Michael Lorenzen has signed to a one-year contract with the Texas Rangers for far less than he had hoped.
Former Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Michael Lorenzen agreed to a late-night/early-morning deal with the Texas Rangers after making headlines earlier this week in free agency.
According to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic and MLB on FOX, Lorenzen and the reigning World Series winners have agreed to a one-year contract for $4.5 million. The agreement is subject to a physical and includes up to $2.5 million in incentives. Overall, Lorenzen might earn up to $7 million. The Rangers have not verified or made the signing official at this time.
The 32-year-old will most likely join the Rangers’ bullpen as a long man and rotation depth if required. Roster Resource expects that he will
be the eighth reliever Texas carries into the season. With Opening Day just one week away, the Rangers are currently without Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer. The rotation consists of Nathan Eovaldi, Jon Gray, Andrew Heaney, Dane Dunning, and Cody Bradford, with the depth falling off after that, per MLB.com’s Kennedi Landry. Lorenzen’s free-agent ordeal is finally over As Rosenthal reported for The Athletic on March 5, the short-tenured Phillie had been seeking a two-year contract worth $20 million (subscription required). As we’ve seen in recent weeks, players left on the free agent market have had to take smaller deals than initially desired. If big names like Blake Snell, Matt Chapman, and Cody Bellinger had to take less money and less term, Lorenzen didn’t stand
Following Gerrit Cole’s injury news, the New York Yankees allegedly expressed interest in the right-hander. Jon Heyman of the New York Post claimed that the Yankees checked in on Lorenzen, but that was all we knew.
Lorenzen, who is entering his tenth MLB season, will want to rebound off a dismal showing with the Phillies down the stretch. After making two excellent starts in Philadelphia, including the franchise’s 14th no-hitter, things went bad. He had an 8.01 ERA in his last nine outings, which were split between the rotation and the bullpen.
Overall, he had a 5.51 ERA, 1.46 WHIP, and only 28 strikeouts in 47 1/3 regular-season innings for the Phillies. The 32-year-old flung two
