With spring training just days away, and one free agent deal already in the books this morning, here are three things for MLBTR readers to keep an eye out for today:
1. Will Brasier be traded?
Veteran right-hander Ryan Brasier pitched quite well for the Dodgers last year when healthy, with a 3.54 ERA and 3.31 FIP in 28 innings of work. He was squeezed off the club’s roster due to the addition of Kirby Yates, however, and as such was designated for assignment last week. Brasier’s DFA doesn’t need to be resolved for another two days, but given his solid work out of the bullpen last year and affordable contract it would hardly be surprising if a trade was worked out. Brasier would have to be placed on waivers 48 hours before the end of his DFA window, however, so if he’s going to be traded it’ll very likely have to come together today. Will a deal get done?
2. Blue Jays 40-man move incoming:
Yesterday saw three signings get finalized: Ha-Seong Kim’s two-year deal with the Rays, Jorge Polanco’s one-year pact with the Mariners, and Tim Mayza’s one-year agreement with the Pirates. All three of those moves required a 40-man roster move, and those clubs made space for their new additions by designating Osleivis Basabe, Cade Marlowe, and Alika Williams for assignment, respectively. One other as-of-yet not finalized addition that’s been reported is Max Scherzer’s one-year contract with the Blue Jays.
Toronto’s 40-man roster is full, meaning the club would need to clear a spot in order to officially add Scherzer to the mix. Perhaps that would come in the form of a DFA like the aforementioned trio of corresponding moves did, or maybe the Jays will be able to work out a trade involving a 40-man roster player in the coming days. One other alternative at the club’s disposal would be to wait out the nine days remaining until Toronto’s pitchers and catchers are set to report for spring training, at which point the 60-day IL opens. The Blue Jays are among a number of teams with likely 60-day IL candidates, and they could theoretically take advantage of that status in order to avoid losing a player from their 40-man roster to accommodate Scherzer.
3. MLBTR Chat Today:
With spring training creeping ever closer, we’re nearing the point where the baseball offseason starts to give way to preseason excitement even as major free agents remain unsigned and team needs remain unfulfilled. Whether you have questions about what’s left for your team to do before Opening Day or a trade proposal in the back of your mind, MLBTR’s Steve Adams will be here to answer your questions during a live chat scheduled for 1pm CT. You can click here to ask a question in advance, join in live once the chat begins, or read the transcript once the chat is complete.
Toronto is going to have to clear another space when they sign Bregman.
Alex seems to be allergic to Canadian money. Maybe they should’ve made the offer in crypto.
Guy’s aren’t sure what’s going on in Toronto and the possibility of them becoming a 51st state so they’re staying away until the dust settles.
In case you weren’t watching, Trudeau and Trump discussed the 51st state scenario and Trump refused to trade California and New York State to Canada to obtain Canadian land. Trump quickly changed the subject. Since 98 percent of the citizens wouldn’t join the US and their circus environment of lunacy, it was the ramblings of a psychotic delusion that even brought it up.
When it comes to Brasier, why would ANY team send LA another player when they can merely wait and have LA pay his whole contract when he passes through waivers. It is time for the league to take advantage of the Dodgers and let them pay the freight.
Ashley….because any team that wants Brasier and waits until he’s on waivers, particularly teams that are good and will only have the opportunity to claim him AFTER weaker teams pass, might never get the chance to exercise that sweet little option you describe.
IF a team really wants Brasier, they had better make a deal with Friedman that includes paying ALL or at least some of Brasier’s relatively affordable salary.
No thank you. We will not be joining the US (doubly so if Trump goes through with the tariffs).
Unfortunately, Trump has not realized yet that Canada is just not that into him.
sorry Ashley…wrong again
@edfungus – One does not need to be a liberal in order to despise the drooling idiocy of magatville and the cult of stupidity.
I’m sorry to burst your bubble but Trump is still despised outside of the US for the most part.
Also, I’m not on the left. I just don’t like people who treat others poorly for no reason. The way he talks about certain groups of people and assigns childish insulting nicknames to anyone who disagrees with him is extremely off-putting. You can also tell by the facial expressions that he makes that he’s an extremely arrogant person who often looks down on others.
Also anytime anyone disagrees with him he calls them a sick psychopathic radical leftist. Anyone who thinks that way about people who don’t immediately bow down to them is not someone I can respect.
@edfungus – Go back to playing with the childish fools in your cult, and leave the adults to try to deal with your fallout.
I’m as left as can be. I despise liberals. Liberals are not on the left. Liberals are fluid, they’ll latch onto any difference they can, then continually browbeat both conservatives and progressives over the head with it while ignoring the 95% of crap they actually agree about, for no other reason than to feel superior and self-appoint themselves the moral center of society.
I used to say I was liberal, but over my dead body will I be associated with that disease. Liberals are the ones that create and sustain the divide in America. Normal democrats and republicans do not gather to go and attack their neighbors because crooked politicians told them to, so that they could have the public distracted while they go and commit more crimes.
Liberals are absolutely what’s wrong with this country. If this country could rid itself of liberals AND Fox News, we’d live in the Garden of Eden, it would be paradise.
Also, as someone as far left as they come, you can’t be a radical far left. You want TOO much human rights, TOO much equality? I’m not talking about creating new genders or classifications so that you can pretend to cater to and advantage them to coerce their vote while not actually caring about them. That’s a liberal move. I’m talking about true human rights, true equality, true peace, being anti-war unless it is a war of defense (and the only wars of defense that exist are against US led or started-and-backed conflicts), and true government transparency. Being called far left is not an insult.
Being called a liberal is the worst insult I can possibly imagine. Liberals will be remembered as tools, instruments that were wielded and easily manipulated by playing on their hubris, but mostly they’ll be remembered as the jerks that caused the collapse of the American empire while lighting the world on fire and blaming everyone else.
So it’s not a left/right thing, brother. A know-it-all jerk incapable of being accountable is a know-it-all jerk incapable of being accountable, regardless of what party they are. It just so happens that anyone that fits that descriptions seems to call themselves liberals, as if it makes the rest of the world blind to what toxic trash they are.
Coming from a far leftist. Dems aren’t left btw, they’re center-right now. This country has no left in their major political parties whatsoever. Nixon would be considered radical left today, and that’s not an exaggeration, it’s not an embellishment, it’s a fact.. He would be FAR left today.
Tiger, no te conozco pero hablas como un idiota
Tiger – Interestingly he has connections with every team that has shown serious interest in him.
Astros – His old team
Jays – Very close to former teammate Springer
Tigers – Very close to former manager Hinch
Red Sox – Very close to Astros cheating mastermind Cora
He’s just trying to milk them for every last dime.
Hey, capitalism at it’s finest. Why should he be any different?
Team – Certainly it’s his choice, but it’s not the same when it’s a player.
If he demands too much, he could lose bigtime ….. he needs one of the 30 teams, none of the 30 teams need him.
I think Bregman puts most teams into the post season.
Bregman is a Tiger
Back-to-back chats for Steve, wow. Thank you to Steve, Darragh, Nick, Mark, et. al. for the entertainment we get here at MLBTR
Seconded!
In an era where sustained success relies on a well-stocked farm system, sidelining or accelerating the exposure of prospects for short-term fixes could undermine a team’s future competitive balance.
I read this in the movie trailer voiceover guy voice.
Under-rated comment!
I read it in Pablo Francisco’s movie trailer voice, touché! “In an era” was the perfect beginning…
Does bregman have dogs that aren’t allowed in Toronto?
Lose your feeble attempt at humor, this is not a political site
Idk, I chuckled. Always appreciate the humor… and cheap attempts at it, too. Swings and misses happen.
Seeing fewer deferral posts recently; wonder whether they will be replaced by tariff posts?
People decided to defer them until the tariffs were implemented.
Braiser should clear waivers as no team should help LAD get out from under an overpay contract.
Teams should just wait to sign for minimum
Agreed 100% Data, but if a team reaaaallllly wants him then they’ll attempt a swap.
@gwynning. 4.5 isn’t crazy. He’s not going to cost anything substantial, but taylor rogers got traded with a salary of 12.(6 million still owed). Stanek is 5.5 if he reaches incentives. I would say those would be fair comps for brasier.
both of those pitchers are at least 3-4 years younger and have better historical stats behind them.
@datashark. Ok fair, but does it really matter with relievers. The numbers are similar is 4.5 a overpay? for the bat boy that plays in single a. Does it really matter about age it’s not mlb the show franchise mode. Also a one year deal.
Lol there is so much that doesn’t make sense with that comment.
He was signed for 2-years and $9M, with equal salaries of 4.5 each year.. He’s not an overpay.
If he was, waivers have a priority, it’s not open season to any team that wants to sign him unless all the other teams pass. The Nats, Braves, and Cubs have already checked in on him. Not all teams will pass, which makes the idea of “letting him slip through waivers” one that won’t come to pass and teams won’t try.
And the reason they checked in is because he has appeal. He was just a World Series star. He’s 68th in RP WAR the last 2 years, but 60 of the guys with more WAR pitched more innings than he did. The 6 guys right behind him, within .1 WAR of him, all pitched at least 10 more innings than he did (the guy right behind him, Derek Law, pitched a whopping 57.2 more innings than Brasier). The 9 guys with more WAR but less innings includes names like Devin Williams, Mason Miller, Felix Bautista, Cade Smith, and Matt Brash, i.e., the top of the stud class of relievers. 49 of the 60 that pitched more innings than Brasier, pitched at least 20 more innings. 40 of them pitched at least 30 more innings. 28 of them pitched at least 40 more innings. For context the top 3 RP by WAR, Tanner Scott, Emmanuel Clase, and Griffin Jax, pitched at least 53 more innings that he did.
So he’s not an overpay contract, and he’s not someone that teams can wait to let pass. At least 3 teams are interested in acquiring him at his $4.5 salary. Presumably, something like 29 teams would have interest in him at the league minimum and without giving up any talent in return. That means that for 28 teams, that’s not a plausible option to consider..
For a data shark, you kinda seem to be sleeping the wheel.
If Braiser wasn’t being DFA’d specifically by the Dodgers, @datashark would have a very different perspective.
Good point, but I might speculate if he wasn’t being DFA’d specifically by the Dodgers OR Yankees…. I get not wanting to help these two teams, but if you can help your team, and also not help another competitor in the process, and choose not to because you’re hung up on not wanting a team with a $380M payroll next year save a little over $3.5M that they’re not worried about, it seems like an especially weird and petty way to use sour grapes to cut your nose and spite your face.
Lol. The Yankees aren’t getting that level of scorn anymore thanks to the Dodgers. The “Evil Empire” baton has been passed.
*And Mets too.
Braiser is not all that great – outside the season he had .70 era he seemed like a below average RP to just average.
@Datashark $4.5M for an average reliever with a high-ceiling is very palatable for any team with aspirations to compete. His ERA may not be shiny but he still strikes out opponents and limits walks and homerun at a good rate.
Duuuude. Cohen. Just nuts.
Not counting revenue sharing, the Rays spent 33.2% of their revenue on player salaries last year, lowest in baseball. The A’s spent 34.9%, Orioles 35.4%, Tigers at 38.6%, Pirates at 38.8%, and Nationals at 38.9%..
Yankees spent 46.5% of their revenue on payroll, 17th in baseball. The Dodgers are 5th at 60.1%. Padres are 4th at 60.9%, then a big jump.
Diamondbacks 3 at 7o.1%.
Blue Jays 2 at 75.0%.
And the Mets #1, spent 87%.
The Jays at 2nd is surprising and impressive. Rogers is publicly held, all of their books are open, them and the Braves answer to ruthless corporate overlords and stockholders, who are far more stingy than Hal or the Guggenheim guys. BUT….
The Jays receive revenue sharing that offsets and subsidizes their spend. So do all of the bottom 5 teams. The A’s were told if they don’t run a $105M payroll this year, they’ll have a grievance filed and lose revenue sharing. The A’s are receiving $70M in revenue sharing, that’s why we immediately saw the uncharacteristic Severino, Urshela, and Leclear signings, as well as the Rooker extension, Teams make a ton of money..
Cohen is paying a 100% tax, literally called the “Cohen tax”, on that salary, then paying INTO revenue sharing. Dodgers and Yankees had penalties and revenue sharing to pay into as well, but nothing like that. We weren’t losing money all said and done. Both of our teams made more than Arizona, Kansas City, Colorado, Toronto, and Minnesota (in that order, AZ was 2nd least profitable after the Mets) after all penalties and revenue sharing.
Even Illitch on his deathbed didn’t lose money. Teams don’t actually LOSE money, the worst that happens is they just don’t make a ton of it and the A’s have to pay for their own sodas in their clubhouse. But they still don’t lose money.
Cohen runs a legit deficit that is really unprecedented. He won’t just actually lose money next year, he’ll lose 9 figures!!
Mind boggling..
Personally, I love it, but if people want to focus on picking at a teams payroll and spending, there really is only one outlier.
Since he’s not under contract past this year, and expected to be worth more than his minimal salary, he’s basically no risk and all reward. Even most bad teams not trying to compete would take on the $4.5M simply to try and flip him at the wire to a contender in need of bullpen help. Plus in that event, they only end up paying ~ half of that salary anyway.
well then shark, nobody will want him right? I guess we’ll all find out soon enough. While I don’t share your opinion, you may well be correct.
Quality relief pitchers are an asset teams want to possess. Particularly, at the affordable price Brasier is going to cost. If he is indeed worthless, the Dodgers will be paying his salary in 2025. However , this delusional and tribal notion that teams will “punish the Dodgers” and not acquire a reasonably cost effective bullpen asset is just shortsighted.
high ceiling??? he is 37 years old his ceiling past long ago…he had one lucky time after boston with LAD.
he is 37 years old with a spotty record outside one lucky time after a disaster in Boston.
Lol Brasier has a 3.85 career ERA with a strikeout an inning and a 1.15 WHIP. That on it’s own is solid. BUT….
His xERA in 2022, the year you’re referencing, was 3.97. He wasn’t good, but he wasn’t bad. And piitchers don’t age so much as they break. Age is much less of a concern than mileage is, and Brasier doesn’t have much mileage. Surely age matters SOME, but Verlander just won the Cy Young in 2022 pitching the whole year at 39 because his stuff hadn’t diminished yet. As for Brasiers stuff, his average fastball velocity when he broke into the majors in 2013 was 94.5 MPH. His average velocity last year was…. 94.5 MPH.
He had a 5.0 K to BB ratio last year with a 0.96 WHIP.. In 38 innings with the Dodgers in 2023, he had a 2.48 ERA with a .0724 WHIP. He wasn’t great with Boston before the Dogers picked him up midseason, but that’s an awfully good year and a half.
From a 37 year old that went to the team that revitalized Rich Hill at an older age, which along with how they turned around Alex Wood, impressed pitchers so much that for 5 years straight they had a run of 1-year signings of guys that took half of what they were offered by other teams to come learn from the Dodgers pitching development, so they could get better and get paid. And it worked. Andrew Heaney. Tyler Anderson. Other RP like Shelby Miller, Brandon Morrow, Daniel Hudson, and Blaek Treinen.
Up until last year, with the failed Syndergaard and Joe Kelly attempts, it hadn’t failed. But even last year it didn’t NOT work with Paxton, they were able to deal him at the deadline, he just retired.
So yes, considering that on a per-inning basis, of guys that have thrown 50+ innings the last year and half he was one of the top 25 RP in baseball, and there are 30 teams, which is more than 25, meaning he pitched well enough to be the #1 guy on a random MLB team, yeah lol. He has a high ceiling.
Pretend Brasier was a Marlin, then go look at his stats and consider the DFA…
You think dodgers are the fountain of youth and can bring back pitchers….if so they shouldn’t have let buehler walk and surely they can bring Kershaw back to old form right? too much dodger blue in you. I will give dodgers this they know when to fold ’em on players….and this is one of them I bet he flounders for next team
You don’t read what people say and you have your mind made up. As for me, literally my favorite thing in life is to be proven wrong. I love to be proven wrong, life is boring if everything is as you assume it is at first glance.
Maybe you missed it, but I never said the Dodgers had a miracle cure for pitcher injuries, and Walker Buehler just returned from his SECOND Tommy John surgery. Pitchers are known to struggle with command and feel when they return from the Tommy John, but there haven’t even been enough pitchers to undergo TWO to have data to know what to expect when they return.
Buehler broke, which is what I said happens to pitchers. He also was in form for the playoffs, after being able to throw just 75 regular innings since 2022. He performed well enough to get over $20M from the Red Sox for next year, and the Dodgers didn’t need to resign him bc as I said, they’ve had plethora of options that come to them for much less than $20M, and they have 6 SP better than Buehler, or as good as Buehler but for much less. Why would they sign a 7th they can’t play anywhere, for more money than they could sign an equivalent for? Buehler is an absurd case to bring up as it’s just not a comp for anything we’re talking about. And he’s the least silly thing you said.
Kershaw has 2742 regular season innings on his arm. He also has 194.1 playoff innings, which are known to be more strenuous as they’re higher leverage. That is a lot of mileage that Brasier doesn’t have. He has perhaps the best case for the greatest pitcher perhaps ever, but certainly in the last 100 years, and the last 100 years include Pedro, Unit, Clemens, and Maddux, who round out the top 5.
Among SP with 1500+ IP, Kershaw’s ERA is #1 at 2.50.
#2 is Whitey Ford at 2.75, followed by Koufax at 2.76, Palmer at 2.80, and Seaver at 2.86. They all pitched in much friendlier pitching environments, and Palmer of course had the best defense in history behind him, and was very much a top line pitcher who was made an all time great as a product of his team.
The next lowest ERA for a pitcher that has played since the turn of the 21st century is Pedro at 2.95, followed by Sale at 3.06. Even if you lower the IP threshold to just 1000 IP, it only adds deGrom, who is on a per-rate basis a unicorn throwing 98 MPH sliders that broke his arm and didn’t allow him to sustain his level of greatness.
The Dodgers get credit for Kershaw, they don’t need to remake him after he’s given us the greatest 3000 innings pitched in the modern era of major league history. It’s a ridiculous point to try and bring up when talking about a reliever with 285 career innings that didn’t break into the big leagues to stay until he was 30 years old. Before he was 30, he pitched one year, 9 innings, 5 years earlier, then made it back after 5-years.
He is clearly someone that had room to improve his skills upward. Kershaw is clearly someone that had zero room to improve, and could ONLY get worse, and after 3000 innings and 15 years as the best starting pitcher in baseball history, that’s was the only thing that could happen, bub.
You are proving yourself to be ignorant of…….. everything. Just everything. But now I get your name. There was a line in a movie that was made for you.
“At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it.”
You are seriously one of the least knowledgeable and reasonable fans I’ve ever engaged with, and you’ve proven beyond any shadow of a doubt that you are completely clueless. And it’s not just me that thinks so. The examples I provided about the Dodgers are well known, well discussed, well researched, and unquestioned by anyone in baseball. The examples you brought up are a weak attempt at shifting goalposts that still do nothing but weaken your already unimaginably weak argument. I couldn’t possibly be more validated, and any reasonable person with a modicum of critical thinking ability will quickly and adamantly agree. You also have proven you’re unwilling to have an intellectually honest conversation or allow yourself to grow in any area by means of being proven wrong, and you’ve proven that you will not allow the possibility that you could ever be wrong about a quick and uninformed opinion you made on the fly about a player you know nothing about. So that being the case, I’ll never waste another word or sentence on you, after all, as they say, arguing with a fool only proves there are two. But do have yourself a nice day.
Nicely put Dodgerbleu!!! The Ryan Brasier fan club is up to 2 members now!!! You can be the VP!!!
Olm, I have been waiting for your ‘Bring My Bras Home’ chant! Thank You!
Oh, and I think a cheer leader uni is a skirt and pompoms… not a kilt and 2 cases of beer.
Dbh!! In my younger days ,Pap would have been normal next to me!!!LOL!!
Thank you DB for taking the time to explain to these geniuses how the world works. sheeesh!
Ya’ll just say anything on this site. How is $4.5 for 1 year for a decent middle reliever an overpay?
Sorry but couldn’t resist bringing to light how the sissy dodgers are waiving their brasier. “Squeezed off the roster “ really ?
Nice to hear Tom Caron’s voice calling Beanpot yesterday!! He said B/C lit lamp more times than Paul Revere did in his life and that Brasier is as good as gold to be signed by the Redsox!!!( ok fine he said one of those)
If no team wants to jump the line for a lotto ticket prospect, Brasier will get snagged by some team willing to take a $4.5 mil flier….