Cody Bellinger, Dozens Of Others Become Free Agents As Non-Tenders

The pool of baseball free agents morphed into a flood Friday after the 30 big-league teams met the 2022 non-tender deadline.

Dozens of players, including former National League MVP Cody Bellinger, were not offered contracts, plunging them into the pool and impacting negotiations with players whose contracts had expired earlier.

A flurry of trades preceded the deadline as teams adjusted their 40-man rosters.

Bellinger, a 6’4″ left-handed slugger paid $17 last season, won’t turn 28 until after the 2023 All-Star Game. During his MVP season of 2019, he hit .305 with 47 home runs and 115 runs batted in but hasn’t been the same since.

He struggled over the last two seasons, averaging just .193. But teams in search of a veteran center-fielder who hits with power might want to take a chance.

He’s hardly the only name player included on the list of non-tenders.

In the National League alone, that list includes catcher Jorge Alfaro (Padres), first basemen Luke Voit (Nationals) and Dom Smith (Mets), second baseman Garrett Hampson (Rockies), former All-Star reliever Alex Reyes (Cardinals), outfielder Rafael Ortega (Cubs), and outfielder-third baseman Brian Anderson (Marlins).

Familiar names non-tendered by American League teams were catcher Luke Maile (Guardians), outfielders Adam Eaton (White Sox) and Bradley Zimmer (Blue Jays), third baseman Jeimer Candelario (Tigers), first baseman Franchy Cordero (Red Sox), and pitchers Ryan Yarbrough (Rays) and Touki Toussaint (Angels).

Like Bellinger, Smith is a left-handed hitter who turns 28 next season. Blocked by Pete Alonso in New York, his playing time and batting average has fallen in each of the last three seasons after hitting a career-best .316 in 2020, when he also hit 10 homers in 50 games during the virus-shortened season.

That same year, Voit led the American League in home runs when he hit 22 for the Yankees. He reached that number again in 2022, when he split his time between the Padres and Nationals, but contributed a .226 average that convinced the Nats to let him walk.

The alternative was a significant, arbitration-caused raise above his 2022 salary of $5.25 million.

Reyes, who missed the entire ‘22 season after shoulder surgery, was a 2021 All-Star who had 29 saves for St. Louis that year, working 69 times out of the bullpen. The 28-year-old right-hander has youth on his side in a seller’s market for bullpen help.

Even Anderson, whose career began with the 2017 Marlins, won’t reach 30 until May.

He split his time last year between third base and right field but battled shoulder, back, and oblique problems. The .256 career hitter has twice topped 30 doubles but reached 20 homers just once, probably because Marlins Park has such spacious dimensions.

Alfaro, whose claim to fame is inclusion in the trade that sent J.T. Realmuto to Philadelphia, also carries a .256 career average – more than passable for a reliable backstop. In 2019, the last year injuries didn’t interfere with his performance, he hit 18 home runs for the Marlins.

Ortega, a left-handed hitter, hammered 18 homers in limited duty for the Cubs over the last two years but showed versatility by playing more than 10 games at each of the three outfield spots.

Candelario is a switch-hitter who has spent the past five years playing third base for Detroit, where he wore out his welcome with an anemic .217 batting average in 2022. Still, he’s only 29 and hit 16 homers and 42 doubles just two years ago.

As for Cordero, versatility plus power potential could equal a make-good contract. A left-handed hitter who plays first base and the outfield corners, he had eight homers in a career-best 84 games for Boston last year.

Eaton, 33, doesn’t have that kind of pop but he’s a fleet lead-off type who supplies solid outfield defense if healthy. He wasn’t in 2022, when he missed the entire season. Eaton won a World Series ring with the 2019 Washington Nationals.

The best pitcher non-tendered by an AL club was Yarbrough, a 6’5″ lefty let go by Tampa Bay after five seasons. Used as a reliever and a starter – especially when the club needed an opener in a bullpen game – he won 27 games in his first two seasons (2018-19).

By far the most intriguing name on the list was Toussaint, a righty who had four cups of coffee with the Braves before they sent him to the Angels last winter. Plagued by command issues, he has a 10-7 lifetime mark but bloated 5.34 earned run average. At age 26, the 6’3″ Floridian is virtually certain to find a taker on the open market.

Adding the non-tenders to this year’s free-agent frenzy may change the dynamics of the market.

For example, will the Dodgers be more inclined to increase their offer to Aaron Judge now that Bellinger has vacated center field? Will the World Champion Astros, rebuffed in their quest to sign Anthony Rizzo, turn their attention to Voit or Smith? Can Alfaro fill the Cardinals’ need for a front-line catcher to replace Yadier Molina?

Because many of the non-tenders are coming off seasons marred by injuries or unexpectedly poor performances, their asking prices are likely to be lower than the existing market. As teams fill their needs, that could even lower the prices on second-tier free agents from the original group.

Much of the action is expected to take place when team executives gather for the San Diego Winter Meetings, which start Dec. 4 at the Manchester Grand Hyatt.