1:35pm:\u00a0The Boston Globe has has clarified that, while the Red Sox, Yankees, and Orioles are among the teams King is considering, there are no finalists for his services at this point.<\/p>\n
1:11pm: Right-hander Michael King<\/a> has narrowed his search for a new team to three options, according to a report from Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe.<\/a> Those teams are the Red Sox, Yankees, and Orioles. Additionally, Chris Cotillo of MassLive<\/a> reports that the Rhode Island native and Boston College alum has \u201cstrong interest\u201d in playing for Boston. Abraham notes that King would like to make a decision on his destination soon.<\/p>\n King, 30 has been among the league\u2019s most widely sought-after starters this winter. He\u2019s been connected to the Mets, Cubs, Tigers, Marlins, Angels, and Blue Jays in addition to the three apparent finalists for his services, and it\u2019s not hard to see why the right-hander would garner such widespread interest. The 30-year-old flashed significant upside during his 2024 season with the Padres, when he pitched to a 2.95 ERA in 173 2\/3 innings of work with a 3.33 FIP and a 27.7% strikeout rate. That was a strong enough performance to earn him a seventh-place finish in NL Cy Young award voting that year, which was his first as a full-time starter.<\/p>\n The right-hander seemingly appeared to be lined up for a massive payday heading into his platform season of 2025, but injuries complicated things this past year. King was limited to just 15 starts by a nerve issue in his shoulder (as well as a less significant knee injury late in the year), and while he dominated to the tune of a 2.59 ERA, 3.26 FIP, and a 28.4% strikeout rate in ten appearances prior to the shoulder injury, he didn\u2019t look quite the same after returning with a 6.11 ERA and a 14.5% strikeout rate a 10.8% walk rate across his final five appearances in the regular season.<\/p>\n King moved to the bullpen for San Diego\u2019s Wild Card series against the Padres and looked more like himself as he struck out the side on 19 pitches in a scoreless inning of work, but headed into the offseason his second half struggles and significant injury woes left cause for concern as he entered free agency. He received a qualifying offer from the Padres, a positive sign that the club didn\u2019t see King\u2019s injuries as too concerning for the 2026 campaign, and declined it in order to pursue a multi-year pact in free agency.<\/p>\n Looking at the three teams still in the running for King\u2019s services, the Orioles stand out as the team with the biggest need in their rotation. The club is coming off a deeply disappointing 2025 campaign where their decision to eschew high-end arms in free agency came back to bite them, as rolls of the dice on Charlie Morton<\/a> and Tomoyuki Sugano<\/a> failed to bear fruit while Zach Eflin<\/a> took a big step back from his previous work with the Rays. While Kyle Bradish<\/a> and Trevor Rogers<\/a> could plausibly form an exciting front-of-the-rotation duo for the Orioles next year, adding at least one proven, playoff-caliber starter to the mix has been the team\u2019s clear priority this winter.<\/p>\n King would certainly fit that mold if healthy, and likely could do so without breaking the bank and requiring Baltimore to commit to a second nine-figure contract this winter after they signed Pete Alonso<\/a> last week. MLBTR predicted<\/a> King to land a four-year, $80MM contract as the #14 ranked free agent in this offseason. Of course, with top-of-the-rotation upside and an expected contract price tag and length that falls below that of your typical front-end starter, there\u2019s plenty of room for a more opportunistic team to get involved.<\/p>\n That\u2019s likely where the Red Sox come in, given that Boston is incredibly deep in pitching talent as it is. Garrett Crochet<\/a> leads a rotation that figures to also include Sonny Gray<\/a> and Brayan Bello<\/a> at the front end, with players like Johan Oviedo<\/a>, Patrick Sandoval<\/a>, and Connelly Early<\/a> in the mix for the final spots as things stand. Kutter Crawford<\/a>, Payton Tolle<\/a>, Kyle Harrison<\/a>, and Hunter Dobbins<\/a> are among the pitchers who figure to serve as depth for the Red Sox this year, an embarrassment of riches that make adding a starter in free agency more of a luxury than a necessity.<\/p>\n Even so, landing King on a deal that the Red Sox perceive as good value would still make sense, as it could free them up to more fully explore trades involving some of their young pitching talent. Boston has already been connected to Ketel Marte<\/a>, Willson Contreras<\/a>, and Isaac Paredes<\/a> on the free agent market as they search for help on offense this winter, and perhaps signing King and trading from their pitching depth to land one of those big names could be more attractive as an option than taking a swing on one of the big bats still available in free agency.<\/p>\n As for the Yankees, a reunion with the team King spent the first five years of his MLB career with splits the difference between the extremes Baltimore and Boston represent. New York isn\u2019t in desperate need of a front-of-the-rotation ace with Max Fried<\/a> already in place and Gerrit Cole<\/a> expected back from Tommy John surgery at some point next year, but their rotation could certainly use additional depth. Cole and Carlos Rodon<\/a> are both not expected to be ready for the start of the 2026 campaign, while Clarke Schmidt<\/a> figures to miss most if not all of next year.<\/p>\n That leaves the Yankees with an Opening Day rotation of Fried, Cam Schlittler<\/a>, Luis Gil<\/a>, Will Warren<\/a>, and Allan Winans<\/a>. Given Winans\u2019s lack of MLB experience and Gil\u2019s significant injury history, there\u2019s certainly room for another quality starter in the Yankees\u2019 rotation mix even if they don\u2019t necessarily need one with the same level of upside that King offers. Even so, King was a popular player during his time with the Bronx and well-liked within the organization. Between the potential value to be had on King\u2019s contract and his past connection to the club, it\u2019s hardly a surprise that New York would get involved in his market as they survey the offseason landscape for rotation help.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"1:35pm:\u00a0The Boston Globe has has clarified that, while the Red Sox, Yankees, and Orioles are among the teams…\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-348083","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\/348083","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=348083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348083\/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=348083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=348083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=348083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}