{"id":330736,"date":"2025-12-06T03:33:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T03:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/330736\/"},"modified":"2025-12-06T03:33:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T03:33:08","slug":"latest-on-michael-kings-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/330736\/","title":{"rendered":"Latest On Michael King’s Market"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michael King<\/a> is one of the bigger risk-reward plays in the starting pitching class. He\u2019s arguably a top 10 pitcher in MLB when healthy but is coming off a platform season that was wrecked by a nerve injury in his throwing shoulder. He\u2019s also attached to draft compensation after rejecting a qualifying offer from the Padres.<\/p>\n

That hasn\u2019t deterred plenty of teams from expressing interest. King was already known to be a target for the Cubs, Tigers and Yankees, while even the Marlins checked in as a long shot suitor. Mark Feinsand of MLB.com<\/a> and Joel Sherman of The New York Post<\/a> each write that the Mets are involved. Feinsand adds the Orioles, Angels and incumbent Padres as teams on the periphery of the market. Sherman reports that the Red Sox have also shown interest in the 30-year-old righty.<\/p>\n

King converted to the rotation late in the 2023 season as a member of the Yankees. He pitched well enough to stick as a starter after being traded to San Diego as the centerpiece of the Juan Soto<\/a> deal. King finished seventh in NL Cy Young voting in 2024, pitching to a 2.95 ERA while striking out 201 batters over 31 appearances. He\u2019d pitched even better over the first six weeks of the \u201925 campaign. King reeled off 10 starts with a 2.59 earned run average and punching out 28% of opponents before the injury.<\/p>\n

Durability is the big question. The shoulder issue wasn\u2019t structural but proved a lot more problematic than initially expected. He wound up missing almost three months and showed signs of rust when he returned late in the season. King gave up 12 runs while tallying all of 17 1\/3 innings over five starts in the second half. His velocity was fine but he only managed 12 strikeouts while issuing nine free passes.<\/p>\n

King appeared on track for a nine-figure contract amidst his hot start. That\u2019s tougher to envision now, as the 2024 campaign remains the only season in which he has reached even 105 innings. That\u2019s largely because of his usage with the Yankees, but he also missed a couple months in 2021 with a finger injury and suffered a season-ending elbow fracture the following year.<\/p>\n

MLBTR predicted<\/a> King to receive a four-year, $80MM contract. It\u2019s also possible he prefers a two- or three-year deal with an opt-out to get back to free agency next winter. King declined the straight one-year qualifying offer, but a multi-year deal with an out clause would give him a little more security than the QO would have provided. Jeff Passan of ESPN<\/a> wrote this morning that King is willing to sign for a shorter term than the top free agent arms (e.g. Framber Valdez<\/a>,\u00a0Tatsuya Imai<\/a>, Ranger Su\u00e1rez<\/a>). That wouldn\u2019t necessarily rule out a four-year deal, as the best starters are expected to command five or six-year contracts. Dylan Cease<\/a> already pulled a seven-year guarantee.<\/p>\n

The Mets should come away with a mid-rotation or better arm via free agency or trade. They stayed away from the top of the rotation market last winter. That worked out early in the year but collapsed down the stretch. Only the Rockies, Nationals and Angels had a higher second-half ERA from their rotation than the Mets\u2019 5.31 mark. Nolan McLean<\/a> looks like a budding frontline starter, but he\u2019s their only pitcher who allowed fewer than 4.20 earned runs per nine after the All-Star Break.<\/p>\n

Baltimore, Boston, San Diego and the Angels have all been in the rotation market. The Red Sox should probably focus elsewhere after acquiring\u00a0Sonny Gray<\/a> and\u00a0Johan Oviedo<\/a> in trade. The Angels have landed a pair of starters this offseason as well, but\u00a0Grayson Rodriguez<\/a> and\u00a0Alek Manoah<\/a> both have significant health questions. They still need a starter and are also in the mix for\u00a0Zac Gallen<\/a>. The O\u2019s are involved on Valdez and Su\u00e1rez; no pitcher seems to be off the table for them. The Padres are unlikely to spend what it\u2019d take to bring King back, though they\u2019ll need multiple rotation adds after also losing Cease to free agency and Yu Darvish<\/a> to elbow surgery.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael King is one of the bigger risk-reward plays in the starting pitching class. He\u2019s arguably a top…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":330737,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,6102,591,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-330736","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-michael-king","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330737"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}