2025 IBC Padres non-prospects news and notes

[Padres]

Good news!

ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports that Charlie Morton plans to pitch in 2025.

Morton is now 41 — Tuesday was his birthday — and he’s coming off a season with Atlanta where he forged a 4.19 ERA while showing some decent durability with 165 2/3 innings. He’ll assuredly be looking at another one-year deal, but Morton has been effective enough to earn that right to be in the back of someone’s rotation in 2025. Atlanta should be considered the favorites just based on their history.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/charlie-morton/48665

Veteran right-hander Charlie Morton has seemingly been mulling retirement for more than a half decade, but he’s continued his career on a series of one-year deals, leaving open the possibility that each successive year will be his last. That won’t be the case with 2024, however. ESPN’s Jeff Passan writes that Morton intends to suit up for an 18th MLB season next year.

Morton, who turns 41 today (happy birthday, Charlie!), has spent the past four seasons in Atlanta, anchoring the rotation as a durable innings eater amid frequent injury troubles throughout the rest of the starting staff. Despite those years representing his age-37 through age-40 campaigns, Morton has made at least 30 starts and pitched at least 163 1/3 innings each of the past four seasons. He’s provided more than just bulk work, as well; in 686 1/3 innings for the Braves, the grizzled righty has pitched to a sharp 3.87 ERA while striking out 26.6% of his opponents against a 9.3% walk rate.

The 2024 season wasn’t Morton’s best in Atlanta but was still a solid year all around. He logged 165 1/3 frames and turned in a 4.19 earned run average. Last year’s 23.8% strikeout rate was Morton’s lowest since his late-career breakout with the Astros, which began in his age-33 season, but it was still enough to check in about a percentage point north of league-average. Morton’s 9.3% walk rate was worse than average but marked an improvement over the career-worst 11.6% mark he turned in during the 2023 season. His 46.3% grounder rate was strong, and he generally did a fine job avoiding hard contact. It wasn’t the Cy Young-caliber performance Morton flashed in his 2018-19 peak, but it was a fine showing for a veteran third or fourth starter.

Logically speaking, a reunion with the Braves seems possible. Atlanta is looking for innings behind staff leaders Chris Sale, Reynaldo Lopez and Spencer Schwellenbach. Young ace Spencer Strider will miss the beginning of the season as he continues mending from last year’s UCL surgery. Longtime Atlanta star Max Fried is a free agent and seems likely to sign elsewhere on a contract beyond the Braves’ comfort zone. Morton has also been happy to pitch in the southeast region of the country, close to his young family in Florida.

On the other hand, the Braves are all but certain to pay the luxury tax for a third straight season this year. That’ll mean at least a 50% tax on any dollars over the luxury barrier, and perhaps more — depending on the extent by which they surpass this year’s $241MM mark. Morton earned $15MM from 2019-21 and has been paid $20MM in each of the past three seasons in Atlanta. Even if he’s likely looking at a pay cut from that level, he should still be able to land a salary north of $10MM, barring an unexpected discount to pitch in a locale of his preference. For an Atlanta club also looking to upgrade at shortstop and add to the bullpen in the wake of Joe Jimenez’s injury, a hefty one-year price tag on what’d be a fourth or fifth starter for them when or if everyone is healthy might be a bridge too far. Per RosterResource, the Braves’ current luxury projection is already at $228MM — just $13MM shy of this year’s threshold.

If Morton does end up leaving the Braves, it’s likely he’ll land with a contending club. At age 41, he’s unlikely to sign on for any rebuilding efforts or to mentor a group of young arms. He’ll look for an opportunity to pitch in the middle of what already looks like a postseason staff, adding some stability and significantly raising the floor of a new club’s rotation.

Morton would also have the chance to reach some more personal milestones; Morton is 12 wins shy of 150 in his career and would have a realistic chance at moving into the top-70 all time in strikeouts (he’s currently 82nd). With a strong performance in 2025, he could also nudge his career ERA under 4.00. He entered the 2024 season at 4.00 flat and raised it to 4.01 with this season’s 4.19 performance.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/11/ ... raves.html

[Padres]

Nice to see his 110 ERA+ ZiPS projection but ...

Josh Sborz underwent right shoulder surgery last week and is expected to miss the first 2-3 months of next season.

With veteran closer Kirby Yates hitting free agency, Sborz would’ve been among the candidates vying for closing duties in Texas, but he’s going to wind up missing most of, if not all, of the first half of next season after undergoing a debridement procedure earlier this month to address a lingering right shoulder issue.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/josh-sborz/48430

[Padres]

Brewers general manager Matt Arnold told reporters at the Winter Meetings that Christian Yelich (back) is expected to be fully healthy for spring training.

It’s a positive update overall from Arnold as he added that Yelich hasn’t resumed swinging a bat yet, but has begun other baseball activities, and should be a full-go by the time spring training rolls around. The 33-year-old outfielder was excellent last year, registering a robust .909 OPS with 11 homers and 21 steals across 73 games, before undergoing season-ending back surgery in mid-August. He’s a high-end OF3 option for fantasy managers in redraft formats heading into 2025.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/christian-yelich/48159

[Padres]

Tigers signed RHP Alex Cobb to a one-year, $15 million contract.

The deal, which was agreed to earlier this week, is now official after Cobb passed his physical. The 37-year-old veteran hurler’s ongoing injury issues curtail his realistic upside for fantasy purposes, but he’s remained a viable streaming option for fantasy managers in recent years, especially in deeper mixed leagues. He was limited to just three starts last year with the division-rival Guardians due to hip, shoulder and blister issues. He’s unlikely to reverse a three-year decline in strikeout rate, but his above-average control remains intact. He’s probably best left on the waiver wire to open the year, but if he’s healthy there aren’t a ton of more pitcher-friendly ballparks than Detroit, especially in the early portion of the year when the temperatures are near the freezing mark.

The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reported that the Tigers have signed RHP Alex Cobb to a one-year contract.

The deal is pending a physical, which is important since Cobb struggled with injuries (again) in 2024, pitching just 16 1/3 innings for the Guardians after they acquired him from the Giants at the trade deadline. The 37-year-old does have a 3.84 career ERA in 233 MLB starts, so he will provide a reliable veteran presence for this young Tigers’ rotation and will likely be a useful fantasy starter when he’s healthy. However, it would be irresponsible for fantasy managers to expect a fully healthy season from Cobb in 2025.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/alex-cobb/49238

[Padres]

Brewers general manager Matt Arnold told reporters that Nestor Cortes (elbow) has had a “fully healthy offseason.”

Cortes was traded Friday to the Yankees in the three-player deal with New York for All-Star closer Devin Williams. Arnold said the Brewers did extensive work on his medicals, and expect the left-hander to be fully healthy for the Brew Crew heading into 2025. Cortes unfortunately will be “best” remembered in 2024 for giving up the grand slam to Freddie Freeman in Game 1, but the 30-year-old threw a career-high 174.1 innings with a 3.77 ERA and 162/39 K/BB prior to dealing with his flexor tendon injury at the end of the year.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/nestor-cortes/49224

Cortes, like Williams, is going to be a free agent after the 2025 season. Like Williams, he doesn’t operate like most other pitchers. But where Williams has an incomparable breaking pitch as his one weird trick, Cortes is all funk. He changes speeds and throws five or six different pitches, depending on what classification system you like. He varies his delivery endlessly, sometimes within an at-bat. He disrupts timing and uses elite command to avoid walks.

It doesn’t look like it should work, but it does. In his four-year stint with the Yankees from 2021-24, he’s compiled a 3.33 ERA, 3.68 FIP, and racked up 9.4 WAR despite intermittent injury problems. No one feels comfortable during a Cortes start, from opposing batters to his own team’s fans. He’s perpetually walking a tightrope to get hitters out with so-so raw stuff – and he manages that balancing act at a remarkable frequency.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/yankees-bre ... yone-wins/

[Padres]

Currently at pick 333 in draft champions leagues ADP, Hunter Goodman is currently my favorite deal at his price. A lot can go wrong with the free-swinging profile, but there is a ton of power in the bat and he is in Colorado which always helps with the BABIP. His ability to play in the outfield gives him the potential to rack up plate appearances in a way that normally only the top tiers of the position can. I only projected him for 400 plate appearances, but if he found his way to more, watch out!

https://fantasy.fangraphs.com/catcher-2 ... -rankings/

Much like Oakland did with the likes of Lawrence Butler and Darell Hernaiz, the Rockies have time to let their risky young players develop at the big league level. This paid dividends with Brenton Doyle in 2024 and could benefit any of the 2025 ETA prospects above, as well as Jordan Beck (I’m a skeptic) and Hunter Goodman (I’m an enthusiast), who aren’t rookies anymore.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/colorado-ro ... prospects/

[Padres]

Haven't seen his 2025 ZiPS yet but good news!

ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports the Giants and Justin Verlander are in agreement on a one-year, $15 million contract.

The Giants definitely needed at least one rotation addition, and Verlander remains a reasonable bet at age 42, even though last season with the Astros was pretty disastrous. The three-time Cy Young Award winner wound up with a 5.48 ERA in 17 starts before being left out of Houston’s postseason plans, but he was excellent in 2023 (3.22 ERA in 162 1/3 IP) and he just won a Cy Young in 2022 at age 39. He’ll join Logan Webb, Robbie Ray, Jordan Hicks and probably Kyle Harrison in the San Francisco rotation. It’s an ideal landing spot for fantasy purposes as Oracle Park remains one of the most pitcher-friendly venues in baseball. He’ll be a late-round pick in fantasy drafts this spring based on his track record alone.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/justin-verlander/48244

[Padres]

Obviously I was hopeful his 2025 ZiPS would be a bit better but I am holding onto him as I still a believer ...

When Jonathan Cannon was called up for his major league debut early last season, this site ran a story full of quotes from the start of spring training with the 24-year-old right-hander talking up the new power curveball he had spent the offseason developing.

The only wrinkle was that Cannon spent his debut spamming the Royals with newly learned sweepers instead.

The sweeper was just part of a new, decidedly east-west oriented arsenal built out for Cannon under Brian Bannister in the spring bullpen sessions together at Camelback Ranch, predicated on harnessing seam-shift effects with his sinker and changeup. For a player whose energy for adding and tweaking pitches was part of the appeal to the White Sox on draft night, has seen his arsenal bloat to six pitches or more at times, but is also such that coaches have to keep an eye out for his tinkering, it was very on-brand.

But a day before Cannon throws off a mound for the first time since last season, he has no new pitches to share. He wants his wandering days to be over.

“It’s a little bit of a relief. I feel like my whole career it’s been, ‘Hey you might want to think about adding this,’ or ‘This pitch might not be good enough.'” Cannon said. “I know exactly what I’m going to do; I’m not adding any pitching or subtracting any pitches, I’m really focusing on the pitches that I have and making them more consistent and making them a little better. Because I think my arsenal is really good as it is.”

That Cannon went from scuffling in Triple-A last April to 124⅓ major league innings of nearly league average work (92 ERA+) would be commendable enough on its own. And until the signing of Martín Pérez last week, the White Sox might not have had a better candidate to be their Opening Day starter besides Cannon, who considered departed ace Garrett Crochet “one of my best friends” and worked to mirror the way he studied opposing lineups.

But Bannister regularly evokes Logan Webb when discussing Cannon’s development, which doubles as an explanation for his bold projection that the 6-foot-6-inch righty will soon become one of the more reliable arms in the league, despite consistently below-average strikeout rates that call upon him to rigidly avoid walks and control the type of contact he induces. The faith is mutual; Cannon wouldn’t have gone through the tumult of trying to learn how to command new pitches in-season if he didn’t see big gains in his stuff. He’s just spent the winter trying to parse why they regularly felt nastier and more reliably located in innings 1-3 than frame 4-6.

“Sometimes my hand got a little bit late getting up, and that kind of caused my sweeper to back up, or spike it in the left-handed batter’s box,” Cannon said. “A lot of it was the arm the path. If you look at the video of when I first came up, I was really low with my arm slot, and I think that was one of the reasons why I got sent down. I had really dropped my arm slot and it was causing everything to flatten out a little bit and making everything a little bit easier to hit. When I came back up my arm slot was a little bit higher, it was a little bit easier to have consistency in those pitches. It made all my pitches a little bit better, which I think is a little bit counterintuitive as a sinker baller.”

But in this era of pitching, counterintuitive is often the goal. Seven years ago, a common story would be discussing a pitching prospect raising their arm slot to try to generate the most possible riding action on their four-seamer. Now, it’s about generating pitch movement that hitters aren’t used to seeing from certain angles. So Crochet throwing his four-seamers from a lower three-quarters sees some extra benefit from his flatter approach angle, and Cannon — while naturally a short-strider with a lower slot — sees his sinker play up when it comes from a higher, steeper release.

“It’s just a little bit tougher to track,” Cannon said. “For [hitters], that sinker is really barreling down on their hands and moving a lot more, it feels like, from that higher slot. From a lower slot, it almost goes up and then falls back down into the zone, and for whatever reason they tend to see that a little bit better. It’s different for everyone, but it’s finding that slot that’s a little bit more challenging on the hitters. Because I’m a big believer in the hitters tell you everything you need to know. The pitch might be really good on Trackman or analytically be really good, but if it’s getting hit a lot, it might not be very good.”

So if Cannon throwing off a mound for the first time around a month before he’s due to report to Camelback scans as later than other offseason preparation stories, it’s because he’s intentionally spent more time trying to build himself up physically for what’s hopefully another new professional career high in innings, with an emphasis on shoulder care. He doesn’t want to set more ambitious goals in January than staying healthy enough to make all his starts, but training to maintain his arm path for six innings per night, for six months out of the year, is a good example of health and effectiveness intertwining.

Pitching changes too much and too quickly, and Cannon is too curious to guarantee that this will keep him from adding something to his sinker/changeup/sweeper/four-seam/cutter mix in 2025, since Bannister has already stated that finding solutions to reduce left-handed slugging against him is a project he’s considering. But with all the permutations that lie ahead for a very unsettled White Sox roster, Cannon wants to be part of establishing a port in the storm.

“Spring training is going to be very competitive,” Cannon said. “Last year was obviously tough for everyone, including us. It definitely provides a lot of motivation. It comes down to putting in the work, putting ourselves in position every night to win a baseball game, and I think it comes down to everyone doing their job. For me specifically, I can only control what I do and that’s going out there every fifth day putting my team in position to win a game.”

https://soxmachine.com/2025/01/white-so ... t-in-2025/

[Padres]

Alex Cobb is dealing with hip inflammation.

Cobb has been shut down from throwing after receiving a PRP injection last week to address the issue. Tigers manager A.J. Hinch told reporters Tuesday it’s pushed him back about a month, which suggests he’ll open up the regular season on the injured list. While it’s not ideal that Cobb is already on the shelf, the Tigers weren’t in any way expecting to get 30 starts out of him and they have plenty of rotation options. This definitely increases the chances of Jackson Jobe starting off in the majors, but it’s still far from a lock, with two rotation spots available for Jackson Jobe, Casey Mize, Kenta Maeda, Brant Hurter, Keider Montero, Matt Manning and others.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/alex-cobb/49238/news

[Padres]

Rangers placed RHP Josh Sborz (shoulder) on the 60-day injured list.

Sborz underwent shoulder surgery at the end of November and was already expected to be out for the first three months of the season. The Rangers needed a spot on the 40-man roster after signing Luke Jackson, so Sborz was moved to the injured list to create that space.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/josh-sborz/48430

[Padres]

Geraldo Perdomo is not leaving Arizona any time soon. On Monday night, Mike Rodriguez reported that the Diamondbacks and their switch-hitting shortstop had agreed to a contract extension, which is for four years and $45 million, includes a club option for a fifth season, and starts in 2026, according to ESPN’s Jeff Passan. The 25-year-old Perdomo has just over three years of big league service time, so the deal will buy out his final two arbitration seasons and at least the first two years after he would’ve reached free agency. Perdomo was an All-Star in 2023, and he put up 2.0 WAR in 2024 despite an April knee injury that limited him to 98 games. He’s now set to spend the entirety of his 20s providing the Diamondbacks with a throwback blend of solid shortstop defense and an absolute refusal to swing the bat.

Perdomo got a cup of coffee in 2021 and played his first full season in 2022, running a 59 wRC+ that limited him to just 0.3 WAR. In 2023, he earned an All-Star nod on the back of a torrid, BABIP-fueled start that saw him with a 200 wRC+ on May 3. He quickly came back to earth, but ended up running a 117 wRC+ in the first half and a 74 wRC+ in the second half, for an overall mark of 98 and 2.3 WAR. Perdomo missed just over two months due to a torn meniscus in 2024, but he put up a 101 wRC+ and his second straight two-win season. Essentially, he’s been a bit better than league average for two seasons now, and that was enough to convince Arizona to lock him down for the entirety of his prime. Perdomo and the Diamondbacks had already avoided arbitration by agreeing on a $2.55 million salary for 2025, and the new deal will add a $5 million signing bonus to that. He’ll receive a $5 million salary in 2026, then $8 million in 2027, $11 million in 2028, and $13 million in 2029. The Diamondbacks also have a $15 million club option for 2030, with a $3 million buyout should they choose not to exercise it. There are also incentives for a top-10 finish in the MVP voting.

That’s a pretty big commitment, even bigger when you consider the fact that the Diamondbacks have shortstop Jordan Lawlar, whom Eric Longenhagen just ranked our 14th overall prospect. Let’s talk about why the Diamondbacks feel Perdomo is worth extending, even if it means blocking the best prospect in their system.

Personally, I think Perdomo is one of the most fascinating players in the game. He came up as a glove-first shortstop prospect, and he certainly looks the part, but the advanced defensive metrics have been split on his performance for his entire career.

Geraldo Perdomo Advanced Defensive Metrics

Year DRS FRV DRP
2022 -3 0 6.4
2023 -3 1 -3.4
2024 10 -1 4.2

For his first two seasons, DRS thought he was costing the Diamondbacks runs. Then in 2024, the season when he missed time due to a major leg injury, it thought he was one of the best shortstops in baseball. Statcast has pretty much seen him as neutral throughout his three-year career, while DRP thinks he’s been great with the exception of 2023. Clearly, though, the Diamondbacks believe in his defense.

On offense, Perdomo is just plain weird. I know I summarized his overall offensive performance earlier, and those numbers are pretty standard – he’s been right around league average for two straight seasons – but it’s important to understand how he got to those numbers. For starters, Perdomo cannot stop bunting. Over the past three seasons, Perdomo has laid down 66 bunts, the most in baseball. His 33 sac bunts are also the most in the game; only three other players have even reached 20. His 15 bunt hits rank eighth, but among the 61 players with at least six bunt hits over that period, his 23.8% bunt hit rate ranks dead last. Even more damning, he leads baseball with 52 foul bunts. According to Baseball Savant, those fouls have cost the Diamondbacks four runs. That’s the worst number in baseball.

The bunting is genuinely a problem, but it fits perfectly with Perdomo’s overall approach at the plate, because that approach could be best summed up as “Try with all your might to avoid swinging.” Perdomo is one of the most passive players in all of baseball. Our database goes back to 2002, and since then, Perdomo’s 39.2% swing rate ranks 48th out of the 1,129 batters with at least 1,000 plate appearances. That puts him in the fifth percentile. Over the past three seasons, it’s the sixth-lowest mark in the game. Perdomo is the exact kind of player whom Robert Orr’s SEAGER metric was built to expose. In 2024, SEAGER had him in the 77th percentile in terms of selectivity, but it put him in the second percentile in terms of taking hittable pitches. In other words, Perdomo’s unwillingness to swing at strikes is way more extreme than his ability to lay off balls.

Keep in mind that SEAGER was meant to assess a player’s ability to do damage, and, well, that’s just not Perdomo’s game. He runs some of the lowest contact quality numbers in baseball. However, he makes tons of contact. Not only that, but over the past two seasons, he’s run a foul rate of nearly 43%, one of the higher marks in the game. It’s nearly impossible to get him to swing and miss, even when he swings and doesn’t put the ball in play. So even though pitchers attack the zone like crazy, he runs excellent walk and strikeout rates. If I’m making it sound like every single part of Perdomo’s game is at one extreme or another, well, yeah, that’s pretty much how it is. His Baseball Savant sliders are either bright red or bright blue. He’s all patience, no power. He’s the rare player who runs an incredible squared-up rate but an unimpressive line drive rate. Because Perdomo puts tons of balls in play, he’ll always have the chance at posting a great BABIP and putting up a three- or four-win season, but unless he decides to try attacking the ball, there’s not much ceiling here.

I am so, so curious to see what it would look like if Perdomo were to start attacking the ball. He’s still young, and I really do think it’s possible that he has the capacity to be more than an average hitter. I’m sure the Diamondbacks remember clearly how well it worked out when he was pulling everything in sight at the beginning of the 2023 season, and maybe they’ll try to help him become that player again. Still, I don’t think we should expect that going forward. I think the Diamondbacks are paying for floor rather than ceiling. However he gets there, if Perdomo keeps performing like a two-win player, the contract will work out well for both sides. If he can remain a solid defender and a league-average bat, he’s a really useful player, even if he pushes Lawlar to third base. In the meantime, we all get to enjoy watching Perdomo live at the extremes in order to perform right at the mean.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/geraldo-per ... mondbacks/

[Padres]

Twins: OF Harrison Bader

Bader has done it on both sides of the ball, showing some surprising power and driving in runs while also playing an outstanding outfield. For a player who appeared to be signed as a fourth outfielder and insurance against a Byron Buxton injury, he’s been just about an everyday player in the early going. -- Matthew Leach

https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-newcomer-i ... -team-2025

[Padres]

Davis Martin is pitching for a special team whenever he takes the mound.

An obvious answer is, “Of course he is. It’s the White Sox.” They are stationed across the front of his jersey, and they are the team who selected Martin in the 14th round of the 2018 Draft. But the team being referenced in this instance is a bit smaller and, to be honest, far more important.

It’s his wife, Jenna, and his son, Doak. They are with him every home and road step of the way during the 2025 season, marking Martin’s first full campaign following Tommy John surgery in May 2023 after just three starts with Triple-A Charlotte.

“She wants to see all the stadiums,” Martin said of his wife. “Again, this thing only lasts so long. Even 10-year big leaguers say it ends eventually. We are trying to enjoy every day together and enjoy this experience together.”
Davis Martin

Doak, who is 1 1/2 years old, loves hotel rooms -- and any hotel close to an airport where he can see airplanes, according to his dad. But even as they were becoming a family of three, Jenna provided the support to get her husband through the good times and the tougher moments.

There was a rehab choice for the Martins after his Tommy John surgery, either stay in the Dallas area with Dr. Keith Meister or go to Arizona. For 14 months, the Martins went all in on Arizona, where Davis could be around the White Sox Camelback Ranch facility and the club’s training staff in Glendale. Jenna came with him and was about six months pregnant when they arrived in the unwelcoming Arizona heat of late May.

“She was in her third trimester, and Arizona broke the record for most 110-plus [degree] days in a row,” Martin said. “So she was like with an extra weight vest, and she was like, ‘I’m dying here.’ She grinded.”

Now, Martin is one of the White Sox rotation staples, with a 4.01 ERA over eight games (seven starts). The 28-year-old, amid his third big league season and the White Sox latest rebuild, could eventually become a trade target.

But like so many other players and their families in this situation, the Martins aren’t worried about next month, or maybe even next week. It’s a concept stemming from his nine trips up and down from the Majors to the Minors in 2022.

“Four doubleheaders and five options,” said Martin with a wry smile. “Whatever happens, happens. That’s our mindset. We are not getting too far ahead of us.

“We are enjoying the day-to-day, the off days, the traveling. Whatever that may be, and wherever we are at the end of the year, it’s where we are. We are having a good time and enjoying the fact that we are here together.”

Jenna was an outside hitter for the Texas Tech volleyball team, the same school for which Davis posted a 21-9 record and a 3.50 ERA over 45 games (40 starts) in three collegiate seasons. He gives his wife the nod as the far better athlete, hoping their son gets her traits in that area.

Her competitive nature and loving support guided Davis through the rigors of Tommy John recovery to where they can now celebrate success as a family.

“People don’t understand, a lot of times, what happens to us usually trickles down into the family as well,” Martin said. “With Tommy John, the inability to do anything really, like you are pretty much stagnant.

“You kind of almost feel like a waste of space sometimes. I credit her for being the one who picked me up, brushed me off and said, ‘Hey, this is what we are doing. This is why we are doing it. I’m here. Your son is here.’ Without her support, I think that Tommy John would have been pretty awful.”

As a die-hard Eagles fan who is still celebrating Super Bowl championship dominance, Davis jokes how he would like to name their next child Saquon or Saquonda in honor of running back Saquon Barkley and his more than 2,000 yards rushing this past season. He’s not winning that battle, despite Jenna also being a fan of Barkley.

With Mother’s Day approaching Sunday, they simply are celebrating what they have presently.

“To finally be in a position where we are able to fully enjoy this thing together and be in one spot for a little bit, it’s been truly incredible,” Martin said. “We are doing this thing together and enjoying everything the big leagues have to offer for both of us.

“She’s an incredible companion. She always pushed me to be my best version of myself, whether that’s picking me up or keeping me humble. … I know she’s proud of me, but I couldn’t do it without her.”

https://links.mlb.mlbemail.com/s/vb/cTH ... dIbbA2iu/8

[Padres]

Recently, I’ve had to re-evaluate a strongly held belief. It’s an important thing for responsible adults to do every now and then; even if the opinion wasn’t wrong at the time, conditions can change. And I’m not too proud to identify such a situation now.

Here’s the old take, the one I’m revising now: Jeremy Peña is the most overrated player in baseball. At the time, it made sense. But it definitely doesn’t now.

Peña came to national attention at a portentous place in space and time. The Houston Astros had just let go of their superstar shortstop, Carlos Correa, the one-time future face of the franchise, their homegrown talisman. Peña, a 24-year-old rookie, stepped right up and filled those enormous shoes rather well, all things considered.

He played 136 games in 2022, hitting .253/.289/.426 with 22 homers. He won a Gold Glove and, more notably, was named MVP of both the ALCS and World Series. And Peña was terrific in the playoffs; he hit .345 with four home runs in 13 games. He had at least one base hit in 12 of those games, and scored a run in 10 of them.

The rookie shortstop homered for the only run of the 18-inning marathon Game 3 of the ALDS, which put the Astros through to the next round. In the final three games of the World Series, in which the Astros overhauled a 2-1 deficit on the road, Peña went 7-for-13, including a fourth-inning home run in Game 5 that put the Phillies on the back foot for good.

Forget replacing Correa; now you’ve got this lean, right-handed-hitting rookie shortstop with 20-homer power and a flair for clutch moments, playing a pivotal role on a World Series-winning team. What is that if not 1996 Derek Jeter?

That hype never seemed credible to me. Sure, he had 20-homer power, but that’s only so useful for a player with a sub-.300 OBP. And the Gold Glove-caliber defense? Well, DRS absolutely adores Peña, but other advanced defensive metrics are more lukewarm. I’ve seen plus-15-run defense at shortstop before, and it looks like Andrelton Simmons or a young Francisco Lindor; Peña seemed more pedestrian.

Over the first three full seasons of his career, Peña posted a 100 wRC+ while averaging 16 home runs and 3.0 WAR per year. That’s a good player! A valuable supplemental starter on a World Series winner, for sure. But there are a ton of really good shortstops in the league right now, some — Lindor, Corey Seager, Bobby Witt Jr., Gunnar Henderson — with truly game-breaking skill sets. A league-average hitter with some major offensive flaws, with above-average defense at best? That didn’t excite me very much by comparison.

Halfway through the 2025 season, however, Peña is leading all shortstops in WAR.

Shortstop isn’t quite as productive a position this season as it was last year; at this point in 2024, the top three shortstops in WAR were Henderson, Witt, and Mookie Betts, and all three are having somewhat disappointing campaigns in 2025. But Peña isn’t just beating out scrubs here. Witt, Trea Turner, and Jacob Wilson are all on pace for more than 6.0 WAR; Wilson is almost hitting .350, for God’s sake.

Elly De La Cruz has 18 home runs and 21 stolen bases, which puts him on track to become just the seventh shortstop ever to post a 30-30 season. And he’s not too far from being on pace for 40-40, a feat achieved by only one shortstop ever: Alex Rodriguez.

But Peña, whom I’d once dismissed as hitting for an empty average, is now toting around a .325/.380/.495 batting line and a 150 wRC+, which leads all qualified shortstops in 2025. His 4.0 WAR, having played in all 81 of Houston’s games this year, is “in the MVP discussion” territory at the very least. Whatever I thought about Peña before, I don’t think it’s possible to overrate a player who’s produced the way he has so far this season.

It seems that Peña himself has chosen this moment to reconsider his place in the league-wide pecking order. He and the Astros are (or were) in negotiations for a contract extension that would’ve bought out his final two arbitration years, plus three seasons of free agency. Five total, at a little north of $20 million per.

Just this week, however, Peña switched agents, from Beverly Hills Sports Council to the dreaded Scott Boras. Which doesn’t mean Peña won’t sign an extension — Boras seems to get along well with Houston, having locked Jose Altuve and Lance McCullers Jr. into long-term extensions there — but it does indicate Peña is seeking top dollar for his services.

What should Peña be asking for? Well, as a college player who didn’t debut until he was 24, Peña got a little bit of a late start on the march toward free agency, but he’s also been a starter since Opening Day of his rookie year, which makes his service time calculation quite easy.

If Peña doesn’t sign an extension, he’ll hit free agency heading into his age-30 season. He’ll be two years older than Seager, one year older than Dansby Swanson, and the same age as Turner when they were free agents. Mostly, that means he won’t be in line for the kind of ludicrously long-term contracts Juan Soto and Bryce Harper got.

But if he’s this productive at the end of his 20s, big money is still very much a possibility. If I had to choose, I’d have this version of Peña over Swanson in his walk year, and the latter still got a seven-year contract as the fourth-best shortstop in his class. For that matter, I could see Peña going into free agency as Turner with better defense but worse baserunning. He’d need to keep hitting like this for more than three months, but it’s a much more realistic possibility than it was this time last year.

The sky is the limit. The big question now is whether Peña, a true talent 100 wRC+ guy for three years, is now a true-talent 150 wRC+ guy.

Probably not. Peña has unquestionably made massive improvements at the plate over the course of his major league career. Just off the top of my head, he’s cut his strikeout rate from 24.2% as a rookie to 17.1% last year and 16.0% this year — that’s a reduction of more than a third. And for a hitter who doesn’t walk and doesn’t have top-end power, not striking out is a major plus.

But while Peña’s improvements are real and meaningful, I do think they’re somewhat overstated by the top-line numbers. In the olden days, we’d talk about his .364 BABIP, but I find this graph of his wOBA (.381) versus his xwOBA (.347) to be most illuminating.

A wOBA in the high .340s is still great, especially for a shortstop, but it’s not what’s showing up in the box score right now. José Ramírez has a .379 wOBA right now; once you get down around .350 you’re looking at Zach Neto.

And Peña isn’t making particularly harder contact. He’s not putting the ball in the air more — in fact, his groundball/line drive/fly ball ratios are eerily similar to what they were last year.

Miscellaneous Underlying Offensive Stats
Season GB/FB LD% GB% FB% Bat Speed Contact% HardHit% Barrel%
2024 1.57 19.2% 49.4% 31.5% 72.6 mph 77.1% 38.8% 5.4%
2025 1.58 19.8% 49.0% 31.1% 72.4 mph 75.9% 41.3% 7.7%

Just looking at the numbers, it seems like Peña has made a number of marginal gains — a few more walks here, a little more selectivity within the strike zone there — that have combined to pay off big.

Plus, there’s one big one: The fabled in-air pull rate. Last year, 15.2% of Peña’s batted balls were in the air and to the pull side; this year, that percentage is up to 20.1%.

The implications of that change are staggering for a right-handed hitter who plays his home games in Daikin Park. The Crawford Boxes are so close to home plate Peña can probably see the pores of the fans sitting in the left field seats.

So far this year, Peña has hit 48 balls 300 feet or more. Of those, 22 have been to the pull side, including 16 out of Peña’s 20 base hits on balls of that distance, and all 11 of his home runs.

If you’re worried about the discrepancy between Peña’s wOBA and his xwOBA, this is a pretty powerful counterargument for two reasons. First, xwOBA accounts for launch angle and exit velo, but not batted ball direction. So a hitter who puts his fly balls into a particularly profitable area of the field, as Peña does, ought to naturally outperform his expected stats to some degree.

Second, there’s a very clear explanation for how Peña is doing this. And believe it or not, it comes from a place that’s so narratively fitting you almost couldn’t make it up.

Last year, Peña came to the plate with his feet square and his bat wobbling between one and two o’clock. His leg kick naturally brought his front foot closer to the plate, resulting in his momentum going toward right center.

You want Jeter? This swing is Jeter as all get-out. Any more Jeter and it’d come with a gift basket.

But it’s also kind of like stepping in the bucket. It’s the bucket in the left-handed batter’s box, but still, Peña’s momentum was not going straight back toward the pitcher.

This year, instead of trying to correct his stride, Peña is just starting with his bat on his shoulder, his stance open, and his feet farther apart.

It looks to me like he’s keeping his weight back longer as well, but what’s indisputable is that he’s now striding directly toward the pitcher. That means he can pull the ball without fighting his body weight, and allows him to take greater advantage of that great architectural gift out in left field.

Now here’s the fun part, from a feature in The Athletic this week by Chandler Rome. Peña landed on the new stance over the winter, during a session with his new workout buddy: Carlos Correa. How cool is that?

It took a couple years, and some tinkering, but Peña is now indisputably the kind of player he was thought to be as a rookie. He’s been the best position player by a mile on the team with the second-best record in the AL. He’s going to be an All-Star, and barring a massive second-half regression he ought to vacuum up down-ballot MVP votes. The hype, if anything, was not big enough.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/more-like-jeremy-payin-ya/

[Padres]

You got to be shitting me ...

Guardians placed RHP Luis Ortiz on non-disciplinary paid leave

We don’t yet know the reason why Ortiz was placed on non-disciplinary leave, but we do know that he will be out through the All-Star break because of an MLB investigation. We’ll await more details, but Ortiz can be dropped in most leagues since he will be out for three weeks at least. He was supposed to start tonight against the Cubs, but now Joey Cantillo will instead.

https://www.nbcsports.com/mlb/luis-ortiz/48607

Guardians pitcher Luis Ortiz has been placed on “non-disciplinary paid leave” through the end of the All-Star break as a result of an MLB investigation, the league announced Thursday morning.

MLB said in a statement it would not comment further until the conclusion of the investigation.

Ortiz had been scheduled to start for the Guardians on Thursday night against the Cubs at Wrigley Field. Joey Cantillo will be promoted from Triple-A Columbus to start instead.

The Guardians released the following statement: “The Guardians have been notified by Major League Baseball that Luis Ortiz has been placed on leave per an agreement with the Players Association due to an ongoing league investigation. The Guardians are not permitted to comment further at this time, and will respect the league’s confidential investigative process.”

Ortiz, acquired in a trade with the Pirates in November, owns a 4.36 ERA in 16 starts this year. The 26-year-old played for Pittsburgh from 2022-24.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/647132 ... stigation/

[Padres]

Guardians Slade Cecconi is down to a 3.44 ERA in 10 starts after a great outing in Houston (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 2 BB, 9 K). There’s some regression coming against right-handed hitters, where he isn’t missing many bats, but he’s riding his new sinker and stellar command to a fresh start with the Guardians. While Location+ looks at Cecconi favorably (104), I would be curious to see his miss distances to righties. He’s thrown 61% of his pitches on the outer third to them this season, where the league average is just 44% (right on right). His shadow rate isn’t exceptional, he’s moreso just sitting away from righties but still in the zone to elicit swings. There’s also very little miss back over the heart of the plate with these away targets on his pretty two-plane four-seamer. This is likely how he can run a 9.5% swinging-strike rate with a <4% barrel rate since June.

Cecconi feels like a comfortable sub-4 ERA pitcher rest of the way. If there’s any easy edge left in pitching development, it’s taking mediocre major leaguers from teams that are more average to below average at development (the Diamondbacks) and finding a tweak. The Guardians did this exceptionally well with Cecconi. The DBacks retooled their pitching department at the major league level this most recent season. I think they’re aware of their past faults.

https://substack.com/home/post/p-167966988

[Padres]

Davis Martin, Chicago White Sox (4% rostered)

Martin is the kind of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde starter that can be hard to stomach on good teams, let alone on a team like the White Sox.

So, why is he here? I’m not entirely sure, but all I can say is that I like him.

Here’s the Jekyll-and-Hyde act in action: Martin had, by FanGraphs’ Game Score metric, one of his worst starts of the season on Tuesday, allowing five earned runs—including two homers—in a loss to the Mariners. And yet, in that same start Martin also generated 17 swinging strikes, including nine (of just 21!) on his cutter. In the start before that, Martin matched Cristopher Sanchez with 14 whiffs. The start prior to that one? A complete dud, both in terms of missing bats and suppressing runs.

In fact, Martin has made 16 starts this year, and eight of the 16 have been considered below average by Game Score. That means the other half have been above average. And some of his best starts have come against good offenses like the Red Sox, Mariners and Phillies. On any given day, you’re not really sure which Davis Martin is going to show up.

That can certainly be viewed as a bug, but in deep fantasy leagues I prefer to view it as a feature. I want a guy who can spike a brilliant start, especially at this point in the season where I may only be on the hunt for certain categories. Does he fit everyone’s needs? No, not many guys available in 96 percent of leagues do. But could he be an asset for the right team? I think so.

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/fant ... 5-week-19/

[Padres]

Likely the IBC Padres starting 1B in 2026 ...

He signed the summer before, but Lenyn Sosa's professional career otherwise lines up with Chris Getz's tenure in the White Sox front office. Getz's first year as the organization's farm director in 2017 saw Sosa debut as a skinny 17-year-old shortstop fresh out of Venezuela whose complex league stat line stood out for the most rudimentary reasons.

"He's always had contact ability," Getz said. "When we were around him at 17 years old, I mean, there were always a lot of positives. You could tell he was a guy that was looking forward to getting in the box. That's a good sign. Not everyone had that trait about them. But we've always believed in the player, and most importantly he's believed in himself."

In many ways, Sosa's present at age 25 can obscure his origins.

His contact skills are still evident in his 22.1 percent career strikeout rate, because someone with merely average bat-to-ball ability would be completely sunk by the aggression (41.2 percent career chase rate) that is a hallmark of Sosa's offensive game. His 2022 big league debut came after he had transformed his body and swing, both filling out his lower half and loading into his back hip to develop more power. His torrid stretch since the All-Star break, which has seen him hit .289/.336/.526 with seven home runs in 26 games, has similarly stood out for its pop.

But considering this emergence of pull-side power has turned a year that could have been Sosa's South Side swan song -- after being sent down to Triple-A eight separate times over the last three seasons, he's out of options in 2025 -- into one where he's bulldozed his way into the regular big league playing time that's eluded him for years, perhaps it's a testament to his self-belief.

"I've been working on that for a very long time, for the last two or three years," Sosa said via interpreter of his work to catch the ball out front. "But everything takes time, right? Now we're seeing those results, but the work started a long time ago."

Everything does take time, but Sosa's offensive progression has taken the adage of player development isn't linear and seemingly merged it with the night is darkest just before the dawn. After slashing .373/.398/.566 last September, albeit with an inflated BABIP and his typically gnarly strikeout-to-walk ratio, and immolating the Venezuelan Winter League (slugging .765 over 25 games), Sosa entered spring convinced he was finally positioned to stick.

His option status certainly provided an extra reason for assurance, and remains a relevant item as the White Sox try to accommodate playing time for Sosa, Curtis Mead and Chase Meidroth. But Sosa dove into using the Trajekt machine in spring to improve his traditionally suspect plate discipline and secured a roster spot with a performance that saw him walk as many times (5) in Cactus League as any single month of the 2024 season. The straightforward explanation he provided for embracing the new tech could double as ad copy for the machine.

"It can help me a lot because I'm basically facing the pitcher I'm going to face that day, and that gives you a better understanding of how his pitches move and all his stuff, and puts you in a better position to face the pitcher during the game," Sosa said via interpreter in spring.

And at the 45-game mark of his season, Sosa was swinging at an unthinkable 49.1 percent of pitches outside of the strike zone per Statcast. Merging his contact skills with a horrible diet of swing decisions was producing the brand of offense that could see him lead the team in hits and also provide replacement-level production: .265/.283/.368.

Paired with defensive foibles that have seen him slide all the way down the infield spectrum, with Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) pillorying his work at second base this year (-8), Sosa's worst moments can make his on-field decision-making look too reactive for him to ever thrive at the major league level. He's familiar with those moments too, having lived through them, but has decided against them taking up permanent residence in any stage of his development.

"The most important thing for us as major league players is our capacity to bounce back," Sosa said via interpreter. "If you have a bad game, if you have a bad at-bat, if you make a mistake, you have to be able to put that in the past right away and focus on what's next. If you're able to do that, which I have been and it's one of the reasons I feel like I belong here -- not just because of the results but because I've been able to control that -- that's the key."

Since that 45-game point, Sosa has now hit .278/.314/.496 (121 wRC+) with a comfortably above-average 46.4 percent hard-hit rate over a meaningful sample of 245 plate appearances. His 37.2 percent chase rate over that span is both a massive improvement, and roughly about as aggressive as Luis Robert Jr. when he was a rookie. That puts him firmly in a territory where he'll still produce at-bats too kamikaze in nature to resemble someone who is locked in, but just measured enough that his manager can start pulling out some logical threads while observing them in bulk.

"He regulates it," Will Venable said. "We know he's aggressive and we know there's chase in there, but we've seen early in the count where he takes a step back and gathers information and might seem passive early in the count, even getting to two strikes, then doing damage after two strikes. For him, it's balancing that out day to day, at-bat to at-bat, knowing he's ready to go but knowing when it's time to kind of scale back and get some information and see some pitches."

Obviously that balance is always going to be tenuous. It's hard for a hitter this aggressive to avoid streaky production. Nothing puts that to the test quite like preparing an article about Sosa, only to watch him post his first three-strikeout in almost two months, followed by back-to-back showings where he homers but it's also his only hit of the game. The instability of his defensive home, lack of minor league options and arbitration eligibility after 2026 makes it hard to discern if he'll be traded in the offseason to clear a logjam, or make a surprise appearance for the Savannah Bananas at wherever the Sox are playing in 2048.

While the first half of this past White Sox season saw an under-talented offensive group wrest meager gains from being more patient and disciplined, the second half has been dedicated to trying to convince opposing teams that they are aggressive enough to punish attempts to challenge them in the strike zone.

In that second goal, Sosa can find a fit for his skill set quite easily. He's not a perfect player, nor even a model for others to follow, but there will be no uniform way to attack a White Sox lineup so long as he's involved. If the end goal in spamming offspeed pitches is always to make hitters hesitant, and eventually get them off fastball timing, Sosa's purpose is simply to be the one who never stops charging ahead.

"The pitchers know that I'm aggressive, they're going to try to get me chasing," Sosa said. "At the same time, I know that being aggressive is going to put me in an advantage position against them. I haven't lost my aggressiveness and I obviously use it to my advantage."

It's gotten him this far. He's been slowed, but he's never been stopped, and while unstoppable is usually reserved for more dominant, dynamic displays of baseball force, it's only befitting of Sosa when it's achieved by grudging admission.

https://soxmachine.com/2025/08/lenyn-so ... -to-relent

[Padres]

Friday night's matchup of Carlos Rodón versus Yoendrys Gómez actually features two starting pitchers facing the organization that gave them their first pro contract.

Gómez was just 16 years old when the Yankees signed him out of Venezuela in 2016, beginning his slow climb through their farm system that did not culminate in a major league look until 2023. From there, the right-hander has been bouncing between the minors and majors, burning through his option years, never catching on for more than relief work in the latter until this month with the White Sox.

In Gómez's 115 minor league appearances over the last eight years, 107 of them were starts, and his role preference is clear.

"Being a starter, it comes with a huge responsibility," Gómez said via interpreter. "And I just like it."

The three starts Gómez has strung together for the White Sox (18 IP, 15 H, 7 ER, 7 BB, 18 K, HR, 3.50 ERA) are the first three of his big league career, and Friday would seemingly offer the opportunity for the 25-year-old to show to his old organization what they missed out on. But after what Gómez has experienced in 2025 -- designated for assignment by the Yankees in late April because he was out of options, then DFA'd by the Dodgers again two weeks later, and finally once more by these same Sox after a brief bullpen cameo in May -- the rejection he felt was more far-reaching.

"Every time a team DFAs you, you feel like you're near the end of your career, and that was how I felt," Gómez said.

The White Sox, having already endured their share of former players flourishing with more resourced organizations like the Dodgers and Yankees, tried to look at Gómez's travails -- clearly influenced by his option situation and the loaded 40-man rosters he was a part of -- a little differently.

"The stuff has always been there," said pitching coach Ethan Katz. "That’s why a lot of teams have had him this year."

Parsing why a shot in a big league rotation hasn't been in the cards for Gómez until he reached the last place White Sox doesn't require much beyond looking at his walk numbers. He's walked 11 percent of hitters throughout his 130 career Triple-A innings, with no dissipating in his major league action (11.7 percent).

The Sox saw an unfortunate confluence of Gómez narrowing his arsenal to mostly four-seamers and sweepers against big league competition, and an inability to be as fine with his command as such a limited arsenal requires.

"There were signs of nibbling, trying to be too fine," Katz said. "The arsenal wasn’t really complete for us. So he had a chance to add on to his arsenal, which when we first acquired him, we were excited to start that process. The added pitches we’ve been able to accomplish, throwing a ton more strikes right now, confidence is there."

Gómez's return to the majors has seen him peppering in more cutters and changeups, but perhaps most strikingly a sinker that he had never thrown in big league action before. The presence of second fastball to work with has given opposing hitters more shapes to consider in the strike zone, and provided Gómez with a Plan B.

"Every day you feel different with your pitches," Gómez said via interpreter. "One day, one is worker better than the other and you have to go with that one. The next day, for one reason or another, a different one works."

"Him adding on to his arsenal has enabled him to navigate through righties and lefties and go deep in the game and pound the strike zone," Katz said. "He’s been great to see two different versions of him in his time up here. Now this as a starter is really exciting for us."

The league average for pitches seen in the strike zone is 52.5 percent this year for pitchers, according to Statcast. With his new arsenal, Gómez has been at 52.1 percent over his last three starts with the White Sox, after never cracking 50 before in any of his major league stints.

Jonathan Cannon's most recent work in Charlotte could have him back in Chicago this year, and Will Venable's praise for Gómez's has come alongside allusions to the right-hander returning to multi-inning relief work by the end of the season.

"His early usage has not put us in a spot where he's top of the list of guys we can worry about exceeding innings limits," Venable said of Gómez, who has 79 innings pitched on the year. "He should be in a good spot to just continue on here, whether that's a start or in the bullpen. We know he's got innings left."

But now, the combination of Gómez's available innings and unavailable options are not a ticket to the waiver wire, but a reason to keep him around now that he's shown that he can provide serviceable work. And more than he lauded any of his new pitches or stated his desire to keep starting, Gómez appreciates the investment that was placed in his talent.

"The people here, the coaches here have put more faith in me, trying to make me better," Gómez said. "For different reasons, they told me to add those pitches, sinker, changeup, cutter. They made me a starter again. It has been important for me to be able to control and expand my repertoire, because as a starter you need all your pitchers rather than just two or three, like I was using before."

And in light of that investment, Gómez wants to provide a return.

"You see a team that takes a chance on you and shows interest in you, you appreciate that and try to make the best of that opportunity. That's why I'm so grateful that this organization gave me the chance to be in a situation where I feel I can do a good job."

https://soxmachine.com/2025/08/after-th ... ral_thread