The Cincinnati Reds and Michael Lorenzen have agreed to a 1-year contract for the 2021 season. Today is the day that teams and players must submit arbitration numbers unless they come to an agreement on a contract for the 2021 season. Cincinnati and pitcher Michael Lorenzen avoided the hassle of arbitration today by agreeing to a 1-year deal for $4,437,500 according to Bobby Nightengale of the Cincinnati Enquirer. That’s right in line with the $4.4M projection that MLB Trade Rumors had for Lorenzen when the offseason began.
What the 2021 season has in store for Michael Lorenzen is still up in the air. As things stand today he’s heading into spring training to compete for a job in the rotation. He hasn’t had a gig as a starting pitcher in any meaningful way since his rookie season in 2015. During 2018 he would make three starts and then last season he made two more – but that’s it, five total starts over the last five seasons. With the need to fill out the rotation, Lorenzen will compete with a few others to grab the 5th spot.
Jesse Winker agrees to a 1-year deal
Cincinnati and Jesse Winker have also agreed to a 1-year contract for the 2021 season. Winker’s deal is for $3.15M (also first reported by Bobby Nightengale of the Cincinnati Enquirer). That’s a little under the projected $3.4M that MLB Trade Rumors had on his arbitration number when the offseason began. The outfielder is coming off of his best season at the plate, hitting .255/.388/.544 for a career best .932 OPS (also a career best 142 OPS+) in his 183 plate appearances. For Winker, it seems he’ll be heading back to the outfield in 2021 as the National League will not have the designated hitter role in the upcoming season after having it during the shortened 2020 campaign.
Reds and Tyler Mahle reach a deal for 2021
The Reds and right-handed pitcher Tyler Mahle have also come to an agreement on a 1-year deal for the 2021 season, avoiding arbitration. Robert Murray of Fansided was the first to report that Mahle and Cincinnati came to an agreement for $2.2M for the upcoming season. Like Winker’s deal, that’s a little lower than the projected MLB Trade Rumors arbitration number that they had set at $2.5M. Mahle, coming off of a 2020 campaign where he posted a 3.59 ERA in 47.2 innings with 60 strikeouts spread over nine starts and one relief appearance.
Amir Garrett agrees to a deal, too
As the day has gone one the Reds have been getting more and more work accomplished. The organization and left-handed reliever and soon-to-be dad, Amir Garrett, came to an agreement on a 1-year deal for the 2021 season. Garrett and Cincinnati inked a deal for $1.5M to avoid arbitration. Mark Feinsand of MLB.com was the first to report this deal. With Raisel Iglesias out, Garrett could slide into the 9th inning role (along with Lucas Sims). The lefty is coming off of a 2020 season where he posted a 2.45 ERA in 21 games that saw him throw 18.1 innings with 26 strikeouts and a 0.93 WHIP.
Reds also agree to a deal with Noé Ramirez
The newest Cincinnati reliever, Noé Ramirez, has also agreed to a 1-year deal with the Reds today. Ramirez agreed to a deal for $1.175M today according to Bobby Nightengale. MLB Trade Rumors had a projected arbitration number on Ramirez at $1.2M – so they were once again right on the money. It was Ramirez who came over to Cincinnati in the trade with the Los Angeles Angels in the deal for now former Reds closer Raisel Iglesias. He’s coming off of a season with the Angels where he posted a 3.00 ERA in 21 games.
Remaining arbitration eligible players
When the day began the Cincinnati Reds have six players that were arbitration eligible for the 2021 season. By the end of the day they had signed all six players to a deal for 2021, including Luis Castillo, who signed his much later than the others and got his own little article about his deal. You can read about that one here.
six of my favorite players. I hope the other three agree before arbitration. I don’t want the potential hostility between the reds and their players.
didn’t they only have 6 arb players?
Yes. But this post has been updated throughout the afternoon. At various points a different number of players have been signed, so I’m guessing that Larry’s comment was submitted when only three of the six players had signed.
Oh no. Common core strikes again!
Doug is correct. Only three of the six arb eligible players had signed when I commented earlier on the blog. Reading it now though, I can see that I was suggesting that there were a total of nine arb eligible reds. Sorry duckeastwood, my bad.
Technically this is my bad.
Mahle (2.2 MM) and Garret (1.5MM) have reportedly both signed.
Yes, MLBTR shows them signed. Only Castillo not signed.
He agreed too
As we get closer to opening day and with it a better sense of the vaccine rollout and by extension the in-person attendance, I’d like to think the Reds are thinking about offering extensions to some core pieces. Castillo, Winker, Lorenzen should be approached to gauge their interest.
I can’t help thinking, if Winker and Mahle come up with even better years, I would lock them up after this season.
Though I’m still high on Lorenzen, I still need to see some more from him. For, I believe I could easily be overestimating him.
I like Garrett, also. And, I believe Garrett has proved himself. I just feel he’s been used too much as a LOOGY and not as a reliever good for a couple innings at a time. Or, I wouldn’t mind seeing him as a starter again. I mean, he wasn’t too good last time as a starter. But, that was his rookie season. I wouldn’t mind giving him another shot.
Glad to see all of these guys signed. Now we just need to get a Castillo deal done.
Giants pitching staff looking familiar: Cueto, Gausman, Disco, Wood, Peralta, Wisler.
I noticed this too… I especially thought them picking up Wood for not much was a pretty good signing for them…He looked very solid in the World Series.
Are the Reds working on an extension for Castillo? Very happy to see the rest of the Arb Eligible players signed.
This is coming from a guy who did not pitch, but has a lot of experience in sports that you need to close out (as opposed to sports where you can hold the ball and wait for time to expire). It seems like there is a different mentality for a good starter, closer, and middle reliever (outside of repertoire of pitches and physical aspects). Garrett seems to have a closer mentality. Lorenzen . . . I’d like to see him get a true shot as a starter. Curious what others think about it.
I like Garrett as a closer if he can keep the walks under control.