The Tigers designated infielder Eddys Leonard and relievers Ricky Vanasco and Brendan White for assignment. Their spots on the 40-man roster will go to righties Chase Lee, Tyler Mattison and Tyler Owens. Detroit kept that trio out of next month’s Rule 5 draft.
Leonard has held a spot on Detroit’s 40-man roster since they acquired him in a minor trade with the Dodgers in August 2023. The 24-year-old infielder hit .253/.320/.435 between three minor league levels this year. He hasn’t appeared in the majors. Vanasco also landed in Detroit via a small trade with Los Angeles — this one coming this past July. He pitched two scoreless innings at the major league level and has four career appearances. White, who turned 26 yesterday, pitched to a 5.03 ERA across 40 2/3 innings as a rookie in 2023. He spent most of this season on the minor league injured list.
The three players joining the roster are all upper level bullpen arms. Lee, an Alabama product, came over from the Rangers at this year’s deadline in the Andrew Chafin trade. The 26-year-old righty turned in a 2.75 ERA across 36 innings between the two organizations. He punched out 30% of batters faced with a tidy 6.8% walk rate.
Mattison, a 6’4″ pitcher out of Bryant, posted excellent strikeout numbers this year. He fanned nearly 38% of hitters en route to a 2.41 ERA across 59 2/3 innings between High-A West Michigan and Double-A Erie. While the 25-year-old was a bit more advanced than most hitters he faced, he pitched well enough that another team could’ve tried to stash him in the middle innings.
Owens, 24 in January, has been traded twice since entering pro ball as a 13th-round pick in 2021. Originally an Atlanta draftee, he went to the Rangers last offseason for outfielder J.P. Martínez. Texas dealt him to Detroit as part of the Carson Kelly deadline deal. The 5’10” hurler put up a 2.96 ERA while striking out just over a quarter of opponents in Double-A this year.
Leonard surprised me a bit. He had a lot of promise coming over from the Dodgers. Injuries and defensive issues likely doomed his chances here. Chance he’ll clear waivers but suspect some team will take a chance on him.
Yeah I’d imagine he will be picked up along with Navigato. Lockhart and Workman are also possible in the rule 5
Played against Tyler Mattison in high school. He was unhittable. Crazy to see him added to an MLB 40 man roster.
Off
Ok…..
Out.
I think technically, it is,”off”.
But…..
then you change the whole thing. Roster to Rule 5.
It’s a conspiracy.
I would have kept Vanasco over Baddoo. Hopefully they all clear and we can keep the depth!
I’d have DFA’ed Baez ahead of Leonard, but that’s just me.
For real. We all just knew that wasn’t going to happen though.
You, sir, have a lot of extra money to give away. The time has not yet arrived. If he puts up a spring training like last years, it will be here sooner than later. With such a large portion remaining, I understand them waiting to see how he performs in camp.
Should have ditched Baddoo and Kreidler, kept Leonard and added Navigato and possibly Workman.
Neither Kreidler or Workman are ML players.
Workman has improved a bunch since batting from the left side only. He’s also pretty decent defensively and can run. He will almost certainly be in AAA next season.
Hopefully in the Detroit organization.
I’m really surprised to see Leonard’s name there. Hopefully he doesn’t get selected. Lots of others who haven’t shown enough. Kreidler and unfortunately Baddoo would fall into that category..
Workman won’t get selected IMO, but got a feeling Leonard will. Baddoo is never going to be a MLB regular and I highly doubt any team will be able to keep him on a roster for an entire year.
I think Baddoo only needed to be on a major league roster the year that he was a Rule 5 pick (2021?). But I am surprised he wasn’t one of the players we DFA’d today, as the non-tender deadline is in 3 days and he probably will be cut at that time anyway.
On most teams, he’d still have a bench role. On Detroit, where everyone arriving from the minors is LH, not so much. He was fun to watch his rookie year, when the team had little worth watching.