The Pirates have made three trade in the last two days. Yesterday, they swapped post-hype prospects with the Red Sox — struggling right-handed pitcher Quinn Priester for Triple-A 2B/LF Nick Yorke — and added veteran southpaw Jalen Beeks from the Rockies in exchange for minor league lefty Luis Peralta. Then, earlier today, Pittsburgh acquired 29-year-old lefty Josh Walker from the Mets for DSL pitcher Nicolas Carreno. Read the rest of this entry »

Generally speaking, late Saturday night is not the time for rational decisions. Late Saturday night is when people make the kinds of decisions that they won’t even remember until halfway through their eggs on Sunday and whose logic they’ll struggle to puzzle out for years to come. But just before midnight on Saturday, Jeff Passan revealed that the Nationals and the Mets made a perfectly reasonable swap. The Mets, currently half a game ahead of the Diamondbacks for the final NL Wild Card spot, bolstered their outfield and added a much-needed left-handed bat by sending 24-year-old right-handed pitching prospect Tyler Stuart to the Nationals in exchange for half a season of the resurgent Jesse Winker. After putting up a dreadful -0.8 WAR in an injury-shortened 2023 campaign, Winker is running a 126 wRC+ and has put up 1.3 WAR, fourth-best among Washington’s position players. Winker also spent his early childhood in upstate New York and has been vocal about his appreciation for Mets fans.

Winker got into Sunday’s game with his new team, entering as a replacement and playing left field, though his ultimate destination might be in right. Winker hasn’t played more than 100 innings in right field since 2019, but with Starling Marte out since June 22 due to a knee injury, that seems like the most logical fit. The Mets are currently platooning Jeff McNeil and Tyrone Taylor out there. Against righties, Winker could allow McNeil to move second base, pushing Jose Iglesias, who started out red-hot but has just one hit over his past six games, back into a bench role. Read the rest of this entry »

While trades of relievers at the deadline are rarely the hottest moves featuring the best prospects, there are usually a lot of them. As the summer reaches its peak, contenders start to think about their bullpens down the stretch and beyond, and with modern bullpens seemingly as densely populated as the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s, there’s always room to add a quality arm. Let’s dig through them!

Editor’s Note: This reliever roundup doesn’t include the more recent trades for Carlos Estévez, Nick Mears, and Jason Adam. Ben Clemens will cover those moves in a separate post.)

The Arizona Diamondbacks acquired LHRP A.J. Puk from the Miami Marlins for 1B/3B Deyvison De Los Santos and OF Andrew Pintar

Don’t focus too much on the raw ERA or unimpressive walk rate when judging the merits of Arizona’s trade for A.J. Puk. Partially in response to their myriad rotation injuries in the spring, the Marlins took Puk’s attempt to get back into the rotation seriously, and he started the season there after a successful spring. I still think that was a well-founded experiment, but it didn’t pay dividends for Miami. Puk was absolutely dreadful as a starter, and it wasn’t long before he landed on the IL with shoulder fatigue. His four starts resulted in a 9.22 ERA, a 6.29 FIP, and an alarming 17 walks in 13 2/3 innings. He was moved back to the ’pen upon his return in mid-May, but the damage to his seasonal line was so significant that it still looked underwhelming at the time of the trade (4.30 ERA, 3.62 FIP, 44 IP).

As he has the last few years, Puk has dominated as a reliever; across 30 1/3 relief innings with the Marlins, he had 33 strikeouts and, perhaps most importantly, only six walks. The result was a 2.08 ERA/2.42 FIP, with batters managing a bleak .159/.204/.252 against him. The Diamondbacks are short on lefty relievers, with Joe Mantiply shouldering a very large share of the southpaw burden. Puk has historically been better against righties than Mantiply, so he can be used in more situations.

In return, the offense-starved Marlins pick up a couple of possible bats to add to their farm system. With a .325/.376/.635 and 28 homers combined at two levels in the high minors this year, Deyvison De Los Santos looks impressive at first look, but it’s important to contextualize those numbers. He’s playing in some very high offensive environments and there’s a lot of hot air to remove from those numbers to turn them into expected MLB performance. ZiPS translates his 2024 minor league performance to .263/.302/.428 in the majors and projects for wRC+ lines between 95 and 110 in the coming years with the Marlins. Now, that’s enough for the Marlins to be interested in him and chase any upside, but don’t be shocked if he’s not an offensive force.

Similarly, ZiPS translates Andrew Pintar’s season at .235/.302/.365 and doesn’t see a ton of growth from him offensively, viewing him as most likely to be a spare outfielder if he reaches the majors. I talked a bit with my colleague Eric Longenhagen about him on Friday and Eric still grades Pintar as a fifth-outfielder type, which is about how ZiPS evaluates him. Still, as with De Los Santos, Pintar’s interesting enough for a team like the Marlins to take a chance on him and give him an extended look; projections are frequently wrong, after all, by design!

The Seattle Mariners acquired RHRP Yimi García from the Toronto Blue Jays for OF Jonatan Clase and C Jacob Sharp

With the Blue Jays as short-term sellers, it’s hardly surprising to see them trade Yimi García, who is a free agent at the end of the season. His three-year, $16 million deal turned out to be a success for the Jays; he’s been worth 2.7 WAR and put up a 3.44 ERA/3.28 FIP over 163 appearances across two-plus seasons. This season has arguably been his best, as he’s striking out nearly 13 batters per nine innings. With Gregory Santos limping a bit after a knee injury – not believed to be severe – García slots in behind Andrés Muñoz in the Mariners’ bullpen pecking order. Seattle’s relief corps has been in the middle of the pack, but adding García to a group that features Muñoz, a healthy Santos, and Taylor Saucedo gives the M’s an excellent quartet of high-leverage guys, which could be crucial in what’s shaping up to be a tight AL West race.

Jonatan Clase was listed with a FV of 40 earlier this month when Eric ran down the top Mariners prospects, but with Julio Rodríguez entrenched in center field and backed up by other outfielders who can capably cover the position (namely Victor Robles, Cade Marlowe, and even, in a pinch, newly acquired Randy Arozarena), Clase’s ability to do so was simply less valuable in Seattle. Beyond that, the team needs more thump in its lineup at this point, and that’s not Clase’s speciality. For the Jays, Kevin Kiermaier is a free agent after the season and the organization has a real lack of center field candidates anywhere near the majors. ZiPS projects Clase at .218/.291/.373 with an 84 wRC+ for 2025 but views him as an above-average defensive center fielder, suggesting that he’s at least a reasonable stopgap option or a useful role player for Toronto. Jacob Sharp has been off the radar as a prospect, a fairly small catcher who is hitting decently well, albeit as a 22-year-old in A-ball.

The New York Mets acquired RHRP Ryne Stanek from the Seattle Mariners for OF Rhylan Thomas

The Mets have an extremely unimpressive bullpen once you get past Edwin Díaz, and now that they are firmly in contention for an NL Wild Card spot this season, they are looking to improve their relief corps. Ryne Stanek hasn’t excelled in Seattle, but the veteran reliever still throws in the high-90s, is durable, and misses bats. Guys like that will always resurface. Especially after trading for García, the Mariners have better options than Stanek to pitch in high-leverage, non-save situations. But that’s not the case in Queens, and he’s a welcome addition to the bullpen.

Rhylan Thomas isn’t a high price to pay and he largely fills a similar role to the departed Clase in Seattle’s organization, though he’s a different type of player. As a high-contact hitter, Thomas may fare well in pitcher-friendly T-Mobile Park. ZiPS sees Thomas as a .263/.313/.333 hitter with plus defense in the corners in 2025.

The Tampa Bay Rays acquired RHRP Cole Sulser from the New York Mets for cash

Cole Sulser is a relative soft-tosser who relies on deception. He had a big breakout season in 2021, but after a trade to the Marlins, he struggled with his command in ’22 and had his season marred by a lat injury that landed him on the 60-day IL. A shoulder injury ruined his 2023 and he’s spent ’24 trying to rehabilitate his value in the minors for the Mets, with mixed results. This is the third time the Rays have traded for Sulser in his career, so they seem to see something in him, and given Tampa Bay’s record with random relievers, I wouldn’t be shocked if he became useful for the Rays next season.

Cash is slang for currency, which can be exchanged for goods and services. It can be vulnerable to inflation, and because of this, it doesn’t represent a stable medium of exchange in some countries. But cash also has the benefit of being very flexible.

The Chicago Cubs acquired RHRP Nate Pearson from the Toronto Blue Jays for OF Yohendrick Pinango

Nate Pearson was rightly a hot prospect back in the day, and there were good reasons to think he’d play a key role in Toronto. Both scouts (he graduated at a FV of 55 here) and projections (ZiPS was a fan) thought a lot of his abilities, but the question was how he’d hold up physically as a starter. This worry turned out to be a real issue, and for the most part since 2019, his seasons have been marred by a wide variety of nagging injuries, costing him significant development time. Pearson throws hard, but he’s still rather raw, a problem given that he turns 28 in a few weeks and he has only two years left of club control after this one — not a lot of time for a reclamation project. The Cubs have decided to take a shot at fixing him. They are short-term sellers, but if Pearson pays off, he could be a significant player for their ’pen in 2025 and ’26.

Yohendrick Pinango is rather raw as well, a corner outfielder with decent power upside who hasn’t really shown that home run pop in the minors so far. The Cubs are kind of stacked with raw, interesting outfield prospects, while the Jays are rather short of them, making Toronto a better home for Pinango. ZiPS only translates Pinango’s 2024 season to a .344 slugging percentage; he hit well in High-A, but that was as a 22-year-old in his third stint there. Like Pearson, Pinango’s a lottery ticket.

I updated the Top 100 Prospects list today. This post goes through the pitchers and why they stack the way they do. Here’s a link directly to the list, and here’s a link to the post with a little more detail regarding farm system and prospect stuff and the trade deadline. It might be best for you to open a second tab and follow along, so here are the Top 100 pitchers isolated away from the bats. Let’s get to it.
Read the rest of this entry »

Today the Killers list turns the corner — or rather turns to the teams receiving less-than-acceptable production in the outfield corners. While still focusing on teams that meet the loose definition of contenders (Playoff Odds of at least 9.5%), and that have gotten about 0.6 WAR or less out of a position thus far — which prorates to 1.0 WAR over a full season — I have also incorporated our Depth Charts’ rest-of-season WAR projections into the equation for an additional perspective. Sometimes that may suggest that the team will clear the bar by a significant margin, but even so, I’ve included them here because the team’s performance at that spot is worth a look.

As noted previously, some of these situations are more dire than others, particularly when taken in the context of the rest of their roster. I’ve batched the two corners together into one supersized roundup because three of the seven teams below the WAR cutoff for left field also make the list for right field, and because there’s plenty of crossover in play with regards to personnel. The capsules are listed in order of their left field rankings first, while noting those three crossover teams with an asterisk. As always, I don’t expect every team here to go out and track down upgrades before the July 30 deadline, but these are teams to keep an eye on. All statistics are through July 14.

Read the rest of this entry »

Today, we turn our attention to the second base Killers. While still focusing on teams that meet the loose definition of contenders (a .500 record or Playoff Odds of at least 9.5%), and that have gotten about 0.6 WAR or less out of a position thus far — which prorates to 1.0 WAR over a full season — I have also incorporated our Depth Charts’ rest-of-season WAR projections into the equation for an additional perspective. Sometimes that may suggest that the team will clear the bar by a significant margin; as you can see by the table below, four of the six teams listed here project to receive more than a win from their current cast of second base options. Even so, I’ve included them here because the team’s performance at that spot is worth a look, and the incumbent may no longer appear to be the best option.

Particularly in light of those projections, I don’t expect every team to go out and track down an upgrade before the July 30 deadline, though I’ll note that some of the players cited within for their poor performance are themselves change-of-scenery candidates; one team’s problem may be another team’s solution, albeit not necessarily an ideal one. Either way, I’m less concerned with those solutions – many of which have more moving parts involved than a single trade — than I am with the problems. Unless otherwise indicated, all statistics are through Sunday.

Read the rest of this entry »

FanGraphs was at the Futures Game in Arlington on Saturday. In total, 16 pitchers appeared in the seven-inning game. The following are some quick notes on every pitcher who toed the rubber during All-Star weekend’s premier prospect event. Obviously one game isn’t enough on its own to move the needle significantly for any of these guys — they all have a large body of work that can better inform our evaluations — but it’s useful to see whose stuff ticks up when they’re in an environment like the Futures Game and get to let it eat in a shorter burst than they’re accustomed to. Read the rest of this entry »

The National League Wild Card race is wide open, with eight of the league’s 15 teams separated by a grand total of four and a half games in the standings. Five of those teams are currently below .500, their flaws on display on a daily basis — and some of those teams are at a particular disadvantage when it comes to their defenses.

On Wednesday, I investigated what a handful of the major defensive metrics — Defensive Runs Saved, Ultimate Zone Rating, Statcast’s Fielding Run Value (FRV), and our catcher framing metric (hereafter abbreviated as FRM, as it is on our stat pages) — told us about the teams with the best defenses. Some of them appear to be playoff-bound, while others are barely hanging onto hope thanks in part to those defenses, among them the Diamondbacks. Read the rest of this entry »

Baseball is truly a game of goops and gunks. Clubbies prepare pearls with Lena Blackburne Baseball Rubbing Mud. Position players paste their bats with pine tar and pamper their gloves with leather conditioner. Trainers soothe sore muscles with Icy Hot or Tiger Balm, and coaches spray the field with foul streaks of tobacco juice. Between innings, players wolf down caramel-filled stroopwafels specially designed to replenish high-performance athletes while fans slather hot dogs with mustard, ketchup, relish, chili, and blindingly yellow nacho cheese sauce that is, in fact, none of those three things. And of course, pitchers have been known to secret everything from sunscreen to petroleum jelly to Spider Tack on their person. If it defies easy categorization as a solid or a liquid, there’s a place for it at the ballpark.

Rosin sits somewhere in the middle. It’s powdered plant resin that sits on the mound inside not one but two cloth bags, but it doesn’t work its magic in that form. It requires a liquid to coax out its adhesive properties. The only approved liquid is sweat, for which a player might go to their hair or their forearm, but even then, there are limits. David Cone demonstrated the power of rosin after Max Scherzer’s ejection last April. With just a small amount of water and rosin, enough to create only the slightest discoloration on his fingers, Cone could create enough tack to make the baseball defy gravity. Read the rest of this entry »

Willie Mays was the gold standard. We can debate whether he was the greatest baseball player who ever lived or merely on the short list of those with a claim to the title. Based upon both the legend and the statistics, we’re on more solid ground declaring that Mays was the game’s greatest all-around player, accounting for his skill and achievement at the plate, on the bases, and in the field. Combining tremendous power, exceptional speed that factored on both sides of the ball, and preternatural grace afield, the man could do it all on the diamond, and he did it with an endearing, charismatic flair. “The Say Hey Kid” — a nickname bestowed upon him when he was so fresh on the scene that he didn’t know his teammates’ names — projected a youthful exuberance and an innocence that made him an icon.

Mays began his professional career while still in high school, with the Birmingham Black Barons, signing a $250-a-month contract in July 1948, when he was just 17 years old. He was supposed to return to Birmingham this week, one of three Negro Leagues alumni from the 1920-48 period — along with Bill Greason and Ron Teasley — slated to attend a major league game tonight between the Cardinals and Giants at historic Rickwood Field, the country’s oldest professional ballpark. Sadly, Mays passed away two days ago, in an assisted living facility, at the age of 93.

Willie Mays gave this statement to Dusty Baker on Monday, a day before Willie passed, to share with the city of Birmingham: pic.twitter.com/hQ0XmRKsmc

— John Shea (@JohnSheaHey) June 19, 2024

Mays was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1979. At the time of his death, he was its oldest living member, a distinction he inherited when Tommy Lasorda died on January 7, 2021, and one that now belongs to 90-year-old Luis Aparicio. Read the rest of this entry »