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Astros Place Jeremy Pena On Injured List

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11:15am: Manager Dusty Baker told reporters (including Brian McTaggart of MLB.com) that Peña won’t swing a bat for at least a week. He certainly won’t be ready to return after a minimal IL stay then, but the Houston skipper said an MRI didn’t reveal any cause for long-term concern.

10:41am: The Astros have placed shortstop Jeremy Peña on the 10-day injured list due to left thumb discomfort. First baseman J.J. Matijevic has been recalled from Triple-A Sugar Land to take his spot on the active roster.

Peña didn’t play in last night’s win over the Rangers, and the club sent him from Arlington to Houston for further evaluation. The Astros haven’t divulged many specifics on the issue, but it’s apparently serious enough he’ll need at least a week and a half out of game action to recover. Aledmys Díaz got the start at shortstop last night, and he’ll presumably play there regularly for whatever time Peña is out.

A former third-round draftee, Peña has dramatically raised his stock since entering the pro ranks. He’d been an excellent player on both sides of the ball throughout his minor league tenure, emerging as one of the sport’s top prospects by the start of the 2021 campaign. Left wrist surgery kept him to just 30 Triple-A games last season, but Peña hit .287/.346/.598 during his initial crack at the level. The Astros had enough faith in his ability to handle MLB pitching they penciled him in as the Opening Day shortstop after watching Carlos Correa depart to free agency.

That was a bold call for general manager James Click and his staff, as Houston remains one of the league’s top World Series contenders. Yet Peña has excelled, more than rewarding the organization’s confidence through his first two-plus months in the majors. He’s hitting .277/.333/.471 with nine home runs across 211 plate appearances. The resulting 133 wRC+ is tied for third among the 28 rookies with at least 100 plate appearances, and he’s viewed as a Gold Glove caliber defender. Peña looks to be the early favorite for the American League’s Rookie of the Year award as a result, but his strong debut campaign will be put on hold while he rehabs.

Díaz is having a rough 2022 showing, hitting only .214/.261/.304 through 119 trips to the plate. He’ll be a marked downgrade from Peña with the glove, but his career track record at the dish is more respectable than this year’s performance would suggest. Díaz has hit .254/.316/.414 since landing in Houston in advance of the 2019 season. Mauricio Dubón and Niko Goodrum are also on the 40-man roster as shortstop-capable depth options. Dubón, who is out of minor league option years, is on the active roster; Goodrum was optioned to Sugar Land after a brutal start to the season and has been on the MiLB injured list for the past week.

Trade Candidate: Brandon Drury

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Very little has gone right for Cincinnati Reds in 2022. The club entered the season with hopes of competing, but those hopes were on shaky footing due to some cost-saving moves over the winter that softened the depth of the roster. Once the season began, the injury bug bit them hard, putting pressure on that depth, which the roster hasn’t been able to withstand. Their record is currently 23-39, ahead of just Washington among National League clubs. One small silver lining in all this, however, is that these injuries created an opening for Brandon Drury, who is having the best season of his career.

Drafted by Atlanta in the 13th round in 2010, Drury was sent to the Diamondbacks as a prospect, as part of the deal that sent Justin Upton the other way. He made his big league debut with Arizona in 2015 and showed some promise over his first few seasons. From 2015-2017 with the Snakes, he got into 289 games and hit 31 home runs, slashing .271/.319/.448. That wasn’t elite production, with his wRC+ actually coming in slightly below average at 95, but still encouraging for a player in his age 22-24 seasons. He also provided the Diamondbacks with defensive versatility, as he spent time at every infield position and the outfield corners.

There was enough there to intrigue the Yankees, who acquired Drury prior to the 2018 season. Unfortunately for them, this was the beginning of what would end up being a miserable three-year stretch for him. Drury dealt with blurred vision and migraines, which caused him to miss time and struggle to the point that the Yankees optioned him to the minors. While he hit well on the farm, he struggled mightily in the majors, hitting .176/.263/.275 in 18 games with the Yanks.

Despite those struggles, the Blue Jays decided to take a chance on him, acquiring him from the Yankees in the J.A. Happ trade, ending Drury’s time with the Yanks after just a few months. After just eight games with the Canadian birds, Drury faced another setback, breaking his hand and heading to the injured list again. In 2019, Drury was able to stay healthy but still struggled, hitting .218/.262/.380 for a 66 wRC+ in 120 games. In 2020, the struggles got even worse, with Drury hitting .152/.184/.174 in 21 games, producing a wRC+ of -10 and getting designated for assignment toward the end of the season.

Despite that abysmal three-year stretch, the Mets decided to take a flier on him, signing him to a minor league deal prior to the 2021 campaign. After the big league club suffered a pile of injuries to their position player mix, they called on Drury in May, who was having a nice showing in Triple-A. He would end up holding himself well in a utility role, playing 51 games while taking the field at first, second and third base, as well as the outfield corners. He hit .274/.307/.476 for a wRC+ of 114 in 88 plate appearances. Despite that solid showing, he was designated for assignment as the season was winding down in October.

A similar situation played out for Drury this year, as he signed a minor league deal with the Reds in March. A slew of injuries created a need for Drury, who has taken the opportunity and ran with it. He’s now played 53 games with the Reds, just beyond his total with the Mets last year. However, it’s clearly been a full-time role this time around, as his 218 plate appearances more than double his 88 from last year. In that time, he’s hit 12 home runs, a number bested by only 12 other National League hitters this year. His overall slash is .269/.335/.508 for a wRC+ of 129. He’s already produced 1.4 wins above replacement this year, according to FanGraphs, with almost two-thirds of the season still remaining. This doesn’t seem to just be good luck either, as his .297 BABIP on the year is just barely ahead of his .294 career mark, and his Statcast page has plenty of those healthy red hues. Defensively, Drury has largely played second and third, helping the club cover for extended absences from Jonathan India and Mike Moustakas, though he’s also made cameos at shortstop and first base.

Taking all of this into consideration, Drury’s true nature is very difficult to peg. A pessimist could point to his dismal stretch from 2018-2020 and dismiss this year’s showing as a small-sample hot streak. He’s also a mere rental, as he began this season with 5 years and one day of service time. Since he cracked Cincy’s Opening Day roster, he will just barely eclipse six years at the end of this season. But on the other hand, he showed enough promise earlier in his career for three different teams to trade for him, clearly demonstrating that this breakout was considered possible in the past. Now he’s delivering on that promise and should hold plenty of appeal to competing teams, especially those with budgetary constraints. The financials of Drury’s deal weren’t reported at the time, though his Baseball Reference page lists his salary as the $700K league minimum.

What Drury also has going for him as a trade candidate is his versatility. Since he can play multiple infield spots, there are potentially many teams who could fit him into their plans. The Angels have gotten very little out of their middle infield this year and could slot Drury in at second base. Josh Harrison and Leury Garcia have both struggled mightily, leaving the White Sox with the keystone as an obvious area to upgrade. The Dodgers love adding underrated bench players and have watched Justin Turner slouch through most of the season so far. Alec Bohm is still struggling in Philly, and since they’ve gone over the luxury tax for the first time, Drury’s low salary could be extra appealing to them. It’s also possible that an injury to an infielder creates a need on a team that didn’t previously have one, like when this week’s Ozzie Albies injury suddenly created a huge hole at second base in Atlanta. Though one team that almost certainly won’t be in the mix is the Blue Jays, as Drury is apparently unvaccinated and isn’t eligible to cross the border. Drury won’t complete remake any of these teams on his own, but role players like this can sometimes have huge impacts. Last year’s marquee deadline trade sent Max Scherzer and Trea Turner to the Dodgers, but the Braves won the World Series after acquiring lesser-known players like Jorge Soler, Adam Duvall and Eddie Rosario.

Even if Drury does garner interest at the deadline, it likely won’t lead to a massive return. Strong season aside, he’s got enough warts on his resume to prevent acquiring teams from shelling out any kind elite prospect package. Still, for the Reds to get any kind of trade return out of a player who signed a minor league deal when Spring Training was already underway, that’s one nice development in a season that hasn’t had too many.

Royals Release JaCoby Jones

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The Royals are releasing outfielder JaCoby Jones from his minor league contract, reports Anne Rogers of MLB.com (Twitter link). The 30-year-old had been with their top affiliate in Omaha after signing a non-roster deal over the offseason.

Jones struggled at the dish over his stint with the Storm Chasers. He suited up in 38 games but hit only .214/.270/.357 with four home runs through 137 trips to the plate. Perhaps even more concerning than the slash line is that he struck out in just over 40% of his plate appearances while only drawing a walk 6.6% of the time. Kansas City added former Phillies outfielder Roman Quinn to the organization on a minors pact last week, and it seems he’ll step in as a center field-capable depth option in Omaha.

While Jones didn’t reach the big leagues with the Royals, he suited up with the division-rival Tigers in each season from 2016-21. A former third-round draftee of the Pirates, the LSU product was Detroit’s primary center fielder for a few seasons. He flashed some power potential and rated well defensively at times, but he posted a higher than average strikeout percentage in every year of his career. Detroit began to curtail his playing time in recent years and eventually outrighted him off their 40-man roster last June.

Jones heads back to free agency in search of a new opportunity. He’ll certainly again be limited to minor league offers after his rough stretch in Omaha, but it seems likely he’ll catch on somewhere as a depth option based on his raw power and athleticism.

Latest On Fernando Tatis Jr.

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The Padres continue to await the return of Fernando Tatís Jr., who hasn’t played this season while recovering from an offseason fracture in his left wrist. The club’s franchise shortstop underwent his latest set of imaging yesterday, and the results were mixed.

Tatís’ latest CT scan didn’t reveal the level of healing for which the team had been hoping, writes Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He has still not yet been cleared to swing a bat, although he hasn’t suffered any sort of setback. “Another MRI scan continues to show healing, but it was not quite at the level for … a full green light,” president of baseball operations A.J. Preller told reporters (including AJ Cassavell of MLB.com). “Basically we’re in a spot where we’re going to progress week-to-week.”

That’s certainly not an ideal development, particularly given how long Tatís has already been sidelined. When announcing the injury and subsequent surgery in mid-March, Preller indicated the All-Star infielder could be out for three months. We’ve now hit that timetable, and the continued “week-to-week” treatment plan for Tatís to pick up a bat means he’s still not on the verge of an imminent return. As Acee points out, it’s difficult to imagine he’ll be ready to play in a major league game before the July 18-21 All-Star Break, since he’ll certainly need a rehab stint in the minor leagues even after building back into game shape physically.

At the same time, Tatís has continued to make incremental progress. He was cleared to play catch today, the first time he’s been able to snag balls out of the air after previously being limited to taking grounders (video provided by Annie Heilbrunn of the Union-Tribune). Asked how he feels about his current status, Tatís conceded “It’s a little of both. A little bit happy because I’m still progressing. And a little bit sad, because it’s not what everybody wants, including myself” (Cassavell link).

As Tatís was quick to point out, the team hasn’t missed much of a beat in his absence. Despite losing one of the sport’s top players, San Diego enters play Tuesday with a 38-24 record. They’re the top Wild Card team in the National League at the moment, and they sit just percentage points behind the Dodgers in the NL West. That’s largely on the strength of the pitching staff, though, as the Friars place 13th in the majors in runs scored (272) and 21st in park-adjusted hitting (94 wRC+). San Diego shortstops have an awful .170/.271/.257 slash line on the season, as Ha-Seong Kim has cooled after a strong start and top prospect C.J. Abrams struggled badly enough he was optioned back to the minor leagues.

Whenever Tatís is able to return, the position should go from a weakness to an unqualified strength. Preller unsurprisingly indicated the club isn’t feeling any pressure to make an outside addition over the coming weeks, telling Acee and others “we’re expecting to have him back, it’s just a matter of when. I don’t think (the recent imaging) changes anything to where we need to do something form a roster standpoint.“

Twins Activate Joe Ryan, Designate Elliot Soto

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The Twins announced that right-hander Joe Ryan has been reinstated from the COVID-19 injured list to start this evening’s game against the Mariners. To create space on the active and 40-man rosters, infielder Elliot Soto has been designated for assignment.

Ryan has missed a bit more than three weeks due to virus issues. The length of his absence necessitated a one-game rehab stint with Triple-A St. Paul, where the righty tossed three scoreless innings last Thursday. He’s now ready to return to the MLB rotation, where he’s made eight starts this season. Through 43 1/3 innings, the 26-year-old owns a sparkling 2.28 ERA with a solid 24.3% strikeout rate. Acquired from the Rays as part of last summer’s Nelson Cruz trade, Ryan was surprisingly tabbed Minnesota’s Opening Day starter and has allowed fewer than three earned runs per nine innings over his first 13 big league appearances.

Soto was selected onto the major league roster yesterday, and he loses his spot after just one game. The 32-year-old didn’t play in last night’s win over Seattle, leaving him without an MLB appearance since a three-game stint with the 2020 Angels. Signed to a minor league deal over the winter, Soto has hit .213/.327/.331 with a pair of home runs in 159 trips to the plate with St. Paul.

Minnesota will likely place the right-handed hitter on waivers within the next few days. Having previously been outrighted in his career, he’d have the right to refuse a minor league assignment in favor of free agency if he passes through unclaimed.

Liam Hendriks Placed On Injured List With Forearm Strain

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White Sox closer Liam Hendriks has been diagnosed with a flexor strain in his forearm, general manager Rick Hahn told reporters (including Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times). He’s been placed on the 15-day injured list, retroactive to June 11, with Joe Kelly reinstated from the IL to take his place on the active roster.

Asked about a timetable for Hendriks’ return, Hahn noted the club will have to see “how he responds to treatment over the next few days” but added “the preliminary estimate is three weeks.” A return within a few weeks would register as a positive for the club given the ominous diagnosis, as flexor strains can sometimes be a precursor to more serious elbow problems.

Signed to what amounts to a four-year, $54MM free agent deal over the 2020-21 offseason, Hendriks has generally been excellent for the South Siders. He posted a 2.54 ERA with an otherworldly 42.3% strikeout rate through 71 innings last season, saving 38 games in the process. He’s collected another 16 saves this year and owns a 2.81 ERA across 25 2/3 frames. The righty’s strikeout rate has taken a step back from its previous heights, but he’s still punching out a very strong 34.6% of batters faced.

Hendriks is one of the sport’s top late-inning weapons. The Sox also lost southpaw Aaron Bummer to the IL over the weekend, leaving manager Tony La Russa a bit shorthanded in the bullpen. Despite having a Hendriks – Bummer pairing at the back end, Chicago continued to invest heavily in relief pitching this past offseason. The front office brought in Kendall Graveman and the aforementioned Kelly on multi-year free agent deals, and that duo plus Matt Foster figure to see plenty of high-leverage opportunities over the next few weeks.

Nationals Designate Dee Strange-Gordon For Assignment

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The Nationals announced a series of roster moves before tonight’s contest with the Braves. Right-handers Jackson Tetreault and Reed Garrett have been selected onto the big league roster, while southpaw Francisco Pérez was recalled from Triple-A Rochester. In corresponding moves, the club placed Stephen Strasburg on the 15-day injured list with a stress reaction in his ribs, designated infielder Dee Strange-Gordon for assignment, and optioned righty Jordan Weems. Strange-Gordon’s DFA clears one 40-man roster spot, while the other was created by transferring righty Hunter Harvey from the 10-day to the 60-day injured list.

Tetrault, 25, will get the start tonight in his big league debut. A seventh-round pick in 2017 out of a Florida junior college, he’s posted capable numbers over his five-plus professional seasons. Tetrault owns a 3.85 career minor league ERA while starting the vast majority of his outings. He’s only punched out 20.8% of batters faced, but he owns a decent 8.6% walk percentage and appeared among the back half of the Nationals top 30 prospects at Baseball America each season from 2018-21. He’s spent the entirety of this season in Rochester, working to a 4.19 ERA with a 20.9% strikeout rate over a dozen starts.

Strasburg had initially been slated to start tonight’s ballgame, but manager Dave Martinez told reporters yesterday he’d go back on the IL after experiencing some discomfort following a recent bullpen session. The club has now provided a more specific diagnosis. Strasburg underwent surgery to correct thoracic outlet syndrome last June, a procedure that involves the removal of a rib to alleviate nerve pressure.

Martinez told reporters today that the stress reaction is related to the surgery (via Mark Zuckerman of MASNsports.com). He’ll soon visit orthopedic surgeon Dr. Neal ElAttrache to determine the source of the setback, but it seems he’s likely in for another lengthy absence. Martinez didn’t provide a specific timetable but noted the current plan is simply for the right-hander to rest.

In addition to the injury-necessitated rotation shakeup, the Nats move on from Strange-Gordon to add an extra arm to the bullpen. Washington signed Strange-Gordon to a minor league contract over the offseason and he cracked the Opening Day roster. The two-time All-Star made a return to the big leagues after topping out at Triple-A last season, but he only wound up appearing in 23 games in a Nationals uniform. That’s partially due to a two-week stay on the COVID-19 injured list between April and May.

Strange-Gordon hit .305 over his 59 trips to the plate, but he didn’t draw a single walk and collected only two extra-base hits. He’s always been reliant on his contact skills and speed, but he hasn’t made much of an impact at the plate since being dealt from the Marlins to the Mariners over the 2017-18 offseason. Strange-Gordon also rated very poorly in 103 innings as a shortstop this season, an unsurprising development for a player seeing his first semi-regular action there in nearly a decade.

The Nationals will have a week to trade Strange-Gordon or place him on waivers. The likeliest course of action is that he’ll pass through the waiver wire unclaimed and hit free agency in the coming days, either via release or rejection of an outright assignment to the minor leagues. As a player with more than five years of MLB service time, Strange-Gordon has the right to elect free agency if he clears waivers while still collecting what remains of this season’s $800K salary.

In his place, Garrett is up for his first major league look in three years. The 29-year-old reliever appeared in 13 games with the Tigers in 2019, serving up an 8.22 ERA with more walks than strikeouts as a Rule 5 draftee. Detroit eventually returned him to the Rangers, the club that had originally selected him out of VMI in 2014, but he never appeared in an MLB game with Texas.

Garrett spent the 2020-21 campaigns with the Seibu Lions of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball, totaling 106 2/3 innings of 3.46 ERA ball. He returned stateside via minor league pact with Washington in February, and he’ll head back to the big leagues after 22 appearances in Rochester. Garrett posted an even 4.00 ERA across 27 innings for the Red Wings, striking out 21.9% of opponents against an 8.8% walk rate.

Harvey, meanwhile, made four appearances after being claimed off waivers from the Giants. Today’s transfer is a procedural move, as he’s already been on the IL since April 21 due to a pronator strain. (The transfer is backdated to the date of his original placement). The former first-round pick has yet to begin a rehab assignment, so he surely would not have been ready to pitch in an MLB game within the next week.

Phillies Select Yairo Munoz, Option Mickey Moniak

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The Phillies have selected the contract of infielder Yairo Munoz from Triple-A Lehigh Valley and optioned center fielder Mickey Moniak back to Lehigh Valley in a corresponding 26-man roster move. Infielder Jean Segura was transferred from the 10-day injured list to the 60-day injured list to open a spot on the 40-man roster for Munoz. Segura suffered a broken finger a couple weeks back and is expected to miss up to 12 weeks of action as a result.

Munoz, 27, is hitting .319/.345/.454 in 172 plate appearances with the IronPigs so far in 2022. A solid utilityman with the Cardinals back in 2018, he’s struggled to recreate that year’s .276/.350/.413 output at the big league level. Munoz has consistently hit well against Triple-A pitching, though, and he’ll give the Phillies some additional infield cover with Segura, Johan Camargo and Nick Maton all on the injured list.

As for Moniak, the 24-year-old former No. 1 pick hasn’t gotten it going at the plate after getting a late start to the season due to a fractured hand suffered in Spring Training. He’s hit just .160/.250/.160 in a tiny sample of 25 plate appearances, and the Phils will give him a reset in Triple-A to try to get back on track there. At this point, it’s unlikely that Moniak ever matches the expectations so often associated with the top overall pick in the draft, but that doesn’t rule him out as a potentially useful contributor to the Phillies — either in 2022 or further down the road.

Brewers Claim Chi Chi Gonzalez

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The Brewers have claimed right-hander Chi Chi Gonzalez off waivers from the Twins, per a club announcement. Right-hander Freddy Peralta was transferred from the 10-day injured list to the 60-day injured list to make room on the 40-man roster. Minnesota had both selected Gonzalez’s contract for a spot start and subsequently designated him for assignment over the weekend. He’d also been up for a start as a Covid-related replacement when the Twins were in Toronto.

The Twins signed Gonzalez to a minor league pact over the winter and got some decent innings out of him in Triple-A St. Paul, where he posted a 3.44 ERA with a 23.2% strikeout rate and 9.3% walk rate in 36 2/3 innings (five starts, three relief appearances). Gonzalez tallied seven total big league frames with the Twins but was tagged for six runs on the strength of a dozen hits, including two homers.

A former first-round pick of the Rangers back in 2013 (23rd overall), Gonzalez has now seen action in parts of six Major League seasons between Texas, Colorado and Minnesota but has never had much success. He posted a 3.90 ERA in 67 innings as a rookie in 2015, but he did so while walking more hitters (11.4%) than he struck out (10.7%), so that production never felt sustainable. Indeed, in 201 2/3 frames since that rookie showing, he’s pitched to a collective 6.29 ERA with just a 14.2% strikeout rate (albeit against a solid enough 8.4% walk rate).

Though he hasn’t had much in the way of Major League success, Gonzalez clearly showed enough with the Twins to pique the interest of a Milwaukee front office that has done well when it comes to coaxing new levels of performance from pitchers. The 2022 version of Gonzalez, notably, is a bit different than prior iterations, too. He’s entirely scrapped his curveball, going from a five-pitch mix to a more concise four-pitch mix: sinker, four-seamer, changeup, slider. Gonzalez had begun to move away from the sinker in 2019 upon signing with the Rockies, but he’s using it nearly a quarter of the time in 2022 and enjoying standout ground-ball rates both in Triple-A (55.7%) and the big leagues (55.6%) as a result. He’s also back to sitting at 92 mph with the sinker after seeing his average velocity dip to 90.6 mph in 2021.

Gonzalez doesn’t have any minor league options remaining, so the Brewers will try to elevate his game while he’s working at the big league level. There’s no immediate need in the rotation even with injuries to Peralta and Brandon Woodruff, as the Brewers are getting strong work from Corbin Burnes, breakout lefty Eric Lauer, rookie Aaron Ashby and quietly solid righty Adrian Houser. Rookie Jason Alexander has given them a handful of good starts, too, though like a younger Gonzalez, he’s walked more hitters than he’s fanned along the way. It’s possible Gonzalez will get a spot start for the Brewers, but he’ll otherwise likely be ticketed for a long relief role for now.

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