With the post-holiday offseason in full swing, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on today in baseball:
1. The Giants’ 40-man roster changes are as follows:
Yesterday, the Giants reportedly brought in the future Hall of Famer Justin Verlander Signed a one-year contract. The club is betting on Verlander’s return after the first truly terrible season of his career. Last year, Verlander had a 5.48 ERA and a 4.78 FIP in 17 starts with the Astros. There are certainly risks in waiting for Verlander, who is more than four years older than San Francisco’s new president of baseball operations Buster Poseyeven if it’s just a year or two back. However, the 2022 AL Cy Young Award winner is pitching like a starter in the first half of the 2023 postseason rotation, and it’s hard to bet against Verlander’s pedigree.
Before Verlander can work with San Francisco, he needs to be officially added to the 40-man roster. That could happen as early as today, when the Giants will need to clear a roster spot. The most common approach for clubs is to simply designate a player for assignment, although sometimes clubs will make trades to free up 40-man spots.
2. Will there be more expansions?
Yesterday, the Rays finalized a contract extension with their right hand Drew Rasmussen. The deal guarantees Rasmussen an annual salary of $8.5MM, covers his final two years of arbitration and includes a club option for the 2027 season – which will be his first free-agent season. The looming deadline for players and teams to exchange data before arbitration hearings certainly helps the deal. Most arbitration-level players typically agree to trades before the deadline to allow for hearings, making the days leading up to the deadline a natural time for clubs to discuss long-term extensions with players. Since the deadline is coming tomorrow, it’s possible, if not unlikely, that we’ll see other extensions within the next day and a half. At the very least, some one-year deal should be struck early today.
3. Players in DFA Limbo:
We’re officially a week away from 2025, which means players who were assigned assignments while MLB league offices were closed for the holidays will finally come to their long-awaited conclusions. This situation currently applies to two players: Infielder Braden Shoemakerwho was DFA by the White Sox on New Year’s Day, left-handed Bailey Hornthe Tigers conducted a DFA over the holidays to prepare for Gleyber Torres sign. At this point, the trade window for any player appears to have passed. Both have been cleared. The next steps for Shewmake and Horn are to either clear waivers, offering their clubs the opportunity to move them directly to the minors as non-roster depth, or be claimed by a new club and retain a 40-man roster spot at another club.
