Siani was released by the Orioles a couple weeks ago. Baltimore had claimed him off waivers from the Dodgers in mid-May and mostly kept him in the minors. Siani came up for two days and made one appearance as a defensive substitute. Baltimore outrighted him off the 40-man roster after that and eventually pushed him off the Triple-A team as well.

The lefty-hitting Siani has had a rough year in the minors. He has combined for a .167/.281/.242 slash line with one homer and an ugly 30% strikeout rate across 219 plate appearances. Siani has been a well below-average hitter even in the minors. He’s an excellent baserunner and defender who has mostly been a fourth/fifth outfielder outside of a couple months as a regular center fielder for the Cardinals in 2024.

Siani has a similar profile to James Outman, whom the Tigers lost to a concussion yesterday. Riley Greene went on the injured list one day earlier. Detroit has needed to call up Trei Cruz and Corey Julks from Toledo, so they’ll bring in Siani to backfill the outfield depth.

This is the first injured list stint for Uribe since the end of the 2024 season. He fired 75 1/3 innings of 1.67 ERA ball last year and has been nearly as effective this season. Uribe sports a 2.05 mark over 48 1/3 frames. He’s striking out a quarter of batters faced while getting ground-balls at a 55% clip.

Uribe has collected six saves, most of them early on while Trevor Megill was in a funk. He’s the team leader with 18 holds and has only blown two leads. Uribe led the majors with 37 holds last year and is still third in that category (behind Hunter Gaddis and Tyler Rogers) since the beginning of 2025.

A forearm issue for one of the league’s best setup men is going to raise some concern. That’s particularly true when the pitcher has a fastball pushing triple digits. Fortunately, Uribe downplayed the issue, telling reporters (including Curt Hogg of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel) that imaging came back clean. He’ll take a few days off before restarting his throwing program.

That’s reason for optimism that it’ll be a fairly brief absence. Milwaukee’s lead in the NL Central is down to 3.5 games with the Cubs on a heater. They’re also jostling with the Braves and Dodgers for the top two seeds in the National League.

Milwaukee has one of the deepest bullpens in the league. Megill has been fantastic dating back to May. Aaron Ashby, Chad Patrick and DL Hall are having good years. They’re a little light on right-handed setup arms with Uribe down, though, putting a lot of pressure on deadline acquisition Antonio Senzatela. He’s allowed runs in three straight appearances and has an earned run average close to 8.00 since the beginning of June.

Topa is a Binghamton native who played his college ball at LIU-Brooklyn. He has pitched parts of seven big league seasons between the Brewers, Mariners and Twins. Topa battled various arm injuries, including multiple Tommy John procedures, and only saw limited action with Milwaukee. He had a breakout year at age 32 for the Mariners three seasons ago, firing 69 frames of 2.61 ERA ball.

Seattle traded Topa to Minnesota the following offseason as part of the deal sending Jorge Polanco to the Pacific Northwest. Topa’s injury issues returned and limited him to three appearances in 2024. He had a decent rebound last year, pitching to a 3.90 ERA across 60 innings, but has not performed well in 2026.

Topa was shelled for 18 runs (17 earned) across 19 big league appearances with Minnesota to begin the year. The Twins released him in the middle of May. He has gone to the Blue Jays and Royals on successive minor league contracts without getting back to MLB. Topa has combined for a 1.74 ERA across 20 2/3 Triple-A frames, but he’s only striking out 14% of minor league hitters. He had a 12:11 strikeout-to-walk ratio and one of the lowest whiff rates in the league for Minnesota.

As with many Yankees relievers, Topa is a sinkerballer who gets grounders on more than half the batted balls he allows. He still had a 54.4% ground-ball rate in the majors this season. The sinker sits in the 93-94 mph range and he’ll mix in a cutter, slider and changeup.

Chivilli’s injury comes a few days after the Yankees placed Kervin Castro (elbow neuritis) on the major league injured list. They brought up Bradley Hanner from Triple-A to replace Castro. They don’t have any other healthy pure relievers on the 40-man roster, though one of their pitchers — presumably Hanner or Yerry de los Santos — will be squeezed out when Carlos Rodón is activated. Elmer Rodríguez and Brendan Beck, both of whom are working as starters, are the two currently available pitchers on optional assignment. One or two injuries in the big league bullpen could open a spot for Topa if they want to keep Rodríguez and Beck stretched out.

It’s the second MLB stint for Gonzales. Texas signed him to a minor league deal in June, selected his contract a month later, and designated him for assignment around the trade deadline. Gonzales elected free agency but quickly re-signed a new minor league deal. He allowed four runs in five innings in a Triple-A start on August 9 and is back up as a fresh arm five days later.

Texas stretched their bullpen in last night’s 7-0 loss in Anaheim. Jacob deGrom left his start after two innings because of triceps fatigue. They used five relievers, Peoples included, to cover the final six frames. Jordan Montgomery went 52 pitches and will be down for a couple days. Peyton Gray and Cole Winn have each pitched back-to-back nights and probably aren’t available.

Gonzales can eat some innings tonight behind Kumar Rocker if the game gets out of hand in either direction. It might be another brief stay on the roster, though perhaps he’ll stick around if deGrom requires an injured list stint to force Montgomery into the rotation. Gonzales has worked six innings of one-run ball over two MLB appearances this year. He has an ERA close to 8.00 in Triple-A between the San Diego and Texas systems.

His call pushes the 25-year-old Curvelo off the roster. The Venezuelan-born righty has made 26 appearances over the past couple seasons. Curvelo hasn’t found much MLB success, allowing just over seven earned runs per nine with a 19% strikeout rate while walking more than 12% of opponents. He’s having a similarly tough year in Triple-A, pitching to an 8.42 ERA with a 14% walk rate across 25 2/3 frames. Texas will likely place him on waivers this weekend, and Curvelo would need to accept an outright assignment if he goes unclaimed.

The other move sees Freeman replace Cauley as a right-handed bat off the bench. Texas will see a couple left-handed starters this weekend. The A’s will pitch Gage Jump tonight and Jacob Lopez for Sunday’s finale. Cauley hasn’t hit much in his first big league stint. Freeman is in the lineup tonight at second base over Nicky Lopez. Cauley’s demotion means Evan Carter gets the start in center field against a lefty.

4:00pm: The Brewers have sent right-hander Lyon Richardson outright to Triple-A Nashville, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. That indicates he cleared waivers after being designated for assignment a few days ago. Richardson has elected free agency, per Jack Stern of Brewer Fanatic.

Richardson, 26, was a second-round pick of the Reds in 2018. He got up to the majors a few years ago and mostly acted as up-and-down arm. He exhausted his final option year in 2025 and got pushed to fringe roster status. The Reds were able to get him through waivers unclaimed in the offseason. He was added back to the roster a couple of months into the campaign but was quickly nudged onto the wire again. When he cleared the second time, he was able to elect free agency and signed with the Brewers.

With Milwaukee, he got a very brief look. He was added to the roster last week. He made one appearances, throwing 1 2/3 innings without allowing a run, before getting designated for assignment. He could now return to Nashville but he could also return to the open market. Since 29 teams just passed on the chance to grab him from the waiver wire, he would likely be limited to minor league offers.

Over his sporadic big league looks, Richardson has logged 58 1/3 innings, allowing 6.48 earned runs per nine. His 17.2% strikeout rate and 14.6% walk rate are both poor marks, though his 51.6% ground ball rate is quite strong. He has shown more potential in the minors. Dating back to the start of 2025, his first season as a primary reliever, he has thrown 92 1/3 Triple-A innings with a 4.39 ERA, 23.9% strikeout rate, 11.4% walk rate and 51.2% ground ball rate.

Photo courtesy of Katie Stratman, Imagn Images

Bride only appeared in two games for Texas. He tallied six plate appearances and went 1-for-5 with a single and a walk. The 30-year-old corner infielder/outfielder has spent the rest of the season in Round Rock, where he’s compiled 431 plate appearances and delivered a quality .282/.401/.425 batting line with 10 home runs and more walks (16.7%) than strikeouts (16%).

This is the fifth season in which Bride has logged at least some major league work. He’s totaled between 106 and 272 plate appearances in each of the past four seasons, suiting up for the A’s, Marlins and Twins along the way. Bride is a career .220/.311/.312 hitter in 696 major league plate appearances.

Back in 2024, Bride had something of an unexpected breakout in Miami. That season saw him log those career-high 272 plate appearances, and he slashed .276/.357/.461 with 11 homers in that time. He followed with a .100/.200/.100 showing through his first 45 plate appearances with the Fish the following season, however, leading to a DFA. The Twins picked him up and took a quick look, but Bride’s .208/.275/.236 slash in 80 plate appearances naturally wasn’t enough to keep him on the roster.

Bride has been outrighted in the past, so he can reject this assignment in favor of free agency even though he doesn’t have three years of major league service. Even if he accepts, he can become a minor league free agent at season’s end if he’s not added back to the big league roster.

Báez, 23, was the club’s second-round pick in 2021. Since then, he has continued to add more and more power but with lingering concerns about his strikeouts. From 2021 to 2024, he made 896 plate appearances across various minor league levels, striking out in 34.4% of those while hitting 24 home runs.

He showed big improvement last year. Splitting his time between High-A and Double-A, he hit 20 home runs in 499 plate appearances while only getting punched out at a 20.6% clip. That was enough for the Cards to give him a 40-man spot in November, to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft. This year, he has taken the power to new levels but the strikeouts have ticked back up. In 461 trips to the plate, he has already launched 34 homers but has also gone down on strikes at a 29.5% pace.

Despite the concerns, Báez is still considered a top 100 prospect by some. Baseball America currently lists him #56 overall and MLB Pipeline has him at #59. Kiley McDaniel of ESPN had Báez #93 coming into the season. Some are less optimistic, however. Keith Law of The Athletic didn’t have Báez top 100 before the season and recently provided an updated top 70 with no Báez on it. FanGraphs currently lists him sixth in the Cardinals’ system and outside the Top 100.

As expected, reports focus a lot on his work at the plate, but other facets of his game are also notable. He’s considered a capable corner outfielder with a strong arm. His baserunning is also an asset, as he stole 54 bases last year and is at 21 so far this year.

The timing of the promotion is surely not a coincidence. As MLBTR covered earlier today, several prospects will likely be called up in the coming days as it’s now possible to call a player up and keep his rookie status going into next year. A player exhausts rookie status once he has 45 days of service time or 130 at-bats or 50 innings pitched. It’s now late enough in the season that Báez can’t hit the 45-day threshold. As long as the Cards keep him under 130 at-bats, he will still be a rookie going into 2027.

That could be a notable distinction when considering the Prospect Promotion Incentive. Players are PPI eligible if they begin a season on two of the three top 100 lists at Baseball America, MLB Pipeline and ESPN. If such a player is promoted early enough in a season to earn a full year of service time, he can earn his respective club an extra draft pick based on awards voting.

The Cards are also mostly focused on the future, despite being only 3.5 games out of a playoff spot. They just traded Dustin May, JoJo Romero and Lars Nootbaar at the deadline, getting prospects in return. Though they are not totally buried in the standings, they can use their remaining games to get a look at Báez and see how he fares against big league pitching. He will jump into an outfield mix with Jordan Walker, Nathan Church, Everson Pereira, José Fermín and Bryan Torres.

Photo courtesy of Jim Rassol, Imagn Images

It’s a notable move but not necessarily a surprising one. Abrams is a very talented baseball player but he has often looked overmatched as a shortstop defender. He has 5,297 innings at that spot in his career thus far. He has been credited with minus-11 Defensive Runs Saved, including minus-5 this year. The Outs Above Average metric has given him an eye-popping minus-63 grade in his career, worst in the majors for the 2022-26 span, regardless of position. That included minus-17 this season, again the worst tally in the majors regardless of position.

Throughout the baseball industry, including here at MLBTR, people have wondered when he might be moved to second base, third base or center field. Now it seems the Nats are going to try him on the other side of the second base bag.

That reduces his value in a sense, as a premium shortstop is generally worth more to teams than a strong second baseman, but he clearly wasn’t going to stick at short for the long term. His experience at second base is limited, as he got 66 innings there with the Padres in 2022 but hasn’t been there since.

Regardless of where he lines up on defense, he will be a valuable player since he is one of the best offensive performers in the league. He has 29 home runs and 23 stolen bases already this year. His .284/.357/.541 line translates to a 143 wRC+, indicating he has been 43% better than league average at the plate overall. That’s a top-ten mark among qualified hitters this year.

It’s interesting timing for Abrams and the Nats. The club has been in rebuilding mode for a while and clearly isn’t prioritizing the near future. MacKenzie Gore was traded in the most recent offseason when he still had two seasons of club control remaining. Washington flirted with contention this year but still acted as sellers at the deadline. They traded away impending free agent Foster Griffin but also Luis García Jr., who isn’t slated for free agency until after 2027, and Curtis Mead, who is controlled through 2030.

Abrams is slated for free agency after 2028, meaning the Nats still have him for the rest of this season and two further campaigns. He has already been in trade rumors for a while but remains with Washington. Perhaps that is related to some questions in his profile. In both 2024 and 2025, he hit great in the first half but faded down the stretch. Time will tell whether 2026 will be a similar story. He was great through July but has a .235/.278/.373 line so far in August. On top of that, his future positional home has been an ongoing question.

Going forward, the Nats will have to make some choices on Abrams. If he is a part of the club’s future, then perhaps they could look to extend him. If not, then it makes sense to put him on the trade block while his value is still quite high. As his window of club control shrinks and his arbitration salary rises, his value will go down. Similarly, as he approaches free agency, his asking price in extension talks will go up.

Those upcoming decisions may hover over the coming offseason. Before the long, cold winter arrives, the Nats will get some looks at Abrams at second and see how it goes. Other clubs will surely be watching with interest as well.

Nuñez has been the club’s primary second baseman this year, so it’s an easy switch for the short term. He doesn’t hit much but is a strong defender and baserunner. He has a .230/.315/.267 line this year but leads the major with 40 stolen bases. His defensive grades at both second and shortstop have been above average in his career. In the short term, it could be a net positive for the Nats if Abrams is competent at the keystone.

With his lack of offense, Nuñez is surely not the long-term answer at shortstop. Zoom out far enough and the top guess is Eli Willits. The top pick in last year’s draft, he is one of the best prospects in the league but he isn’t coming anytime soon. He is 18 years old and is only at the High-A level.

Before Willits arrives, it’s possible Seaver King gets a look. Washington’s first-round pick in 2024, he is currently at the Triple-A level and playing well, though he is a divisive prospect. Most evaluators consider him a top 100 talent but FanGraphs is far more skeptical, placing him 30th in the Nats’ system due to concerns he is a future utility guy rather than a future shortstop. Whether it’s in the latter stages of this season or at some point in 2027, the shortstop position is more open for King to get a look.

Photos courtesy of Scott Marshall, Isaiah J. Downing, Patrick Gorski, Imagn Images

August 13: The Mariners informed rookie shortstop Colt Emerson that he’s being optioned back to Triple-A Tacoma, reports Ryan Divish of The Seattle Times. The move comes after Seattle blanked the Yankees 1-0 on Thursday afternoon, avoiding a sweep and ending a six-game losing streak. Divish adds that infielder Brock Rodden will be selected onto the big league roster in his place.

Emerson, who turned 21 last month, was out of the lineup today with the Yankees running an elite left-hander in Max Fried. He made a late-game appearance as a defensive substitute. Emerson wore a golden sombrero in Wednesday’s loss. That pushed his strikeout rate to an untenable 34.4% clip in his first 68 big league games.

One of the sport’s top prospects, Emerson signed an eight-year extension with a $95MM guarantee at the beginning of the season. The Mariners kept him in Triple-A at the time. Seattle promoted him and installed him as the everyday third baseman when Brendan Donovan went on the injured list in the middle of May. An early-June injury to J.P. Crawford allowed Emerson to slide over to shortstop, where he remained even with Crawford’s return to health.

Emerson homered in his second game and had a generally encouraging May. He’s gone sharply downhill since then, batting .205 with a .271 on-base percentage in June. While Emerson at least connected on five homers that month, he has been completely overmatched during the past six weeks. Emerson has hit .157/.185/.196 since the beginning of July, making him the worst offensive player in the league during that stretch.

It simply reached a point where the Mariners couldn’t continue running him out against MLB arms. Emerson is too frequently expanding the strike zone, getting beat within the zone, and not making any hard contact. That comes after a solid but slightly concerning start to the year in Triple-A, where he struck out at a 27% clip while batting .255/.347/.469 over 38 games.

This obviously isn’t how Emerson or the Mariners hoped his rookie year would go. Still, it’s far too early to make any pronouncements about his career. Emerson is the youngest player in the American League and second-youngest hitter in MLB (behind Pittsburgh’s Konnor Griffin). He’s a few months younger than this year’s first overall pick, Roch Cholowsky. If he’d played college ball instead of signing out of high school, Emerson would’ve been a member of this year’s draft class and likely playing in A-ball right now. This is the first time in his career that he’s struggled for an extended period.

Donovan returned last week and is playing regularly at the hot corner. Crawford went back on the injured list in late July with left wrist inflammation. The starting shortstop job will probably go to Leo Rivas until Crawford is healthy. That’s not ideal, as the switch-hitting utility player owns a .130/.258/.167 line without a home run in 130 plate appearances this year. Rivas provided a spark late last season and should draw some walks, but he has minimal power and works so many deep counts that he strikes out a lot.

Rodden could factor into the shortstop mix, though he’s also more of a bench type who’ll bounce around the infield. A fifth-round selection in 2023, Rodden is having a solid year in Tacoma. He’s hitting .262/.342/.499 with 19 homers and eight stolen bases through 410 plate appearances. Rodden is a switch-hitter who has done more damage from the left side of the dish.

Baseball America and MLB Pipeline each list the Wichita State product just inside the top 20 prospects in a deep Seattle system. Both outlets credit him with above-average to plus speed and praise his versatility, but Rodden is a smaller player (listed between 5’7″ and 5’9″) who’s not viewed as having an especially high offensive ceiling. This year’s power production is probably inflated, as Rodden has a modest 34% hard contact rate. MLB Pipeline’s scouting report coincidentally notes the similarities to Rivas.

The Mariners would’ve needed to add Rodden to the 40-man roster to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft this offseason. They’ll take an earlier look and see if he can provide any help to one of the game’s most disappointing teams. The M’s are eight games below .500 and have fallen five back in a winnable AL West. They’re 3.5 out in the Wild Card with six teams to surpass.

Sterner, now 29, was claimed off waivers from the Rays in November of 2024. He was a solid bullpen option for the A’s last year, as he gave them 65 innings, allowing 3.18 earned runs per nine. His 26.3% strikeout rate and 7.9% walk rate were both strong figures.

This year, he started out on a similar trajectory but faded more recently. Through his first 34 innings, he had a 3.18 ERA, 25% strikeout rate and 5.9% walk rate. In his most recent 7 1/3 innings, he allowed 13 earned runs while walking 10.3% of opponents and only striking them out at a 12.8% pace. That bumped his season-long ERA all the way to 6.12 before he hit the 15-day IL a month ago due to right knee chondromalacia.

Given the awful downturn in his most recent results, perhaps the knee issue started bugging him before he hit the IL. Regardless, he won’t get a chance to get back on track until 2027. He came into this year with 169 days of service time and will therefore go into 2027 at 1.169. He would be a lock for Super Two status after next year, barring major changes to the rules in the next collective bargaining agreement, though he does still have an option remaining and could still be destined for time in the minors in the future.

In the short term, it’s not a notable impact for the A’s. They have the worst record in baseball at 47-74. They are playing out the string on a lost season. They have almost no one established in their bullpen. Of the eight guys currently there, none of them came into 2026 with even three years of service time. The A’s can keep giving opportunities to those arms throughout the remainder of the campaign to evaluate who belongs in the long-term plans.

Photo courtesy of Lon Horwedel, Imagn Images

It’s unclear when the blister started bothering Martin but it came up in conversation yesterday. Martin was ejected from his most recent start after a couple of pitches to Sal Stewart, one of which went over Stewart’s head while the other made contact with Stewart’s helmet. After the game, in comments relayed by Chatterbox Sports, Martin claimed the blister played a role in him losing his grip on those offerings. The umpires didn’t assess the situation that way, as Martin was ejected.

The young righty is having an uneven season. Through the end of May, he had thrown 67 2/3 innings with a flat earned run average of 2.00. Since the calendar flipped to June, he has a 7.06 ERA in 57 1/3 innings, which has pushed his season-long ERA up to 4.32.

The Sox are pushing to make the playoffs for the first time since 2021. They are 62-58 and have a lead of 2.5 games over the Tigers in the American League Central. As they look to finish strong, they will have to do so without Martin for at least a couple of weeks.

Subtracting Martin, their rotation is left with Sean Burke, Luis Castillo and Anthony Kay. Today, Sean Newcomb is starting a bullpen game. Urquidy has been working as a starter in the minors this year and could absorb multiple innings as part of that. Erick Fedde tossed three innings yesterday after Martin was ejected. He won’t be available for a few days but could be back in the mix soon.

Though Martin might just miss a few starts, the Sox might have to reach for some more depth options. Drew Thorpe, who underwent Tommy John surgery last year, is on a rehab assignment and got up to five innings pitched in his last outing. Noah Schultz, Jonathan Cannon, Shane Smith, David Sandlin and McDougal are on optional assignment, though McDougal can’t be recalled for 15 days unless someone else is going on the IL. Sandlin was also just optioned three days ago and Schultz six. Cannon and Smith both have ERAs north of 5.00 in Triple-A this year.

Photo courtesy of Matt Marton, Imagn Images

Let’s get into it!

Chris asks:

What might a Sandy Alcantara extension look like?

Not that long ago, I’d have started any question like this by saying a trade felt like the far likelier outcome than an extension. Now, after Miami has gone two deadlines and an offseason without moving Alcantara despite good value — all amid repeated reports that he’s (understandably) a personal favorite of owner Bruce Sherman — another long-term deal seems like something the organization will consider.

First, let’s take a quick look at Alcantara’s return from Tommy John surgery, which cost him the 2024 season. Last year’s results — particularly early on — were gruesome. Alcantara needed a 3.13 ERA over his final dozen starts just to get his season-long ERA “down” to 5.36. Early on, he wasn’t missing bats anywhere close to an average level. His command was well shy of its prior standards. He was more homer-prone than he’d ever been. Opponents were making quite a bit of hard contact. It wasn’t encouraging.

Late last July, Alcantara seemed to turn a corner. His command sharpened, and his strikeout rate improved. He was still giving up too much hard contact, but that was more manageable with a league-average strikeout rate and plus walk rate than it was earlier in the season, when he’d been fanning 17% of his opponents with a walk rate around 12%. Alcantara didn’t have a dominant finish, but those 12 starts were a portent for better days ahead.

That’s precisely what’s come to pass. Alcantara has a 3.52 ERA this season and leads the majors in innings pitched. His strikeout, walk and ground-ball rates are all worse than their peak levels but are vastly improved over their 2025 levels. Alcantara is on an absolute heater right now, with seven straight quality starts — including three straight scoreless outings (a total of 20 innings). He’s sitting on a 1.88 ERA with a 23.4% strikeout rate, 5.3% walk rate and 42% grounder rate over his past 48 innings. It’s ace-level performance.

Skeptics can say it’s “only seven starts,” but if we go back to last July’s turnaround, Alcantara boasts 241 1/3 innings (37 starts) with a 3.39 ERA, 20.1% strikeout rate, 6.1% walk rate and 44.8% ground-ball rate. Opponents are averaging 89.2 mph off the bat with a 39% hard-hit rate. It’s average quality of contact that plays down because Alcantara does a good job avoiding barrels and gets plenty of chase on balls off the plate.

Even if Alcantara is more of a No. 2 starter than a Cy Young candidate moving forward, he’s a workhorse who any club in the game would be happy to start in a playoff setting. The Marlins have him signed through next year by way of a $21MM club option that’ll be a no-brainer to exercise. He’s said he hopes to spend his career in Miami, and if the team’s repeated decisions to pass on trading him are any indication, Sherman is amenable to that concept. The offseason will be an ideal time to extend him, so as not to have his expiring contract casting a cloud over the entire season. Let’s jump into MLBTR’s Contract Tracker to pull up some age-related comps and see where such a deal might land.

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Aug. 12: The Nationals announced Wednesday that they have designated veteran righty Miles Mikolas for assignment. That opens a spot on the MLB roster for prospect Jackson Kent. The 23-year-old southpaw will make his major league debut on Wednesday against the Cubs.

Mikolas is squeezed off the roster a week after Washington released Zack Littell. They held onto Mikolas for a few more days. (It’s likely not a coincidence that they waited until he reached the 10-year service milestone on Thursday.) The Nationals have now moved on from all three pitchers whom they signed to major league free agent contracts. Foster Griffin was by far the most successful of those acquisitions. The Nats were able to cash him in for controllable reliever Will Dion and three prospects in a deadline day trade with the Guardians.

Neither Littell nor Mikolas found much success. The latter had a 5.82 earned run average over 116 innings. Mikolas has one of the game’s lowest strikeout rates (11.6%) and has given up 27 home runs, the third-highest total in the majors. That includes a Seiya Suzuki solo shot on Tuesday, the only blemish for Mikolas over three innings in a generally solid final outing with the club.

Mikolas still has some of the best control in the league. He’s not going to put batters on with free passes, but he has well below-average raw stuff that hasn’t fooled hitters for a few years. Mikolas has had an ERA of 4.78 or higher in each season since 2023. He’s incredibly durable and ranked 13th in innings pitched between 2023-25. His ineffectiveness has kept him from taking quite so significant a workload this year, as the Nats tried to keep him to two times through an opposing lineup — frequently behind an opener.

Kent should join Cade Cavalli, Jake Irvin and Andrew Alvarez in the rotation for the remainder of the season. Spencer Nusbaum of The Athletic suggests Brad Lord could build back up as a starter. Lord has worked as a multi-inning reliever this year, tossing 61 2/3 frames of 3.79 ERA ball over 29 outings. The second-year righty bounced between starting and relief last season and held a rotation spot for most of the 2025 second half.

The Nationals will remain on the hook for the rest of Mikolas’ $2.25MM base salary. He earned another $200K in bonuses based on his innings total. Mikolas could have earned an additional $550K in incentives between 120 and 140 frames had the Nationals not moved on. He’ll be placed on release waivers and be a free agent in 48 hours. He’d then be available for the prorated $780K league minimum (without any bonuses) if another team gives him a roster spot, though it seems likelier he’ll be limited to minor league offers.

Anthony Franco

• Good afternoon, hope all is well!
• Looking forward to another of these, let’s get rolling

Hits Like Rays

• All of the Rays’ starting pitchers are free agents in the next 15 months (Freddy Peralta and Nick Martinez after this year, then Drew Rasmussen, Shane McClanahan, and Griffin Jax after 2027).  What do you think the Rays will do about this?  I assume they will let Peralta and Martinez walk in free agency, then try to extend one or two of the 2027 class and trade the last one this winter to bring in younger talent…

Anthony Franco

• I think Rasmussen gets moved this offseason because of the option escalators. Could see them bringing Martinez back, not Freddy. Probably going to need another mid-level FA add like that, maybe they built another reliever out given the success they’ve had going that route in recent years
• Tyler Wells has been a pretty good starter. Can keep him in relief rest of the way this year and give him a rotation look in ’27. He’ll also be a free agent after that but helps cover for the shorter-term losses

Tiger Fan

• The Tigers have been hot as of late, do you think they should have picked up a bat at the trade deadline?

Anthony Franco

• I think they handled the deadline appropriately. Had to move Skubal with where they were in the standings, less so on Mize but when SD put Mayfield on the table, makes sense to pull the trigger. Hold all the other short-term guys and hope to still make a run
• Different story if they’d have been in possession of a playoff spot two weeks ago but at the time they decided to move Skubal they were 52-58 with five teams to jump in the Wild Card
• Credit to the team for not quitting and putting themselves back in position to compete for a playoff spot but buying would’ve felt irresponsible with where they were at a couple weeks ago

Fake Jim Bouton

• Is Spencer Jones next year’s CF for the Yanks?

Anthony Franco

• I expect him to get the first look, yeah

Arizona

• So given we chose to stand pat at the deadline then immediately shut Puk down…how viable are our wild card chances? Seems like you can basically guarantee 1+ of the four big injuries are going to fail to return as well (Burnes Gurriel Lawlar Martinez). And then 1+ won’t perform even if back… should fans just look at 2028 and hope the Minors have seasons in 2027 because they are a different union now?

Anthony Franco

• Pretty bland deadline, can’t believe they came away with no pitching. I know they put out the Holmes thing and there’s probably some truth to the bad timing there but a) you’re allowed to try to make trades before deadline afternoon and b) that doesn’t explain not getting any bullpen help
• Would probably have them around 35% to get in. Think they’re a little worse than San Diego, about on par with Philly. They’re a couple tiers below the Cubs or whichever division winners finishes 3rd who they’d play in the first round

Chris

• Is it far to say that Bichette’s opt-out odds are ~40% now?
• 

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  ]]> 1 https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2026/08/white-sox-designate-joe-rock-for-assignment.html https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2026/08/white-sox-designate-joe-rock-for-assignment.html#comments Fri, 14 Aug 2026 18:50:54 +0000 https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/?p=908539 The White Sox announced their previously-reported waiver claim of catcher Jake Rogers. To open a 40-man roster spot, left-hander Joe Rock has been designated for assignment.

  Rock, 26, was just acquired from the Rays in May. The Sox sent infielder Oliver Dunn to Tampa in order to acquire the lefty. Since then, Rock has mostly been kept on optional assignment. He has only made four major league appearances for the big league club, allowing four earned runs in 10 1/3 innings with 12 strikeouts but 11 walks, two hit batters and a wild pitch.

  The lack of control has been an issue for Rock in the minors this year as well. He has logged 32 2/3 Triple-A innings with a 6.89 earned run average. His 28.1% strikeout rate and 50.6% ground ball rate are strong figures but he has walked 31 of the 171 batters he has faced, an awful 18.1% rate. He has also hit six batters, so that’s 21.6% of opponents getting a free trip to first base.

  The wildness has pushed him off the roster and into DFA limbo. With the trade deadline having passed, he’ll be on waivers in the coming days. He is still optionable for the rest of this year and will still have one more option year after that.

  Perhaps that roster flexibility will give him some appeal, along with his past results. From 2023 to 2025, he logged 329 minor league innings with a 4.79 ERA, 23.1% strikeout rate and 7.5% walk rate. He has been moved to a primary relief role this year. The early results haven’t been especially encouraging but perhaps some other club sees light at the end of the tunnel or would want to stretch him back out again.

  Photo courtesy of John Jones, Imagn Images

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