Major League Baseball

Major League Baseball

The Rockies announced the hiring of Tommy Tanous as assistant general manager today. Tanous has spent the past 15 years in the Mets' scouting department. He will focus on scouting and player development with Colorado. Thomas Harding of MLB.com was first to report the hiring. Tanous was most recently vice president of player evaluation and special advisor to the president of baseball operations in New York. He'd been with the club since 2010.

"There's a lot of teams (from which) we have taken incoming calls," president of baseball operations AJ Preller told reporters, as relayed by Acee. "...It's nice when people are calling you, and they have interest in your players. At least then, you have some options. But I think the focus has been on the starting pitching and how do we fill that without taking away from the bullpen or from the lineup."

In late July, before a game against the Boston Red Sox, Bryce Harper sat slumped in a chair in the Philadelphia Phillies clubhouse, a baseball bat in hand. Philadelphia was the latest stop on Rob Manfred's leaguewide speaking tour; ahead of a CBA negotiation that virtually everyone in baseball expects to involve a 2027 work stoppage, the MLB commissioner spent the summer visiting all 30 teams, trying to get players on board with his plans to restructure the league's economics. When the subject of a salary cap came up late in the meeting, Harper rose from his seat. He walked closer to Manfred until their noses almost touched, and told the commissioner that if Manfred wanted to talk salary cap, he could "get the fuck out of our clubhouse."

Soto, 30, spent the 2025 season split between the Baltimore Orioles and New York Mets. In his tenure with the American League East team, the lefty posted a 3.96 ERA and 3.33 FIP in 36.1 innings pitched, with a 27.5 K% and an 11.3 BB%. Before the 2025 trade deadline, he was sent to the Mets, where he had a 4.50 ERA and 3.55 FIP in 24 innings pitched, with a 21.8 K% and 5 BB%.

Between 2016-17, Lamb connected on 59 home runs. He reached 30 doubles in both seasons and combined for 13 triples. The lefty-hitting infielder posted a .248/.345/.498 slash in more than 1200 plate appearances. Lamb was worth around six to seven wins above replacement over that stretch, and he earned an All-Star selection in 2017. He popped 30 homers and drove in 105 runs in his career season, one of 19 players to reach 30 homers and 100 RBI that year.

The draft lottery is over and the order for the 2026 MLB Draft is pretty much set at this point, with the exception of picks moving around due to free agent signings. The Atlanta Braves are set to pick with the 9th pick, their own first round pick, and the 26th pick, which is the one they are receiving for Drake Baldwin's Rookie of the Year.

Carlos Narvaez had a solid rookie season and emerged as Boston's top option behind the plate in 2025. However, the Red Sox have been linked to J.T. Realmuto's market, so there is some indication that the Sox aren't entirely set at the catching position. Along those same lines, MassLive.com's Sean McAdam reports that the club shown some interest in reuniting with ex-Boston prospect , though "nothing is close now" between the Red Sox and White Sox.

The Brewers are getting calls about right-handed reliever as teams around the league look for under-the-radar bullpen help, per Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon of The Athletic. Milwaukee has also gotten plenty of interest in closer Trevor Megill and ace Freddy Peralta this winter. There's no indication the Brewers are especially motivated to part with any of the bunch. Mears, 29, landed with the Brewers ahead of the 2024 trade deadline in a deal sending pitchers Bradley Blalock and Yujanyer Herrera back to the Rockies.

The Phillies are going to acquire right-hander Yoniel Curet from the Rays. Right-hander Tommy McCollum is going the other way. The Rays designated the Curet for assignment recently to open a roster spot when they signed outfielder Cedric Mullins. Philadelphia's 40-man roster count jumps from 34 to 35. Reporter Mike Rodriguez first noted that Curet was going to Philly. Matt Gelb of The Athletic reported on McCollum's inclusion.

There was a lot of optimism that perhaps Giménez could return to the form he had in 2022 when he slashed .297/.371/.466 with 17 home runs in 557 plate appearances. His month of March was encouraging, as he hit three home runs in his first five games, but his play dropped like a rock from there. As a whole, the second baseman slashed .210/.285/.313 with seven home runs in 369 plate appearances for a career-worst 70 wRC+.

Before joining the Blue Jays' organization, Duncan was drafted in the first round of the 2003 draft, but unfortunately never made the big leagues. He retired as a player in 2012, coached in college for a bit, then joined the Yankees' minor league system as their hitting coach. After that, Duncan served as the Miami Marlins hitting coach from 2020-22, joining the organization in the 2018/19 off-season.

The club doesn't intend to shop Castillo during this year's winter meetings, reports Adam Jude of the Seattle Times. The 32-year-old Castillo delivered steady results last season, pitching to a 3.54 ERA over 32 starts. He topped 175 innings for the third straight year. Castillo's strikeout rate fell to a career-low 21.7%, but he countered the downturn with a career-best 6.2% walk rate. The veteran has now improved his walk rate in each of the past four seasons.

The Dodgers handed Tanner Scott $72 million last winter. It hasn't worked out. So, on Tuesday, the Dodgers handed Edwin Díaz $69 million. If the Dodgers are going to be Exhibit A for Walter's rival owners to cry about how desperately they need a salary cap, bring it on. If Walter's rival owners demand that players be locked out next winter and not be allowed back until they relent and accept a salary cap, well, bring that on too.

The Mariners struck gold with last winter's re-signing of Jorge Polanco on a $6MM free agent deal. They attributed his down 2024 season to a knee injury that had required postseason meniscus surgery. The switch-hitting infielder rewarded their faith by connecting on 26 home runs with a .265/.326/.495 slash across 524 plate appearances. Polanco has certainly put himself in position for a more lucrative trip this time around.

The question going into next season, naturally, is just how much the team has available to spend, and the answer appears to be that same $211MM-$221MM range. " We anticipate payroll will remain at a similar level to last year....We're operating the club as we have for the last five or six years," Padres chairman John Seidler told the San Diego Union-Tribune's Kevin Acee and other reporters on Monday at the Winter Meetings.

Diaz returned to the open market this winter, opting out of the final two seasons of the record-breaking five-year, $102MM contract he signed with the Mets the last time he was a free agent. The right-hander had been guaranteed $38MM over the final two seasons of that contract, so by opting out and testing the market, he secured himself an additional one year and $31MM in guarantees.

An 11-year veteran, Matz lands a multi-year deal with Tampa after spending the past four years with the St. Louis Cardinals and the Boston Red Sox. Signing a four-year deal with the Cards following the 2021 season, Matz made just 10 starts (15 appearances) in his first campaign in the NL Central, authoring a 5.25 ERA and a 3.78 FIP across 48 innings, as injuries saw him make fewer starts and position him more into a bullpen role during the length of his contract.

Castro landed the final spot on MLBTR's ranking of the offseason's top 50 free agents, with a prediction of a two-year, $14MM contract as Castro enters his age-29 season. The multi-year pact reflects Castro's extreme versatility as a player who has lined up at every position but catcher over his seven Major League seasons. While Castro is an average defender at best, his ability to at least capably handle multiple spots around the diamond makes him a bit of a Swiss Army knife type

Even as general manager Mike Hazen continues to downplay the possibility of a trade, Diamondbacks second baseman Ketel Marte is one of the most talked-about players around baseball's Winter Meetings at the moment. Hazen has called a trade unlikely, stating that despite far more public chatter this offseason, the amount of interest he's receiving in Marte is in line with the robust interest he's received in past offseasons.

Bellinger spent the first six seasons of his MLB career with the Dodgers, and had a wildly successful time through his first four seasons. He won an MVP in 2019, and maintained an OPS above .775 through all four years. After the 2020 season, though Bellinger's numbers took a huge dip. He had a collective .611 OPS in 2021 and 2022, recording 29 homers and 104 RBIs across both seasons - numbers he surpassed in his MVP season alone.

It's not a commentary on Tarik; it's more of a blanket approach to building a winning organization. My job is to make this organization better ... which means that I need to listen to every opportunity, no matter how likely or unlikely it is to actually happen. I've got to listen because we've got to get better as an organization, so that's our approach.

Scott heads to Orange County after four seasons as the lead pitching coach with the Rockies. He'd previously spent two years as Colorado's bullpen coach and had been in the organization dating back to 2009. The 57-year-old's time in professional baseball began with the Angels. He signed as an undrafted free agent with the franchise in 1990 and made 16 relief appearances for the '93 team. That wound up being his only MLB action amidst a decade-long minor league career.

It's a logical position for a PBO to take, since you never know when a team might emerge with an outlandish trade offer that is too good to pass up. Reports indicate that Skubal is unlikely to be dealt, both because the Tigers' "asking prices are enormous" (as per ESPN's Buster Olney) and because keeping Skubal atop the rotation obviously gives Detroit a much better chance of winning the World Series in 2026.