Mariners Moose Tracks, 1/12/24: Marcus Stroman, Luke Weaver, and Michael Busch
The starting pitching market continues to thin with another couple of names coming off the board.
Good morning everyone and happy Friday! Yesterday marked another deadline around baseball as teams and players had to submit contract numbers for arbitration. With that, here’s what went down around baseball.
In Mariners news...
- The Mariners agreed to deals with all seven of their arbitration-eligible players.
- The M’s also inked former top infield prospect Michael Chavis to a minor league deal.
- Mark Simon at Sports Info Solutions dug into the numbers under the hood for Luke Raley, who had the biggest difference between OPS and expected OPS in baseball in 2023.
- Patrick Ellington, Jr. profiled top Seattle prospect Harry Ford, writing about his journey to pro baseball and his outlook as a player.
Around the league...
- The Yankees finally got the established starter they were looking for, signing right-hander Marcus Stroman to a two-year contract.
- The Yankees agreed to a one-year deal with right-hander Luke Weaver, further bolstering their pitching depth.
- The Cubs and Dodgers agreed to an interesting trade, with infielder Michael Busch and right-hander Yency Almonte being sent to Chicago for a pair of minor leaguers.
- Juan Soto set an MLB record by signing a one-year, $31M deal with the Yankees to avoid arbitration.
- However, several players did not finalize deals with their clubs prior to the arbitration deadline. Devin Williams is the lone name from this list that agreed to terms with his team after this tweet.
In total, 23 arbitration-eligible players did not reach terms on a contract and are seemingly headed for a trial. Deals still could be worked out, either for one year or long-term. Here is the full list of players, their requested salaries and teams' requested salaries. pic.twitter.com/M3gBan7Huv
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) January 12, 2024