The Yankees announced Thursday that they’ve claimed right-hander Roansy Contreras off waivers from the Orioles. Baltimore designated Contreras for assignment last week. He’ll now return to his original organization. The Yanks signed Contreras as a 16-year-old out of the Dominican Republic back in 2016. He spent nearly five years in their organization and emerged as one of their better pitching prospects before being included in the trade netting righty Jameson Taillon from the Pirates in Jan. 2021. Coincidentally, today’s claim comes on the eve of that trade’s four-year anniversary.
At the time of the trade, Contreras was quite well regarded. His first season in the Pirates organization did nothing to dull that reputation. In 13 starts between Double-A and Triple-A, he logged a 2.64 ERA with plus strikeout and walk rates. The Bucs game him his MLB debut late in the season, and he fired three scoreless relief innings that December. In 2022, Contreras looked like he’d grabbed hold of a long-term rotation spot in the Steel City. He appeared in 21 games, 18 of them starts, and notched a 3.79 ERA with a 21.1% strikeout rate and 9.6% walk rate. Both of those rates were a bit worse than average, but for a 22-year-old in his first big league season, it was hard not to be impressed.
The following season, however, Contreras lost more than a mile per hour off his fastball and saw opponents ambush him for a 6.59 earned run average across 68 1/3 MLB frames. He was hit hard in Triple-A, too, barely keeping his ERA under 5.00 in eight trips to the hill.
Out of minor league options and losing his grip on a roster spot, Contreras was designated for assignment by the Pirates back in May. The Angels picked him up in a cash swap and leaned on him for 52 innings of low-leverage relief. Contreras held his own with a 4.33 ERA and more questionable rate stats (17.9 K%, 10.6 BB%).
Since the end of the season, Contreras has bounced from the Angels to the Rangers to the Reds to the Orioles and now to the Yankees — all by way of waivers. On the one hand, the constant DFAs are surely a point of frustration. On the other, the fact that he’s yet to make it through waivers and has been with one-sixth of the league since the end of the season alone illustrates that clubs still believe there’s at least a competent MLB reliever to be unlocked.
If he lasts on the 40-man roster, Contreras will compete for a bullpen spot this spring. He’s out of minor league options, so he’d have to make the Opening Day roster or else be yet again jettisoned from a 40-man roster by way of DFA/waiver placement or perhaps a small trade.
Matt Blake project. I don’t hate it.
@178
Hawk tuwey…Gluck gluck gluck gluck. #consistently
Love it! Was hoping they would. Claim day going well!
Where are the lefties??? Just one please.
I’m genuinely surprised the Yankees haven’t re-signed either Hill or Mayza
YBC: Oh, Tanner Scott? He’s in LA…. Argh.
I know it’ll happen, but it is worrisome.
Dang, I was hoping he would slip through unclaimed.
Oh well, it probably would have taken like 4 or 5 injuries for him to get a look in Baltimore anyway.
He seems to be someone, somebody figures they can improve. Yet to see him not pass through waivers.
Good karma
Figures they would pick up a dad beater. hasn’t stopped them in the past
He beats up dads?
if you read my previous comment you’d understand. He beat my dad up in an alley in 2022 over NFTs
@choof
huh???
If hes anything like you, your daddy asked for it choof!
What did I ever do wrong
You have the worst football slider on Earth, Roger Beshen!
You’ve never seen me throw it punk, you’re just jealous
Lol cheers bub
this might be the strangest mlbtr comment i have ever read
… and that’s saying something.
He had a promising start here in Pittsburgh. Good heat. Decent spin
Then he had a couple outings where he couldn’t stay off of dead red and got hammered. Lost the feel on his breaking stuff. And lost his confidence
Next thing you know, he’s in the bullpen and trying to figure things out, including loss of speed
He’s still bouncing around which tells me he hasn’t found all the parts yet
Hope the Yankees can work on his mechanics and his head
“The Bucs game him his MLB debut late in the season, and he fired three scoreless relief innings that December.”
Yeah, several things wrong here….
The ball always finds the mitt in December.
Can they please get a LHP. Why is that too much to ask. If Hill is too expensive to bring back, sign someone else. Is there any chance this kid Selvidge is ready from the minors.
@mlb
Hold steadfast grasshopper. Still time. But honestly, I don’t think there’s been any lefties to claim yet.
Crap. Short list of squads with better records than Baltimore last yr and the Yanks have open spots on the 40. Oh well, plenty of reclamation projects for the Oriole PD team.
Yankees need a solid Third Baseman and move Jazz to Second. Yet, they may go cheap at third. Plus, they need to unload Stroman.
get ready for has beens (DJL ) or never weres who have no business starting on a supposed championship caliber team ( Oswalds x 2) We start off good, but never finish the job, i see Hal saying “whoaaaaa thats enough to get a playoff check ” and turns off the spigot.
My, my… how the round table turns ’round… or something. Good luck on Round 2, Roansy!
I love that they are claiming pitching depth but how about some depth from the left side? I think the yankees have 1 lefty reliever from AA to the majors… how about tyler Jay or Brandon eisert ?? Not to say I want them as my only lhp out of the pen but they need a lefty! Tim hill mayza? They should all be short money! 3 mill or less
Contreras is fine, as long as the Yankees don’t acquire anyone else
no lefty in the bullpen, no infielder, expecting to now use retread used up or never was players. Why do the Yankees always stop before the jobs done?
Hitter: The answer is Hal. He wants to go below that 3rd tier. They’re waiting to dump as much of Stroman’s deal as possible before making more moves. Except Hill and some infielder both to be signed for less than 10 mil total.
Then why sign Fried in that case? Cashman is bargain basement shopping now. There’s only so much time left before Hill/Mayza/Kahnle get snatched up. Stroman can be dumped by attaching prospects. Even with him traded, I don’t see how they can fall below the 3rd tier since they should be active at the trade deadline.
Bleacher: They got the best players they could within the budget. They’re topped out now and looking to off Stro so they can fill out the rest of the roster. Spoiler alert, they’re going cheap for the last few spots…
@Yankees
Because Fried is a great pitcher, and Cole missed half the season? I see nothing wrong with bolstering the FOR. It allowed them to fall from strength and acquire Williams as a closer. Cashman stashed he’s been after him for years, so obviously, they had already discussed possible trade scenarios. As soon as Soto made his decisions, they almost immediately locked in Fried and traded Cortez for Williams. They had likely already agreed to include Cortez in a deal ahead of the Soto decision and likely had a verbal agreement with Fried. Acquiring Fried is an underrated move considering the health issues of Cole, the youthfulness of Gil and Schmidt, and possible regression of Rodon.
I think we also have to remember that these contracts carry over to next winter and could affect their ability to go after Vlad or Tucker.
@Knicks I fully understand the reasons for signing Fried. I’m questioning @jersey stating that Cashman wants to go below the third CBT tier. They were already over before accounting for player arb raises.
Yankee: I’m guessing because they’re barely over right now. Either way they seem very reluctant to make any more big splashes. We’re bargain hunting for infielders and don’t seem in a hurry to sign one of the dwindling supply of lefties.
FG has them at $303M right now and Cots is at $316M. I will lean towards the Cots figure as FG is slow to update that stuff. Mark Leiter is arb holdout and hasn’t signed yet.
@Hitter
Who says their done? A good GM, and I put Cayman in that category, teach out to every team to discuss possible trade targets both at the major and minor league level. It takes two to tango, and maybe they’re watching the market to see what might transpire? I remember when Cash said Bubba Crosby was going to be the starting CF before signing Johnny Damon. Shoot, he was saying Caleb Durbin was going to be in the mix at 2b before teasing him for Williams. Maybe they’ve made trade offers to guys not mentioned? Maybe they have an offer with Pittsburgh for Ke’bryan Hayes, and they’re waiting on Pittsburgh to consider? Or maybe they’ll start ST and see about Cabrera, Peraza, or DJ? It wouldn’t shock me if some combo of those 3 turned out to provide good offense at one of the infield spots. If DJ’s hip is healed, maybe he can be productive? Both Cabrera and Peraza were decent prospects, but neither had been given even a full half of a season to go thru their bumps and improve.
Austin Wells didn’t start hitting until late June and ended up having .900+ OPS in July and August. Cabrera had a good 2bd half, albeit with fewer PA. I absolutely would love if they could put an all- star at every position, but that’s not realistic. The Yanks COULD employee the use of more deferred contracts, but I’m not quite knowledgeable to know the full extent of what that looks like in 10 years?
Cayman =Cashman
Solid landing spot for Roansy. I hope he figures it out.
There shouldn’t be a comma before “too.”