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Seth Lugo Drawing Widespread Interest

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Multiple reports have indicated that the demand for starting pitching is huge this offseason and one player that could benefit is right-hander Seth Lugo. In an appearance on Foul Territory, Robert Murray of FanSided reports that Lugo’s market is extensive and “more than half the league” has checked in on him.

Lugo, 34, spent most of his career in the bullpen with the Mets but reached free agency last winter and drew plenty of interest from clubs who thought he could return to the rotation, as he had done years before. The Padres were ultimately the one to take a chance on Lugo, signing him to a two-year, $15MM deal with an opt-out opportunity midway through.

The experiment worked quite well, as Lugo was ultimately able to throw 146 1/3 innings over 26 starts. He missed about a month due to a calf strain, but apart from that, the larger workload didn’t seem to impact his results. He posted an earned run average of 3.57, striking out 23.2% of batters, limiting walks to a 6% rate and keeping 45.2% of balls in play on the ground.

Now that he has proven himself capable of filling a starting role, his market should be even stronger this offseason than it was a year ago, making it an easy decision for him to opt out and retry free agency. Murray notes that Lugo’s market is vast and that he would not be surprised to see Lugo get a three- or four-year deal. At the start of the offseason, MLBTR predicted Lugo for a three-year, $42MM pact, which would be $14MM per year.

Given his age, it would be hard for Lugo to go too far beyond that. But that ceiling is perhaps why so many clubs are interested. Aaron Nola already secured himself a seven-year, $172MM deal to return to the Phillies and nine-figure deals should also be available for guys like Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Jordan Montgomery. The appetite for starting pitching is high but not every club will be able or willing to pay those kinds of prices, leaving them looking to guys like Lugo.

To this point in the offseason, Lugo has been specifically linked to the Tigers but it seems his market is far wider than that. He will likely require a modest average annual value, relative to some of the other free agents, which makes him a speculative fit for a far greater number of clubs. Even mid- or small-market teams need to give out eight-figure contracts from time to time and the widespread demand should help Lugo earn a much greater guarantee than he got a year ago. It was recently reported that nearly half the league had checked in on Yamamoto, but he is widely expected to get $200MM or more. Since Lugo is perhaps looking at getting a quarter of that, it stands to reason that he has even more clubs calling him up.

Pham: Interest From Around 10 Teams In Free Agency

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Tommy Pham is on the open market for a third consecutive season. The veteran outfielder is in a better spot than he had been from 2021-22, as he’s coming arguably his best year since 2019.

In an appearance on the New York’s Post podcast with Jon Heyman and Joel Sherman, Pham said his representatives at Vayner Sports have had conversations with roughly 10 teams. While he said he has yet to receive an official offer, Pham indicated that interest is far more robust than it was last offseason. The righty-hitting outfielder told Heyman and Sherman that he heard from just three teams before he signed a $6MM guarantee with the Mets in the middle of January.

Pham unsurprisingly didn’t name any of the clubs that have checked in. He suggested he’s seeking an opportunity to continue playing on an everyday basis. “I don’t view myself as a platoon player,” he replied when asked about his free agent priorities. “I’m not comfortable going into a situation where they’re saying ’hey, you’re only going to play against lefties.’ I still want to play every day. That’s most important to me. Then winning, of course.”

Landing a job as a team’s primary left fielder seems attainable after Pham’s solid performance in 2023. He hit .256/.328/.446 with 16 home runs through 481 plate appearances. As he has throughout his career, he posted strong exit velocities. Pham’s respective 9.8% walk rate and 22% strikeout percentage weren’t far off the league averages. He also stole 22 bases in 25 attempts and rated as a neutral corner outfield defender.

Pham’s offensive production was balanced. He hit for more power against left-handed pitching but had a higher batting average and on-base mark against same-handed arms. His .262/.332/.435 slash versus righties and .245/.322/.465 showing against southpaws aren’t that dissimilar. Pham’s production was concentrated more heavily early in the season. He hit .268/.348/.472 for the Mets before running a .241/.304/.415 line upon being dealt to the Diamondbacks on deadline day. Pham ran a .279/.297/.475 slash over 16 postseason contests during the Snakes’ run to the World Series.

Turning 36 in March, the 10-year MLB veteran may again be limited to one-year offers. He should at least find a loftier guarantee than last year’s $6MM figure and a two-year pact isn’t entirely implausible. Pham’s old teams in Queens and Arizona each have questions about their left field situations. The Braves, Nationals, Twins, Dodgers, Blue Jays, Mariners and Yankees are among other speculative suitors for corner outfield help.

Josh Donaldson Open To Playing Another Season

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Josh Donaldson returned to free agency at season’s end. The veteran third baseman had finished out the year with the Brewers after being released by the Yankees in late August.

The 2015 AL MVP tells Josh Wegman of The Score that he’s open to a return for what would be his age-38 season. A potential 14th big league campaign would seemingly be his last, as Donaldson indicated he’d be unlikely to continue into 2025.

“If it’s a situation that I feel (comfortable in) then I’m definitely up for playing one more year,” Donaldson told Wegman. “But I think after this upcoming season, that would be my last season no matter what. I would like to play one more year and go out on a good note and then that’d be it.”

Donaldson isn’t going to be a priority target for teams coming off the worst season of his career. He had hit .142/.225/.434 in 34 games for the Yankees. Donaldson had a pair of lengthy injured list stints, losing time to hamstring and calf injuries. His production in Milwaukee was slightly improved but still below average. Over 17 contests with the Brew Crew, he managed a .169/.290/.390 showing. He finished the year with a bizarre .152/.249/.418 batting line over 189 plate appearances. A staggering 13 of his 25 hits for the season were home runs.

While he still brings some power potential from the right-handed batter’s box, Donaldson’s offense has skewed toward an extreme three true outcomes approach. He surely won’t repeat a .115 batting average on balls in play, but he’s also striking out more than he did earlier in his career.

In July, Donaldson acknowledged some uncertainty about playing beyond 2023. He’s apparently now willing to do so, although it’s possible he’d be particular about a destination. Donaldson understandably didn’t seem enthused about the idea of signing with a non-competitive team. At the same time, he indicated the calculus for competitiveness would be his subjective perception of a team’s chances as opposed to general consensus.

“For me to believe that the team has a chance to contend, I wouldn’t say that everybody has to have the thought of that team contending,” Donaldson said. “I would definitely want to feel like the team has a chance to win.”

It isn’t clear if he’d have any appetite for a minor league deal if no team were willing to guarantee him a roster spot. Donaldson’s contract with the Brewers was a non-roster deal, but Milwaukee called him up after five tune-up games in Triple-A.

Matt Chapman is the headliner of this winter’s free agent third base class. Jeimer Candelario is the clear #2 option, while Justin Turner and Evan Longoria are veteran righty hitters who could rotate through the corner infield and designated hitter. Gio Urshela has a chance at a two-year deal. Brian Anderson, Mike Moustakas and Eduardo Escobar are among the depth options.

Enter The MLBTR Free Agent Prediction Contest

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UPDATE: The contest is now closed.  Stay tuned for the leaderboard.

The MLB Trade Rumors Free Agent Prediction Contest is currently open!  Click here to enter your picks for the destinations for our top 50 free agents.  The deadline for entry is TONIGHT at 11pm central time!  You can edit your picks until then.  Further contest info:

  • After the window to make picks has closed, we’ll post a public leaderboard page so you can see who’s winning the contest as players sign with teams.  We’re going to use entrants’ full names on it.  So, if that concerns you, please do not enter the contest.  Entries with inappropriate names will be deleted.
  • We are also collecting email addresses, which I will use to notify winners.
  • If a player signs between now and the close of the contest, that player will be excluded from the contest.
  • After you submit your picks, you’ll receive an email from Google Forms.  In that email, you’ll see a button that allows you to edit your picks.
  • We will announce the winners on MLBTR once all 50 free agents have signed.  We will award $500 to first place, $300 to second place, and $100 to third place.  We will also be giving  one-year memberships to Trade Rumors Front Office for everyone who finishes in the top 15.  Winners must respond to an email within one week.
  • The winners of this contest will be declared on Opening Day 2024, and any unsigned players will be excluded from the competition.
  • Ties in the correct number of picks will be broken by summing up the rankings of the free agents of the correct picks and taking the lower total.  For example: Tim and Steve each get two picks correct.  Tim gets Shohei Ohtani (#1 ranking) and Jordan Hicks (#21 ranking) for a total of 22 points.  Steve gets Jordan Montgomery (#6) and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. (#14) for a total of 20 points.  Steve’s total is lower and he’s ahead of Tim for tiebreaker purposes.

If you have any further questions, ask us in the comment section of this post!  Otherwise, make your picks now!

Trevor Bauer’s Representatives Meeting With Teams In Search Of MLB Opportunity

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Trevor Bauer’s representation at Luba Sports is meeting with MLB teams in an effort to find him a major league landing spot, tweets Jon Heyman of the New York Post. It isn’t clear which clubs, if any, have reciprocated interest in the right-hander.

Bauer has not pitched in MLB since June 2021, when an allegation of sexual assault was first publicly reported. Three additional women went public with sexual assault allegations over the next two years. Bauer was never criminally charged, with the L.A. District Attorney’s Office declining to proceed after an investigation into the first woman’s allegations. “After a thorough review of the available evidence, including the civil restraining order proceedings, witness statements and the physical evidence, the People are unable to prove the relevant charges beyond a reasonable doubt,” prosecutors said at the time.

MLB nevertheless leveled a 324-game suspension under the joint domestic violence/sexual assault policy with the Players Association. Last December, an arbitrator reduced that figure to 194 games — immediately reinstating Bauer onto the Dodgers’ roster based on the amount of time he had already spent on administrative leave while the investigations played out.

That reduced suspension remains the most significant domestic violence discipline since the policy was introduced in 2015. The Dodgers released Bauer two weeks after the appellate results were announced. In mid-March, he signed a one-year, $4MM contract with the Yokohama DeNA BayStars of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball. In October, the civil actions between Bauer and the woman who first brought the allegations were settled outside of court (link via Alden González of ESPN).

Bauer had a successful age-32 campaign in NPB. He posted a 2.76 ERA through 130 2/3 innings while striking out 24.3% of opposing hitters. With that one-year deal complete, he is again a free agent.

Enrique Hernández Undergoes Hernia Surgery

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Free agent infielder/outfielder Enrique Hernández underwent double hernia surgery on October 24, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. The utility player is expected to resume baseball activities in three to four weeks, which should allow him to have a fairly normal offseason and Spring Training.

It’s unknown exactly when this issue cropped up but it’s possible it has been bothering him for a while. Jen McCaffrey of The Athletic relayed today that Hernández had surgery on a hematoma in his psoas muscle last year. He made multiple trips to the injured list in 2022 with what was called a right hip flexor strain, though McCaffrey’s reporting from September of 2022 states that the issue “turned into an abdominal strain created by a hematoma in the psoas muscle, located between the lower part of his spine and his upper thigh. Hernández had blood drained through a needle in his spine and received a PRP shot around the All-Star break to accelerate the healing.”

Hernández, now 32, hit .237/.312/.432 for the Dodgers over 463 games from 2017 to 2020. That amounted to a wRC+ of 98, indicating he was just 2% below league average in that time, as he served as a versatile player that could be plugged into many places. He played every position except catcher in that stretch, even making an appearance on the mound.

He was able to parlay those results into a two-year, $14MM deal with the Red Sox going into 2021. He first season of the deal went very well, with Hernández getting his batting line up to .250/.337/.449 and his wRC+ to 109. Unfortunately, he dipped to a line of .222/.291/.338 and a 74 wRC+ in 2022 as the aforementioned IL stints limited him to 93 games.

Nonetheless, the Sox believed in him enough to give him a one-year extension as that season was winding down, giving him $10MM to stick around for 2023. That didn’t really work out, with Hernández hitting .222/.279/.320 for a 59 wRC+ with the Red Sox. He was flipped to the Dodgers at the deadline and had a respectable finish, slashing .262/.308/.423 for a 96 wRC+, though the combined line between the two clubs resulted in a wRC+ of 72 for the year.

If the surgery puts Hernández in position to have better results going forward, that could be a noteworthy development for the free agent market. There’s a general dearth of impact position players, particularly in the middle infield. Hernández was set to be one of the most accomplished players available in that category, alongside options like Amed Rosario, Whit Merrifield and Adam Frazier. If his two most recent seasons were dragged down by health issues, that will make his status in the months to come a development worth monitoring.

MLB Trade Rumors: Bringing You Independent Hot Stove News And Analysis For 18 Years

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Over the weekend, MLB Trade Rumors celebrated its 18th birthday!  MLBTR just went and bought its first pack of smokes.

18 years is a long time, especially for an internet business.  I’ve seen a lot of other sites come and go, change ownership, and move into gambling.  But we’re still doing what we always have.  We put all worthy MLB trade and free agency news in one place.  We’ve perfected the art of getting news up quickly while still supplementing with tons of our own context and analysis.  This is not an easy job, as our writers Steve Adams, Anthony Franco, Darragh McDonald, Mark Polishuk, Nick Deeds, and Leo Morgenstern could tell you.

That’s our entire writing team here at MLB Trade Rumors.  October and November are big months for high-quality original work at MLBTR.  We just completed Offseason Outlook posts for all 30 teams.  We published Matt Swartz’s widely-used arbitration projections.  And today, we unveiled our Top 50 MLB Free Agents list, complete with contract and team predictions and 20,000+ words of analysis.

There are long-term ups and downs with any business.  2023 has been a down year: our revenue is down over 23%, to be particular.  MLBTR has historically been primarily ad-supported, and that will continue.  But ads are not always a reliable source of revenue, which is why I launched our Trade Rumors Front Office subscription service during the pandemic in 2020.

With Trade Rumors Front Office, we’ve created another revenue source to help ensure MLBTR’s longevity and independence.  In doing so I wanted to be sure to provide great value to those who subscribe.  I think we have been successful at that.  Here is what $29.89 per year gets you:

  • Removal of ads on MLB Trade Rumors and in our app
  • Exclusive weekly hot stove articles from expert MLB writers Steve Adams and Anthony Franco
  • Exclusive member-only online chats with Anthony Franco every week
  • MLB Contract Tracker: a high-powered tool featuring more than a decade of free agent contracts and extensions
  • MLB Agency Database: agencies for more than three-quarters of those who played in MLB in the last three seasons, compiled from industry sources

Your subscription supports MLBTR directly, and we offer a 100% money-back guarantee.  Subscribe to Trade Rumors Front Office today.  And we hope you enjoy our Top 50 Free Agents list!

Gold Glove Winners Announced

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Major League Baseball announced the Gold Glove winners tonight, as selected by a group of managers, coaches, and statistical analysis.  Twenty-five percent of the selection total was determined by SABR’s Defensive Index metrics, while the other 75 percent was determined by votes from all 30 managers and up to six coaches from each team.  Of the latter pool, managers and coaches were limited to voting on players in their own league, and they weren’t allowed to vote for any players on their own team.  The utility Gold Glove wasn’t determined with any votes, but rather via a defensive formula calculated by SABR and Rawlings.

The list of winners…

 

David Peralta Undergoes Flexor Tendon Repair Procedure

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Outfielder David Peralta underwent a flexor tendon repair procedure on his left/throwing arm, reports Jack Harris of the Los Angeles Times. The impending free agent is expected to be throwing and hitting again by March.

Peralta, now 36, was signed by the Dodgers to a one-year deal with a $6.5MM guarantee coming into 2023. He carried a career batting line of .281/.339/.457 into the season, which translated to a wRC+ of 110, indicating he had been 10% better than the league average hitter in that time.

He ended up having a down year in 2023, though it’s possible the injury played a part in that. According to Harris, the issue popped up around the All-Star break and Peralta played through it in the second half of the season. The outfielder was hitting .283/.323/.434 for a 106 wRC+ at the break but then produced a diminished line of .231/.259/.319 and 54 wRC+ after.

With his one-year deal with the Dodgers now ending, Peralta is heading back to free agency on the heels of a subpar platform. The injury gives him a plausible explanation for the poor results, though it also creates some uncertainty about the future, as it seems as though he may not be fully healthy by the time Spring Training ramps up in February. Given his age and this procedure, teams may want to wait and see how things develop over the winter before agreeing to a deal for the 2024 season.

Thursday’s Waiver Priority Order

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Tomorrow will be an active day on the transaction front. It’s the last day in which teams can add players from outside the organization and still have them eligible for postseason play. Not coincidentally, non-contending clubs placed a number of impending free agents on waivers yesterday. The two-day waiver window for all those players will be resolved tomorrow at 12:00 pm CDT (though it’s possible the claim results won’t be officially announced until later in the day).

[Related: Best fits for Starting Pitchers, Outfielders, Relief Pitchers]

Before getting to the waiver order, a refresh on the priority rules. Claim priority is the inverse order of win percentage as of Thursday morning. Waivers are not league specific, although teams in the same league as the club that put a player on waivers have priority over a claiming team in the opposite league among clubs with the same win percentage. To break ties between teams with identical records and in the same league, the club with the worse record in previous seasons has priority. (A team moves to the back of the line if they’re attempting to claim a player for the second time in a given season, though that won’t be a factor for any of the players known to be on waivers at the moment.)

Tomorrow’s waiver priority:

  1. Oakland Athletics, .291
  2. Kansas City Royals, .304
  3. Colorado Rockies, .368
  4. Chicago White Sox, .396
  5. St. Louis Cardinals, .433
  6. Detroit Tigers, .444
  7. Pittsburgh Pirates, .455
  8. New York Mets, .455
  9. Washington Nationals, .463
  10. San Diego Padres, .463
  11. Los Angeles Angels, .478
  12. Cleveland Guardians, .478
  13. New York Yankees, .489
  14. Miami Marlins, .496
  15. Cincinnati Reds, .511
  16. Arizona Diamondbacks, .515
  17. Minnesota Twins, .515
  18. Boston Red Sox, .515
  19. San Francisco Giants, .519
  20. Chicago Cubs, .534
  21. Toronto Blue Jays, .545
  22. Milwaukee Brewers, .556
  23. Philadelphia Phillies, .556
  24. Texas Rangers, .564
  25. Houston Astros, .570
  26. Seattle Mariners, .571
  27. Tampa Bay Rays, .612
  28. Baltimore Orioles, .624
  29. Los Angeles Dodgers, .629
  30. Atlanta Braves, .659
  • Pittsburgh has priority over Mets based on 2022 record
  • Washington has priority over San Diego based on 2022 record
  • Angels have priority over Cleveland based on 2022 record
  • D-backs have priority over Twins based on 2022 record
  • Minnesota has priority over Boston based on 2021 record, as teams had identical records in ’22
  • Milwaukee has priority over Philadelphia based on 2022 record

This post originally indicated that the Twins had priority over the D-backs. We regret the error.

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