The Rays have signed old friend Jake Odorizzi to a minor league contract, reports Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times. The Excel Sports Management client already in camp. Odorizzi tells Topkin that he’d been throwing teams throughout the winter in search of a big league contract, but his familiarity with the organization and a clear opportunity in an injury-plagued rotation paved the way for the current agreement. Joel Sherman of the New York Post reports that Odorizzi will be paid at a $1.5MM rate in the big leagues with $500K bonuses available for reaching 25, 50, 75, 100 and 150 innings on the season.
Tampa Bay already entered the season knowing that Shane McClanahan is likely to miss the season due to last August’s Tommy John surgery, while both Drew Rasmussen (internal brace surgery last July), Jeffrey Springs (Tommy John surgery last April) and Shane Baz (2022 Tommy John surgery) are midseason additions at best. This week, they learned that young right-hander Taj Bradley will open the season on the injured list due to a pectoral strain that still doesn’t have a definitive timetable for his return. Unsurprisingly, they’re bringing in some veteran rotation depth.
Odorizzi himself is on the mend from an injury. He was traded from the Braves to the Rangers in the 2022-23 offseason but wound up requiring arthroscopic surgery on his right shoulder in early April, which knocked him out for the entire season. He never threw a pitch for Texas.
It’s been an up and down few years for Odorizzi, who from his peak with the Rays and Twins was a durable and quite effective mid-rotation arm. In a six-year span from 2014-19, the right-hander tossed 991 2/3 innings of 3.88 ERA ball, striking out 23% of his opponents against an 8.2% walk rate. Odorizzi has never been a flamethrower but has typically posted solid spin rates on his 91-95 mph heater and missed bats at the top of the zone. He was an All-Star with the Twins in 2019 when he pitched 169 innings of 3.51 ERA ball with a career-high 27.1% strikeout rate.
That season prompted the Twins to issue a qualifying offer, which Odorizzi accepted. He returned to Minnesota for the shortened 2020 season but wound up only making four starts due primarily to an intercostal strain. Odorizzi returned to free agency, inked a two-year deal with the Astros, and split the 2021-22 seasons between Houston and Atlanta, combining to toss 211 innings with a 4.31 ERA and diminished 19.8% strikeout rate. A flexor strain in his right arm in 2021 and a tendon strain in his lower leg in 2022 cost Odorizzi more than three months of action during that two-year period.
It’s not entirely clear when Odorizzi will be game-ready, but he could very well emerge as an option at some point in the season’s first few weeks. The Rays currently project to deploy right-handers Zach Eflin, Aaron Civale, Zack Littell and Ryan Pepiot in the top four spots of the rotation. Other options for starts include swingmen Tyler Alexander and Chris Devenski, both of whom were being stretched out to three innings during camp anyway. Prospect Jacob Lopez is also on the 40-man roster, while non-roster options of note include prospect Mason Montgomery, NPB signee Naoyuki Uwasawa and journeyman righty Jacob Waguespack.
