Cruz, 27, is the grandson of José Cruz and the son of José Cruz. Per Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic, the Cruzes will soon become the fifth family with a grandfather, son and grandson all to have played in the major leagues. The other four are the Bells (Gus to Buddy to David and Mike), the Boones (Ray to Bob to Bret and Aaron), the Colemans (Joe to Joe to Casey) and the Hairstons (Sam to Jerry to Jerry and Scott).

The Tigers selected Trei with a third-round pick in 2020. He didn’t show too much in his first few seasons as a professional but burst onto the radar last year. Splitting his time between Double-A and Triple-A, he stepped to the plate 564 times in 2025. His home run tally of 13 was fairly modest but he drew walks at an exceptional 18.1% pace. That helped him produce a .279/.411/.456 slash line. The resulting 149 wRC+ indicated he was 49% better than league average. He got some help from a .349 batting average on balls in play but it would have been a nice showing even with some more neutral luck.

That prompted the Tigers to give him a roster spot in November, to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft. He can play all three outfield spots and the three infield spots to the left of first base. He can swipe a few bases, getting to 17 last year. Coming into 2026, Baseball America ranked him the #18 prospect in the system. FanGraphs was a bit more bearish putting him at #32, expressing some concern with the switch-hitter’s lack of power as a righty and his general propensity to struggle with breaking stuff.

Cruz hasn’t carried over that momentum into this year. He was on the minor league injured for over a month, starting about three weeks into April and going through most of May. Around that IL stint, he has a .225/.331/.326 line in 163 plate appearances this year.

Pérez injured himself in a freak accident this week when a plyo band snapped and hit him near his eye, per McCosky. The Tigers will give him some time to recuperate and add Cruz into an outfield mix that also includes Riley Greene, Kerry Carpenter, Zach McKinstry, James Outman, Jahmai Jones and Matt Vierling. Since Cruz can also play multiple infield spots, he’ll give Detroit some extra flexibility on the dirt as well. The infield group currently consists of Spencer Torkelson, Kevin McGonigle, Colt Keith, Hao-Yu Lee and McKinstry.

Photo courtesy of Junfu Han, Imagn Images

At this point, there are no details on the cause or the severity of Trout’s injury. He played in last night’s game and there wasn’t any indication that anything was amiss. Presumably, something popped up after the game or earlier today.

Regardless of the details, it’s a rough development for him and the team. The 34-year-old Trout continues to put up good numbers when on the field. He has been back in center field after mostly being a right fielder and designated hitter last year. He has 17 home runs. He is drawing walks at a massive 19.7% clip, one of the best such marks of his career. His 24.8% strikeout rate is above average but a nice improvement over last year, when that figure spiked to 32%. His .234/.394/.472 line leads to a 139 wRC+, indicating he has been 39% better than the league average hitter.

That will now be put on pause, which has become a common theme of Trout’s career as he has pushed into his 30s. Due to various injuries, he hasn’t played more than 130 games in a season since 2019. He has only twice topped 82 games in that span. He had stayed healthy this year until this point, appearing in 74 of the club’s 75 games. Unfortunately, he’s now going to be on the IL once more.

For the team, it’s a brutal blow, even if it’s a fairly minor injury. The Angels are 30-45 right now. The Rockies are the only team in the majors with a worse record. The Halos can’t really afford setbacks of any kind. Losing their best player for any amount of time only worsens their already-bleak prospects.

Without Trout, the Angels will probably have a regular outfield alignment of Jo Adell, Wade Meckler and Jose Siri. Moore has only played second base in his big league career but the Halos have started playing him in left field in the minors in recent weeks. Infielder Donovan Walton also has some outfield experience. It was reported a month ago that the club was doing some outfield work with Vaughn Grissom and Oswald Peraza but neither infielder has been sent to the grass in official game action yet.

Photo courtesy of Matt Kartozian, Imagn Images

With that gem, May brought his ERA under 4.00 and moved into the NL’s top 10 in quality starts and FanGraphs WAR. He owns a 3.38 xERA and a 3.75 SIERA. Only two qualified pitchers in either league have a lower home run rate, a lower walk rate, and a higher strikeout rate this season: Cam Schlittler and Cristopher Sánchez. 

A shutout will juice anyone’s numbers, and not everything May is doing right now is sustainable. His home run-to-fly-ball ratio won’t stay so low forever. It’s currently less than half his rate from 2019-25. At the same time, his BABIP is significantly higher than his career average, while his strand rate is markedly lower. That means he’s run into some bad luck to balance out his good fortune. The result is a matching 3.75 ERA and SIERA. Baseball Prospectus agrees that his “deserved ERA” is 3.77, while the ZiPS projection system forecasts a 3.78 mark for him over the rest of the season. The PitchingBot model suggests the quality of his arsenal translates to 3.85 earned runs per nine. All of those metrics use disparate methods to reach their conclusions, but when it comes to May, they end up at the same one: He has earned his success so far in 2026.

May was an honorable mention on MLBTR’s last Top 50 Free Agents ranking. The $12.5MM guarantee he secured from the Cardinals was surprisingly high to some, but it wasn’t a mistake to leave him off the top 50; in terms of total salary, his contract was the 51st largest of the offseason. This winter, May could be much higher on the list. Not only is he healthy and pitching well, but the 2026-27 free agent class is notably thin. It’s so thin that Michael Soroka was one of five players who just missed the top 10 on MLBTR’s latest Free Agent Power Rankings.

Soroka isn’t just catching strays here. I bring him up because he’s a shockingly apt comparison for May. Watch them pitch this year, and you won’t see many similarities between the two. May leads with a sinker that touches 99 against righties and a four-seam that touches 99 against lefties. Soroka’s max velocity is three ticks slower, and his primary pitch is an 80-mph slurve. Yet, the two right-handers, born 33 days apart in 1997, are more alike than you might realize.

Their stories are two chapters from the same book. Once star prospects, May and Soroka lived up to the hype in their debut seasons, only for a series of injuries to derail their careers. Finally, in 2025, they both made double-digit starts for the first time since their rookie campaigns. They proceeded to sign one-year contracts (with mutual options for 2027) in free agency. Here are the career numbers through 2025 that earned them those deals: 

• 3.86 ERA, 4.25 SIERA, 21.9% K rate, 8.3% BB rate, 46.6% GB rate
• 3.85 ERA, 4.29 SIERA, 21.8% K rate, 8.0% BB rate, 47.1% GB rate

The first bullet point is May, and the second is Soroka, but I left them unlabelled to drive home the message. For all intents and purposes, the stats are identical. Soroka has thrown more innings in his career, but May has thrown more recently. And on a per-inning basis, these two were pretty much the same pitcher for the first six seasons of their respective careers.

Through their first 14 starts in 2026, May ranks ninth in the National League in FanGraphs WAR. Soroka is one spot ahead, with a lead so small that a rounding error could wipe it out. Soroka has the better ERA, but May has the edge in xERA. Soroka has the lower walk rate, but May has induced more ground balls. SIERA favors Soroka, but most of the major pitch models prefer what May brings to the table. ZiPS projects nearly identical performance from each of them for the rest of the season. 

So, if Soroka is on track to be one of next winter’s top 20 free agents, May belongs in that conversation as well. Soroka is a bigger name, thanks to the All-Star appearance, Rookie of the Year runner-up finish, and down-ballot Cy Young votes on his resume. All of that is impressive, but all of that was seven years ago. If either of these two still has an All-Star ceiling, it might be May instead. He throws harder and boasts an even deeper arsenal, with six pitches that he throws at least 5% of the time. In 2026, only three starting pitchers (min. 50 IP) have thrown six different pitches at least that often with an average fastball harder than May’s: Dylan Cease, Sandy Alcantara, and Eury Pérez. There’s more to being an ace than high velocity and a diverse pitch mix, and Pérez is all the proof you need. Nonetheless, those are valuable traits – perhaps even valuable enough to engender a bidding war among teams that think they can get the most out of them. Just last winter, the Blue Jays gave Cease $210MM because they saw the blueprint for a more consistent ace. So far, it’s looking like they were right. May won’t command anything close to nine figures, but that only increases the number of teams that might be interested in his services.

It’s far too soon to start writing May’s blurb for the top 50 list. When the last Free Agent Power Rankings came out, he still had a 4.59 ERA. That was less than two weeks ago. Things can change quickly. May also has to stay healthy, which is far from a given. This is a pitcher who has already torn his UCL twice. The elbow neuritis he suffered last September proved to be minor, and the esophageal tear that ended his 2024 season had nothing to do with baseball activities. Still, he has never topped 24 starts or 150 innings in a season, at the major or minor league level. But this could be the year that changes. 

All he needs to do is stay on the field and keep pitching the way he has. If he can pull that off, Dustin May will be a name to watch this winter. That might be an indication of a weak free agent class, but it would also be a huge accomplishment for a pitcher who has dealt with more than his fair share of setbacks. With every start he makes in 2026, May can boost his free agent stock.  

Images courtesy of Jeff Curry, Imagn Images.

It’s a familiar refrain for Angels fans. Detmers is controlled only for two more seasons beyond the current campaign. The Angels, tied with the Royals for the American League’s worst record and sporting one of MLB’s weakest farm systems, aren’t going to be competitive in that time.

One could easily argue that Detmers ought to be an extension candidate. There’d be good sense in that for the Halos, but it doesn’t seem likely. The last time the Angels signed any player to an extension was more than four years ago, when catcher Max Stassi signed for three years and $17.5MM. A look at MLBTR’s Contract Tracker shows that since the hiring of GM Perry Minasian in Nov. 2020, Stassi and utilityman David Fletcher (five years, $26MM in 2021) are the only two players who have signed extensions buying out would-be free agent years.

Detmers, the No. 10 overall draft pick back in 2020, moved back to the rotation after a year spent in the bullpen in 2025. He’s out to an excellent start, sporting a 3.68 ERA through 88 innings across his first 15 turns back in the Angels’ rotation. His underlying rate stats are even better. Detmers has fanned 28.2% of opponents against a 6.8% walk rate. He’s touting better-than-average chase, contact and swinging-strike rates.

A significant amount of the damage against Detmers this season came in one lone start: an eight-run drubbing at the hands of the A’s back on May 19. Detmers responded to that outing by bouncing back with eight innings of one-run ball and a career-high 14 strikeouts. He hasn’t slowed down. In five starts since that Athletics hiccup, Detmers has pitched 33 innings, allowed five runs (1.36 ERA) on 12 hits and five walks. He’s set down 33.9% of his opponents on strikes in that span and only walked 4.3% of the batters he’s faced. Metrics like SIERA (3.33), FIP (2.81) and xERA (2.76) feel Detmers has performed far better than his already-solid earned run average might suggest.

Given his prospect pedigree, age, remaining club control and upward trendlines, Detmers would be one of the most sought-after trade pieces on the entire market. Any team acquiring him would be adding the southpaw for potentially three playoff races. He’s being paid just $2.625MM this season and will likely cost less than $20MM for his remaining two seasons of club control. He’d fit into any club’s playoff rotation, and organizations with a better track record of pitcher development might feel there’s another gear to be unlocked.

Trades of starters with two-plus seasons of left are rare at any point but especially midseason. The Marlins added four prospects from the Yankees in the trade sending Ryan Weathers to the Bronx and added a three-player package (headlined by consensus top-100 prospect Owen Caissie) when they traded Edward Cabrera to the Cubs. Both players had three full seasons of club control remaining, though Detmers is arguably more accomplished and more desirable than both former Fish hurlers. The White Sox picked up a pair of top-100 prospects (Kyle Teel, Braden Montgomery) plus a nearly MLB-ready infielder (Chase Meidroth) when trading two seasons of Garrett Crochet to the Red Sox.

Detmers is just one of several potential high-end trade chips the Angels possess. He, Jose Soriano and Zach Neto, in particular, could net the sort of trade deadline haul that would completely overhaul an Angels farm system that entered the year ranked 27th of 30 per ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel, 28th at Baseball America and at MLB.com, and 29th via The Athletic’s Keith Law.

As I recently explored in a piece for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers, however, the Angels have repeatedly refused to acknowledge their bleak long-term outlook and held onto just this set of marketable asset until they either reached free agency or completely eroded their trade value. Only time will tell whether barreling toward a fifth straight season of at least 89 losses — they’re on pace to lose 97 games in 2026 — will prompt a philosophical change from owner Arte Moreno.

The league’s proposed framework would be a significant drawdown of the way the draft has operated for years. High school players would no longer be eligible to be selected. In fact, anyone under 20 years old by September 1st of the draft year would not be eligible, so that would take many college and junior college players off the table as well.

The draft itself would be dropped from 20 rounds to 12. The current 20-round format is already a significant reduction, as the draft has been much longer in the past. It was 50 rounds through 2011, when it was dropped to 40. That length lasted through 2019. Another notable element of the proposal is hard draft slots, meaning a drafted player would have no ability to negotiate his signing bonus.

Teams would also have more freedom to trade picks. Currently, only the Competitive Balance Round picks can be traded. Under this proposal, all picks could be traded, with a few restrictions. A pick could not be traded until the prior draft has taken place, so picks can’t be traded years in advance. A team would not be allowed to trade a first-round pick two years in a row. A team could not add more than three picks in the first three rounds of any individual draft. Trades while the draft is actually taking place can only be made until the first round has been completed.

The Competitive Balance Round picks would be eliminated. That aligns with the league’s salary cap and floor proposal with shared league revenues. Those picks currently exist to provide a boost to the lower-spending clubs. Since the goal of the cap-and-floor system is to eliminate financial imbalances between clubs, the need for those picks would theoretically be eliminated as well. The lottery would also be altered as there are different rules for revenue-sharing payors versus payees.

A common theme of the proposed changes is cutting costs for big league clubs. In terms of costs directly associated with the draft, fewer rounds means fewer signing bonus to pay. The hard slot values also provide the teams with cost certainty.

Less directly, the rules would limit the upside of certain players, as it would become harder to approach or reach free agency at a young age. For instance, Konnor Griffin was drafted out of high school at the age of 18. He made it to the majors prior to his 20th birthday and would have been on a path for free agency in his mid-20s. That would not be possible under this current system. The trajectory gave Griffin enough leverage to secure a nine-year extension worth $140MM, a record deal for a player with just a handful of days in the majors. (Though Kevin McGonigle would get to $150MM one week later.) Cooper lists Mike Trout, Álex Rodríguez, Mickey Mantle, Ken Griffey Jr., Bryce Harper and Johnny Bench as other examples from the past of guys rising to the majors as teenagers.

It would also probably lead to other indirect cost savings. The proposed setup would effectively outsource player development of younger players to colleges. That means big league teams would probably dedicate fewer resources to staffing at the lower levels. Teams cut also cut corners when it comes to scouts, as scouring the continent to see high school players would no longer be as important.

The proposal would also include an international draft, which is something not currently in existence. Players from outside the United States, Canada and U.S. territories such as Puerto Rico are currently free to sign with any club if they are going to be 17 years old by September 1st of the signing year. Each team has a hard-capped spending pool in the range of $5MM to $9MM, so no one gets more than a few million.

Under today’s proposal, players would not be eligible for selection until one year later, the year in which they are 18 prior to September 1st. An international draft was discussed as part of the last round of CBA negotiations but ultimately didn’t get agreed to, so the pool system stayed in place. In previous proposals, the international draft had significantly smaller pools than the domestic draft. This proposal would see them lined up, though that would be done by reducing the domestic pools.

Given that the measures would cut the amount of spending going to players, the MLBPA is unsurprisingly opposed. The union released a statement saying that the new rules would lead to a $400MM drop in player compensation just when comparing the 2026 draft/pool systems to what the league is proposing for 2027, as well as a loss of over a billion over the next five years.

As with all proposals made this early in the process, it’s worth pointing out that there’s still a long way to go and most things that hit the table won’t come to fruition. The current CBA runs through December 1st. When the last CBA expired, MLB locked out the players. That lockout lasted over three months, going over a week into March. This far out, both sides are going to stake out positions that they know the other won’t accept. Over time, the sides will each back off some demands as the negotiating process plays out.

Photo courtesy of Kirby Lee, Imagn Images

Allard, 28, just opted out of a minor league deal with the Guardians. He had been pitching well at the Triple-A level prior to getting out of that deal. He had thrown 30 2/3 innings for Columbus, allowing 4.11 earned runs per nine. He struck out 22.4% of batters faced, gave out walks to 7.2% of opponents and induced grounders on 45.3% of balls in play.

The lefty doesn’t throw particularly hard, averaging around 90 miles per hour with his four-seamer and sinker. But he has nonetheless been able to find some major league success at times. He had a 2.63 earned run average in 65 innings with Cleveland last year, though he had some help from a 79.2% strand rate. His 3.54 FIP and 4.41 SIERA pointed to him being a regression candidate. For his big league career as a whole, he has a 5.47 ERA over parts of nine seasons. That includes a 10.38 ERA in a small sample of 8 2/3 innings with the Guards earlier this year.

For the Phillies, the back of their rotation is a big question mark right now. The first three spots are golden, as they have Zack Wheeler, Cristopher Sánchez and Jesús Luzardo in those. Aaron Nola is struggling but there’s not much the club can do about that, given his contract and status in the organization. Andrew Painter has been in the rotation all year until this week. He has a 7.06 ERA for the season. His struggles finally became too much to bear yesterday, as he was sent down to the minors.

Bryse Wilson was added to the roster today. He could take a rotation spot or be used as a long reliever. Alan Rangel and Jean Cabrera are on the 40-man roster, though Cabrera has a 9.39 ERA on the farm this year. Rangel’s 3.99 ERA is more palatable but he has just 14 innings of big league experience.

The Phillies have reportedly been exploring the market for back-end starters. Even if they don’t put anything together soon, they will likely enhance their efforts to add starting pitching as the deadline draws nearer. For now, Allard gives them an experienced depth arm who has been putting some decent numbers lately. If Allard eventually gets a roster spot, he is out of options.

Photo courtesy of Gary A. Vasquez, Imagn Images

García’s injury was clear at the moment it occurred, as seen in this clip from MLB.com. In a game against the Blue Jays last week, García came up throwing as George Springer tried to score from third on a fly out off the bat of Kazuma Okamoto. García made a strong throw, though Springer was safe on the play. Immediately after the throw, García was in obvious pain. He received attention from the training staff and then departed the contest.

Two days later, the Phillies placed García on the 60-day injured list, indicating they knew pretty quickly that he was going to miss at least a few months. Now he’ll miss even more than that and won’t be a factor in the second half.

The news closes the book on Philadelphia’s planned switch in right field for 2026. They had Nick Castellanos in that position for many years and he was still signed through this year but it was clear all offseason that they would be moving on from him before the campaign kicked off. They signed García to a one-year, $10MM deal in December and then released Castellanos in February.

That pivot has not worked out. Moving on from Castellanos was sensible enough. His numbers had been declining for a while and he hit .191/.221/.339 for the Padres this year. But García couldn’t meaningfully patch that spot. He hit .195/.270/.329 while striking out at a 32.4% pace before this shoulder injury wiped out the rest of his season.

The Phils are reportedly on the look for outfield help and they will almost certainly do something prior to the trade deadline. They still have Brandon Marsh and Justin Crawford in two spots. Marsh is having a good season but Crawford has a .238/.293/.330 line in his first 222 career plate appearances. Since García’s injury, the Phils have been using a platoon of Gabriel Rincones Jr. and Edmundo Sosa to cover another spot. Sosa has a .234/.269/.378 line on the year and Rinconces has a .071/.071/.286 line through 14 plate appearances.

For García, it’s a rough position to be in. He had some strong seasons with the Rangers from 2021 to 2023, helping that club win the World Series in the final of those three seasons. His numbers slipped from there, as he slashed .225/.278/.397 over the 2024 and 2025 seasons. Texas decided to move on, non-tendering him after last year.

His strong defense and his past success were still enough to get him his aforementioned deal with the Phillies but he performed poorly and will still be recovering from this surgery when the offseason begins. It’s widely expected that there will be a lockout at the start of December, like there was in the 2021-22 offseason. That winter saw a rush of transactions before and after the lockout. If that happens again this time, García might be trying to draw some attention amid that frenzy with some kind of showcase after he is recovered.

Photo courtesy of John E. Sokolowski, Imagn Images

Wilson, 28, signed a minor league deal with the Phillies in the offseason. He was released in June, perhaps after triggering an opt-out clause, but then re-signed with the club on a new minor league deal. It was reported yesterday that Wilson had triggered an upward mobility clause in that deal.

It’s understandable why the Phils would give him a roster spot. The back of their rotation has become an issue. They started the year with both Taijuan Walker and Andrew Painter in rotation spots. When Zack Wheeler was able to return from his surgery recovery, Walker was jettisoned. Painter held his spot but his struggles mounted. His outing yesterday bumped his earned run average for the year to 7.06, which led Philly to kick him to the minors.

The Phils have a strong front three in Wheeler, Cristopher Sánchez and Jesús Luzardo. They aren’t getting good results from Aaron Nola but he’s not going anywhere due to his contract and his stature within the organization.

Wilson could be a candidate to fill Painter’s spot, at least for a while. Wilson has some big league track record, both as a starter and a reliever. He has appeared in 163 games, 57 of those being starts. He has logged 461 innings, allowing 4.82 earned runs per nine. His 16.6% strikeout rate isn’t strong but he has limited walks to a 7.5% pace.

This year, his results have been trending up. For the year as a whole, he has a 6.29 ERA in 54 1/3 Triple-A innings, but with most of the damage coming early on. He has a 3.94 ERA since the start of May, with a 24.1% strikeout rate, and his past three outings have been scoreless.

The Phils are reportedly searching the market for back-end starters. They have an off-day on Friday, so they may not need to decide on a fifth starter right away. For now, Wilson gives them a length option in the bullpen, but he could perhaps make a start next week if they don’t find any other options. Alan Rangel and Jean Cabrera are spot starter candidates on the 40-man, although Cabrera has a 9.39 ERA on the farm this year. If Wilson is nudged out of the club’s plans at any point, he is out of options.

Photo courtesy of Nathan Ray Seebeck, Imagn Images

The Twins selected Arcia to the major league roster last month after they optioned Royce Lewis to third base and moved Brooks Lee from shortstop to the hot corner. The 31-year-old wound up appearing in 19 games and taking 50 plate appearances. He hit .271/.300/.354 with a homer in that span. He’ll now return to the Saints (the Twins’ Triple-A affiliate), for whom he slashed .318/.376/.556 with eight homers in 165 plate appearances prior to his call to the majors.

Arcia has played in parts of 11 major league seasons and accrued nearly nine years of service in the process. The younger brother of former Twins outfielder Oswaldo Arcia, Orlando once ranked among the sport’s 10 best prospects but never came close to reaching his ceiling with the Brewers, his original organization. He had a nice two-year run with the Braves after being traded to Atlanta, hitting .258/.319/.419 in 767 plate appearances from 2022-23.

Since that quality run in Atlanta, Arcia’s bat has regressed. He’s batted .217/.265/.338 over his past 866 big league plate appearances and is now a lifetime .240/.292/.369 hitter in 3587 plate appearances as a major leaguer. He’ll have plenty of playing time in St. Paul right now with top shortstop prospect Kaelen Culpepper recently hitting the injured list due to a hip strain. Even if the Twins give Culpepper a shot to prove he’s their shortstop of the future once he returns, Arcia could work his way back to the big leagues with another injury in the Minnesota infield or if infielder/outfielder Tristan Gray (.244/.288/.370) continues to struggle.

It’s an unfortunate early birthday present for Roycroft, who turns 29 on Sunday. An undrafted free agent in 2019, the righty started his professional career in independent ball before the Cards scooped him up in 2022. He worked his way up through the minors as a reliever who could generate ground balls. He was added to the 40-man roster in May of 2024.

His first season in the bigs was fairly successful. Roycroft logged 34 1/3 innings out of the St. Louis bullpen, allowing 4.19 earned runs per nine. His 21.3% strikeout rate and 11% walk rate were both a bit worse than average but he induced grounders on 53.5% of balls in play.

Since then, the results haven’t been nearly as pleasant. Dating back to the start of last season, he has a 9.35 ERA in 26 innings. He has still generated grounders on 53.1% of balls in play in that time but he only struck out 13.6% of opponents and gave out walks at a 14.3% pace. He has mostly been in the minors this year and has put up a 5.84 ERA at the Triple-A level.

That performance has led the Cards to push him off the roster and into DFA limbo, which can last as long as a week. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so the Cards could take as long as five days to explore trade interest, but they could also put him on the wire sooner than that. If he were to clear waivers, he would stick around as non-roster depth. Since he doesn’t have a previous career outright nor three years of big league service time, he would not have the right to elect free agency.

Photo courtesy of Rick Osentoski, Imagn Images

Pereira, 25, only just returned from a six-week absence due to a pectoral strain. He took six hitless plate appearances between IL stints, dropping his season line to .232/.299/.420 in 77 trips to the plate. Pereira suffered his injury when he crashed into the center field wall while making an outstanding catch against Yankees slugger Ben Rice (video link). He’ll be sidelined for at least the next week.

The 24-year-old Perez was only acquired from the A’s back in mid-May. Chicago sent minor league lefty Jackson Nove back to the Athletics to acquire Perez, who’d previously been designated for assignment. Perez has hit .230/.326/.432 in 80 Triple-A plate appearances since landing in the ChiSox organization. He’s popped a pair of homers and swiped five bags while fanning at an alarming 37.9% clip.

Perez was only selected to the 40-man roster back in November. The A’s were understandably unwilling to risk letting him go unprotected ahead of the Rule 5 Draft after he’d slashed .231/.348/.478 with 26 homers, 27 steals and a 14.8% walk rate between Double-A and Triple-A in 2025. His production this season hasn’t kept up; between the two organizations, he’s hitting .217/.292/.401 with a 35% strikeout rate.

Perez is a right-handed hitter with plus speed and above-average power. He’s capable of playing all three outfield spots and has spent the bulk of his minor league tenure in center field, where scouting reports peg him as serviceable. There are clear hit tool concerns with him — he also fanned at a 28% clip in 2025 — but the power/speed/defense combination and a full slate of minor league options held appeal for the White Sox. The South Siders now have Pereira, Austin Hays, Brooks Baldwin and Tanner Murray on the injured list, which has helped to open a path for Perez to get his first major league look.

Banfield, 26, signed a minor league deal with the Reds in the offseason. He presumably had some kind of opt-out or upward mobility clause in that deal, as that usually explains why a team would add a player to its roster but then immediately option him back to the minors. Giving him the 40-man spot prevents him from getting away but doesn’t require the team to bump anyone else off the active roster.

It has been a good season in Louisville for Banfield so far. He has six home runs in 189 plate appearances, a .281/.337/.439 line and 103 wRC+. That indicates he has been 3% better than league average, though he’s gotten some help from a .344 batting average on balls in play.

Banfield has a good defensive reputation, so it’s possible the Reds view any offensive output as a bonus. He hit just .233/.285/.343 at the Triple-A level across 2024 and 2025 but still got a brief look in the majors with the Reds last year, getting into seven games. He was non-tendered at the end of the year and then re-signed his aforementioned minor league deal.

The Reds have Tyler Stephenson and Jose Trevino as their catchers at the big league level. Higgins was on the 40-man but on optional assignment. It seems the Reds preferred Banfield in that job, so they have swapped him in. Stephenson is an impending free agent and Trevino’s deal is only guaranteed through 2027, so there could be some long-term openings for playing time. Banfield can be optioned for the rest of this year and one additional season.

Higgins, 33, also signed a minor league deal with the Reds in the offseason. He was added to the roster in April, outrighted in May, but then selected back to the roster a few days later. Around the transactions, he took 32 plate appearances in 14 games and hit .231/.276/.269. He now has a .212/.289/.340 line in 286 career trips to the plate. He has generally received favorable marks for his defense in the minors.

Since Higgins has been previously outrighted in his career, he has the right to reject this outright assignment and elect free agency. The last time the Reds outrighted him, he accepted and was back on the roster a few days later. Now that Banfield is ahead of him on the chart, perhaps that makes him more likely to test the open market.

Photo courtesy of Katie Stratman, Imagn Images

Rajcic, 24, was a sixth-round pick of the Cards in 2022. He was a prospect of note as he climbed the ladder, working as a starter, but his results backed up as he reached the higher levels of the minor leagues. This year, the Cards have been using him exclusively as a reliever. He did technically make one start but that was for two innings as an opener.

The results of the switch have been encouraging. Rajcic has thrown 40 2/3 Triple-A innings over 26 appearances, allowing 2.88 earned runs per nine. His 8.6% walk rate is around average while his 28.4% strikeout rate and 48.5% ground ball rate are both notably better than par. His four-seamer and sinker are both averaging around 95 miles per hour as he also mixes in a slider, curveball and changeup.

Roycroft has been up and down all year and it took him 42 pitches to get through an inning and a third in last night’s game. He was probably going to be unavailable for a bit after that performance anyway, so he has been sent down once more. That will give Rajcic a chance to potentially make his major league debut and see how his stuff plays against big league hitters. Since this is the first time Rajcic has been added to a big league roster, he has a full slate of options and could be easily sent back to the farm when the Cards need a fresh arm again in the future.

Photo courtesy of Sam Navarro, Imagn Images

Wilson, 31, appeared in 21 games with the O’s and took 46 plate appearances prior to being designated for assignment. He hit .231/.348/.333 in that brief stretch, which marked his fourth season with some degree of major league experience. Wilson debuted with the 2023 Phillies and has totaled 291 plate appearances in the majors since. In that time, he’s slashed .240/.331/.413 — about 8% better than league-average production, by measure of wRC+.

Solid as that overall showing is, it came in frontloaded fashion. Wilson posted big numbers in brief auditions with the 2023-24 Phils before struggling to a .198/.282/.369 performance in a career-high 125 plate appearances with Philadelphia last year. He’s a right-handed hitter who’s batted .248/.351/.456 when facing lefties but just .229/.302/.352 against fellow righties.

Wilson has played first base, second base, third base and both outfield corners in the majors. He’s a career .248/.340/.462 hitter in parts of six minor league seasons. He gives the Mariners some righty-swinging depth at several positions and a generally productive Triple-A bat to round out the Tacoma roster. Seattle is currently without righty-swinging left fielder Randy Arozarena, lefty-hitting infielder/outfielder Brendan Donovan and righty-hitting utilityman Will Wilson (the latter of whom is reportedly weighing season-ending surgery).

At the moment, the Mariners are carrying a pair of veteran infield/outfield options on the bench: Rob Refsnyder and Connor Joe. Refsnyder has struggled greatly in his first season with the M’s. He signed a one-year, $6.25MM deal in free agency after a nice four-year run in Boston but has hit only .143/.214/.242 in 104 plate appearances. Joe is batting .189/.302/.324 in 43 plate appearances as a Mariner. Should either (or both) continue to struggle, it’s possible the Mariners could view the newly signed Wilson as a right-handed alternative off the bench.

Priester has been dealing with thoracic outlet symptoms since spring training. As the righty himself explained, diagnosing thoracic outlet syndrome is often a “process of exclusion,” meaning the best way to definitively diagnose it is to eliminate other potential causes. They’ve done that and attempted various alternate treatments in hopes that Priester could avoid going under the knife, but while Priester has gotten to the point of being pain-free at times, he’s not able to consistently repeat his mechanics because of the nerve issues that are plaguing him. Priester made eight minor league rehab appearances but walked 25% of his opponents and plunked another 4.1% of them.

Some fans may wonder why Priester didn’t get the surgery in spring training, when his symptoms first arose. That stems from the exclusionary nature of the diagnosis process but also is likely due to the expected timetable for recovery. Priester said he’ll be down from throwing for three months following the surgery and will need a total of eight to ten months before he’s game-ready.

That eight-month timeline would’ve wiped out his entire season anyhow, even if he’d had surgery in late March. He’s now hoping to be ready when pitchers and catchers report next spring, though that’ll depend on his recovery. It’s obviously possible that his rehab could push later into spring training or even early in the season.

Priester is already on the 60-day IL. He’ll spend the entire season there, accruing major league service time and pay while he’s on the mend. He’ll finish the season with 2.134 years of major league service, which could put him on the bubble of Super Two eligibility. That’d make him arbitration-eligible for the first time this coming winter and for each of the three subsequent offseasons. If he falls just shy of Super Two designation, he wouldn’t be arb-eligible until the 2027-28 offseason.

Even with Priester missing the season and possibly being arb-eligible, there’s no scenario in which he’d be a non-tender candidate. The former first-round pick and top prospect came to Milwaukee in what’s become a potential heist with the Red Sox. Minor league outfielder Yophery Rodriguez, minor league righty John Holobetz and the Brewers’ Competitive Balance draft selection in 2025 went back to Boston in that swap. The Sox selected righty Marcus Phillips with that pick. Boston’s return still has potential. Phillips and Holobetz entered the season ranked ninth and 14th among Red Sox farmhands, per Baseball America.

Priester, however, broke out as a high-end, playoff-caliber starter with Milwaukee last year and is still controlled four years after the current season. The 6’3″, 225-pound righty pitched 157 1/3 innings for manager Pat Murphy and logged a sharp 3.32 ERA. Priester’s 20.2% strikeout rate was a bit shy of average, but he countered that with good command (7.7% walk rate) and one of the highest ground-ball rates in the game (56.1%). Priester took some time to find his footing, but after a shakier start in the rotation, he closed out the season with a 2.95 ERA and even better rate stats over his final 17 appearances.

With Priester out for the season, the Brewers will lean more heavily on Cy Young candidate Jacob Misiorowski and lefty Kyle Harrison, whose 2026 breakout closely mirrors that of Priester. (Like Priester, Harrison is a former first-rounder and top prospect who’d been traded from his original organization to the Red Sox — only to be dealt a second time to Milwaukee.) The rest of the rotation has been more fluid, in part due to injury. Robert Gasser, Brandon Sproat and Shane Drohan have rotation spots right now, but Brandon Woodruff, Logan Henderson and Coleman Crow have all started games for Murphy and are currently on the injured list. Chad Patrick has bounced between the rotation and bullpen, giving the Brewers another solid back-end option.