CLEVELAND, Ohio — Triston McKenzie, in the grip of a bad season, was optioned to Class AAA Columbus on June 30 and never made it back to the Cleveland for the rest of the season.
On Thursday, well before Friday’s non-tender deadline, McKenzie avoided arbitratrion by signing a one-year deal worth $1.95 million. Projections by MLB Trade Rumors had McKenzie scheduled to make $2.4 million through arbitration.
The 6-5, right-hander made $1.6 million this year.
The Guardians must offer contracts to Josh Naylor, Lane Thomas, Sam Hentges, Nick Sandlin, Steven Kwan and Ben Lively by Friday’s non-tender deadline. They are all eligible for arbitration. If they don’t receive contracts, they will become free agents.
McKenzie opened the 2023 season on the injured list because of a strained teres major muscle in his right shoulder. After being activated, he strained the UCL in his right elbow and was limited to just four starts.
He could have elected surgery, but chose to rehab the injury. McKenzie made the opening day rotation in 2024, but struggled. He went 3-5 with a 5.11 ERA in 16 starts. He walked 49 and allowed 19 homers in 75 2/3 innings before being optioned to Columbus.
McKenzie struggled at Triple-A as well, going 4-4 with a 5.23 ERA in 13 games, including 10 starts. Late in the year McKenzie pitched out of the bullpen to give the Guardians a possible option for the postseason, but it never came to fruition.
In the 2024 postmortem of the Guardians’ season, Chris Antonetti, president of baseball operations, said McKenzie and his elbow were healthy.
The Guardians have a lot of questions to answer in the starting rotation before opening the 2025 season. A healthy McKenzie could answer one of them.
McKenzie, 27, had his best season in 2021 when he went 11-11 with a 2.96 ERA in 31 games, including 30 starts. He struck out 136 and walked 58 in 120 innings.