After a relatively tame offseason, the Padres finally were able to close the deal on a transaction, picking up 1B/DH Luke Voit from the Yankees for minor league pitcher Justin Lange. The 31-year-old Voit, a Cinderella story just a few years ago after heading to New York for Giovanny Gallegos, had his worst season in pinstripes in 2021, hitting .239/.328/.437 and limited to 68 games due to a partial meniscus tear in his left knee. A fifth-round pick in 2020, Lange made his professional debut in the Florida Complex League in 2021, striking out a healthy 12 batters per nine over 22 innings but also walking a less-than-healthy six batters per game.

San Diego’s front office has been aware of the team’s significant weaknesses at the offense-first positions, expressing interest in Michael Conforto and Kris Bryant and said to be thick in the hunt for Seiya Suzuki and Freddie Freeman. The only problem is that, similar to their experience at the trade deadline, the Padres have come up short for their efforts. This winter’s only significant outfield pickup, Nomar Mazara, is not exactly who you want to see start a season high on the depth chart if you’re a would-be contender. And with first base and the outfield corners already not strengths, it’s hard to imagine the Padres being happy about the designated hitter becoming universal in 2022, leaving them scrambling to fill another offensive position. There’s no realistic contender, at least according to our projections, that had a less enviable 1B/LF/RF/DH situation.

Relative to the Dodgers at these positions, the Friars start off 11 wins in the red. With the team reportedly not feeling all tingly about the possibility of Nick Castellanos and the league’s top trade target here, Matt Olson, already off the board, the Padres were quickly running out of options to chip away at some of this deficit. But the Anthony Rizzo signing provided a new opportunity, as it had the effect of removing any real path for Voit to get playing time in New York. Read the rest of this entry »

Free agent signings come in several flavors. There are the big splashy ones – ooh, Kris Bryant and Freddie Freeman are in the NL West now! There are good-fit signings – Mark Canha on the Mets and Yusei Kikuchi on the Blue Jays fill necessary roles on exciting clubs. There are even feel-good reunions, like Zack Greinke returning to the Royals.

There are also reliever signings. So, so many reliever signings. Not every team can sign a star first baseman, but everyone needs a flock of middle-inning arms. There are nine innings every game, and starters don’t pitch as many frames as they used to, and – well, you get the idea, there are a ton of reasons to go out and find some innings, even if you’re not planning on winning 257 games like the Dodgers or overthrowing the established order of things like the Blue Jays.

To that end, the Cubs signed three relievers yesterday, and the Angels signed two of their own. Chicago gave Daniel Norris one year and $1.75 million plus incentives, David Robertson one year and $3.5 million plus incentives, and Mychal Givens one year and $5 million plus incentives. For their part, the Angels signed Archie Bradley for one year and $3.75 million, but also went up-market and signed MVP vote-getter Ryan Tepera to a two-year, $14 million deal. Read the rest of this entry »

Zack Greinke is coming full circle. On Wednesday, the 38-year-old righthander agreed to a one-year contract with the Royals, the team that drafted him in 2002 and stayed with him through low points and high over the course of seven big-league seasons (2004–10), the pinnacle of which was his AL Cy Young award win in ’09. The Greinke deal headlined a busy day for the Royals, who additionally swapped lefties with the Reds, sending 34-year-old starter Mike Minor and cash to Cincinnati in exchange for 29-year-old reliever Amir Garrett.

Via the New York Post’s Joel Sherman, Greinke’s deal guarantees him $13 million, with an additional $2 million in potential bonuses based on innings pitched. Despite the Royals coming off a 74-win season and not looking much stronger for 2022 (though our Playoff Odds give them a 10.7% chance of joining the expanded party), Greinke had this destination in mind. Via MLB.com’s Anne Rogers:

Greinke on the #Royals: "This was a team I singled out that I wanted to play for. It was my No. 1 choice. The only thing that would have made it a little tough is if pitchers were still allowed to hit. That would have opened up a lot of teams I would want to play for in the NL."

— Anne Rogers (@anne__rogers) March 17, 2022

Though he helped the Astros reach the World Series for the second time in less than three full seasons in Houston, Greinke had an uneven 2021 campaign. Prior to landing on the COVID-19 injured list in early September, he led the AL in innings pitched, though he struggled upon returning; his ERA went up more than half a run, and he wound up finishing 11th with 179 innings. His overall 4.16 ERA was his highest mark since 2016, his first year with the Diamondbacks after signing a six-year, $206.5 million deal, but more jarring was his 4.71 FIP, the worst mark of his career.

While Greinke was typically stingy with walks, posting the AL’s second-lowest rate among qualifiers (5.2%), his 1.58 homers per nine allowed was the AL’s second-highest mark and the highest of his career since his 2004 rookie season. Meanwhile, his 17.2% strikeout rate and 12.1% strikeout-walk differential were his worst marks since 2005 (I’m throwing out his three-appearance 2006 for all of these comparisons). Read the rest of this entry »

Seiya Suzuki is rightfully the headline grabber, but the Cubs stayed in the news on Thursday by agreeing to terms with infielder Jonathan Villar on a one-year deal worth $6 million. Villar spent the 2021 season with the Mets, hitting .249/.322/.416 in 142 games for 2.1 WAR and playing second base, third base, and shortstop for the injury-riddled franchise. That 2021 season represented a colossal comeback from his poor showing in 2020, when his power disappeared and he finished with a lackluster .232/.301/.292 line.

Versatility is one of those things that’s hard to put a precise figure on, but having a player such as Villar on your roster is basically like giving yourself a 27- or 28-man roster. He won’t remind anyone of Ozzie Smith at short, but that’s hardly the point with a player with his skillset. Whatever infielder you lose to a pulled hammy or a sprained elbow, Villar represents a 20/20-capable player who can man the position. He’s played much less often in the outfield, but there’s no particular reason to think he’d be a problem out there; he’s certainly fast enough to play even center field, and he stole 40 bases as recently as 2019. Being versatile isn’t one of the parameters that ZiPS looks for when making comps, but it still warms my heart to see Tony Phillips, the Platonic ideal of a super-sub, showing up high in Villar’s comp list at 15th. If he is 80% of Phillips, the retooling Cubs ought to be overjoyed with how their $6 million was spent. Read the rest of this entry »

The Giants continued to fly under the radar Wednesday night, signing outfielder Joc Pederson and pitcher Matthew Boyd to one-year deals. Boyd will receive $5.2 million in 2022, and Pederson will snag $6 million of his own. Neither of these deals makes the impressive splash that acquiring one of the Oakland Matts or Freddie Freeman (now starring for the division-rival Dodgers) does, but they both incrementally improve San Francisco’s roster without spending a princely sum or requiring a long-term commitment.

Pederson made enough of a splash in 2021 to make the term “Joctober” a thing, but the larger problem in recent years has been his Jocpril to Joctember performance. Through 2019, his age-27 season, his career line was at a healthy .233/.339/.474, respectable for a corner outfielder who can fake center field a bit, though with the caveat that he needed to be protected against left-handed pitching. But he’s struggled since the start of 2020, hitting .238/.310/.422 over 180 games, well off his career numbers up to that point. If Pederson had hit free agency after the 2019 season, ZiPS projected that he would have received a four-year deal worth $74 million, so his decline has been sharper and at a younger age than typical.

As a role player who can carefully be used in a platoon, the Giants are a good home for him. Manager Gabe Kapler has shown an admirable ability to mix and match situation players to get the most value of their performance. Earl Weaver’s Orioles lineups were full of players like this, such as Terry Crowley, John Lowenstein, Jim Dwyer, Pat Kelly, and Gary Roenicke, none of whom you wanted to see play 150 games a year on their own most years, but all of whom had some standout skill that could be used to leverage runs. The Giants overall had an average outfield with a combined wRC+ of 101, impressive for a team that only really had one real starter in Mike Yastrzemski. In the end, the Giants were one of the best teams in baseball at getting the platoon advantages with their offense. Read the rest of this entry »

Freddie Freeman went out on top in 2021, riding in a parade through Atlanta as the unquestioned leader of a franchise he’d taken to World Series glory. He’s coming into 2022 on top, but in a different way. This time, he’s headed to Los Angeles as the newest member of a team he beat in the playoffs last year. But more importantly, he’s doing it with $162 million:

BREAKING: Freddie Freeman has agreed to terms with the Dodgers on a six-year, $162 million deal according to @JeffPassan and me.

— Kiley McDaniel (@kileymcd) March 17, 2022

With this signing, the Dodgers are taking another crack at what they briefly built midway through last season: an offense with an All-Star at every position, the kind of team that doesn’t just have depth but also enviable breadth. Cody Bellinger? He’ll likely bat eighth. Will Smith? He’ll be the most overqualified six hole hitter in the game.

It feels like too much. It feels like overkill. But that’s because we’ve all become accustomed to a style of team-building focused on risk mitigation. Have the best team in baseball? Recent orthodoxy would tell you to consolidate your gains and focus on signing one of your stars to an extension, or fortify your minor league system to help develop the next crop of stars. It’s a popular method because it works; no less a team than the Dodgers showed the benefits of this strategy as they built a powerhouse throughout the middle of the last decade. Read the rest of this entry »

The Braves re-signed one of the key members of their championship squad, inking Eddie Rosario to a two-year, $18 million deal with a club option for 2024. Acquired by the Braves on July 30, Rosario didn’t get into a game for his new club until August 28, but from that point on, he slashed .274/.333/.579 (135 wRC+) to help Atlanta win its fourth straight NL East title. He found an even higher gear once the calendar turned over to October, slashing .383/.456/.617 (182 wRC+) in the playoffs; he carried close to the entire offensive load in the NLCS against the Dodgers, earning MVP honors during that series. The Braves made two additional smaller moves on Wednesday, signing left-handed outfielder Alex Dickerson and right-handed reliever Tyler Thornburg to non-guaranteed contracts worth $1 million and $900,000, respectively.

Rosario probably won’t be able to replicate his late-season heroics over a full season in Atlanta, but he’s been a solid contributor throughout his career. In six seasons with the Twins, he posted a 106 wRC+ and 11.4 WAR, then signed a one-year deal with Cleveland after Minnesota non-tendered him early in the offseason. He struggled to a 86 wRC+ to start the year before being sidelined with an abdominal strain, then was traded to Atlanta in a clear salary dump right before the trade deadline.

Due to an aggressive approach at the plate, Rosario has always been prone to hot streaks and cold spells, but he did make some slight tweaks to curb his over-aggressiveness at the plate last season and also improve his contact quality:

Unsurprisingly, Rosario’s batted ball data was fantastic, but it’s reassuring to see that the changes he made to his plate discipline metrics carried over from his time in Cleveland. Overall, he was a little less swing-happy and managed to make better decisions when he did offer at a pitch. His strikeout rate sat right in line with his established norms over the past few years, but his walk rate hit the second-highest mark of his career. With an offensive profile that’s BABIP-dependent, these slight changes to his approach should help improve his floor when he does hit one of those cold streaks. Read the rest of this entry »

In the days since the lockout lifted, baseball has seen a flurry of trades and free agent signings. It’s a lot to sort through, so to assist you in finding anything you may have missed, I’ve rounded up all of our post-lockout transaction pieces in one place. You’ll find links to some of our offseason, free agency, and prospect resources listed first, followed by a team-by-team listing of the transaction analysis that involved your favorite squad. In instances where we dissected a move across multiple pieces — hello, Matt Olson — you’ll see those pieces grouped together. This piece will be updated as more players find new homes and we publish new work.

As always, all of the pieces and tools listed here are free to read and use but took time and resources to create. If you enjoy our coverage and are in a position to do so, we hope you’ll sign up for a FanGraphs Ad-free Membership. It’s the best way to both experience the site and help ensure its sustainability. Now, on to the roundup! Read the rest of this entry »

When we released our Top 100 Prospects list last month, one of the questions we heard most frequently was, “Where is Seiya Suzuki?” It was the subject of considerable internal debate, but the larger discussion revolved around whether or not the Japanese superstar even belonged on a prospect list.

While in terms of service time and rookie eligibility, Suzuki is technically a prospect, it just doesn’t feel right to rank him amongst unfinished products. He is not a player who requires development, or one where we’re talking about the gap between who he is now and what he can become. At 27, Suzuki is a player in his prime, with an impressive track record of performance at Japan’s highest level since his teens. This is not a prospect; this is an established talent who just hasn’t played in Major League Baseball yet.

That’s about to change. After a flurry of inaccurate Twitter reporting on Tuesday, Suzuki ended all speculation about his future on Wednesday morning by signing with the Cubs on a five-year, $85 million deal (when combined with his posting fee, Chicago will spend nearly $100 million for his services), where he’ll step right into the middle of the lineup as the everyday right fielder.

Suzuki’s performances in Japan have been nothing short of outstanding, with an OPS north of 1.000 in each of the last four seasons, including a career high of 1.073 with Hiroshima in 2021, when he hit .317/.443/.639 in 132 games with 38 home runs. Still, statistical projections for him can be challenging, as is the case with any player who has never been in the big leagues; there are skills, tools and traits that may lead to success elsewhere yet not translate at the game’s highest level. Still, Dan Szymborski gave it his best shot and in the end nearly hit a bullseye with a contract projection of five years and $83 million.

Scouts are just as optimistic as Dan as to Suzuki’s ability to produce in the big leagues. He’s a well-rounded player, but the beginning of any discussion about his potential begins with what he can do with a bat in his hands, and luckily for the Cubs and their fans, there’s a lot to like. He features the much desired combination of excellent swing decisions with a very good contact rate and rarely chases outside the zone, which you can reasonably expect will continue with the Cubs; breaking balls in Japan, while rarely matching the velocity he will see in the majors, do move just as much, if not more. Read the rest of this entry »

On Monday, the A’s made the biggest trade of the year when they sent Matt Olson to the Braves. This morning, they kept the momentum going and made the second-biggest trade of the year. Matt Chapman is headed to Canada in exchange for a four-prospect return:

Blue Jays deal for Matt Chapman is done. Kevin Smith, Gunnar Hoglund, Zach Logue and Kirby Snead are headed to Athletics, per source.

— Shi Davidi (@ShiDavidi) March 16, 2022

Oakland doesn’t do anything by half measures, and with Olson and Chris Bassitt out the door, the team was in competitive limbo. Toronto was in search of a new infielder after Marcus Semien left in free agency. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize the potential fit here, and the two teams were linked in trade rumors for much of the locked-out offseason.

From the Jays’ perspective, this trade gets them exactly what they wanted. After losing two of their top starting pitchers in free agency, they signed Kevin Gausman and Yusei Kikuchi to fill holes in the rotation. That still left them with a diminished offensive group, and there weren’t any obvious free agent fits to spruce things up. It may have been a coincidence, but as the Jays pursued Freddie Freeman and Kyle Schwarber, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. was spotted doing third base drills, a sign of how intent the Jays were on shoehorning another hitter into their lineup, positional fit notwithstanding. Read the rest of this entry »