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Pat Murphy, Stephen Vogt Win Manager Of The Year

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For the second consecutive season, Pat Murphy and Stephen Vogt have been named the Managers of the Year. Murphy received 27 of 30 first-place votes in the National League. The American League tally was closer, but Vogt picked up 17 first-place nods to keep his title.

Both skippers have won the award in their first two seasons on the job. They’ve each led a small-market franchise to a Central division title in consecutive seasons. Milwaukee won 97 games and played .500 or better ball in every month after starting the season 0-4 in the final few days of March. The Brewers coasted to another division title and held off the Phillies for the top seed in the Senior Circuit.

The Brewers seamlessly integrated a few quality rookies along the way. Caleb Durbin, Isaac Collins, Chad Patrick and Jacob Misiorowski all made strong contributions in their debut campaigns. Milwaukee also weathered a series of early-season rotation injuries behind Freddy Peralta. A mid-April trade for Quinn Priester paid massive dividends. The offense, meanwhile, trailed only the Yankees and Dodgers in scoring despite the free agent departure of Willy Adames.

Milwaukee knocked off the Cubs in a five-game Division Series. They were swept by the Dodgers in the NLCS and are still searching for their first trip to the Fall Classic since 1982. Awards voting takes place at the end of the regular season, so the postseason performance is irrelevant.

While the Brewers were well positioned to make the playoffs by the end of June, the Guardians got in via a late-season run that surely surprised even the Cleveland front office. The Guards were deadline sellers and seemed more or less finished once Emmanuel Clase was placed on administrative leave. A ten-game losing streak dropped them as low as eight games under .500 shortly before the All-Star Break, and they trailed Detroit by as much as 15.5 games in the division.

The Guards went 14-13 in August before reeling off a 20-7 record in September to steal a division title. They never led the AL Central by more than one game but had the edge when it mattered, finishing the season at 88-74. That included a 5-1 showing against the Tigers in the final two weeks of the regular season. Detroit wound up getting the last laugh in October, though, going into Cleveland and bouncing the Guards in the Wild Card Series.

Murphy appeared first or second on all but one ballot in the NL. Cincinnati’s Terry Francona and Philadelphia’s Rob Thomson also received at least one-first place vote. They finished second and third, respectively. Craig Counsell, Clayton McCullough, Torey Lovullo and Mike Shildt all received votes. Toronto’s John Schneider was a close-runner up in the Junior Circuit. He received 10 first-place votes. Seattle’s Dan Wilson (the other finalist) and Boston’s Alex Cora also had at least one first-place nod. A.J. Hinch and Joe Espada received votes.

Full vote tallies courtesy of the BBWAA. Images via Imagn Images.

Hazen: Trade Of Star Hitter “Mostly Unlikely”

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As the Diamondbacks enter an offseason that’ll be focused on addressing the pitching staff, there’s been some speculation about them trading away a star hitter. Bob Nightengale of USA Today wrote on Monday that the Diamondbacks could shop second baseman Ketel Marte before he gets to 10 years of service time and locks in full no-trade rights two weeks into next season. Under the CBA, any player with 10 years of service, the past five of which have come with one team, cannot be traded without their consent.

Arizona general manager Mike Hazen has addressed Marte’s status from this week’s GM Meetings. Hazen downplayed the idea that the Snakes were looking to move Marte, albeit with the caveat that he wouldn’t fully shut the door on conversations. “It’s what happens. Everyone checks in on your better players,” the GM told The Burns & Gambo Show on Arizona Sports. “They’re coming after your better players. … He’s one of our best players. We have some of the top position players in all of baseball on our roster and we need those players to be good next year.”

Hazen added that he “(has) to listen to what people say.” He noted that the team’s need for multiple arms in both the rotation and bullpen requires a general open-mindedness to trade conversations. However, it doesn’t seem they’re viewing a Marte deal as the best way to accomplish that. Hazen told The MLB Network’s Jon Morosi that while the club has gotten calls on Marte and their other star players, “it’s mostly unlikely” that a trade of that magnitude would happen.

The Diamondbacks have signed Marte to three separate extensions. The most recent of those came in April and has Marte signed through the 2031 season. There’d been trade speculation following midseason reports that some of the three-time All-Star’s teammates were frustrated with his work habits. Manager Torey Lovullo seemingly has a close relationship with Marte and defended him publicly. Hazen seemed similarly disinclined to trade the second baseman when asked about the possibility in August.

“Ketel is one of, if not our best player,” Hazen told Wolf & Luke of Arizona Sports at the time. “He’s a superstar in this league. You win with superstars in this league. Yes, I do know it’s a team game and putting a team together to win baseball games is also equally important. That’s on us to figure out what the right mix of players is.

Two years ago, we went to the World Series with this player on our team. … So this mindset of where he is on our team and his inability or ability to help us win is hard for me to just take that. … Where this lays down at his feet and where it’s coming from now is a little bizarre to me. I’m not ignoring the inconsistencies with some of the things that have happened. He’s addressed those things. We’ve addressed those things with him.

We’re not blind to having an imperfect clubhouse and an imperfect roster. … I’m also in a job and position to put players on the field that can win you baseball games, because ultimately that’s what this comes down to. We are going to put the best team on the field every single day we can.”

Latest On Dodgers, Kyle Tucker

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Kyle Tucker is the top free agent in this year’s class. That more or less guarantees that he’ll be linked to the two-time defending champions. Jon Heyman of The New York Post wrote last month that the Dodgers were likely to make a run at Tucker this offseason.

That may well be the case, but Jeff Passan of ESPN writes that the Dodgers don’t seem inclined to make a decade-long commitment to the star outfielder. Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic wrote last night that while the Dodgers aren’t ruling out a Tucker pursuit, they’re also not opposed to making a short-term outfield move while awaiting the arrival of internal reinforcements.

In the short term, the Dodgers’ biggest weaknesses are the outfield and late-inning relief. Michael Conforto certainly won’t be back after his one-year free agent deal busted. Kiké Hernández, their primary left fielder in the postseason, is also a free agent. Andy Pages had a poor second half that carried into a dreadful playoffs. Tommy Edman battled an ankle injury late in the season that led the Dodgers to prefer him at second base. (He’s undergoing surgery and is expected to be full go for Spring Training.) Even Teoscar Hernández was a relative weak point in right field. He hit .247/.284/.454 while playing very poor defense.

Assuming the Dodgers intend to keep Mookie Betts at shortstop, the outfield isn’t currently in great shape. It’d probably line up with Pages, Edman and Hernández as the primary options. Alex Call and Ryan Ward — the latter of whom was just added to the 40-man roster to keep him out of minor league free agency — could platoon in left field if the Dodgers want Edman in the infield.

They’ll need to make some kind of external acquisition, but it’s understandable if they don’t want to make an extended free agent play. The long-term outfield picture is more promising than the current mix. In August, Baseball America included four Dodgers outfielders (Josue De Paula, Zyhir Hope, Mike Sirota and Eduardo Quintero) among the sport’s top 60 overall prospects. That doesn’t include top catching prospect Dalton Rushing, whose path to playing time behind the plate is blocked by Will Smith. Rushing didn’t play any outfield during his rookie season but has logged a little less than 300 career innings as a left fielder in the minors.

Of the aforementioned prospects, only Rushing will be in the mix for an MLB roster spot early in 2026. Sirota and Quintero have yet to reach Double-A. De Paula and Hope have played a combined 10 games at that level. None of the four have any Triple-A experience. It’s unlikely all four will pan out given the attrition rate of prospects who are that far from the majors, but the Dodgers will want to have long-term opportunities available for each of them.

The balance could be to turn to the trade market. Steven Kwan, Lars Nootbaar (recovering from heel surgeries), Brendan Donovan and Wilyer Abreu are among the outfield-capable players who might be available. The Dodgers were tied  to Kwan and Donovan at last summer’s deadline. They certainly have the farm system to make a strong offer for a controllable outfielder. Rushing could be a trade chip if the Dodgers don’t feel he’d be an above-average regular in left field, for instance.

The Dodgers obviously have the spending capacity to make a run at any free agent as well. They’ve generally preferred making shorter-term commitments at huge annual rates to offering decade-long deals, though. They’ve broken that precedent for Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, but both were special cases. Ohtani is the best player in the world and Yamamoto was a 25-year-old ace. Tucker is an excellent player but not that kind of unique free agent. The Dodgers would probably be more amenable to a five- or six-year deal at a premium AAV if Tucker winds up going that route, but it stands to reason his camp will try to pull a ten-plus year commitment in the early part of the offseason.

Giants Hire Bruce Bochy For Special Assistant Role

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Nov. 10: The Giants formally announced Bochy’s hiring as a special assistant to the baseball operations department.

“Having Boch back in the organization means a great deal to all of us,” Posey said within this morning’s press release. “His experience, leadership, and feel for the game are unmatched, and his perspective will be invaluable as we continue building towards sustained success.”

Nov. 5: Bruce Bochy is nearing a deal to return to the Giants in an advisory role. CEO Greg Johnson first told Susan Slusser of The San Francisco Chronicle on Tuesday that the sides were working on a deal. Bochy confirmed to Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic this evening that he’s in the process of finalizing a special assistant position. He’ll be on hand as an excellent resource for first-year manager Tony Vitello. Bochy will join another future Hall of Fame manager, Dusty Baker, as special assistants in San Francisco.

The 70-year-old Bochy has spent the past three seasons managing the Rangers. He led Texas to a World Series in 2023, the fourth title of his career. Bochy famously led the Giants to three World Series in a five-year span between 2010-14. President of baseball operations Buster Posey was a face of the franchise for most of Bochy’s 13 seasons at the helm. Only Hall of Famer John McGraw, who managed for 31 years between 1902-32 when the team was still in New York, has won more games in Giants’ history.

This might close the book on Bochy’s managerial career. “I would say that’s where I’m at right now,” he told Baggarly when asked if he expects that his stint with the Rangers would be his last one in the dugout. “I’ll add you don’t ever rule anything out. You don’t, you know? But I’m content with what I’m doing now. … This is what I want to do. I want more time for myself and family but also to contribute to a game that I love.”

Bochy is sixth all-time with 2,252 managerial wins between his stints with the Padres, Giants and Rangers. He and Baker are the only two skippers within the top 10 who have not been inducted into the Hall of Fame. That’s only because both men were managing within the past couple seasons. It’s a matter of time before they’re in Cooperstown. (The same is true for Terry Francona, who is 12th on the all-time list and now the winningest active manager with Bochy back in an advisory role.)

Managers are only inducted into Cooperstown via the Era Committees. Managers who are 65 and older are eligible for Hall of Fame consideration six months after they retire. Baker and Bochy would only be up for consideration by the Contemporary Baseball Era Non-Players Committee. That’ll come up during the 2026-27 offseason. Baker should get into the Hall next winter. Bochy could be eligible for that cycle if he officially retires within the next few months, but it seems he prefers not to shut the door entirely just yet.

There’s also some news on Vitello’s coaching staff. Baggarly reports that Twins bench coach Jayce Tingler has agreed to join the San Francisco staff in some capacity. He’ll bring a decent amount of experience, as he managed the Padres between 2020-21 and had been Rocco Baldelli’s top lieutenant in Minnesota for the last four years. The Twins fired Baldelli and hired Derek Shelton to manage, so it’s not surprising there’ll be some coaching turnover. Tingler and Vitello go back more than two decades. They were teammates at the University of Missouri in the early 2000s.

Rockies Name Paul DePodesta President Of Baseball Operations

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Nov. 9: DePodesta is aiming to hire a general manager and other front office personnel by the time of the winter meetings, according to Jon Morosi of MLB Network.

Nov. 7: The Rockies formally announced DePodesta as their new president of baseball operations today.

“Paul’s previous work in MLB set the foundation for many aspects of the way the game is analyzed today and we are thrilled for him to be a key figure in our future,” executive vice president Walker Monfort said within today’s press release. “Under his leadership, we will evolve the Colorado Rockies into what we know will be an exciting new era. Hiring Paul is an essential first step to the evolution of our baseball department and we’re confident that he will not only maximize our current personnel but will also bring in additional leaders from outside the organization to help lead us forward.”

Nov. 6: The Rockies are reportedly in agreement with Paul DePodesta to run baseball operations. The team has yet to announce the hire, nor whether he’ll be the general manager or president of baseball operations. In any case, it’s a stunning move that brings DePodesta back to baseball after a decade.

DePodesta has worked with the NFL’s Cleveland Browns since January 2016. He has not been the general manager. His relatively vague title has been chief strategy officer. DePodesta has worked under a few GMs in Cleveland — the past five of which have come under executive vice president and GM Andrew Berry. He has seemingly held a high-ranking scouting/player acquisition position without ever having the top spot in football operations.

The Browns have made the playoffs twice in the past eight years and are coming off a 3-14 season that had them in last place in the AFC North. They’re currently 2-6 and at the bottom of the division as they’re amidst another rebuild.

Before his move to the NFL, DePodesta was a high-ranking baseball operations executive. He’s probably most famous for his time as the assistant general manager with the A’s under Billy Beane. That’s due largely to the success of Moneyball, the Michael Lewis book chronicling the A’s being at the forefront of using more advanced player metrics to succeed despite significant budgetary constraints. That was adapted into an acclaimed 2011 film in which Jonah Hill played a composite character that was largely based on DePodesta.

While Moneyball’s popularity makes DePodesta most associated with the A’s, his highest-ranking MLB position came when he accepted the general manager job with the Dodgers in 2004. DePodesta was just 31 years old at the time. He held the role for two seasons, winning 93 games and the NL West title in 2004. The team stumbled to a 71-91 showing the following year, and the Dodgers fired him at the end of the ’05 campaign. DePodesta worked as a high-ranking assistant with the Padres and Mets for the next decade before making the jump to the NFL.

Now 52, DePodesta returns to baseball almost 20 years since his last GM job. He’s facing a monumental challenge. The Rox are coming off a 43-119 season that is tied for the third worst of the modern era. Their -424 run differential was somehow even worse. They were the first team since 1899 to be outscored by more than 400 runs. They scored the second-fewest runs in MLB despite playing half their games at Coors Field. They allowed 122 more runs than the next-closest team.

Despite the abysmal state of the major league roster, the Rockies don’t have the kind of high-end farm system that one would expect from a club that has finished fourth or fifth in the division in seven straight years. Baseball America credited them with two Top 100 prospects on their latest update in August: recent top five picks Ethan Holliday and Charlie Condon. As a result of those consecutive lottery picks, the Rockies are prohibited by the CBA from picking any higher than 10th in the 2026 draft.

There aren’t many buildings blocks on the MLB roster. Shortstop Ezequiel Tovar, center fielder Brenton Doyle, and starting pitcher Chase Dollander have the best chance to be key pieces of a long-term contender. They’re all coming off underwhelming seasons. Hunter Goodman was the team’s best player in 2025. He was one of only four primary catchers to hit 30-plus homers, but he’s a 26-year-old coming off a breakout season in which his strikeout and walk profile was poor. He’s probably more of a good complementary player than someone who’d be one of the three to five best position players on a contender.

On top of all that, the front office faces the unique challenge of building a pitching staff that can succeed at altitude. They’re always likely to face heavier pitch counts and workloads over the course of a 162-game season at MLB’s most hitter-friendly park. Colorado hitters need to adjust to different pitch movements at home and on the road. They’re in a division with the two-time defending World Series winners. The Padres have won 90-plus games in two straight seasons. The Diamondbacks and Giants have been around average of late, but both teams have the kind of impact position player talent that the Rockies have not developed since the Nolan Arenado and Charlie Blackmon heyday.

DePodesta will be the surprise choice to turn things around. The Rockies had seemingly settled on Diamondbacks assistant GM Amiel Sawdaye and Guardians AGM Matt Forman as the finalists last week. Bob Nightengale of USA Today writes that Sawdaye rejected Colorado’s offer, while Forman took himself out of consideration. That led them to go well outside the box for DePodesta.

It’s Colorado’s first external GM hiring in more than a decade. They’d stayed internal with the promotions of Jeff Bridich and Bill Schmidt. DePodesta’s first task will be the final managerial decision of the offseason. Interim skipper Warren Schaeffer has been in limbo since the team moved on from Schmidt at the end of the regular season.

Thomas Harding of MLB.com first mentioned that DePodesta was a strong candidate for the position. ESPN’s Jeff Passan mentioned that they were nearing a deal, while The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal, Brittany Ghiroli and Zac Jackson first reported the agreement was in place.

Image courtesy of Ken Blaze, USA Today Sports.

Braves Claim Michael Siani From Cardinals

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November 7: Thompson will actually not become a minor league free agent, per Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. He will stay in the Cards’ organization as part of the Triple-A Memphis roster. This appears to be because he spent the entire 2025 season on the major league injured list. Therefore, it doesn’t count as a minor league season and he doesn’t qualify for seven-year minor league free agency.

November 6: The Braves claimed outfielder Michael Siani off waivers from the Cardinals, relays Jeff Jones of The Belleville News-Democrat. St. Louis also outrighted left-handed pitchers Anthony Veneziano and Zack Thompson while selecting Bryan Torres onto the 40-man roster.

Siani, 26, is a glove-first center fielder. He has played in parts of four big league seasons but only got significant action in 2024. The lefty batter turned in a .228/.285/.285 slash with two homers and 20 steals over 124 games that year. Siani made just 19 big league appearances this past season. He spent the bulk of the season at Triple-A Memphis, where he slumped to a .209/.307/.329 batting line across 430 trips to the plate. Siani stole 28 bases and plays excellent outfield defense, but the bat is a significant question. He has one minor league option remanning.

Torres, 28, gets a 40-man roster spot after a decade in the professional ranks. He’s a 5’7″ utility player who moved between second base and the corner outfield spots. The lefty-hitting Torres had a breakout season with Memphis, batting .328/.441/.464 while walking more often than he struck out. He would have become a seven-year minor league free agent tonight if the Cardinals hadn’t put him on the 40-man roster.

Veneziano and Thompson will each become minor league free agents after going unclaimed on waivers. The 28-year-old Veneziano was a late-season waiver claim from Miami who pitched four innings of two-run ball for the Cards. He owns a 3.98 ERA over 40 2/3 career frames. Thompson, 28, was a first-round pick out of the University of Kentucky back in 2019. He missed the entire 2025 season with a torn lat.

Rays Decline Option On Pete Fairbanks

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The Rays have declined their $11MM option on reliever Pete Fairbanks, reports ESPN’s Jeff Passan. He’s now a free agent.

Fairbanks has spent almost all of his big league career in Tampa Bay. The Rays acquired him from the Rangers in a swap for outfield prospect Nick Solak in 2019. It worked out beautifully for the Rays, as Fairbanks has been one of the better late-game arms in the sport over the past six seasons. He carries a 2.87 earned run average in nearly 250 innings going back to the start of the 2020 season.

Earlier in his career, Fairbanks posted massive strikeout rates to match the excellent run prevention. He punched out nearly 35% of batters faced from 2020-23, fanning no fewer than 29% of opponents in each season. That has dropped significantly over the last two seasons. Fairbanks has posted a strikeout rate around 24% in consecutive years. He got swinging strikes on 12.6% of his offerings this past season. Both marks are still good but only a little higher than the league average 22.8% strikeout rate and 11.5% swinging strike percentage for relievers.

Fairbanks remains a very good closer despite the drop in whiffs. He’s coming off a 2.83 ERA across 60 1/3 innings. He went 27-32 in save chances and has picked up at least 23 saves in each of the past three years. Fairbanks’ velocity has backed up slightly from his 2022-23 peak when he was averaging north of 99 MPH on his heater. Even with that “regression,” he throws harder than 97 on average with a plus mid-80s slider. Fairbanks has missed time in his career with lat and forearm issues but didn’t spend any time on the injured list this year.

The dip in strikeouts evidently deterred teams enough that they didn’t want to invest in Fairbanks this early in the offseason. His $11MM option always seemed likely to be too rich for the Rays’ taste. Still, it registers as a surprise that the Rays were apparently unable to find a trade partner. Fairbanks was never going to net a huge return as a pricey rental reliever, but it seems no one was even willing to part with a mid-tier prospect to exercise the option themselves.

That instead sends him to free agency in advance of his age-32 season. It’s rare but not entirely unheard of for a player to sign for more money as a free agent than he would’ve made had he been tendered an arbitration contract. Fairbanks could find a two-year deal that pays less than $11MM annually but comes with a higher overall guarantee.

A one-year deal in the $11MM range is also possible. Fairbanks is better than José Leclerc, who commanded $10MM from the A’s last winter. The Orioles have made consecutive $9MM commitments to Andrew Kittredge. There may be teams that value Fairbanks as a $10-12MM arm but didn’t want to tie that money up within the first five days of the offseason. He joins Ryan Helsley, Devin Williams, Kyle Finnegan and Luke Weaver among the middle tiers of free agent closers.

Guardians Decline Club Option On John Means

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The Guardians have declined their $6MM option on left-hander John Means, per Steve Adams of MLB Trade Rumors. Means is now a free agent. Additionally, left-handers Kolby Allard and Matt Krook, right-hander Ben Lively, catcher Dom Nuñez and infielder Will Wilson have been outrighted off the roster and elected free agency, per Zack Meisel of The Athletic.

Means signed a one-year, $1MM free agent deal last winter. He was rehabbing his second career Tommy John procedure and hoped to make it back for the final few weeks of the ’25 season. That didn’t happen. Means was able to make five rehab starts with Triple-A Columbus but struggled to a 7.97 earned run average over 20 1/3 innings. The Guards weren’t going to make a $6MM commitment off that limited body of work.

The 32-year-old Means was an All-Star with the Orioles in 2019. He pitched to a 3.68 ERA over parts of seven seasons as a generally reliable mid-rotation arm with Baltimore. Injuries have unfortunately robbed him of most of the past four years. He’s looking at minor league offers or an incentive-laden MLB deal.

Of the outrighted players, Allard made the most significant contributions to the 2025 Guardians. He put up a 2.63 ERA across 65 innings as a long reliever. Allard throws roughly 90 MPH and doesn’t miss bats, though, so there’s generally been skepticism about his ability to churn out strong results. This is the second time this year that he went unclaimed on waivers.

Lively was Cleveland’s Opening Day starter this year. He carried a 3.22 ERA over his first nine outings but blew out in May. He underwent Tommy John surgery that’ll cost him the bulk of the ’26 season. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projected Lively for a $2.7MM arbitration salary. That’s not outlandish but not exactly a drop in the bucket for a low-payroll franchise to devote to a journeyman starter who’ll miss the majority of the season. This serves essentially as an early non-tender, but it’s possible Lively has shown enough to command a cheap big league deal from another club.

Krook was claimed off waivers from the A’s in May. Cleveland kept him in Triple-A for the rest of the season. He turned in 34 innings of 3.18 ERA ball with Columbus. Nuñez is a depth catcher who only made it into two games behind Bo Naylor and Austin Hedges. The former Rockies backstop hit .176 in 76 Triple-A contests. Wilson is a former first-round pick of the Angels who never panned out with the Halos. The North Carolina State product earned his first big league look this year with Cleveland, batting .192/.267/.244 in 34 games.

Rays Claim Jake Fraley; DFA Kameron Misner, Bob Seymour

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The Rays claimed outfielder Jake Fraley off waivers from the Braves, according to an announcement from Atlanta. The Braves evidently weren’t planning to tender him an arbitration contract and put him on waivers this week.

Tampa Bay also confirmed their previously reported option decisions involving Brandon Lowe, Pete Fairbanks and Taylor Walls. They added Forrest Whitley to the 40-man roster to prevent him from reaching minor league free agency while designating four players for assignment: first baseman Bob Seymour, pitchers Brian Van Belle and Nate Lavender, and outfielder Kameron Misner. Meanwhile, three players who DFA’d earlier this week — Caleb Boushley, Alex Faedo and Stuart Fairchild — cleared waivers and are electing minor league free agency.

Atlanta had claimed Fraley off waivers from the Reds in August. The lefty-hitting outfielder collected seven hits in 23 at-bats but suffered a season-ending oblique strain in the middle of September. Atlanta was well out of contention by that point, so the claim was largely about getting an early look to see if they wanted to retain Fraley in arbitration. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects him for a $3.6MM salary if he’s tendered a contract for his last year of club control.

Fraley was a second-round pick by Tampa Bay back in 2016. They traded him to Seattle before he made his big league debut. Fraley has played parts of seven seasons in the majors, mostly with the Mariners and Reds, and is a career .261/.344/.432 hitter against right-handed pitching. He’s limited to the corners, where he’s a league average defender. This doesn’t guarantee he’ll stick with the Rays, who have a couple weeks to decide whether they want to tender him a contract. They could try to negotiate a deal lower than his projected salary before November 20 if they see him as a borderline non-tender candidate.

Whitley gets back onto the roster after being waived in early July. The former Houston first-round pick gave up 10 runs (eight earned) over five major league appearances with Tampa Bay. He has surrendered 22 runs in 15 1/3 career big league frames. Something appeared to click in Triple-A after the Rays demoted him, however. Whitley fired 55 1/3 innings of 2.60 ERA ball while striking out 30.4% of opponents with their top affiliate in Durham. He would’ve been a free agent if the Rays didn’t reselect his contract tonight. He’s out of options and could be on the roster bubble again next spring, but this suggests the Rays are open to the possibility of carrying him on the MLB roster.

The shuffling required a handful of cuts. Misner, 27, was a former supplemental first-round pick who has shown big physical tools with too much swing-and-miss. He has fanned in 34.1% of his career plate appearances and is a .203/.260/.325 hitter over 232 trips to the plate. Seymour, also 27, had a huge .263/.327/.553 showing with 30 homers in Durham. That got him an MLB opportunity at the end of the year, but the lefty batter struggled to a .205/.253/.282 line over his first 26 major league games.

Van Belle and Lavender were relatively new additions to the pitching staff who didn’t make much of an impact because of injury. Van Belle came over from the Reds in the Zack Littell trade. The 29-year-old made his first four MLB appearances before suffering a season-ending elbow injury.

Lavender was a Rule 5 pick out of the Mets’ system who never pitched with the Rays. He was rehabbing from an elbow procedure at the time he was taken in the Rule 5 and apparently didn’t progress as hoped. He collected a year of major league salary, though he surely wishes he’d had an opportunity to carve out a longer big league role. He’ll be placed on waivers and offered back to the Mets if he goes unclaimed.

Giants Claim Reiver Sanmartin, Justin Dean

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The Giants have claimed reliever Reiver Sanmartin and outfielder Justin Dean off waivers from the Reds and Dodgers, respectively. They opened a 40-man roster spot by designating righty Mason Black for assignment. The moves were relayed by Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area.

Sanmartin, 29, has pitched parts of four MLB campaigns with Cincinnati. He has only made one big league appearance over the past two seasons, tossing 1 2/3 frames while allowing an unearned run against the Blue Jays on September 2. The Colombian-born southpaw otherwise pitched the entire season with Cincinnati’s top farm team in Louisville. He had a strong year, working 67 1/3 innings of 2.67 ERA ball behind a 58.7% ground-ball rate.

Dean is a speed and defense center fielder who just won a World Series with Los Angeles. He got into 18 regular season games and made 13 more appearances in the postseason. They only let him bat twice — he went 0-2 with a strikeout — but clearly valued him as a depth piece. The 28-year-old Dean (29 next month) has a full slate of minor league options and is coming off a .289/.378/.431 showing with 27 steals in Triple-A.

The moves probably spell the end of Black’s time in San Francisco. He’s a former third-round pick who was viewed as one of the organization’s more talented pitching prospects when he was called up in 2024. Black struggled to a 6.44 ERA across 36 1/3 innings during his debut season. He only pitched once in the big leagues this year, instead struggling to a 5.81 earned run average over 30 appearances (24 starts) in Triple-A.

Black will be traded or placed on waivers within the next five days. There’s a decent chance another team takes a flier. He turns 26 next month and still has a minor league option. Black sits around 93 MPH as a starter but could be a speculative relief target. He has posted middling Triple-A numbers in consecutive seasons but fanned nearly a third of opposing hitters in Double-A back in 2023.

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