14 MLB seasons, Lyles has posted an above average season by measure of ERA+ just once in his lengthy career but has nonetheless managed to stick around the majors consistently thanks to his workhorse tendencies. From 2019 to 2023, the right-hander posted a lackluster 5.20 ERA with a similar 5.09 FIP, both well below the league average. In doing so, however, he covered a whopping 735 1/3 innings of work. Just fifteen pitchers in the league ate more innings than Lyles over that period, and that ability to handle a sizable workload has earned him big league deals with rebuilding clubs such as the 2020 Rangers and 2022 Orioles that were in need of reliable volume in the rotation.
The latest rebuilding club to offer Lyles a contract to solidify its rotation mix was the 2023 Royals. The right-hander signed a two-year, $17MM pact with Kansas City during the 2022-23 offseason, and while the righty posted his typical volume of 177 2/3 innings and 31 starts, the results were borderline disastrous. His 6.28 ERA was by far the worst among all qualified pitchers last year, as were his 5.62 FIP and 5.34 xFIP. Only Patrick Corbin and Miles Mikolas stuck out batters at a lower clip than Lyles’s 16% rate last year, and his 39 home runs allowed last year was less than only Lance Lynn and Lucas Giolito.
Those lackluster numbers led the Royals to aggressively pursue rotation upgrades this winter, adding veterans Seth Lugo and Michael Wacha to a rotation that had already acquired young lefty Cole Ragans over the summer. The new additions pushed Lyles to the bullpen to open the 2024 campaign, and the veteran actually took to the new role quite well in the early going. He made just five appearances prior to being placed on the restricted list, but each of those outings was scoreless. In all, Lyles allowed just two hits and two walks across five innings of work while striking out three in his limited work as a short relief arm prior to his departure from the club.
Rival organizations will now have the opportunity to claim the veteran (and the remainder of his $8.5MM salary for 2024), though it’s extremely unlikely that any club will do so between the hefty price tag and the fact that the veteran seemingly hasn’t pitched competitively since mid-April. In the likely event that he clears waivers, Lyles will become a free agent and be available for any club to sign at the pro-rated league minimum, which would be subtracted from the amount Kansas City owes Lyles for the remainder of the season.
How did he manage 14 year career with his results?
His arm is indestructible
Made $52M while having an aggregate negative WAR for his career….
1st round pick that always managed to stay healthy and take ball. I’d take him on my 40 man over Nick Nelson.
He has a case for the worst pitcher in MLB history with 10+ years of service.
I think in the modern era, he has the worst ERA+ (81) of any pitcher with 1000 innings. But it’s even funnier because he’s pitched 1500 innings. I wonder how far down you could push the minimum innings requirements to finally knock him off the list.
I didn’t do a ton of research but closest I could find is Randy Lerch’s 83 ERA+ in 1099.1 innings. Guys like Jose Lima (85 ERA+ in 1567.2 innings) and Jamie Navarro (90 in 2055 innings) were also ridiculously bad at times, but they had a few seasons apiece where they were actually pretty good. Edwin Jackson is another (88 in 1960 innings). Mike Pelfrey, Fausto Carmona, Sidney Ponson, etc. Lyles is still worse by ERA+.
Big Pelf sighting!
Curious how awful statcast would say that he was.
Below average in everything except finger licking, where he is elite.
I wish I had the data on Manny Acosta.
Dude seemed to have the stuff, but would just get lit up every single outing.
It’s easy, teams today look for pitching that eats innings. No matter what their ERA is. By today’s standards he’s worthy of being a ML.By yesterday’s standards he’s a bum.
Ah, yes, a reminder that yesteryear was always better than today…
Jordan Lyles made $51 Million and produced -2.3 WAR in his career. That is insane.
That’s today’s inflated baseball
Perfect fit for the White Sox if his personal matters are sorted out. They need someone to eat innings.
Oh I thought you meant to the White Sox because he is a former KC Royal, and nothing to do with performance, as a matter of fact the more mediocre the more he will fit in.
I’m surprised he lasted this long…..
He’s still a little green for the Cardinals.
Doesn’t the manager make the call whether a mediocre pitcher is going to “eat innings”? Seems there would be a lot more of these types of pitchers if they just kept pitching through their crappy outings
White Sox dropping everything to sign him
Brewers are all over a (4th??) time reunion.
Holy sh#t ! A 6.28 era n he threw 177 2/3 innings ! That’s crazy giving em 31 starts. Royals ain’t got no Ps in the minors ?
Whopping.
Put him on a club like Milwaukee that could easily score 5+ runs per game against the other team’s 5th starter.
The guy is a pro. Just not a very good one. Still someone has to eat innings. Just like someone has to catch balls in the outfield.
I could see him in Baltimore. He was decent, not great. Still 6 innings/3 er he could could eat those starts.
No way!
I agree. Baltimore could also use length out of the pen. And realistically, he was solid for Baltimore.
I am still thanking my lucky stars that the Orioles declined his 2023 option!
all that $$$ though….ugh
Still can’t understand why it was so important to give that money to journeyman Jordan Lyles instead of franchise legend Greinke to get the same results, and I’d wager Greinke would’ve been marginally better than Lyles this year.
Clearly a lot of you aren’t familiar with the Chad Innings Eater
He has a 0.00 ERA this year and they released him? That’s insane!
Welcome to the Boston RedSox