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Indians Made Extension Offer To Shane Bieber In Spring Training

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The Indians have made extension offers to ace Shane Bieber during each of the past two Spring Trainings, reports Jon Heyman of MLB Network (Twitter link). Terms of the respective offers are unknown. Bieber, a client of Rosenhaus Sports Representation, is under team control via arbitration through 2024.

It’s wholly unsurprising Cleveland would like to keep Bieber long-term. The 25-year-old has cemented himself as one of the sport’s top pitchers in recent seasons. After impressing with 214 1/3 innings of 3.28 ERA/3.36 SIERA ball in 2019, Bieber has taken his game to another level over the last two years. He was a unanimous selection as the AL Cy Young award winner in 2020 after dominating hitters to the tune of a 1.63 ERA with an MLB-best 122 strikeouts in 77 1/3 innings.

Bieber hasn’t continued to pitch at that superhuman level this year, but he’s still been one of the game’s best arms. Over his first eight starts, the right-hander has worked to a 2.95 ERA, and he again leads MLB in strikeouts (85). Bieber has thrown a league-leading 132 1/3 frames over the past two seasons. In that time, he also ranks among the league’s top three pitchers (minimum 50 combined innings) in strikeout rate (39.3%), strikeout minus walk rate (31.9 percentage points), SIERA (2.58) and swinging strike rate (17.4%).

Given that continued level of dominance, it stands to reason the Cleveland front office will reengage with Bieber’s camp next winter. In March, Bieber expressed openness to a potential long-term deal but suggested he wasn’t much interested in discussing an extension during the regular season. He’s presently slated for his first of three trips through arbitration next offseason.

There haven’t been many extensions for starting pitchers with three-plus years of service time (which Bieber is set to reach before next offseason) in recent years. Phillies ace Aaron Nola and Cardinals righty Carlos Martínez are the only starters in that service class to sign long-term extensions over the past half-decade. Nola’s 2019 deal guaranteed the righty $45MM over four seasons with a fifth-year club option. Martínez signed a loftier five-year, $51MM guarantee but surrendered an extra potential free agent season via a second club option. Bieber has been more dominant during the past two seasons than either Nola or Martínez were at the time of their respective deals. If he finishes this season just as strong, he could justifiably set an asking price a fair bit loftier than those figures.

The Indians, of course, have taken plenty of criticism for their lack of spending. Cleveland’s $49.6MM payroll this season is the league’s second-lowest, in the estimation of Cot’s Baseball Contracts. However, the Indians have rather aggressively pursued early-career extensions for some of their star players in recent years. They also don’t have a single guaranteed contract on the books for 2022 and beyond, giving them plenty of long-term flexibility.

Chris Tillman Attempting Comeback

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Longtime Orioles starter Chris Tillman is making a comeback attempt, reports Britt Ghiroli of the Athletic. Tillman has been working with Dave Wallace, his former pitching coach in Baltimore, at Cressey Sports Performance in Florida since February, Wallace tells Ghiroli.

Tillman, who recently turned 33 years old, was a regular in the Orioles’ rotation for a good chunk of the last decade. He broke into the majors in 2009 and worked as up-and-down starting depth over the next couple seasons. By 2013, Tillman had locked down a permanent rotation spot, making at least 30 starts every year from 2013-16. He earned an All-Star berth in 2013 during a season in which he tossed 206 1/3 frames of 3.71 ERA ball.

After that highly productive four-year run, Tillman struggled mightily in 2017. Following an even worse start the following year, the Orioles cut bait. Tillman hooked on with the Rangers on a minor-league deal thereafter but didn’t make it back to the big leagues. He hasn’t pitched in a professional game since the end of that 2018 season, thanks in part to a June 2019 shoulder surgery. (Ghiroli notes that Tillman was attempting a comeback last spring before the COVID-19 shutdown).

Nearly three years removed from his most recent pro action, Tillman certainly faces long odds of returning to the majors. If he’s able to build back sufficient arm strength, though, it’s not out of the question he could find some interest from teams on a risk-free minor-league arrangement.

Marlins Select Cody Poteet, Designate Luis Madero

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The Marlins have selected the contract of right-hander Cody Poteet, relays Jordan McPherson of the Miami Herald. To create 40-man roster space, Miami designated righty Luís Madero for assignment. Poteet will start tonight’s game against the Diamondbacks.

Poteet, 26, is now in line to make his MLB debut. Miami’s fourth-round pick out of UCLA in 2015, he’s pitched to a 3.84 ERA over six minor-league seasons. Poteet carved up the low minors but has only managed a 4.02 ERA with an underwhelming 18.6% strikeout rate in 203 2/3 Double-A frames. He has a 5.28 ERA with a similar strikeout percentage in eleven Triple-A starts. While Poteet hasn’t overpowered minor-league hitters, he does have a solid track record of throwing strikes, with a 7.4% walk rate in the minors.

Madero will lose his 40-man spot to accommodate Poteet’s selection. The 24-year-old was himself just selected to the roster last weekend. Madero has tossed his first three MLB innings this season, allowing five runs on six hits with a strikeout and walk apiece. The Marlins will have a week to trade him, place him on outright waivers, or release him. As a player who has previously been outrighted in his career, Madero has the right to refuse a minor-league assignment if he clears waivers.

Edwin Rios To Undergo Season-Ending Shoulder Surgery

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Dodgers infielder Edwin Rios will undergo season-ending surgery on a partially torn labrum in his right shoulder, the team announced. Rios  went on the 10-day IL because of the injury on May 4.

A sixth-round pick of the Dodgers in 2015, Rios tore through minor league pitching and earned his first promotion to the majors in 2019 as a result. Rios thrived both that year and last season, posting far above-average offensive numbers, albeit over a small sample of plate appearances. He took 139 trips to the plate during that span and slashed .260/.338/.634 with 12 home runs and a jaw-dropping .374 ISO, mostly lining up in the corner infield along the way.

Even prior to this injury, this season was a major step back for the 27-year-old Rios, who hit an ugly .078/.217/.137 with one home run and a .059 ISO over 25 games and 60 PA. He’ll now have to wait until 2022 for a potential rebound.

Cubs Agree To Minor League Deal With Adrian Sampson

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The Cubs agreed to a minor league pact with right-hander Adrian Sampson, as Tommy Birch of the Des Moines Register tweeted yesterday. The team didn’t make a formal announcement, but the 29-year-old Sampson is now listed on the roster of their top affiliate in Iowa.

Sampson has pitched in part of three big league seasons, spending some time with the Mariners in 2016 and tossing 153 frames with the Rangers from 2018-19. Sampson spent the 2020 season with the Lotte Giants of the Korea Baseball Organization, racking up 130 innings but struggling to a 5.40 ERA with just a 14.7 percent strikeout rate. He did notch a strong 6.1 percent walk rate in the KBO, in addition to a massive 65.2 percent grounder rate.

Sampson’s time in the big leagues has resulted in a 5.71 ERA through 153 innings, most of which came with the 2019 Rangers. He’s a strike-thrower, evidenced by a career 6.0 percent walk rate, but Sampson also carries a below-average 17.1 percent strikeout rate and has been extremely prone to home runs, yielding an average of 2.2 round-trippers per nine innings pitched.

It’s a depth pickup for the Cubs — one that adds another arm with big league experience to a rather veteran pitching staff in Iowa. Sampson joins new teammates Shelby Miller, Adam Morgan, Kyle Ryan and Joe Biagini veterans with more than 100 Major League innings under their belt. Kohl Stewart, Robert Stock, Ryan Meisinger and Jake Jewell have all seen big league action with other organizations as well.

Brewers Notes: Burnes, Yelich, Godley

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A few updates on the Brewers…

  • Milwaukee will welcome back ace Corbin Burnes from the COVID-19 injured list on Thursday, Adam McCalvy of MLB.com relays. Burnes confirmed Wednesday that he landed on the shelf April 26 as a result of a positive test, but he was asymptomatic and able to continue working out, per Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Prior to going on the IL, the 26-year-old flamethrower got off to a remarkable start with 29 1/3 innings of 1.53 ERA/1.25 SIERA, and he also piled up 49 strikeouts without issuing a single walk. Burnes is now three punchouts away from breaking Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen’s 4-year-old record of 51 strikeouts against no walks to open a season.
  • McCalvy also passes on the latest regarding left fielder Christian Yelich, who hit the 10-day IL for the second time last week because of ongoing back troubles. Yelich has returned to “doing baseball activities,” according to manager Craig Counsell, who didn’t offer a timeline for when he could rejoin their lineup. Yelich’s second IL placement came just one game after the team activated him from a three-week absence. Yelich has appeared in only 10 games and collected 41 plate appearances this year, but the former MVP has hit a rather productive .353/.463/.382 in that short span.
  • The Brewers designated righty Zack Godley for assignment on Monday, and he has since gone unclaimed on waivers, Steve Adams of MLBTR tweets. Godley has up to two days to accept an outright assignment or return to free agency. The Brewers signed the 30-year-old to a minor league contract in March, and they selected his contract April 27. Godley made a start the next day, but he managed only three innings of three earned-run ball before exiting with a right finger injury that required an IL stint.

Diamondbacks Place Zac Gallen, Christian Walker On 10-Day IL

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5:46pm: Early test results on Gallen’s elbow have been “encouraging,” Bob Nightengale of USA Today tweets.

5:02pm: The Diamondbacks have placed right-hander Zac Gallen (elbow sprain) and first baseman Christian Walker (right oblique soreness) on the 10-day injured list, Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic reports. The team also selected righty Seth Frankoff, recalled infielder Andrew Young and designated infielder/outfielder Wyatt Mathisen for assignment.

Gallen was supposed to start Wednesday against his former team, the Marlins, but he’ll instead be out for a while longer. He’s dealing with a “minor sprain of one section of his UCL in his right elbow,” according to manager Torey Lovullo, who added that the team will “reassess in a couple weeks” (via Piecoro). If the issue is anything but “minor,” it would be a terrible development for Gallen and the D-backs, as the 25-year-old has thrived since they acquired him from Miami for second baseman Jazz Chisholm in 2019.

Chisholm has turned into a valuable player in his own right since the deal went down, but Arizona’s surely pleased with Gallen’s output in its uniform. Gallen owns a 2.85 ERA in 142 1/3 innings as a Diamondback, including a 3.04 mark over 26 2/3 frames this year, and has posted a 28.4 percent strikeout rate against a 9.7 percent walk rate.

This is the second IL placement of the year for Walker, who has landed on the shelf both times because of his oblique. Even when healthy enough to play this season, Walker has fallen well short of the above-average numbers he registered from 2019-20, having hit a disappointing .203/.268/.313 through 71 plate appearances.

Mathisen has joined Walker in seeing time at first base for the Diamondbacks, who will have a week to trade the 27-year-old or get him through waivers. Mathisen has been tremendous at the Triple-A level, where he has slashed .267/.370/.514 with 32 home runs in 627 trips to the plate. However, that success hasn’t translated to the majors, as Mathisen has batted .159/.298/.290 over a much smaller sample size of 84 plate appearances. Mathisen has two minor league options left, so perhaps a team seeking offensive depth will take a chance on him.

Frankoff, 32, signed a minor league deal with the Diamondbacks last winter after the Mariners outrighted him. He had a productive run with the Korea Baseball Organization’s Doosan Bears from 2018-19, during which he combined for a 3.68 ERA in 266 2/3 frames. Prior to that, almost all of his career was spent in the minors with the Athletics, Dodgers and Cubs. Frankoff only has 4 2/3 big league innings under his belt.

Mariners To Promote Logan Gilbert

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The Mariners will promote standout pitching prospect Logan Gilbert, according to Jeff Passan of ESPN. Gilbert will start their game against the Indians on Thursday, Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times tweets.

This is the second major promotion coming this week for Seattle, which is also set to call up elite outfield prospect Jarred Kelenic prior to Thursday’s contest. The Mariners and their fans will get their first major league looks at two players they hope will be part of the solution in Seattle for the long haul.

Like Kelenic, Gilbert was part of the first-round class of 2018. The Mariners took the right-hander 14th overall out of Stetson University, where Cy Young winners Jacob deGrom and Corey Kluber attended. And though Gilbert didn’t pitch professionally that season because of mononucleosis, he has since dominated minor league competition. Gilbert combined for 135 innings among the Single-A, High-A and Double-A levels in 2019, when he recorded a sterling 2.13 ERA with 165 strikeouts against 33 walks. There was no minor league campaign in 2020, which prevented Gilbert from pitching in a real game, but he threw five innings of four-hit, one-run ball with five strikeouts and no walks in his Triple-A debut this year.

Thanks in part to the excellence he has shown at lower levels, Gilbert ranks as one of the sport’s premier pitching prospects. MLB.com places Gilbert No. 28 on its top 100 list and writes that his impressive four-pitch repertoire – a fastball, slider, curve and changeup – could help him turn into a No. 2 starter in the majors. Baseball America joins MLB.com in ranking Gilbert 28th, while FanGraphs (No. 37), ESPN (No. 43) and The Athletic (No. 47) also regard him as a top-end prospect.

Gilbert will now join a starting rotation that has received mixed results this year. Yusei Kikuchi, Chris Flexen and Justin Dunn have fared reasonably well over a combined 18 starts. On the other hand, the M’s only other hurlers with three or more starts – Marco Gonzales, Justus Sheffield and Nick Margevicius – haven’t performed as hoped. Gonzales and Margevicius have been out since late April with injuries.

If Gilbert takes hold of a rotation spot and stays up for good, the Mariners will be able to control him through 2027. He’s also slated for Super Two status, meaning he’ll go through arbitration four times.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Dustin May Undergoes Tommy John Surgery

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May 12: May underwent surgery today, as he announced himself on Twitter.

May 3, 4:06pm: May will undergo Tommy John surgery, the Dodgers announced (Twitter link via Juan Toribio of MLB.com). He’ll miss the rest of this season and likely a sizable portion of the 2022 campaign.

2:44pm: Dodgers right-hander Dustin May left Saturday’s start in the second inning due to an arm injury, and the initial news isn’t good.  MLB Network’s Jon Morosi reports (Twitter link) that May has suffered some damage to his right UCL, and he and the “Dodgers will make [an] official decision on how to proceed in the next 24 hours.”

The worst-case scenario, of course, would be a Tommy John surgery that would keep May on the shelf for the next 13-15 months.  Depending on the severity of the UCL damage, May could first opt to rest and rehab his elbow in an attempt to pitch through the discomfort — Masahiro Tanaka is probably the most well-known example of a pitcher who avoided TJ surgery and went on to pitch for years with little issue despite a tear in his UCL.  That said, Tanaka is a rare case, and if May spends time rehabbing his elbow and then has to undergo a Tommy John procedure anyway, the added time could run him the risk of missing the entire 2022 campaign.

Regardless, it’s an all-around tough situation for a 23-year-old hurler who seemed to be on pace to be the Dodgers’ next great homegrown pitcher.  A third-round pick in the 2016 draft, May was regarded as one of baseball’s best prospects during his time in the Los Angeles farm system, and he has a 2.93 ERA, 24.2% strikeout rate, and an impressive 5.9% walk rate over 113 2/3 innings in the big leagues.  He has also logged 14 postseason innings, with 10 2/3 of those frames coming during the Dodgers’ run to the World Series last fall.

Los Angeles plans to have Tony Gonsolin step into May’s open rotation spot, though Gonsolin has yet to pitch this year due to shoulder inflammation, and will require an estimated 3-4 weeks to get fully ramped up.  The Dodgers could make do with a four-man rotation until Gonsolin is ready, and David Price doesn’t appear to be a starting option since he is also still recovering from a hamstring strain.

With a starting four of Trevor Bauer, Clayton Kershaw, Julio Urias, and Walker Buehler, it’s hard to say the Dodgers are exactly hurting for rotation help.  If May does indeed end up missing an extended amount of time, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see the team sign an innings-eating veteran to a minor league deal in the short term, and L.A. could certainly eye a bigger-name hurler at the trade deadline.

Tigers Select Eric Haase, Place Franklin Perez On Release Waivers

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The Tigers announced a series of roster moves Wednesday, placing catcher Grayson Greiner on the 10-day IL with a strained left hamstring, selecting the contract of catcher Eric Haase in his place and placing right-hander Franklin Perez on unconditional release waivers.

The Perez move comes just one day after the Tigers announced that he’s in for a lengthy absence due to surgery on his continually problematic right shoulder. It sounds callous, but teams aren’t able to place injured players on outright waivers, so the only means of removing Perez from the 40-man were to release him or call him up to place him on the Major League 60-day IL, where he’d accrue MLB service time and a big league salary. While another club could claim Perez, or he could sign elsewhere in the likely event that he clears, it’s also fairly common to see players in these circumstances quickly re-sign on minor league deals.

Perez was the top-ranked prospect the Tigers received in return for Justin Verlander back in 2017, but injuries and last year’s canceled minor league season have limited him to just 27 innings with the organization. Perez missed three months back in 2018 due to a strained lat, and he’s since battled shoulder tendinitis and a shoulder strain and has yet to even reach the Double-A level. Last year’s canceled minor league season obviously contributed to his lack of innings, but the injury troubles have tanked Perez’s prospect status. Baseball America rated him as the No. 35 overall prospect in baseball heading into the 2018 season, but he was listed just 28th in the Tigers organization even before the news of this surgery.

As for the catchers in question, Haase’s call to the roster was necessitated both by Greiner’s injury and by the fact that starting catcher Wilson Ramos is currently on the IL due to a back injury. Haase will serve as the backup to 26-year-old Jake Rogers, who was coincidentally one of the other two players the Tigers received in exchange for Verlander. (Outfield prospect Daz Cameron is the third.)

Haase, 28, has appeared in each of the past three big league seasons, spending time with the Indians in 2018-19 and with the Tigers in 2020. He’s struggled mightily, hitting just .122/.170/.184, albeit in a minimal sample of 53 plate appearances. Haase has played parts of four seasons in Triple-A, slashing .234/.306/.479 with 49 homers in 906 plate appearances.

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