SAN ANTONIO, Texas — At first glance, the Los Angeles Angels’ trade for Jorge Soler appeared ill-conceived. Soler’s primary position for the past eight seasons was designated hitter. Why acquire him from the Atlanta Braves — and pay him $13 million in each of the next two seasons — when the oft-injured Mike Trout and Anthony Rendon both might require time at DH?
As often is the case, there’s more to the story.
Trout said in September he was open to moving to an outfield corner and serving more frequently as a DH. The Angels, however, would prefer to use him as a DH only on a limited basis, according to sources familiar with the club’s thinking. Rendon performed poorly even when healthy last season, and likely will not play regularly.
While making Trout a DH might sound like a step toward keeping him healthy, the Angels aren’t so sure. Trout’s three most recent injuries were left ribcage inflammation in 2022, a left hamate fracture in ’23 and a torn meniscus in his left knee in ’24. Each of those issues stemmed, at least in part, from the act of swinging, club officials believe.
Most DHs use their down time to take additional practice swings. Trout, a perfectionist, almost certainly would, too. Playing corner outfield is not without risk, most notably when players make sudden stops going after balls down the line. But at this point, the Angels seem most comfortable with Trout in left or right.
Soler, who turns 33 in February, will be playing for this fourth team in three years. He is far from a star, but his career .331 on-base percentage and .464 slugging percentage make him an above-average major-league hitter. And his $13 million salary likely will be dwarfed by the average annual values free agents such as Teoscar Hernández and Anthony Santander receive on the open market.
The Angels, 28th in the majors in runs last season, need more offense. Soler, in their view, can help provide it. He surely will get some at-bats in the outfield. But the Angels see him primarily as a DH.
A sensible compromise with Cole
The New York Yankees shrewdly called Gerrit Cole’s bluff, declining to void his opt-out by extending his contract by one year and $36 million in 2029, his age-38 season. Still, the team could be motivated to give Cole some type of extension beyond his remaining four years and $144 million, even if it’s not at the original number.
Two factors should motivate the Yankees: A desire to maintain good-faith relationships with Cole and his agent, Scott Boras, who also represents the Yankees’ No. 1 free-agent target, outfielder Juan Soto. And a desire to lower the luxury-tax hit they are taking on Cole’s contract.
The “Steve Cohen” fourth luxury tax threshold will be $301 million next season, and Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner seems disinclined to exceed that figure for a second straight year. Even a minor reduction in Cole’s $36 million average annual value could help the Yankees create more flexibility from a luxury-tax perspective.
Luxury-tax numbers for multiyear contracts are derived from their AAVs. If Cole agreed to a $6 million guarantee for his extra year, with the chance to make tens of millions more in incentives, his AAV would reduce to $30 million. If he agreed to a $16 million guarantee, his AAV would be $32 million.
Cole and Boras likely would want as large a guarantee as possible, but they already know they’re not getting $36 million. As presently constituted, Cole’s career earnings by the end of his current deal will be nearly $350 million. By taking less in his additional year, he could rightly claim he was trying to help the team — and come out looking better for it.
David Ross to return?
The Baltimore Orioles are interested in David Ross for their bench coach vacancy, according to sources familiar with the team’s process. Whether Ross would want the job, if the Orioles indeed offered it, is not known.
A year ago, Ross rebuffed the Yankees’ interest in hiring him to replace Carlos Mendoza as their bench coach. The Chicago Cubs had just fired Ross as manager to hire Craig Counsell. Ross, if he jumped back into a uniformed position immediately, only wanted to manage.
Might things be different for Ross a year later, now that the shock of his dismissal presumably has worn off? If so, the Orioles would seem a logical fit. Orioles manager Brandon Hyde was the Cubs’ first base coach when Ross was a catcher with the team in 2015-16, and the two remain close.
The Orioles created an opening at bench coach after firing Fredi Gonzalez along with co-hitting coach Ryan Fuller and major-league coach Jose Fernandez at the end of the season.
Mariners likely to only go so far
The Seattle Mariners, one of many clubs facing uncertainty with their local broadcast revenue, plan to increase their payroll next season, according to club sources. It would rank as an upset, however, if the team emerged as a major player for any of the top free-agent corner infielders — third baseman Alex Bregman and first basemen Pete Alonso and Christian Walker.
The increase in payroll will be largely fueled by raises in salary arbitration for outfielder Randy Arozarena and pitchers Logan Gilbert and George Kirby. The Mariners want to add an additional option at second and/or third base to go with Dylan Moore and Josh Rojas. They also want to add a first baseman — perhaps Justin Turner in a return engagement — so they could play Luke Raley in the outfield on days they use Arozarena and Julio Rodríguez at DH. But a contract of $100 million-plus for any free agent probably is outside their budget.
Walker, who will play next season at 34, is expected to be in heavy demand. He just won his third straight Gold Glove, and his OPS+ last season was 21 percent above league average, while Alonso was 23 percent above. True, Alonso is more than three and a half years younger than Walker. But he is also expected to seek a much longer deal.
Crochet in demand….again
Typical GM talk from the Chicago White Sox’s Chris Getz on the possibility of trading left-hander Garrett Crochet:
“It’s a long list of teams that have expressed interest, which is not surprising, considering what he accomplished last year. We’ll continue to have those conversations. If there’s a match, there’s a match. But I do think it’s important to know that he’s one of the best starters in the game and I could very easily see him making an Opening Day start for us as well.”
Both the Los Angeles Dodgers and Philadelphia Phillies made offers for Crochet at the deadline that the White Sox considered attractive. The White Sox, however, did not budge.
In July, The Athletic’s Tim Britton projected Crochet’s combined salaries in arbitration over the next two years to be between $10 million and $15 million — a bargain for a pitcher who produced a 3.58 ERA over 146 innings in his first season as a starter.
Around the horn
• Why did no team claim right-hander Colin Rea, who passed through waivers before the Milwaukee Brewers declined his $5.5 million option? While Rea’s performance over 300 innings the past two seasons was nearly league-average, the lack of interest in him was another reflection of how much emphasis teams place on stuff.
According to the advanced metric Stuff+, Rea was 55th out of the 58 qualified major-league pitchers last season. Only Jose Quintana, Austin Gomber and Patrick Corbin ranked lower.
• Former Miami Marlins bench coach Luis Urueta drew interest from both the Orioles and White Sox before joining the Texas Rangers in that position, as first reported by Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News.
• Former major-league pitcher Colin McHugh is at the GM meetings, talking with several clubs about a front-office role. McHugh would be willing to consider an internship similar to how Grady Sizemore got back into baseball with the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2023.
— The Athletic’s Andy McCullough contributed to this report.
(Top photo of Gerrit Cole: J. Conrad Williams Jr. / Newsday RM via Getty Images)
