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Ryon Healy Diagnosed With Spinal Stenosis

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Mariners infielder Ryon Healy – out since May 21 with lower back issues – has been diagnosed with spinal stenosis, Greg Johns of MLB.com reports. He’ll miss at least three to four more weeks as a result, according to manager Scott Servais.

Healy will undergo an epidural Tuesday in hopes of lessening the pain, per Johns. While Healy doesn’t expect the procedure to cure his problem, he suggested to Johns that the injury shouldn’t be a hindrance going forward “if we rehab it properly.” 

With the Mariners firmly in sell mode leading up to the July 31 deadline, Healy has come up in trade rumors during his time on the injured list. This latest development figures to officially take him out of play as an in-season trade piece for Seattle, though. More importantly, the hope is that it won’t hamper the 27-year-old Healy as he continues his career. A spinal stenosis diagnosis in 2015 helped derail former Mets third baseman David Wright, who seldom took the field again before deciding to wrap up his playing days at the end of last season.

In addition to dealing with Healy’s ongoing absence, the Mariners will have to continue without right fielder Mitch Haniger for the time being, Johns explains. Haniger has been on the IL with a ruptured testicle since June 7. While Haniger has begun light (non-baseball) activity, there’s still no timetable for his return.

Mariners Notes: Healy, Gordon, Crawford, Sadzeck

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Seattle sent outfielder Mitch Haniger to the 10-day IL on Friday with a rather unfortunate injury, making him the latest notable Mariner to land on the shelf. Here are updates on a few others, courtesy of Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times (Twitter links: 1, 2, 3)…

  • Infielder Ryon Healy had been nearing a rehab assignment, but that’s now on hold after he suffered a setback in his recovery from lower back inflammation. He’ll undergo further tests to determine the severity. Healy, who headed to the IL on May 21, has come up in trade rumors during his absence. Although, neither this setback nor the numbers he has posted over the past couple seasons will do his value any favors. Since a strong rookie showing with the Athletics in 2016, Healy has slashed an unspectacular .252/.290/.436 (96 wRC+) with 56 home runs in 1,316 plate appearances between Oakland and Seattle.
  • Second baseman Dee Gordon, another trade candidate, went to the IL the same day as Healy with a right wrist contusion. But unlike Healy, Gordon actually is progressing toward a return. The 31-year-old speedster started a rehab assignment with Triple-A Tacoma on Friday. He could return to the majors as early as Tuesday, per Divish. Gordon continued his light-hitting ways before his IL stint, as he batted .281/.310/.369 (85 wRC+) in 173 PA, though he did swat three homers (one fewer than he put up 2018) and steal 12 bases on 14 attempts.
  • Fellow banged-up middle infielder J.P. Crawford will begin his own own rehab assignment at the Single-A level on Tuesday. Crawford, down since May 29 with a sprained left ankle, may be back in the bigs by June 14. The offseason trade acquisition showed well in Tacoma at the beginning of the year, leading the Mariners to promote him May 10 and demote then-starting shortstop Tim Beckham to the bench. It looked as if Beckham would temporarily get his old job back when Crawford suffered his injury, but the lion’s share of playing time has gone to Dylan Moore instead. As someone who started 2019 in excellent fashion before seeing his production fall off a cliff, Beckham’s a microcosm of his team. He could also wind up on the move by the July 31 trade deadline.
  • The Mariners put reliever Connor Sadzeck on the IL on Tuesday with a right flexor mass, which doesn’t seem to be healing properly. Sadzeck “felt discomfort in his elbow” while playing catch, according to Divish, who adds the 27-year-old will undergo an MRI.

Mariners Notes: Sadzeck, Gordon, Healy, Crawford

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The Mariners sent reliever Connor Sadzeck to the 10-day injured list Tuesday with a flexor mass in his right elbow, per Greg Johns of MLB.com. Sadzeck will be out “at least a couple weeks,” Johns writes. His roster spot went to right-hander Andrew Moore, whom they recalled from Double-A Arkansas. Moore started the Mariners’ game against the Astros on Tuesday.

The injury to Sadzeck will deprive free-falling Seattle and its shaky bullpen of one of most utilized options for the time being. The 27-year-old Sadzeck joined the Mariners in an April 1 trade with the division-rival Rangers, who acquired righty Grant Anderson in return. Sadzeck has produced good bottom-line results in 23 2/3 innings since then, thanks in part to a 96 mph four-seamer and a 94 mph sinker. He has pitched to a 2.66 ERA with 10.27 K/9 and a 46 percent groundball rate, though a bloated BB/9 (5.7) and a 4.66 FIP do curb enthusiasm about Sadzeck’s performance.

In better injury-related news for the Mariners, infielders Dee Gordon, Ryon Healy and J.P. Crawford are all nearing rehab assignments, Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times suggests. Gordon (right wrist contusion) and Healy (lower back inflammation) have each been on the IL since May 21, while Crawford went down less than a week ago on account of a left ankle sprain.

With transaction-happy general manager Jerry Dipoto at the helm, Gordon and Healy could be trade chips when they return to health. Both players have managed uninspiring production since they arrived in Seattle heading into the 2018 season, though, and likely wouldn’t bring back much in a deal.

Gordon and Healy may not be long-term building blocks for the Mariners, but the hope is Crawford will emerge as one. Acquired from the Phillies in a blockbuster trade last December, the formerly elite shortstop prospect got off to a nice start with his new organization before landing on the IL. Crawford, 24, hit well with Triple-A Tacoma and then began his M’s tenure by batting .279/.343.426 (112 wRC+) in 67 plate appearances between his promotion on May 10 and his IL placement on the 29th.

Mariners Reportedly Looking To Sell

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TODAY: The Mariners “have shown a willingness to eat significant money in” trades, ESPN’s Jeff Passan tweets, and “almost every veteran on their roster” is available.  We’ve seen the first instance of this earlier today, as Seattle covered $18MM of the approximately $21.5MM remaining on Jay Bruce’s contract in trading Bruce to the Phillies.

SATURDAY: The Mariners, who’ve gone a staggering 12-33 after a 13-2 start in which the club made its fans forget the cavernous dimensions of T-Mobile Park, are “deep in sell mode,” tweets MLB Network’s Jon Heyman, who lists Edwin Encarnacion, Ryon Healy, Dee Gordon, Mike Leake and Tim Beckham among the players the club is “talking” about.

None in the group seem likely to net a significant return – the 36-year-old Encarnacion may be the most attractive piece, despite the some $18MM remaining on his contract – though it’s possible GM Jerry Dipoto would simply like to clear space for younger players. One feather in Encarnacion’s (and the Mariners’) cap is his renewed vigor in the infield: the one-time third-baseman is on pace for the most first-base innings in his fifteen-year career, and has thus far been surprisingly adequate at the position, per both DRS and UZR. The aging slugger, who’s now just seven homers shy of 400 for his career, seemed on a clear DH-only trajectory after two seasons in Cleveland where he totaled just 388 innings at the position, but has nearly eclipsed that mark in just two short months in Seattle. The three-time all-star’s on pace for nearly 3.0 fWAR in ’19, with a hard-hit rate hovering around his peak average, though teams aren’t typically clamoring for 1B/DHs in the rental market, even one with a track record as glowing as Edwin’s.

Thirty-one year-old Gordon, twice an all-star earlier in his career, is still owed approximately $22MM on his deal through 2020, and may indeed have negative surplus value at this point. After a poor 2018 showing, in which the second baseman-turned-center-fielder posted 0.1 fWAR on the back of a 77 wRC+ and hard-to-fathom 1.5% BB rate, the again infielder hasn’t been much better this year, posting just a .281/.310/.369 line (85 wRC+) with a stolen-base rate that doesn’t even begin to approach the standard he’d set from 2014-17. It’s true that Gordon’s ground-ball rate has dropped below 50% for the first time in his career, and that he’s flashing a bit more power than usual, but it’s hard to foresee this profile netting much more than a bit of salary relief.

Mix-and-match artist Leake, now 31 and with over 1,700 big-league innings under his belt, is still owed upwards of $30MM on his deal that extends through 2020 and is currently in midst of the worst season of his career. Leake’s homer rate has skyrocketed to an a galactical 2.23 per nine, thanks mostly to a career-low grounder rate and an average fastball velocity that’s down over four MPH from his 2015 peak of 93.1. FanGraphs places Leake’s value at below replacement-level this season, and peripheral markers aren’t encouraged. His value would seem to mirror Gordon’s closely.

Former number-one overall pick Beckham appeared to have finally turned the corner this season after an early-season hot streak that catapulted him to the top of the league’s leaders in nearly every relevant statistical category. Still sporting an impressive 119 wRC+, Beckham’s secondary markers appear much the same as in years past: his 6.3% walk rate aligns exactly with his career total, and the 30% K rate is actually higher than the standard he’d set in the four years previous. Beckham’s .342 wOBA, on the strength of a middling 32% hard-hit rate, isn’t sustainable, per Statcast, who estimates his true (expected) wOBA title at just .312. The 29-year-old’s defense, too, has been far less than stellar this season, with DRS pegging him at a particularly cruel -7 runs saved already. He’s in his second-to-last year of arbitration, and may yet be a utility target for some contending clubs, but not one that’s likely to yield a blue-chipper in return.

Lesser names, like Healy, Wade LeBlanc, Hunter Strickland, and Domingo Santana, whose 119 wRC+ has been almost entirely offset by poor corner defense, aren’t likely to be coveted on the market. Third baseman Kyle Seager has been hurt for much of the early season, and recent-years returns are probably enough for interested teams to leave the some $50MM remaining on his deal behind.

If Dipoto is feeling particularly frisky, the team could try dangling each of Daniel Vogelbach, Mitch Haniger, Marco Gonzales, and Omar Narvaez to interested teams, though it seems the club is set on contending in the near future, and each of those players are controlled through at least the 2022 season.

AL West Notes: Gallo, Halos Hurlers, M’s, Herrmann, McHugh

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There’s little doubt that Rangers slugger Joey Gallo has drastically increased his career earnings outlook with a massive start to the current season. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News takes a look at the state of affairs on the extension front for baseball’s reigning three-true-outcomes king. The organization is obviously impressed, with manager Chris Woodward tabbing Gallo the club’s “best player” and GM Jon Daniels saying that he’s “mentally in a great spot.” Gallo says he’s not thinking about contracts, but agent Scott Boras surely is. As Grant notes, Boras’s assessment of Gallo’s season to date — “we are seeing the evolution of a superstar player” — offers a hint as to the kind of contract it might take to lock him up.

More from the American League West:

  • Angels righty JC Ramirez is set to launch a rehab assignment later this week, Maria Torres of the Los Angeles Times tweets. Ramirez underwent Tommy John surgery last April. With his 30-day rehab clock set to be triggered, Ramirez is now back on the map as a near-term roster piece for the Halos. The club owes him $1,901,000 this year, with two more arb campaigns remaining. Though he has had some struggles in his time in the majors, Ramirez has given the Halos 200 1/3 innings of 4.04 ERA ball and showed he could stick in the rotation in 2017.
  • As ever, there are other updates to the Angels rotation mix. Nick Tropeano will beat Ramirez back to the big leagues; as Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register tweets, Tropeano is coming up to pitch today’s ballgame. He was optioned after working back from a shoulder strain, and has been tagged in the run-happy PCL, but the innings are needed now. That’s due in no small part to the issues surrounding Matt Harvey, who just hit the injured list with a back strain after an awful stretch on the hill. Harvey didn’t have much of a timeline to offer reporters, as Mike DiGiovanna of the Los Angeles Times reports (Twitter link). With more to sort out than an injury, there’s no reason to think Harvey will be rushed back.
  • For the Mariners, there are a few incremental health updates of note, as Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times reports (all links to Twitter). Rehabbing relievers Sam Tuivailala and Hunter Strickland are still a ways off. The former, who is working back from Achilles surgery, has come down with dead arm and may need to re-start his rehab rather than heading back to the majors. The latter is readying for his first mound work since leaving with a lat injury earlier this year. Starter Felix Hernandez, who’s on the IL with a shoulder strain, is also nearing mound work. The club is still taking it slow with corner infielder Ryon Healy, who has yet to resume baseball activity after recently hitting the shelf due to a balky lower back. That’s a less promising outlook than had been indicated when he was first sidelined, but the club no doubt hopes to avoid a lingering problem.
  • Athletics backstop Chris Herrmann is nearing a rehab assignment, per Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle (Twitter link). Herrmann inked a one-year, $1MM deal over the offseason but hasn’t yet debuted with his new organization owing to knee surgery. It remains to be seen how the Oakland club will manage its roster once Herrmann is ready; Josh Phegley has hit well all year and Nick Hundley has turned it on after a dreadful start. It’s possible the A’s could ultimately carry all three, at least for a stretch, as Herrmann does have experience playing in other parts of the field.
  • It still doesn’t seem the Astros have cause for alarm regarding righty Collin McHugh, but he’s not going to be ready to return within the minimum ten-day window. Manager A.J. Hinch tells reporters, including Chandler Rome of the Houston Chronicle (Twitter link), that McHugh is in need of “a little more down time” to let his elbow stop barking. “He’s played catch a couple days and has not seen any progress,” says Hinch. “He’s not any closer than he was a few days ago.” McHugh has been a bit homer-prone, which explains his rough 6.04 ERA on the year, but otherwise has impressive peripherals. That he has been moved out of the rotation and into a relief role is testament to the depth of the talent on hand in Houston.

Mariners Place Dee Gordon, Ryon Healy On 10-Day IL

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The Mariners announced a lengthy list of roster moves today. Infielders Dee Gordon (right wrist contusion) and Ryon Healy (lower back inflammation) were placed on the 10-day injured list, while righty Parker Markel was optioned out.

Those departures cleared the way for a trio of additions. As already reported, lefty Tommy Milone was added to the 40-man and active rosters. He’ll be joined in the bigs by infielders Shed Long and Dylan Moore.

It doesn’t seem there’s much reason to fear lengthy absences from Gordon or Healy, though details aren’t yet known. Gordon has struggled since being hit by a pitch recently. Healy left last night’s contest with a back flare-up.

AL West Notes: Bolt, Rangers, Seager

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The Athletics are promoting outfield prospect Skye Bolt for his big league debut this weekend, as first reported by AthleticsFarm.com (on Twitter). He’ll step into the roster spot of Ryan Dull, who was optioned to Triple-A following yesterday’s game. Oakland spent its recent series against the Red Sox operating with a two-man bench, so the addition of Bolt will give the club some much needed flexibility on the position-player side of the roster. A fourth-round pick in 2015, the switch-hitting Bolt is batting .325/.400/.675 with six homers and three steals through 90 plate appearances in Triple-A  Las Vegas so far in the season. Despite his 80-grade name and strong start to the year, Bolt is regarded as more of a fourth outfield type than a potential outfield cornerstone in Oakland. He ranks 17th among A’s prospects at Fangraphs and 19th at both MLB.com and Baseball America. The aptly named Bolt draws praise for his above above-average speed and arm strength, which allow him to capably handle all three outfield slots.

Here’s more from the AL West..

  • Rangers 2018 second-round pick Owen White will miss the remainder of the 2019 season due to Tommy John surgery, writes Jeff Wilson of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. The right-hander joins 2018 fourth-rounder Mason Englert as the second Rangers prospect from last year’s draft to undergo the procedure in recent weeks. The pair of injuries comes in spite of the Rangers organization keeping both White and Englert from pitching last summer in an effort to help manage the workloads of young, recent draftees. Both White and Englert were slated to start the season in short-season Class-A and were already years from being options at the big league level, but the loss of a pair of high-upside teenagers for a full season before either even pitches for a minor league affiliate is undoubtedly maddening for a club that has already been snakebit by pitching injuries in recent years.
  • Kyle Seager tells Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times that his surgically repaired finger is back up to full strength and he feels ready to play, but the Mariners third baseman will still miss just over three more weeks by virtue of the fact that he’s on the 60-day injured list. Seager’s recovery is well ahead of schedule, and the 31-year-old figures to head out on a rehab assignment at some point between now and his May 25 return date in order to get him some in-game reps after sitting out since tearing a tendon in his finger on March 8. As Divish notes, his eventual return will create a crunch at the corner infield spots and designated hitter. Seager will join Ryon Healy as a third base option, while Healy, Daniel Vogelbach, Edwin Encarnacion and Jay Bruce are all options at first base and DH. A trade can ever be ruled out with ever-active GM Jerry Dipoto at the helm, though certainly Seager wouldn’t be the player to be moved; he’s owed $15.4MM through season’s end, plus another $19MM in 2020 and $18MM in 2021. His contract also contains a $15MM club option that is converted to a player option if he is traded. Divish suggests that Healy had previously been a candidate to be optioned to Triple-A, though he’s off to a .235/.301/.471 start (110 OPS+) with five homers and a league-leading 13 doubles in 2019.

Quick Hits: Cubs, Maldonado, Cedeno, M’s, Healy, Rox, Estevez

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The Cubs had interest in catcher Martin Maldonado before he agreed to join the Royals on Saturday, Patrick Mooney of The Athletic reports (subscription required). The presence of established starting catcher Willson Contreras worked against the Cubs in this instance, though, as Mooney hears Maldonado wanted to go to a team capable of offering him a solid amount of playing time. After losing out on Maldonado, the Cubs are still interested in bolstering their depth at catcher behind Contreras and Victor Caratini, Mooney hears.

  • Maldonado only ended up in Kansas City because starting catcher Salvador Perez needed Tommy John surgery – a procedure veteran Matt Wieters expects to become more commonplace for backstops. Wieters, who underwent the procedure in 2014 (the first time a starting catcher required the surgery since 1997), told Joel Sherman of the New York Post this week, “I think it is because more and more you are on the clock,” referring to the fact that teams are now timing catchers when they throw. “I am not sure that is a great way to go,” the Cardinals’ Wieters opines. Along with Perez and Wieters, the Red Sox’s Christian Vazquez and the Mets’ Travis d’Arnaud are the most prominent catchers who have undergone TJ surgery in recent years, Sherman notes.
  • With Kyle Seager battling a wrist injury, Ryon Healy has emerged as the Mariners’ top fallback option at third base, Greg Johns of MLB.com writes. Healy totaled over 100 games’ worth of action at the hot corner with the Athletics from 2016-17, but he barely played there last year with the Mariners, instead spending almost all of his time at first. The addition of Edwin Encarnacion has pushed Healy out of a starting spot there, however, and so did his subpar production in 2018. In his first year with the Mariners, Healy slashed an unimpressive .238/.277/.412 (90 wRC+) in 524 plate appearances, continuing his drop-off from an encouraging 2016 rookie campaign with the A’s.
  • Contrary to popular belief, Rockies reliever Carlos Estevez is not out of minor league options, Thomas Harding of MLB.com tweets. Rather, the Rockies will be able to demote Estevez this season “based on complicated regulations regarding full seasons played and age at the time of signing,” Harding writes. That will afford the Rockies more flexibility in their bullpen, where it appeared they’d either have to keep Estevez or potentially lose him. The 26-year-old was a part of the group from 2016-17, but he struggled to a 5.36 ERA (though he did post a much better 4.08 FIP) with 9.27 K/9, 4.33 BB/9 and a 44.3 percent groundball rate across 87 1/3 innings. Thanks in part to oblique and elbow injuries, Estevez failed to appear in the majors last season.
  • Cubs reliever Xavier Cedeno is likely to miss the start of the season on account of a wrist injury, per Mark Gonzales of the Chicago Tribune. It doesn’t seem overly serious, though, as Cedeno’s only expected to sit out the next seven to 10 days. Cedeno, whom the Cubs signed to a minor league contract in February, had been competing for a bullpen spot after several productive seasons divided among the Astros, Nationals, Rays, White Sox and Brewers. Over 175 1/3 innings, the 32-year-old southpaw has logged a 3.69 ERA/3.80 FIP with 8.91 K/9, 3.54 BB/9 and a 50.4 grounder percentage, and has held same-sided hitters to a weak .218/.285/.298 line.

Trade/Free Agent Rumors: Mariners, Brantley, Kepler, Kikuchi

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While fans, pundits and other teams all try to parse the Mariners’ flurry of offseason moves, Seattle GM Jerry Dipoto chatted with Fancred’s Jon Heyman and made a few definitive statements. Dipoto went on the record to indicate that the Mariners won’t be adding star right fielder Mitch Haniger to any trades as a means of persuading another team to take on a bad contract, nor will Seattle give any consideration to the thought of releasing Felix Hernandez this offseason, as some have speculated. Dipoto says there’s “zero” chance the Mariners would release King Felix this winter, adding that “out of respect to the career he’s had he deserves the opportunity” to right the ship in 2019. Heyman suggests that any of Ryon Healy, Carlos Santana, Jay Bruce, Anthony Swarzak or Mike Leake could be the next to go as the Mariners look to further reshape the organization.

Some more rumblings on both the trade and free-agent markets…

  • Michael Brantley’s agents are telling interested teams that the left fielder is willing to play some first base next season, tweets Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Brantley hasn’t played the position since a brief crash course there in the minors back in ’08, and no club is looking at him as a regular at first, Rosenthal notes. That said, Brantley’s willingness to play a new position won’t make him any less appealing to interested parties. One thing that could push suitors away, however, would be his asking price. David O’Brien of The Athletic suggests that Brantley could be looking for a Carlos Santana-esque salary of $20MM over a three-year term — a lofty ask for a player with his injury history. The 31-year-old was undeniably terrific at the plate in 2018, as he typically is when healthy, but shoulder and ankle injuries wiped out most of his 2016-17 seasons. O’Brien further tweets that the Braves might be willing to go to three years for Brantley, but not at an annual value anywhere near that rate.
  • Max Kepler’s name is commonly brought up when rival clubs call the Twins about potential trades, per Dan Hayes of The Athletic (subscription required). That’s been the case for more than a year now, Hayes notes, reporting that Kepler was one of the numerous pieces the Rays sought last winter when chatting Chris Archer with Minnesota. But the Twins still believe that Kepler, an excellent outfielder defender who has displayed some power but not authored a genuine breakout season just yet, is capable of taking his game to a new level. As chief baseball officer Derek Falvey explains to Hayes, it’s tough to judge Kepler’s development as one would with a traditional prospect given that he was born in Berlin, Germany and has still accrued fewer at-bats than many players who are several years younger but come from places where baseball is commonly played year-round. A strong right fielder who can play center as well, Kepler won’t turn 26 until February and still has four years of team control remaining.
  • The Rangers are doing their homework on Japanese lefty Yusei Kikuchi, GM Jon Daniels tells T.R. Sullivan of MLB.com. Daniels declined to comment on the Rangers’ specific level of interest in Kikuchi but suggested that his scouts are “obviously” aware of the Seibu Lions ace, who was posted for MLB clubs earlier this week. While early rumors have suggested that Kikuchi may prefer a West Coast club, the Rangers are no strangers to pursuing high-profile NPB talent, as evidenced by their acquisition of Yu Darvish several years ago (admittedly under a different posting system). While Texas isn’t in position to contend next season, the 27-year-old Kikuchi is a logical target even for non-contending clubs, as his relative youth means that he could still be in his prime when a rebuilding club turns the corner. And, given Texas’ utter dearth of pitching, it’s only logical that they’d have interest in a youthful option with a fair bit of upside.

Quick Hits: Soria, Renfroe, Gordon, Stanton

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Joakim Soria suffered a mild right groin strain during the Brewers’ ninth-inning meltdown against the Padres today. Soria walked off the mound with an apparent injury after allowing a go-ahead grand slam to Hunter Renfroe. According to Adam McCalvy of MLB.com, the malady was later described as a mild right groin strain. There’s no official word on the severity of the injury yet, so it’s not known at this time whether Soria will need to miss any games. The right-hander came over from the White Sox just prior to the trade deadline in exchange for a pair of minor leaguers: left-hander Kodi Medeiros and right-hander Wilber Perez.

Here are a few other small items from around the league this evening…

  • Speaking of Renfroe, the Padres outfielder has been on a tear of late. Including tonight’s grand slam off Soria, Renfroe’s slugged four homers in his past four games. Kevin Acee of the San Diego Tribune suggests that Renfroe’s performance could solidify an everyday spot in the lineup even after Wil Myers returns from the disabled list. That’s good news for the 26-year-old in the wake of today’s news that some of the young Padres outfielders are being intensely evaluated, but it’s also worth noting that Franmil Reyes also homered tonight; his third in his past four games. It will be interesting to see how the Padres address their corner outfield logjam this offseason, or if they choose to at all (Reyes and Renfroe both have minor league options remaining and can be stashed at Triple-A).
  • The Mariners moved Dee Gordon all the way down to ninth in the batting order in tonight’s game. That’s largely due to the speedster’s incredibly pedestrian offensive performance on the season. He’s hitting .280, but with just a .300 on-base and .343 slugging percentage. The biggest culprit to his lackluster showing is a paltry 1.5% walk rate that’s by far the lowest in the majors and approximately half the size of the next player on that list (Salvador Perez of the Royals). Though the plan right now seems to be for Robinson Cano to usurp some playing time from Ryon Healy when he returns from his suspension, it’s fair to wonder whether Gordon could rest in favor of Cano on occasion down the stretch, if he can’t figure out how to show more patience.
  • With his 121.7 MPH homer tonight off Rangers starter Ariel Jurado, Giancarlo Stanton broke a Statcast record. The Yankees’ headline offseason acquisition drilled the ball at a launch angle of 17 degrees, propelling it an estimated 449 feet. It’s officially the hardest-hit homer that Statcast has ever tracked. It’s part of a larger trend for Stanton, who has heated up after a somewhat average start to the season. The right-hander’s .308/.363/.561 batting line since the start of June is much more in line with what the Bombers had imagined when they took on the lion’s share of his contract from the Marlins this offseason.
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