Crown Jewels: Non-Tenders, Evan Sisk and a First Royals Report

Now that the GM meetings are over, we might start to see some movement in either the trade or free agent market. I say might because there’s a lot going on over the next couple of weeks that lead right up to Thanksgiving where things can get quiet for a bit. Players need to be added to 40-man rosters in order to protect them from the Rule 5 draft by November 19, which is also the day players have to decide if they will or won’t accept their qualifying offer. Then three days later is the non-tender deadline, which I’ll get to here shortly. And then six days after that is Thanksgiving.

It’s not that deals don’t get done over holidays, because they do, but other than some non-tender candidates, the next three weeks or so will be mostly transactional work, with only a couple of signings and maybe a trade.

That doesn’t mean work isn’t getting done and that doesn’t mean nothing will happen. The Braves gave Reynaldo Lopez a three-year deal on November 20 last year. The Cardinals signed both Kyle Gibson and Lance Lynn. But the big signings mostly took place after Thanksgiving weekend with the Cardinals getting Sonny Gray the Monday after the holiday.

So I guess the question is what team is going to be the Cardinals and do their bulk shopping early? I don’t know why, but I have a feeling the Blue Jays are going to be pretty active, or at least try to be early. They’ll be in on Juan Soto, but I would bet he falls in a similar category to Shohei Ohtani as a separate line item in their budget even though he’s not the marketing tool Ohtani is. The Nationals could also jump early. I get the sense they think they’re close and might want to pounce.

This week’s newsletters:

Michael Wacha's Deal Sets the Royals Up

2024/2025 MLB Free Agency Predictions

Some Non-Tender Possibilities

One way to get some talent before it hits a market is to look at the list of arbitration-eligible players and determine who might be on the chopping block because their team deems them too expensive. You’re not likely to get a star here, of course, or else their team wouldn’t need to trade them ahead of a decision to give them a contract or not. The flip side of some of these potential trades is if they’re likely non-tenders, you could just sign them without giving anything up and you can maybe sign them for less. But then you’re competing with every team for them, so if you really want to go, just trade a flyer and pay the price.

Plus, you can find some useful pieces. Last year, the Royals traded for Nick Anderson under these auspices. It didn’t work out, but the idea was sound. They also did it with Kyle Wright, who was out for the year but the Royals bought looking to this upcoming season with him. And that’s interesting because of the first name I thought of.

Patrick Sandoval

Sandoval tore his UCL in June and had Tommy John in early late June or early July (I haven’t found a great date, but it’s around there). Assuming a 14-month recovery period, that puts him back around September of this season. Even if he doesn’t come back, though, he’ll have one year of team control beyond 2025 and he showed some promise, particularly in 2021 to 2023. In those three years, he threw 380.1 innings in 72 games (69 starts) with a 3.53 ERA.

There were some signs of struggle in 2023 when his ERA jumped to just over 4 and his strikeout rate dropped while his walk rate jumped. I’d be concerned about that, but for a rotation that can always use some depth, he’d be a relatively inexpensive option and might be available for a playoff run. His projection is for $5.9 million, and I’d guess the 2026 number would be similar, so you’re paying around $12 million for a year of a mid-rotation starter, but you get to spread the money out. I think it makes some sense.

Jordan Romano

It’s another player with an elbow injury, but Romano did not have TJ. He had surgery to repair an impingement in his right elbow and he was terrible before it. But from 2020 to 2023, he had a 2.29 ERA with 251 strikeouts in 200.2 innings and limited walks well. He was still throwing hard in 2024 and still getting whiffs with his slider. The fastball was a disaster with just a 6.5 percent whiff rate. I’d have to dig in a little bit more on why that happened, but with a $7.75 million estimate, I think the Blue Jays could easily move on. It’s not a cheap risk per se, but the reward could be huge for the back of the bullpen.

Aaron Civale

I’m not going to spend much time on Civale and his $8 million estimate for 2025 because I don’t love him, but he did have some success with Brian Sweeney in Cleveland and seemed to rebound in his short time with the Brewers. I wonder if the Royals would have some interest with a Sweeney recommendation. I’m not sure if the Brewers would even move him, but they tend to not want to pay even close to big money for guys who aren’t stars, so I could see it, I suppose.

David Bednar

I don’t think they’ll non-tender him, but if the Pirates are thinking about it, I’d be interested to see what it would take to acquire him and his $6.6 million estimated arbitration deal. His fastball had similar metrics to previous years, and actually was coming in a bit harder than 2023. He did throw his splitter more, but it was also effective. His curve continued to be a good pitch in terms of end results, but the whiff rate dipped to 24.5 percent from 40.5 percent. Similar to the others, I haven’t looked under the hood, but on the surface, a guy who had a 2.65 ERA with 245 strikeouts in 197 innings prior to last season when he dealt with some non-arm injuries seems like a good buy-low candidate to me.

I didn’t intend to only list four pitchers, but that’s where we landed. There are probably others, but those are four who I think are interesting to at least keep in mind as that deadline approaches.

Evan Sisk and His 40-Man Add

You may have been caught off guard last week when the Royals added Evan Sisk to their 40-man roster well before the deadline. I know I was. It didn’t even occur to me at the time, but made sense after I saw it that he was set to become a minor league free agent. That means they had to make the move when they did. I mentioned him a few weeks back when I was looking at potential prospects they’d need to add and I thought they’d give him serious consideration after the season he had in AAA.

He put up a 1.57 ERA in 57.1 innings with 81 strikeouts, 26 walks and just 33 hits allowed. Those are pretty insane numbers. I know I’ve made this comparison before, but Walter Pennington, everyone’s darling, had a 2.26 ERA in 59.2 innings with 79 strikeouts, 20 walks and 39 hits allowed. He was used a bit differently, and I don’t bring him up disparagingly, but just to show how good Sisk was last season. He’s not a true prospect by any means. He’ll be 28 years old about a month into the season. But he’s generally had success in the minors. The biggest blip for him was in 2023 after the Royals got him with Steven Cruz in the Michael A. Taylor deal with the Twins.

The reason he didn’t get much of a chance, even when the Royals bullpen was so bad, is that the metrics are a bit concerning. He’s mostly a sinker/slider guy. Last year, he threw the sinker 41.4 percent of the time and the slider 31.9 percent of the time. He also has a cutter that he threw 11.8 percent of the time, a four-seamer he threw 8.1 percent of the time and a curve he threw 6.3 percent of the time. And he threw two changeups, at least according to Baseball Savant. He did two things well, and they’re the only two things that really matter. He got whiffs, particularly with his slider and curve, and he limited hard contact with every pitch but his four-seam fastball.

Oh, and he DESTROYED lefties. He allowed a .093/.186/.105 line against them in 97 plate appearances. He gave up one extra base hit to them in 97 plate appearances. He was fine against righties, allowing a .608 OPS, which means he can pitch in the big leagues, but if you have someone who can do that to lefties, you have a weapon that can be used in a lot of different situations. He’s very deceptive with his delivery, which helps him against those lefties because he comes at the from a nearly impossible angle, but he also hides the ball well, so that helps against righties too.

I don’t think you’ll see Sisk ever knocking on the door of a closer’s job, but he can be an incredibly useful piece in a good bullpen. It makes total sense why the Royals would have used one of their many open 40-man spots to keep him around.

A Real-Life Royals Report/Rumor!

I guess this is almost three days old at this point, but the Royals were at the top of the reporting in The Athletic on Tuesday evening from the GM meetings. The headline read, “MLB GM meetings: Royals seek leadoff help, Orioles have money for top pitcher.” Okay, so we don’t care so much about the Orioles and their desire to sign a pitcher, but that’s some honest-to-goodness Royals mention. It’s a little obvious, but we’ll take it. What’s frustrating is some of the information contained within the report just didn’t make much sense:

The Royals ideally want a better version of Garrett Hampson, a right-handed batter who plays center field, second base and shortstop. Among the players who might fit are Jonathan India and Spencer Steer (trade) and Jurickson Profar (free agent). They have some flexibility with the position. Michael Massey and Maikel Garcia can play the outfield.

Okay, there is some meat on that bone, but first I want to say that Massey has never played the outfield as a professional or in college. Garcia has 1.2 innings there in that weird game this season where he went out to right field. They did try him in center field in spring training a couple of years ago. I’m not sure I’d go as far as to say that they can play the outfield, though, without any proof that they can actually play the outfield. Though I guess it’s worth mentioning that the Royals haven’t been afraid to throw people to the outfield wolves in the past.

The meat here is that they wanted a right-handed batter who play center field, second base and shortstop. It’s a little odd that they then list a second baseman and a left fielder, but whatever. I think a right-handed center fielder makes sense. They clearly don’t trust Dairon Blanco defensively and want to give Kyle Isbel a platoon partner. And they want that platoon partner to be a better hitter than Hampson. I say hitter because outside of some odd routes to balls in the gap and that one fly ball he just dropped, Hampson was actually really good defensively. I’ve mentioned Harrison Bader before. I’m not sure if he’d want a platoon role, but he may not have a choice.

Could they turn back to Taylor? He was pretty awful offensively last year, but is still a great defender and did slug .602 against lefties in 2023. There just aren’t a lot of great options out there, either on the free agent market or potentially available for a trade. So that’s going to be an interesting thing to watch as this winter progresses. I do hear the Angels have a guy who has played some center field in his life, but he’s been hurt a lot and has a few dollars and years left on his contract, so maybe not.

The other part of the blurb noted that they might be willing to move Kris Bubic or Alec Marsh in the right deal. I totally get that and I’m completely on board with that. But I’m just not entirely sure what either can bring back. I think if you’re going to trade either or both of them, they need to be the second piece in a deal, likely involving Brady Singer. That’s the one that makes sense to me. Or they can maybe soften the blow of a prospect package. The thing about Bubic is he now has three years of control left. He can be an attractive option because you know the floor is a good reliever, but what is that worth and is there a match in a team trying to compete?

Marsh hasn’t done enough yet to bring back more than a hitter version of himself, which I guess is fine as a depth piece, but I’d rather have him as depth than a mid-20s player who hasn’t established himself as center field depth. Again, they could both be moved, but I think they make a deal better with someone else as the headliner rather than as the headliner themselves. I do appreciate that there are real-life rumors and things to discuss, though. A busy offseason is a fun offseason.

Header photo credit to the great Minda Haas Kuhlmann