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Braves Select AJ Smith-Shawver, Designate Lucas Luetge

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The Braves announced that they have selected the contract of pitching prospect AJ Smith-Shawver and designated left-hander Lucas Luetge for assignment in a corresponding move.

Atlanta has shown in recent years that it the most aggressive club in the league when it comes to promoting prospects to the majors and this continues that trend. Smith-Shawver is only 20 years old and was just drafted in 2021, getting selected in the seventh round. He made his professional debut with four Complex League appearances that year and then jumped onto Baseball America’s list of the top 30 prospect in the organization, getting the #18 spot going into 2022.

He would get a lengthier exposure in 2022, making 17 starts in Single-A, posting a 5.11 ERA in 68 2/3 innings. While that earned run figure wasn’t especially impressive, there was some bad luck in there. His .338 batting average on balls in play and 59.5% strand rate were both on the unlucky side of normal, leading to a 3.53 FIP that was much kinder. He jumped to #1 on BA’s list of top prospects in the system, as they highlighted his four-seam fastball, which averaged 95 mph and had good movement. They also praised his slider and mentioned a work-in-progress changeup.

This year, he began the year in High-A but the club has shown little hesitation about bumping him up the ladder. He made just three starts at that level before getting bumped to Double-A for two and then Triple-A for two more. In those seven starts, he has a combined 1.09 ERA over 33 innings, striking out 35.2% of batters while walking 9.4%. He’s getting good luck this time around, with his BABIP down to .257 on the year and his strand rate up to 91.2%. However, his 2.43 FIP still points to excellent work even when taking that into account.

That performance this year has pushed up his prospect stock. Though he wasn’t really considered a top 100 guy coming into the year, he’s now up to #98 at Baseball America and JJ Cooper of BA tweets that he will likely be moving up even higher in their next update. He didn’t open the year in the top 100 at FanGraphs either but it now up to #86 there. Now he’ll get to make his big league debut at a very young age and with a very quick blast through the minors.

As mentioned, this is becoming something of a playbook for the organization. Last year, they promoted prospects like Michael Harris II and Vaughn Grissom, both of whom were in their age-21 seasons. Going further back, players like Ronald Acuña Jr., Ozzie Albies and Michael Soroka all got to the show in the respective age-20 campaigns. Austin Riley and Spencer Strider each got to debut in their age-22 seasons. Now Smith-Shawver will be the latest to be rocketed up to the top level.

Although he is a starter, Smith-Shawver will be used out of the bullpen initially, reports David O’Brien of The Athletic. Though the club has one of the better records in the league at 32-22, the bullpen is an area on the roster that looks a little shaky. The club’s relievers have a collective 4.13 ERA on the year, which places them 17th out of the 30 clubs in the league. Smith-Shawver will try to give them a boost back there as he gets acquainted with the majors.

It’s possible he could join the rotation down the road, as there’s some uncertainty there as well. With Max Fried and Kyle Wright both on the injured list and not expected to return anytime soon, that leaves Atlanta with Strider, Soroka, Charlie Morton, Bryce Elder, and Jared Shuster. Soroka has hardly pitched in the past three years due to various injuries, including twice tearing his Achilles, and it’s unknown how much of a workload he can be expected to take on this year. Shuster, meanwhile, is a rookie with a 5.33 ERA so far this year. There may come a time when Smith-Shawver appears to be a viable option, but he may not have too much leash himself after throwing just 68 2/3 innings last year.

As for Luetge, he spent the past couple of seasons as an effective lefty reliever for the Yankees. He came over to Atlanta in an offseason deal but has struggled mightily so far this year. He has a 10.24 ERA on the season, only making nine appearances around a trip to the injured list due to biceps inflammation. His .406 BABIP and 57.3% strand rate have pushed that up but his 6.08 FIP and 4.53 SIERA still aren’t ideal.

The club will now have one week to trade Luetge or pass him through waivers. Despite his rough stretch here in 2023, he’ll likely garner interest based on his previous work. He tossed 129 2/3 innings with the Yanks over 2021 and 2022 with a combined 2.71 ERA, striking out 25% of opponents while walking only 5.8%. He’s making a salary of $1.55MM this year and could be retained for another year via arbitration. If he clears waivers, he could reject an outright assignment by virtue of having a previous career outright. But doing so and electing free agency would mean forfeiting his remaining salary, since he is shy of the five-year service mark.

Dodgers To Select Bobby Miller

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The Dodgers are poised to promote one of their top prospects for his major league debut, as Russell Dorsey of Stadium and Bally Sports reports that the club is selecting the contract of right-hander Bobby Miller. The club will need to clear room for Miller on both the 40-man and active rosters ahead of Tuesday night’s game against the Braves, when Miller is poised to make his major league debut.

The 24-year-old Miller was the 29th overall pick in the 2020 draft, selected by the Dodgers in the first round out of the University of Louisville. In his first season of minor league action in 2021, Miller immediately impressed with a 2.40 ERA in 56 1/3 innings split between High-A and Double-A that included a dazzling 47 inning performance at the High-A level. During his time in High-A, Miller posted a microscopic 1.91 ERA with a 29.8% strikeout rate and a walk rate of just 5.9%.

That performance saw Miller become a consensus top 100 prospect headed into the 2022 season, where Miller saw mixed results in 112 1/3 innings split between Double-A and Triple-A. In 91 innings at the Double-A level last season, Miller posted a fantastic 30.5% strikeout rate and a solid 8.1% walk rate, though he struggled in terms of top-line results with a 4.45 ERA during that time. Upon his promotion to Triple-A, Miller largely improved as his strikeout rate ticked up to 32.9% and his walk rate fell to 7.1%, resulting in a 3.38 ERA in 21 1/3 innings. That being said, Miller allowed a whopping four home runs in that short time frame as a whopping 26.7% of his fly balls left the yard.

Miller’s uneven 2022 season did little to impact his prospect rankings, however, as he entered the 2023 as a consensus top 30 prospect in the sport. While his 2023 season has been off to a rocky start so far, with a 5.65 ERA and a strikeout rate of just 19.7% in 14 1/3 innings so far this season, the young right-hander is an incredibly talented prospect who has flashed a triple-digit fastball, making it easy to see why the Dodgers would be interested in getting their young hurler a look in the big leagues. It isn’t clear whether Miller’s first trip to the majors is expected to last beyond Tuesday night’s start, though with Walker Buehler, Julio Urias, Dustin May, Michael Grove, and Ryan Pepiot all on the injured list, it stands to reason that this won’t be Miller’s only opportunity to impact the big league club this season.

Guardians Recall Brayan Rocchio

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The Guardians announced to reporters, including Zack Meisel of The Athletic, that they have recalled infield prospect Brayan Rocchio. He’ll take the roster spot of third baseman José Ramírez, who has been placed on the bereavement list. Daniel Álvarez-Montes of El Extra Base had previously reported on Rocchio’s promotion.

Rocchio, 22, actually joined the big league club once already, but he was optioned the next day without getting into a game. Both Amed Rosario and Tyler Freeman were dealing with some minor injuries at that time but ultimately didn’t need to go on the injured list. As such, Rocchio is still looking to make his major league debut, despite that brief trip to the big leagues last month.

Signed as an amateur out of Venezuela, he has continued to impress prospect evaluators as he’s risen up the minor league ladder. Coming into this year, he was placed on lists of the top 100 prospects in the league by Baseball America, MLB Pipeline, ESPN, FanGraphs and Keith Law of The Athletic.

Those outlets generally praise Rocchio’s infield defense and his bat-to-ball skills as he doesn’t strike out or walk much. Last year, he split his time between Double-A and Triple-A, hitting 18 home runs and striking out at just a 17.5% clip. That led to a batting line of .257/.336/.420 and wRC+ of 106 between the two levels. This year, he’s been struck out in just 12.8% of his trips to the plate at Triple-A while hitting .338/.396/.486 for a wRC+ of 126.

Rocchio has split his time between shortstop and second base this year but has also seen some time at third base in the lower levels. He’s not in the lineup tonight, as the Guardians have Gabriel Arias at third while the usual middle infield tandem of Rosario and Andrés Giménez are still in place. It’s possible that Rocchio is only up to serve in a reserve capacity for a few days until Ramírez returns, but he will hopefully get a chance to make his debut this time.

Reds To Promote Matt McLain

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The Reds are set to call up infield prospect Matt McLain, according to Charlie Goldsmith of the Cincinnati Enquirer.  McLain is expected to make his MLB debut when the Reds open a series against the Rockies on Monday.  Since McLain isn’t on the 40-man roster, Cincinnati may have to make more than one transaction to accommodate his promotion onto the active roster.

The 17th overall pick of the 2021 draft, McLain was a highly touted player in his college days at UCLA, and he has made a quick rise through Cincinnati’s farm system.  His breakout year at Triple-A seemed to clinch his promotion, as McLain has hit an outstanding .346/.464/.713 with 12 homers over 168 plate appearances at Triple-A Louisville this season.

Even with just 37 games under his belt at the Triple-A level, these numbers are awfully hard to ignore, and so the 23-year-old will now embark on his next test in the Show.  While McLain has played a good deal of second base in the minors, he has exclusively played shortstop this year, and now looks to supplant the Kevin Newman/Jose Barrero combination at shortstop.

McLain was cited on the top-100 prospect lists from MLB Prospectus (77th) and MLB Pipeline (87th) prior to the 2022 season, but didn’t receive any top-100 attention heading into this year, though his Triple-A surge moved him back to 95th on Pipeline’s most recent update to their ranking.  As per Pipeline’s scouting report, there was concern over McLain’s big spike in strikeouts at Double-A in 2022, as “much of that stemmed from McLain trying to do too much at the plate as he was trying to figure out who he is as a pro hitter and he sold out for power too often.”

To that end, McLain has drastically and impressively cut down on his swing-and-miss this year, with almost as many walks (27) as strikeouts (33) at Louisville.  His plus speed has resulted in 10 steals in 15 attempts at Triple-A, but McLain stole 27 bases in 30 tries at Double-A in 2022.

Baseball America’s little report is a little less optimistic about McLain’s future as a regular, saying “he projects as a super-utility player who can play a variety of positions including shortstop in a pinch.”  It remains to be seen if shortstop will remain McLain’s long-term position, though beyond just defensive questions, his usage might also be impacted by the Reds’ oncoming rush of talented young infielders.  Elly De La Cruz is one of baseball’s elite prospects and is also expected to make his MLB debut at some point in 2023, and third baseman Christian Encarnacion-Strand shouldn’t be too far behind on the shuttle from Louisville.  Infielders Noelvi Marte, Edwin Arroyo, and Cam Collier are also ranked within Pipeline’s top 100, and of course Jonathan India is already established as the Reds’ second baseman and Spencer Steer has been playing respectably well in his rookie season.

It makes for a pretty nice “problem” for the Reds to have as they sort out who exactly will be part of their infield of the future, and with the team in rebuild mode at least through the rest of 2023, they’ll have plenty of time to keep evaluating these youngsters.  McLain will get the first chance at making a first impression, and it could be that he might get bounced around the diamond early if De La Cruz is called up and takes over the shortstop job.

Since McLain wasn’t included on at least two of the preseason top-100 lists from Pipeline, Baseball America or ESPN.com, he won’t qualify for a full year of big league service time even if he finishes in the top two of Rookie Of The Year voting.  However, assuming McLain remains in the majors for the rest of 2023, he should bank enough service time to potentially qualify for Super Two status and an extra year of arbitration eligibility.

Marlins To Promote Eury Pérez

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The Marlins announced to reporters, including Craig Mish of the Miami Herald, they are calling up pitching prospect Eury Pérez. He’ll take the ball for Friday’s game. He’s not currently on the 40-man roster and will require a corresponding move to be added.

Both this move and Pérez himself are unique in a few respects. The promotion is an aggressive one given that the right-hander only just turned 20 years old last month and has yet to pitch in Triple-A. That makes him unusually young for a major league debut, with JJ Cooper of Baseball America pointing out Pérez is about to be the youngest starting pitcher in the majors since Julio Urías in 2016. The pitcher himself is also unique in terms of his size, listed at 6’8″ and 220 pounds.

Signed as an international amateur out of the Dominican Republic in July of 2019, he wasn’t able to make his professional debut until over a year later since the minor leagues were canceled by the pandemic in 2020. The Marlins sent him to Single-A to begin 2021 and he dominated in his 15 starts there. He posted a 1.61 ERA in 56 innings, striking out 36.9% of opponents while walking 9.5% and getting grounders at a 36.4% clip. He was then given the ball for five High-A starts at the end of the year, posting a 2.86 ERA in those.

Going into 2022, he was already considered by many observers to be one of the better pitching prospects in the league, but he continued to raise his stock. Despite just being 19 years old for most of last year, he made 17 starts at the Double-A level. He posted a 4.08 ERA in those along with a 34.1% strikeout rate, 8% walk rate and 41.4% ground ball rate.

Coming into 2023, the youngster was unanimously considered to be one of the best prospects in the league. Baseball America ranked him #7 overall and he’s since moved up to #6. MLB Pipeline had him at #13 and he’s now in the top 10. He was #4 at FanGraphs, #6 at ESPN and Keith Law of The Athletic had him at #10. The reports highlight his fastball, which he can not only ramp up to triple digits but also command exceptionally well. Most observers agree that his changeup is his best secondary pitch, though his slider and curveball both get good reviews as well. By all accounts, Pérez has the ingredients to be a future ace and he keeps proving it. Through his six Double-A starts this year, he has a 2.32 ERA, 35.9% strikeout rate, 7.7% walk rate and 51.6% ground ball rate.

That being said, not all prospects hit the ground running as soon as they reach the majors and it’s not something that should be expected for even the top names. That’s especially true for Pérez given his youth and relative inexperience. His entire professional track record consists of just 186 innings at this point, including just 77 last year, and none of that was at Triple-A. He’s yet to truly test his stuff against big league caliber hitters and it remains to be seen how many innings the Marlins will let him rack up this year. Nonetheless, it will be very exciting to see how the gamble pays off for them.

The club has had a strong rotation for many years and felt good enough about their options that they traded Pablo López to the Twins this winter in order to obtain Luis Arraez. However, they’ve been dealing with a few challenges this year, as both Trevor Rogers and Johnny Cueto are on the injured list with uncertain return timelines. Jesús Luzardo is having a nice season so far but Sandy Alcantara hasn’t quite been his Cy Young self, while Braxton Garrett and Edward Cabrera have each posted middling results so far.

Pérez will now step into that mix and see how he fares, with his performance likely to have some impact on whether this is a brief cup of coffee or if he’s up for good. Since the season is over a month old at this point, Pérez won’t be able to accrue a full year of service time the old fashioned way, though the new collective bargaining agreement affords him a path to get there. A player with less than 60 days of service time who is on two of the top 100 prospect lists at BA, MLB or ESPN will get a full year of service, regardless of the time they spend on the roster, if they finish in the top two in Rookie of the Year voting. Pérez was on all three of those lists and is therefore eligible, but it will be a challenge to rank that highly given the late start. He’ll be competing with players like Corbin Carroll and James Outman who have already had plenty of time to bank stats this year.

Even if he finished the year shy of the one-year mark, his youth would still put him on a good trajectory. If he’s up for good, he would almost certainly qualify for arbitration as a Super Two player after the 2025 campaign and be on pace for free agency after 2029, which would be his age-26 season. Future optional assignments could push those targets further into the future, though he could also reach free agency after 2028 by succeeding in getting that full year here in 2023.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Pirates To Recall Luis Ortiz

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Pitching prospect Luis Ortiz is with the Pirates and is expected to start Tuesday’s game, reports Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He’s already on the 40-man roster but the club will need a corresponding move to get him onto the active roster. The club announced that he’s on the taxi squad today, meaning the move won’t be official until tomorrow.

The 24-year-old Ortiz wasn’t initially a highly-touted prospect, signing with the Pirates as an international amateur in 2018 for a modest bonus of just $25K. However, he’s vaulted himself onto the map with some strong work in recent years. He spent 2021 in Single-A, posting a 3.09 ERA in 87 1/3 innings that year. He struck out 30.1% of batters faced, walked just 7.4% and got grounders on 49.1% of balls in play.

Last year, Ortiz began the season at Double-A and tossed 114 1/3 innings with a 28.6% strikeout rate, 9.5% walk rate and 46.8% ground ball rate. He ran into some home run troubles, however, as 19 long balls inflated his ERA to 4.64 at that level. Nonetheless, he impressed enough to get bumped to Triple-A for a couple of starts and then got called to the majors, taking the ball four times at the end of last year with a 4.50 ERA. He flashed triple-digit velocity on his fastball and even got to 99 mph on his two-seamer while also throwing a slider and a changeup.

Based on that excellent year, he started to garner the attention of prospect evaluators. Baseball America ranked him the #74 prospect in baseball coming into this year and FanGraphs had him at #77. He was sent to Triple-A to begin this year and is doing very well so far with a 2.23 ERA through his first seven starts. His .214 batting average on balls in play and 82.2% strand rate suggest there’s a bit of good luck in there, but he’s getting grounders at a 54.1% clip while striking out 22.8% of opponents and walking 8.7%.

The Pirates have a need for another starter with Vince Velasquez recently landing on the 15-day injured list due to elbow inflammation. It’s still unclear how long he will be out of action, but it seems Ortiz will likely get a few turns through the rotation next to Mitch Keller, Rich Hill, Roansy Contreras and Johan Oviedo.

Ortiz got 23 days of service time during his call-up last year and there will be 146 days left in this year’s season when he is activated tomorrow. Even if he were to stay with the big league club the rest of the season, he would end up at 169 days of service, just shy of the 172 needed to get to the one-year mark. Even if he’s now up for good, he wouldn’t reach free agency until after the 2029 season, though he would be well positioned for reaching Super Two status after 2025. Some rookies can get a full year of service time even after a late call-up by placing high in Rookie of the Year voting, but it requires being on two out of the three top 100 prospect lists from Baseball America, ESPN and MLB Pipeline. Ortiz made it onto the BA list but not the other two, meaning he won’t qualify.

That may end up being a fairly moot point if Velasquez returns in a few weeks and Ortiz gets send back to the Triple-A. Then again, Oviedo and Contreras each have an option year remaining and have been struggling of late. Perhaps there’s some chance that Ortiz can pitch well enough that he sticks and one of the others is sent back to Indianapolis when Velasquez returns.

The Pirates started out scorching hot but have cooled off significantly by losing their last seven. They are still 20-15 on the season but the excitement around the club has dimmed a bit in the past week. If they end up falling out of contention, both Hill and Velasquez would make for sensible trade deadline candidates given that they are veterans on one-year deals. That could make some more room for all their young pitchers in the rotation as the season goes along, but it would be a different situation if they manage to stay in the playoff race.

For now, the club will get a look at one of their top prospects to see how he fares against big league hitters this time around and if he can cement himself as a future building block of their rotation.

Dodgers Select Gavin Stone, Option Alex Vesia

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May 3: The Dodgers have formally selected Stone’s contract, per a team announcement. He brings their 40-man roster up to a count of 39 players. Lefty Alex Vesia was optioned to Triple-A Oklahoma City in order to open a spot on the active roster.

Vesia has been hit hard in 13 appearances this season, yielding a 7.84 ERA in 10 1/3 innings with a 25.4% strikeout rate that’s better than league-average but vastly worse than the 34% he posted in 2021-22. Vesia’s average fastball velocity has held steady at 94.2 mph, but he’s giving up more hard contact than he ever has with the Dodgers; after yielding an 87.2 mph average exit velocity and 34.6% hard-hit rate in 2021-22, he’s at 91 mph and 44.7% so far in the young 2023 season.

April 30: According to MLB.com’s Juan Toribio, the Dodgers are planning on selecting the contract of right-hander Gavin Stone to start Wednesday’s game against the Phillies. Stone is not currently on the 40-man roster, and so a corresponding move will be required to clear space for the youngster.

Stone, 24, is ranked 49th on MLB Pipeline’s top 100 prospect list, 60th over at Fangraphs, and 51st at Baseball America. A fifth round pick from the 2020 draft by the Dodgers, Stone broke out in a big way last season with a 1.48 ERA in 121 2/3 innings of work that saw him strike out 33.8% of batters faced alongside a solid 8.9% walk rate.

That performance saw Stone get promoted twice, with just 25 innings at High-A before moving to the upper minors. After a 23 1/3 inning stint at Triple-A to close out the 2022 season, Stone impressed in spring training with 14 strikeouts in just 6 2/3 innings, but struggled to open the 2023 season when he returned to Triple-A, allowing six runs while recording just eight outs in his season debut. He’s posted a 2.86 ERA in 22 innings since that blowup outing, however, showing more than enough talent to justify a start in the big leagues.

It’s not currently clear if Stone’s call to the majors will last beyond Wednesday’s start. The Dodgers currently sport a five man rotation of Clayton Kershaw, Julio Urias, Tony Gonsolin, Dustin May, and Noah Syndergaard. With no one in that group currently known to be injured, it’s possible that, should Stone stick in the rotation, LA opts to use a six-man rotation for awhile.

That being said, Syndergaard has struggled mightily to a 6.58 ERA over five starts to this point in the season. That ugly top-level run prevention number is supported by a 5.06 FIP, a well-below average 18.3% strikeout rate, and a groundball rate of just 37.2%. Given his struggles, it’s possible that Stone could replace Syndergaard in the rotation if the youngster excels and the 30-year-old right-hander continues to struggle.

In heading to the majors on Wednesday, Stone joins a youth movement in LA that has seen both infielder Miguel Vargas and outfielder James Outman in the lineup on a regular basis and Michael Grove take four starts to open the season before heading to the injured list with a groin strain. 24-year-old right-hander Ryan Pepiot was meant to break camp with the club as well, but suffered an oblique strain at the end of the spring that has sidelined him to this point in the season.

Even with Stone now poised to reach the big leagues, the Dodgers still have multiple top prospects who could make their major league debuts sometime this year, including right-hander Bobby Miller, outfielder Andy Pages, and catcher Diego Cartaya.

Diamondbacks To Promote Brandon Pfaadt

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The Diamondbacks are going to promote pitching prospect Brandon Pfaadt to make his major league debut tomorrow, reports Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic. The right-hander isn’t currently on the club’s 40-man roster, meaning they will need to open a spot for him between now and then.

Pfaadt, 24, was a fifth round pick of the club in the 2020 draft. The minor leagues were canceled by the pandemic that year, but Pfaadt emerged with a strong showing in 2021. He rose through three levels of the minors, going from Single-A to High-A and Double-A that year, tossing 131 2/3 innings total with a combined 3.21 ERA. He struck out 30.2% of batters faced while walking just 5.3%. After that strong showing, he was ranked the club’s #10 prospect by Baseball America going into 2022.

Last year, Pfaadt would continue to impress, throwing 167 innings between Double-A and Triple-A  with a 3.83 ERA, 31.6% strikeout rate and 4.6% walk rate. Going into this season, he was ranked the club’s #5 prospect by BA but amazingly was #26 in the entire league, highlighting a strong and top-heavy system loaded with premier prospects. Their report highlights his fastball, which averages around 93-94mph and has natural cutting action. His slider is his putaway pitch but he also has a changeup and a curveball. He is listed as the #51 prospect in the league at MLB Pipeline, #16 at FanGraphs, #32 at ESPN and was ranked #38 by Keith Law of The Athletic.

The righty was sent to Triple-A to start this year, where he’s posted a 3.91 ERA through five starts, striking out 28.6% of opponents while walking just 5.7%. As he’s been doing that, the Diamondbacks have been playing well, 16-13 record, despite an inconsistent rotation. Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly have been their typically excellent selves so far this year, but the rest of the group hasn’t been nearly as strong. Madison Bumgarner got released after posting a 10.26 ERA in his first four starts. Ryne Nelson has a 6.39 ERA after six outings while Tommy Henry has a 6.52 after a pair. Zach Davies is on the injured list with an oblique strain while Drey Jameson was optioned out after some struggles.

Amid all of that uncertainty, the club will give Pfaadt a shot and see how he fares against big league hitters. Since the season is over a month old already, he won’t be able to earn a full year of service time, at least not the traditional way. The latest collective bargaining agreement has a couple of measures to discourage teams from trying to manipulate a player’s service time and delay their free agency. One of those measures is that a player can still get a full service year even if they didn’t spend the requisite 172 days in the majors. Any player with less than 60 days’ service time at the start of a season who is on two of the top 100 prospect lists at Baseball America, ESPN or MLB Pipeline can still get a full year if they finish in the top two of Rookie of the Year voting. Both Adley Rutschman and Michael Harris II managed to get a full year of service this way last year.

Pfaadt is on all three lists and could follow that path, though it will be a bit of a challenge. He will have to chase down other rookies who have already spent a month accruing stats, such as James Outman or his teammate Corbin Carroll. But for the Diamondbacks, it’s an exciting time as Pfaadt joins Carroll, Gabriel Moreno and other exciting young players on the roster, with prospects like Jordan Lawlar and Druw Jones set to join them in the upstart D’Backs in the years to come.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Mariners To Outright Diego Castillo, Promote Bryce Miller

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The Mariners are shuffling up their pitching staff. They’re set to select the contract of top pitching prospect Bryce Miller, as first reported by Joe Doyle of Future Star Series, and they’ve also passed right-hander Diego Castillo through waivers and assigned him outright to Triple-A Tacoma, per Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times (Twitter link).

With that outright, Castillo is no longer on the 40-man roster. He has the three years of service time needed to reject the assignment in favor of free agency, but he doesn’t yet have five years of service, so rejecting the assignment would mean forfeiting the remainder of this year’s $2.95MM salary. As such, he’s sure to accept an assignment to Tacoma and remain with the organization.

It’s been a swift decline for Castillo, who was one of the top relievers moved at the 2021 deadline, going from Tampa Bay to Seattle in exchange for minor league infielder Austin Shenton and righty JT Chargois. Castillo was quite effective in his first season and a half with the Mariners, pitching to a 3.42 ERA with an above-average 25.5% strikeout rate against a slightly below-average 9.4% walk rate. He held opponents to just a .196 average, yielded only 1.06 HR/9 and kept the ball on the ground at a 48.5% clip.

The 2023 season, however, has been a disaster for the 29-year-old Castillo. In 8 2/3 innings so far, he’s walked as many batters as he’s fanned (seven) and also plunked a hitter. He’s already served up homers to two of the 41 batters he’s faced after surrendering only five in 54 1/3 innings (222 batters faced) a year ago. The 94.2 mph average on his fastball, meanwhile, is down 1.6 mph from last year’s mark of 95.8. Overall, he’s sitting on a 6.23 ERA and has allowed 15 of 41 opponents (.366) to reach base.

Any other team could’ve claimed Castillo, but it’s generally rare for other clubs to claim struggling players of this nature when they have a guaranteed contract of some note. The Mariners could’ve waited to make this move but likely saw Castillo’s struggles as a way to open a 40-man roster spot to accommodate their top pitching prospect. If another club had claimed Castillo, the Mariners would’ve been spared the remaining $2.44MM of this year’s salary, but they’ll instead hope he can round back into form with the Rainiers.

Turning to Miller, he’ll make his big league debut when he takes the mound tomorrow against the A’s. He last pitched on April 25, so he’ll be plenty rested. The 24-year-old has had a rough start to his 2023 season in Double-A, pitching to a 6.41 ERA in 19 2/3 frames, but he entered the year among the top 100 prospects at Baseball America, FanGraphs and MLB.com. He currently ranks 92nd, 89th and 85th, respectively on those three lists.

The handful of shaky outings to begin the year, it seems, won’t dissuade the Mariners from hoping he can follow Logan Gilbert and George Kirby to be the next member of the team’s vaunted farm system to step into the Major League rotation. Seattle has already lost Robbie Ray for the season and has seen Chris Flexen struggle in the fifth spot of the rotation, so it stands to reason that Miller could potentially seize a permanent job, if not tomorrow then certainly at some point this season.

Despite his rocky start to the 2023 season, Miller is seen as a potential mid-rotation starter, thanks in no small part to a heater that sits upper-90s and can bump 100 mph. He pairs that with a slider and changeup, and the former college reliever has improved his command as the Mariners have stretched him back out as a starter.

Miller split the bulk of the 2022 season between High-A and Double-A, logging a combined 3.16 ERA with a 30% strikeout rate and an 8.5% walk rate in 133 2/3 innings. He allowed just 0.67 HR/9 and kept the ball on the ground at a slightly above-average rate. And, given that sizable workload in ’22, there’s little reason to think the Mariners will feel the need to monitor his innings total too aggressively this season.

If Miller were to stick in the big leagues, he’d be on pace to qualify for arbitration as a Super Two player following the 2025 season and reach free agency at the conclusion of the 2029 season. Of course, future optional assignments could alter one or both of those timetables considerably.

Orioles Promote Joey Ortiz

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The Orioles announced Thursday morning that they’ve recalled top infield prospect Joey Ortiz from Triple-A Norfolk and optioned infielder/outfielder Terrin Vavra to Triple-A in his place. Ortiz — who currently ranks as the game’s No. 66 prospect at FanGraphs, No. 88 at Baseball America and No. 91 at MLB.com — will be making his Major League debut the first time he takes the field.

Ortiz, 24, was Baltimore’s fourth-round selection in the 2019 draft and was selected to the 40-man roster back in November, thus protecting him from selection in the 2022 Rule 5 Draft. He’s gotten out to a torrid start in Triple-A this season, slashing .359/.389/.500 with five doubles, a pair of triples, a 6.9% walk rate and a 16.7% strikeout rate that’s considerably lower than average. It’s a strong early followup to a 2022 season in which Ortiz hit .284/.349/.477 with 19 home runs, 35 doubles, six triples and eight steals in a combined 600 plate appearances between Double-A (485) and Triple-A (115).

While he’s spent the vast majority of his professional career to date at shortstop, Ortiz has just shy of 300 innings at second base and another 51 frames of third base under his belt since being drafted. He’s not going to supplant Jorge Mateo at shortstop, given Mateo’s own brilliant start to the season, but Ortiz could see some time at the other two infield spots in the days ahead, with second base seeming particularly plausible.

As Nathan Ruiz of the Baltimore Sun points out (Twitter link), the O’s are slated to face left-handed starters in each of their next three games. The left-handed-hitting Vavra likely wouldn’t have gotten a start in any of those three contests, but Ortiz gives manager Brandon Hyde a righty bat off the bench or, speculatively speaking, at second base to start over the lefty-swinging Adam Frazier (who has struggled in general early this season).

It’s not clear just yet whether Ortiz will only be getting a brief call to the Majors or whether he might be earnestly auditioning for a larger role with the club right now. Frazier’s hitting just .208/.288/.333 through his first 80 plate appearances, though it’s unlikely that the Orioles would move on so soon after signing him to a one-year, $8MM deal over the winter. However, it’s at least feasible that Ortiz could spell Frazier against lefties while also seeing a start per week at shortstop, third base and designated hitter, perhaps accruing something close to regular playing time in the process. Injuries, of course, could always create additional opportunity.

Whether it’s just a brief cup of coffee or a more legitimate big league audition, Ortiz’s early promotion will give Baltimore fans a look at yet another promising young position player who could help form the core of the club for the next several years. He’ll join Adley Rutschman, Gunnar Henderson, Ryan Mountcastle and Grayson Rodriguez as recent top-100 prospects to take the big league stage at Camden Yards over the past couple seasons, with several more waiting in the wings behind them.

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