NEWSLETTER
We’re roughly two weeks from Opening Day, so there’s no time like now to roll out a new recurring column here at Bleacher Nation: The Stretch. It’s like the MLBits series that the BN faithful are familiar with, but longer and a little different. It’ll have a “whiparound” element like MLBits. But it’ll also be a place where we can talk baseball. It’ll be live at BN every Saturday from now until the World Series—and if you’re a BN Newsletter subscriber, you’ll get it on Friday from time to time. We’re going to kick things off with the news of the week in baseball: the Dylan Cease trade.
The Leadoff Spot: The Dylan Cease trade was a no-brainer for the Padres and the White Sox
When I think of Dylan Cease, I think of September 3, 2022. It was my son Patrick’s 13th birthday, and we decided to grab some tickets to the game that evening. We whipped up a poster board sign for him to hold from our left field seats behind the White Sox bullpen.
“Hey, Dylan, how about 13 Ks for my 13th birthday?” the sign read. He flashed it to Dylan, and Cease gave him a wink while warming up in the bullpen before the game.
Cease only struck out seven that night, but he was a 1-1 slider to Twins infielder Luis Arraez away from something even better: a no-hitter. My kids found themselves on the video board in center field celebrating a behemoth of an Eloy Jiménez home run in a four-run first inning. The White Sox blew the hated Twins out 13-0, and Dylan Cease flirted with history at the peak of his young career.
That was an extraordinary baseball memory we were able to make that evening. The funny thing about that slider being the pitch on which Arraez broke up the no-hitter is that, at that point, it was arguably the best pitch in baseball.
In 2022, Cease was 14-8 with a 2.20 ERA and 227 strikeouts in 184 innings. He was arguably the best starting pitcher in baseball. Last season wasn’t as kind to Cease, but the White Sox were an unmitigated disaster in 2023, so I won’t hold that against him. Neither did the San Diego Padres this week.
On Wednesday, the Padres sent four prospects to Chicago in exchange for their ace, Dylan Cease. In Cease, the Padres get a bona fide ace who, despite having a down year in 2023, was one of the best pitchers in baseball the season prior with a 2.20 ERA. He led the American League with 6.4 bWAR.
If you’re wondering what went wrong for Cease in 2023, his .331 BABIP was a driving jumps out at me. The White Sox had a putrid defense last season, meaning a lot of the inflation on Cease’s 2023 slugging percentage allowed (which jumped 99 points year-over-year).
Generally, pitchers with a high BABIP are victims of poor defenses behind them and bad luck. Fangraphs’ WAR considers that far more than Baseball Reference’s formula, hence why Cease’s fWAR only fell from 4.4 to 3.7 year-over-year despite an inflated ERA in 2023. In layman’s terms, Dylan Cease will be just fine, especially now that he’s out of Chicago.
San Diego’s projected starting rotation now includes Cease, Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove, Michael King, and Matt Waldron.
According to MLB Pipeline, three of the four players the White Sox got back from the Padres immediately slotted into their Top 10 prospects. That’s probably saying more about the state of the White Sox farm than anything, but I like the return for them.
Right-hander Drew Thorpe is the headliner — he was also the top prospect traded to the Padres from the Yankees in the Juan Soto deal — for the White Sox. Thorpe led all minor league pitchers in strikeouts last season and was named the Minor League Pitcher of the Year for his work with the Yankees’ High-A team in ’23. He led all Minor League Baseball with 182 strikeouts and finished fourth among all qualified minor league pitchers in ERA (2.52). Across 23 starts, Thorpe had a whopping 14-2 record before suffering an injury to his non-throwing shoulder that would sideline him for the rest of the year.
Along with Thorpe, right-hander Jairo Iriarte comes to Chicago in the deal. Iriarte has showcased impressive velocity, clocking up to 100 mph on the radar gun. While his fastball typically sits in the 93-96 mph range, there have been indications that his velocity might be slightly lower this spring.
Despite this, he continues to exhibit an above-average slider, a potential out pitch for him. However, it’s worth noting that Iriarte’s fastball tends to lack movement and appear relatively flat on the mound. Additionally, his changeup is challenging as its velocity closely resembles his fastball, hovering around 90-91 mph. This similarity in velocity makes it more akin to a two-seamer pitch rather than a distinct changeup pitch.
Possibly the most intriguing of the prospects heading back to Chicago is centerfielder Sam Zavala.
He possesses a disciplined approach at the plate, evident from his impressive tally of 96 walks last season, coupled with a solid .267/.420/.451 batting line while playing in Low A as an 18-year-old. Notably, he was among only six 18-year-olds to complete a full season in the minors in 2023.
Although he demonstrates considerable bat speed, his swing mechanics require refinement to handle higher-quality pitching effectively. Observers have noted that his swing is elongated, with excess movement that hampers consistency in repeating his swing path from pitch to pitch.
While he primarily played centerfield in the minors, some scouts project him to transition to right field due to concerns about his ability to maintain focus in the outfield. Despite striking out over 26 percent of the time last season, a figure deemed reasonable given his age relative to other prospects in the 2023 draft, he must showcase more than just his knack for drawing walks. With his physical strength and bat speed, he has the potential for 20+ home runs, provided he can translate these attributes into consistent game performance.
The White Sox also received reliever Steven Wilson in the deal. Wilson is a 29-year-old right-hander who posted a 3.91 ERA with 57 strikeouts for the Padres last season.
This is one of those “being a fan stinks sometimes” moments for White Sox fans, but it was the right thing to do. And credit to Chris Getz for being patient and waiting for the market to develop here in Spring Training, which would allow them to enter a bidding war (the Rangers and Yankees were also in on Cease this week) long after the offseason dust had settled.
The Two-Hole: Where do the Rangers and Yankees go from here?
The Rangers and Yankees lost in the rapidly evolving Dylan Cease sweepstakes, which reignited this week and culminated in a five-player swap between the White Sox and the Padres. But they still need another starting pitcher, so where do they go from here?
The Rangers will be without multiple starters (Jacob deGrom, Max Scherzer, and Tyler Mahle) until around or after the All-Star Break. As of today, the Rangers’ rotation includes Nathan Eovaldi, Jon Gray, Andrew Heaney, Dane Dunning, and Cody Bradford. Terrible? No. But the Rangers are all-in and looking for another World Series.
The Yankees will be without Gerritt Cole until at least May or June if their ace does not suffer setbacks. They are also all-in on a World Series pursuit this season and need another starting pitcher.
The Rangers’ most sensible choice would be free-agent southpaw Jordan Montgomery, whom they acquired at the trade deadline last summer and helped in their World Series run. Montgomery is one of the starting pitchers, represented by Scott Boras, who has held out for more money deep into Spring Training.
With Cease now in San Diego, Boras and his clients will get what they want. Last week, Boras confidently proclaimed that there’s panic in the game regarding the position, and demand for elite arms will increase as we inch closer to Opening Day.
“There is a pitching panic going on in baseball,” Boras said last Monday. “We’ve got so many starting pitchers who are now compromised — maybe short-term, some long-term. And the calls for elite starters are starting to increase. With many clubs right now, because of the pitching issue, the competitiveness of their seasons is at risk.”
He’s not wrong. So, here’s the answer to what the Rangers and Yankees do now that they’ve missed on Cease: call Scott Boras and get one of the elite arms he represents.
Batting Around
1. Brewers closer Devin Williams is expected to miss around three months with two stress fractures in his back. “He’s dealt with it for a couple of weeks,” new Brewers skipper Pat Murphy said this week. “It just doesn’t feel right, so we wanted to get it looked at by a specialist. We just figured, ‘Why not take every precaution?’”
2. The Braves added a familiar face to their roster this week in Adam Duvall. Duvall signed a one-year, $3 million deal on Thursday. The 35-year-old outfielder hit 21 homers in 92 games with a .247/.303/.531 slash line with the Boston Red Sox.
3. The Mets are also interested in an old friend, according to The Athletic’s Will Sammon. With Ronny Mauricio dealing with a torn ACL suffered in December, the recently released (by the Giants) J.D. Davis could play third base for the Mets or serve as a bench player while Brett Baty and Mark Vientos platoon at third base. (Update: J.D. Davis signed with the A’s on Friday after this column was written.)
4. Speaking of the Mets, Darryl Strawberry is recovering after a recent heart attack. Strawberry announced the news on his Instagram this week.
5. Red Sox starter Lucas Giolito underwent surgery to repair his right elbow UCL. Giolito — who signed with Boston this offseason on a two-year, $38.5 million deal — will miss the 2024 season. Despite having Tommy John surgery in the infancy of his time with the Washington Nationals, Giolito has always been pretty durable.
6. Cubs starter Shōta Imanaga was NASTY on Thursday, racking up nine strikeouts against the Oakland-soon-to-be-Las Vegas-Atheltics.
7. Here’s a pretty wild fact (via Max Mannis): The Yankees have only used four different Opening Day starters since 2009 (Gerrit Cole, Masahiro Tanaka, Luis Severino, and C.C. Sabathia). With Gerrit Cole on the shelf indefinitely, this year will mark No. 5 since 2009.
8. Your “lol” moment of the week in baseball: Elly De La Cruz cracked Hunter Greene’s car window with a foul ball.
9. Lance Lynn is a national treasure …
