{"id":418770,"date":"2026-01-17T09:13:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-17T09:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/418770\/"},"modified":"2026-01-17T09:13:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T09:13:07","slug":"d-backs-notes-arenado-donovan-bullpen-puk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/418770\/","title":{"rendered":"D-Backs Notes: Arenado, Donovan, Bullpen, Puk"},"content":{"rendered":"

The months of Nolan Arenado<\/a> trade rumors came to a close on Tuesday when the Cardinals dealt the 10-time Gold Glove winner to the Diamondbacks. St. Louis paid his contract down to two years and $11MM, while Arizona parted with last year\u2019s eighth round draft pick (Jack Martinez<\/a>). The Cardinals had made no secret of their desire to shed a portion of Arenado\u2019s salary and open space at third base for younger players, with Nolan Gorman<\/a> likely to get the first run.<\/p>\n

Arenado\u2019s full no-trade clause gave him say over his destination. He had a limited number of teams to which he would have accepted a deal last offseason. He expanded that list this winter and discussed the decision on an introductory Zoom call with reporters. \u201cSeeing where (the Cardinals) were headed the past few years, it was very evident that there\u2019s a step they need to take,\u201d Arenado said (link via Sam Blum of The Athletic<\/a>). \u201cLetting these young guys go and finding out who they are, and who their identity is. I think I\u2019m just kind of in the way of that, in a sense. I kind of always felt like that last year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked about the appeal of the Diamondbacks specifically, Arenado pointed to their position player core built around\u00a0Corbin Carroll<\/a>,\u00a0Geraldo Perdomo<\/a> and\u00a0Ketel Marte<\/a> (video provided by Steve Gilbert of MLB.com<\/a>). He noted the geographic proximity to his native Southern California and expressed excitement about the team\u2019s playing style. He\u2019ll take over as the everyday third baseman and should at least provide a strong glove, though it remains to be seen how much he has left in the tank offensively. He\u2019s going into his age-35 season on the heels of a .237\/.289\/.377 showing over 107 games.<\/p>\n

Cardinals president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom told Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch<\/a> that conversations with the Diamondbacks developed quickly. Arizona had been involved in the market for free agent third baseman\u00a0Alex Bregman<\/a>, who agreed to a five-year deal with the Cubs on Saturday. It wasn\u2019t until last Friday that reports emerged that they had firmly pulled Marte off the trade market. While the Cardinals and D-Backs had discussed Arenado throughout the winter, it seems talks accelerated in the wake of the Bregman\/Marte developments.<\/p>\n

Goold writes that the Snakes had also been among the teams to reach out to the Cards about\u00a0Brendan Donovan<\/a>. Their interest in the left-handed hitting utilityman had not previously been reported. That\u2019s unlikely to mean much at this point. St. Louis is widely expected to trade Donovan, but teams like the Mariners and Giants appear more engaged. Arizona has Marte, Perdomo and Arenado in the three infield spots to the left of first base. Donovan would be an upgrade in left field, but a team with a second base need will probably be more motivated to part with high-end prospect talent.<\/p>\n

Arizona\u2019s focuses now seem to be a right-handed hitting first baseman and the bullpen. Franchise icon\u00a0Paul Goldschmidt<\/a> has made sense as a target in the former role all offseason, and the acquisition of his longtime St. Louis teammate only strengthens that fit. They may need to take more of a patchwork approach to the bullpen. This week\u2019s one-year, $1.55MM deal<\/a> to bring back\u00a0Taylor Clarke<\/a> is their only big league bullpen pickup to date.<\/p>\n

Clarke projects as more of a middle or long reliever than a leverage arm. That\u2019s true of essentially everyone in the Arizona \u2019pen until\u00a0A.J. Puk<\/a> and\u00a0Justin Martinez<\/a> return from last year\u2019s elbow surgeries. General manager Mike Hazen acknowledged that while the front office would love to add an established late-game arm, that\u2019ll be challenging at this stage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWould I like to have somebody that has a clear pedigree of pitching in the eighth and ninth inning? That\u2019s an easier answer. I\u2019m not sure what we\u2019ll have access to in that way,\u201d Hazen told Nick Piecoro of The Arizona Republic<\/a>. He acknowledged they need to continue adding to the bullpen this offseason but suggested the biggest impact would probably come from internal improvements and hopefully getting Martinez and Puk healthy. Arizona prioritized upper minors pitching in last summer\u2019s deadline activity.\u00a0Brandyn Garcia<\/a>,\u00a0Juan Burgos<\/a> and Andrew Hoffmann<\/a> all came over as inexperienced but essentially MLB-ready bullpen pieces.<\/p>\n

Of the injury returnees, it seems Puk is further along. Piecoro writes that the D-Backs hope to get the southpaw back within the first few months of the season, while Martinez is targeting a second half return. Puk underwent internal brace surgery in late June. Martinez required a full Tommy John reconstruction, which comes with a longer recovery timeline. It was the second elbow ligament procedure of each pitcher\u2019s career, as they\u2019d both had Tommy John surgeries during their prospect days.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The months of Nolan Arenado trade rumors came to a close on Tuesday when the Cardinals dealt the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":418771,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[220692,64,63,24616,220693,591,6591,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-418770","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-a-j-puk","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-brendan-donovan","12":"tag-justin-martinez","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-nolan-arenado","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418770","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=418770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=418770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=418770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=418770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}