Last week, I wrote about the careers of the two former college baseball players who have been featured on this season of Love Is Blind, and don’t worry, I’m not going to follow up with a detailed breakdown of their performance on the episodes released this past weekend. (Though if anyone wants the short version: It’s been pretty dire. Ben is getting flamed on TikTok so bad his fiancée is thinking about pulling the plug, while Dave… I don’t know what you’re doing, man. Get it together. You’re in your mid-30s. You should be able to have a frank, productive conversation with your partner.)
I bring all this up because it’s been hard to shake something I mentioned in Friday’s article: Ben Mezzenga’s astonishingly high incidence of taking strike three. In his best years, only about half of his strikeouts came swinging. A typical big league hitter strikes out three times swinging for every time he strikes out looking. Last year, José Ramírez ran a ratio north of 15-to-1, the highest mark in baseball. Cavan Biggio was the only hitter who had 50 or more strikeouts with more than half of them coming with the bat on his shoulder. Read the rest of this entry »
You have to hand it to the Mets. There really does seem to be something ineffable that brings drama to Queens. No, I don’t mean the LOLMets meme, the belief that things will find a way to break every year, because I don’t really think it’s true. The Mets aren’t cursed. But they do have a way of making things interesting. It’s never all smooth sailing, but they’re never completely down and out either. There’s always a little more to explore at Citi Field, and this offseason is no exception. The Mets are on top of the world, because they signed Juan Soto, one of the biggest free agent prizes of all time. And they have their backs to the wall, because two pitchers they signed to assemble a playoff rotation are already injured.
Frankie Montas was the first casualty. He felt discomfort after his very first bullpen session of spring training, and a lat sprain means that he won’t be able to throw for another 5-7 weeks. Given that the regular season is five weeks away, and that Montas had done essentially no buildup before his injury, we’re talking about multiple months of absence.
The good news is the Mets built their rotation this offseason to withstand injuries. After all, Montas wasn’t the most prominent starting pitcher they signed this winter. Sean Manaea holds that distinction; he was the best pitcher on last year’s team, and though he hit free agency, he signed a three-year deal worth $75 million to come back. That’s not quite ace money in today’s game, which is perfect: Manaea’s not quite an ace, just a solid playoff starter with upside. Except, he’s also hurt now. After feeling some discomfort of his own, an MRI revealed a right oblique strain. Read the rest of this entry »
In a generally bleak 2024 season for the Toronto Blue Jays, one of the few bright spots in that Kafkaesque wasteland was the return of Vladimir Guerrero Jr. as a force to be reckoned with in the lineup. Guerrero followed up his MVP-caliber performance in 2021 with a solid-but-underwhelming 2022 season and a below-average 2023, and there were real questions about his value as a player as he neared his expected free agency after the 2025 campaign. His .323/.396/.544, 165 wRC+, 5.5 WAR line last year was a dramatic demonstration that his 2021 season was a lot more than a stone-cold fluke. Free agency beckons, and the Blue Jays are down to the last year of his services before he reaches the open market. Guerrero set the deadline to work out an extension with Toronto for February 17, and that date has come and gone without an agreement.
Jose Iglesias had something of a dream season in 2024. Out of the majors for all of 2023 – and twice-released at that — he spent the first two months of last season stashed at the Mets’ Triple-A Syracuse affiliate before being recalled on May 31. Out of nowhere, he not only put up a sizzling .337/.381/.448 line while setting a career high with 2.5 WAR, he released a no. 1 Billboard hit single “OMG,” recorded under the stage name Candelita. His on-field performance helped turn the Mets’ season around, with his newfound pop stardom providing some feel-good mojo as well. Yet with spring training in full swing, the 35-year-old infielder remains jobless.
Iglesias is hardly the only player of note who’s still looking for work. What follows here is a quick roundup — by no means comprehensive — of some of the bigger-name position players still on the market, and some potential fits. Coincidentally enough, four of the six I’ve chosen to highlight played for the two New York teams in 2024, but I don’t think there’s a particular East Coast bias here; it’s also worth noting that four of the six got late starts last year due to spring signings or injuries. In a companion piece, I’ll run down the pitchers waiting by the phone as well. I’ve included each player’s Depth Charts projections, though it’s worth noting that their estimated WAR totals are driven by levels of playing time that might well differ depending upon their landing spots. Read the rest of this entry »
The great Irish writer Seamus Heaney often spoke of the good that poetry could do, both for individuals and the world at large. To that point, he once lamented in jest that “poetry can’t be administered like an injection.” Admittedly, I stumbled upon that quotation by accident, deep within an internet rabbit hole I tumbled down while researching the American baseball pitcher Andrew Heaney. (Sometimes I forget to search for more than just a last name.) Nevertheless, I was so taken with Seamus Heaney’s message that I felt inspired to inject his words into my writing and analysis today.
Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests.
I’ll dig with it.
-From “Digging” (1966)
On Thursday, the Pirates and Heaney – Andrew, to be clear – agreed to a one-year, $5.25 million contract for 2025. After two years with the Rangers, the veteran left-hander will slot into Pittsburgh’s rotation for his age-34 season.
A first-round pick by the Marlins in 2012, Heaney spent three seasons in their organization. He climbed to the summit of Miami’s top prospect list in 2013 and made his big league debut the subsequent summer. Following the 2014 season, he was the headlining prospect in a fascinating trade with the Dodgers that brought Dan Haren, Dee Strange-Gordon, and Miguel Rojas to the Marlins in exchange for Heaney, as well as future Dodgers stalwarts Enrique Hernández and Austin Barnes, and catcher-to-pitcher convert Chris Hatcher. Hours later, the Dodgers flipped Heaney to the Angels for Howie Kendrick. At the time, Kendrick was coming off a 4.6-WAR season for the reigning AL West champions, just to offer some sense of how highly the Angels must have valued Heaney. Read the rest of this entry »
Xavier Isaac’s game is built around damage. No. 98 on our recently-released Top 100, the 21-year-old, left-handed-hitting Tampa Bay Rays prospect has, according to our lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen, “some of the most exciting power in pro baseball.” Getting to it consistently will be his biggest challenge going forward. As Longenhagen also wrote in his report, “By the end of the season, [Isaac] had a sub-60% contact rate, which is not viable at the big league level… [but] if “he can get back to being a nearly 70% contact hitter, he’s going to be a monster.”
While Isaac’s 143 wRC+ between High-A Bowling Green and Double-A Montgomery was impressive, his 33.3% strikeout rate was another story. The built-to-bash first baseman knows that cutting down on his Ks will go a long way toward his living up to his lofty potential. At the same time, he’s wary of straying too far from his strengths.
“I’ve tuned up my power, and now I need to get my contact up a little bit more,” Isaac told me during the Arizona Fall League season. “It’s like a tradeoff, kind of. I’m going to strike out, but I’m also going to hit the ball a little harder. I have a lot of power, so some of it is about going up there and taking a risk. I obviously don’t want to strike out — I‘m trying to put it in play — but I also don’t want to be making soft contact.”
That’s seldom a problem when he squares up a baseball. Not only does his bat produce high exit velocities, he knows what it feels like to propel a pitch 450-plus feet. He doesn’t shy way from the power-hitter label. Asked if that’s what he is, his response was, “For sure.”
Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the end of the Yankees’ beard ban, the potential end of MLB’s business relationship with ESPN, and whether the World Baseball Classic should imitate the NHL’s 4 Nations Face-Off. Then they preview the 2025 Texas Rangers (50:07) with MLB.com’s Kennedi Landry, and the 2025 Pittsburgh Pirates (1:27:23) with Pittsburgh Baseball Now’s John Perrotto, plus a postscript (2:03:57) about Ben’s growing affection for Tigers righty John Brebbia.
The heavy lifting for the offseason appears to be over, unless there’s a big trade coming down the pike. (Remember, Dylan Cease wasn’t moved from the White Sox to the Padres until March 13 last year.) But that doesn’t mean nothing has happened in the last week; there were still some stragglers on the free agent market who found teams as spring camps opened, and there’ll be more yet in the lead up to Opening Day. Let’s go over the moves, all of which are updated in the Offseason Matrices document.
Turner’s days of getting significant action at third base are over, so I don’t think his acquisition is going to give Matt Shaw any less of a chance of winning the job out of camp. Most of Turner’s plate appearances are likely to come against lefties, spelling lefty-swinging first baseman Michael Busch. The Cubs could also theoretically do some rearranging (Ian Happ to center, Seiya Suzuki to left) to give Turner some DH run against lefties, but that’s a big defensive downgrade from Pete Crow-Armstrong.
Pirates Sign Andrew Heaney for One Year, $5.25 Million
Heaney hasn’t been anything spectacular over the last couple of years, but he’s a pretty good bet to take the ball for 25-plus starts for a third straight season. He’ll follow Paul Skenes, Jared Jones, and Mitch Keller in the rotation. Bailey Falter is likely to take the fifth spot, with Johan Oviedo, who is coming off Tommy John surgery, also in the mix. Heaney’s recent dabbling in bouncing back and forth between the rotation and bullpen could prove useful down the stretch, assuming at least one of Bubba Chandler, Mike Burrows, Braxton Ashcraft, and Anthony Solometo is ready to contribute at some point this year.
Nationals Sign Lucas Sims for One Year, $3 Million
Sims signed a deal identical to the one Jorge López got last month, and both will be taken into account for the Nationals’ open closer job after they non-tendered Kyle Finnegan. Sims ended the season with a rough 15 appearances for the Red Sox in which he walked more batters than he struck out, but has a good track record of swing-and-miss stuff. Derek Law and Jose A. Ferrer could also get outs in the late innings for Washington.
Alexander is one of just two relievers who is 100% assured of a spot in the Rockies bullpen, along with presumptive closer Tyler Kinley. Seth Halvorsen and Luis Peralta had excellent (small-sample) MLB debuts last year, Victor Vodnik showed some flashes and picked up nine saves, and former closer Justin Lawrence is out of options. Alexander’s ability to get grounders with the best of them should work quite well at Coors Field.
Rangers Sign Luke Jackson for One Year, $1.5 Million
The top six (!!!) relievers in the Rangers’ projected bullpen weren’t on the 2024 club, though Texas is plenty familiar with Jackson, who made his MLB debut with the team in 2015, the last year of Mike Maddux’s first stint as the club’s pitching coach. The Rangers are probably all set with the bullpen now, with those top six spots locked in and no fewer than 10 arms vying for the final two.
Athletics Sign Luis Urías for One Year, $1.1 Million
Urías figures to compete with fellow new Athletic Gio Urshela for the open third base spot, and he can also spell Zack Gelof at second base when he needs a day off. It’s possible that the A’s have just one open roster spot remaining for a position player, with the top contenders being Esteury Ruiz, Max Schuemann, Darell Hernaiz, Brett Harris, and CJ Alexander. The Other Max Muncy could make his debut sometime this year.
Nationals Sign Paul DeJong for One Year, $1 Million
DeJong is settling for a much more limited role than he signed for last year, when he agreed to a $1.5 million contract with the White Sox early in the offseason to be their starting shortstop. Despite hitting 24 homers in his best season 2019, DeJong had to take a deal for two-thirds of his 2024 salary. With the Nationals, he’ll have to fight for plate appearances at third base with José Tena and Amed Rosario, while also occasionally spelling CJ Abrams at short. Alas, the free agent market isn’t always rational, especially this time of year.
Guardians Sign John Means for One Year, $1 Million
For the 2025 Guardians, Means doesn’t mean too much. After undergoing his second Tommy John surgery in three years last June, it’s hard to foresee the lefty pitching for Cleveland at any point this year, since his first rehab took 16 months. If his recovery goes well, the Guardians have a $6 million club option for 2026, a bargain for a pitcher of Means’ caliber so long as he is healthy.
Who’s Still a Free Agent?
Remaining free agents who could plausibly earn a major league deal include:
The need to define a scope, to create a boundary of coverage, creates a hole in prospect writing. Most public-facing prospect publications, FanGraphs included, analyze and rank players who are still rookie-eligible because, contrary to what you’ve probably learned about my capacity to be long-winded over the years, you just have to stop somewhere. Because of this, every year there are players who fall through the cracks between the boundaries of prospect coverage and big league analysis. These are often players who came up, played enough to exhaust their rookie eligibility, and then got hurt and had a long-term rehab in the minors. Or who graduated and then have been mothballed at Triple-A due to clogged major league rosters ahead of them. The goal of this piece is to highlight some of the players who no longer fit the parameters of my prospect lists and provide an updated long-term scouting prognosis for each of them.
Peraza was evaluated as an average everyday shortstop when he was last a prospect. Backburnered due to the emergence of Anthony Volpe, Peraza is still an above-average shortstop defender despite average arm strength. He’s always had a slight power-over-hit offensive skillset, and that dynamic has continued; Peraza still has above-average bat speed but only had a 71% contact rate in 2024. He dealt with a shoulder strain which kept him out for most of the first two months of the season and might have impacted his hitting ability. If the shoulder injury continues to affect his bat and he ends up with closer to a 30-grade hit tool instead of his projected 45, he would end up as a utility man rather than a regular.
Rodriguez came to Pittsburgh via the three-team Joe Musgrove deal in 2021, and graduated in 2023 as a 55-FV prospect thanks to projected plus contact ability and catching defense. He needed Tommy John surgery after the 2023 season and missed almost all of 2024, except for 10 games in September at Altoona and Indianapolis. Rodriguez looks bigger and stronger now, and the receiving aspect of his catching defense was fine when he returned, though he had only a few opportunities to throw (he popped 1.97, and 1.90 on a throw cut in front of the bag) and wasn’t really forced to block any pitches in the dirt in his few games back there. Offensively, he looked rusty. He wasn’t rotating as well as before the injury, but he still flashed low-ball bat control from both sides of the dish. I’m wondering if the Pirates had conversations about Rodriguez playing winter ball as a way to get him live reps and, if so, why they decided not to send him. He didn’t play enough to have cogent, updated thoughts on anything but his defense, which I thought looked fine.
I started to move off of Luciano prior to the start of the 2023 season, when he fell to the very back of my Top 100, then was completely off it in 2024. Not only had he made zero progress as a shortstop defender but cracks began to show in his offense. Across the last couple of seasons, as opposing pitchers’ fastball velocity climbed while Luciano traversed the minors, his ability to pull fastballs completely evaporated. He can crush a hanging breaking ball, but his bat path is such that he can really only inside-out heaters to right field. Through my own learned experience, this has become a warning sign when it’s true of low-level prospects. If Luciano can’t pull fastballs when they’re 92 mph, what happens when they’re 95? Well, we’re finding out that it means he has a 70% contact rate, and that in effort to be more on time against fastballs he’s lunging at sliders and missing 40% of those. For a player who is only now just starting to learn the outfield, and therefore not really bringing anything polished to the table at the moment, that’s a problem. The late transition on defense was a stubborn misstep, probably by some combination of Luciano and the org. The Giants were perhaps trying to preserve Luciano’s prospect value for as long as possible (which I suppose worked to an extent, just not here at FG) by leaving him at shortstop and hoping nobody would notice he couldn’t actually play there.
The good news is that Luciano still hits the ball really hard, as do the couple of good big league outfielders who power through their sub-70% contact rates, which appears to be what Luciano will have to do. Think of guys like Teoscar Hernández and Brent Rooker, who broke out in their late 20s. Outcomes like that are perhaps an eventuality for Luciano, but the Giants aren’t exactly in a long-term rebuild such that they’ll be happy to wait around for it to happen. Luciano is also entering his final option year, which means if they want to retain him, those growing pains will have to occur under the big league spotlight. His tenure with San Francisco has been painted into a bit of a corner. He’s still a 40+ FV player for me, and I think Luciano will have a meaningful power-hitting peak in his physical prime, but I think that’s more likely to occur in a different uniform.
I’m still keen on Matos who, despite some relevant flaws, is a special contact hitter with unique pull power characteristics. Matos graduated as a 55-FV prospect in 2023, in part because I believed he could play a viable center field (he cannot). He spent most of 2024 at Triple-A and has struggled to find big league footing, slashing a career .235/.288/.344 in 400 total plate appearances across a couple of seasons. Despite a frustrating tendency to chase, Matos has still maintained high-end contact rates (92% in-zone, 85% overall), and he has a special ability to cover high fastballs with power. A body blow to Matos’ fit on a big league roster is that he’s a below-average corner defender. That’s fine for guys like Juan Soto, Yordan Alvarez, Riley Greene, and Anthony Santander, but less so for one-note offensive performers, which is what Matos might be. Matos’ chase, and the way it saps his game power because he’s putting sub-optimal pitches into play, makes it more likely that his FV hovers in that 30-to-40 range when you stack him against the other corner outfielders across the next several seasons.
Walker was sent down to Memphis in April, didn’t come back up until mid-August, and struggled on both sides of the ball upon his return. The Cardinals have a new hitting coach and so this might change, but Walker’s swing (and more specifically his spray despite his style of swinging) is bizarre. He hits with an enormous open stride, bailing way out toward third base, the swing of someone trying like hell to pull the ball. But he still mostly doesn’t, certainly not as much as you’d expect from someone swinging like this. Walker has also never had especially good secondary pitch recognition, and changeups and sliders both performed like plus-plus pitches against him last year. His current swing certainly doesn’t help him cover those outer edge sliders.
On defense, Walker made a full-time transition from third base to the outfield in 2023, but he’s never looked comfortable catching the baseball out there, and that remained true at the end of 2024. Walker is still only 22 years old and has impact tools in his power, speed, and arm strength. His top-end speed for a 6-foot-6, 250-pound guy is amazing, his outfield arm is one of the better ones in baseball, and his bat speed is near elite. Aside from his lack of plate discipline, Walker shares a lot of similarities with Pat Burrell. Burrell was also a heavy-footed outfielder who relied on his arm on defense, and his issues with secondary pitches continued throughout his career, but ultimately his power made him a very productive player for a long time. Walker was in the big leagues before he turned 21, and Burrell didn’t debut until well after his 23rd birthday. I think Walker deserves more runway, and I’m still optimistic that he can be a middle-of-the-order hitter during his window of team control, but there probably has to be a swing change here.
For the last couple of years, Pratto’s strikeout rates have continued to hover around 30%, even in the minors, and while his swing still has superlative lift, his raw power has plateaued and is insufficient for a first baseman striking out this much. He’s out of options and is on the Royals’ roster bubble.
Trammell only played 10 big league games last year. He looks pretty much the same as he did in 2021 when he was struggling to get his footing in Seattle. He still has above-average power and speed, but he’s a 65% contact hitter who hasn’t been able to cover high fastballs. Despite his speed, Trammell is still not an especially skilled defender; he is a clunky fit in center, and his arm makes left field his best spot. He doesn’t make enough contact to be a regular, but he fits great on a roster as the fifth outfielder. He brings big energy and motor to the party, and he can run into the occasional extra-base hit coming off the bench.
Grissom, who was traded straight up for Chris Sale, looked pretty bad in 2024 amid multiple hamstring injuries. He is not a good defensive second baseman (the only position he played last year), and has a 50-hit, 40-power combination on offense. That’s a fringe big leaguer.
Sponsor Us on Patreon
EW Subreddit
Effectively Wild Wiki
iTunes Feed
Spotify Feed
Facebook Group
Bluesky Account
Twitter Account
Get Our Merch!
