{"id":440017,"date":"2026-01-27T05:14:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T05:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/440017\/"},"modified":"2026-01-27T05:14:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T05:14:09","slug":"mlb-legends-justin-verlander-max-scherzer-remain-in-limbo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/440017\/","title":{"rendered":"MLB Legends Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer Remain in Limbo"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"inline-text-0\" class=\"mt-[18px] md:mt-0 mb-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"60\">There are two clear-cut future Hall of Famers available in free agency right now in Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-1\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"63\">Verlander spent the 2025 season with the San Francisco Giants and had a 3.85 ERA in 29 starts to go along with a 137-to-52 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 152 innings of work. That&#8217;s legit production that any contender would be fortunate to have in the middle of the starting rotation. Scherzer made 17 starts for the Toronto Blue Jays and had a 5.19 ERA in 85 innings of work. His regular season production wasn&#8217;t up to par with the rest of his career, but he was a key piece en route to Game 7 of the World Series. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-2\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"66\">If you like our content,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=si.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">choose Sports Illustrated as a preferred source on Google<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-3\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"69\">Now, they&#8217;re both still looking for work and <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/MLBNetwork\/status\/2015945096890351914\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">MLB Network&#8217;s Jon Morosi<\/a> gave updates on both free agents on Monday. <\/p>\n<p>There are two legends still available<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/01kfypvvhsk4wh1zet7d.jpg\" alt=\"San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Justin Verlander\" title=\"San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Justin Verlander\" width=\"4737\" height=\"2664\" class=\"undefined w-full w-full blur-[5px]\" q:id=\"6l\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Sep 27, 2025; San Francisco, California, USA; San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Justin Verlander (35) takes the field to face the Colorado Rockies during the first inning at Oracle Park. Mandatory Credit: D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images | D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-6\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6p\">&#8220;Who wants to sign a future Hall of Famer? They&#8217;re out there and available. Both Verlander and Scherzer. One team that is certainly in that conversation: the Baltimore Orioles. We know they want to get at least one more starting pitcher. They&#8217;ve been pretty active overall this offseason. When you consider Max Scherzer and his future, Ken Rosenthal has reported that maybe Scherzer will wait until after Opening Day to make a decision. And again, you start to think about the reasons why. Maybe that Padres possibility is out there depending on how that [Yu Darvish] situation is solved.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-7\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6s\">&#8220;Other teams could have flexibility. Look at a team like the Chicago White Sox, who in their situation, just moved Luis Robert Jr.&#8217;s contract, so they now have additional flexibility. A team like the Guardians, we talked about spreading out some of [Jos\u00e9 Ram\u00edrez&#8217;s] money over the long term. Maybe that gives them some flexibility as well. &#8230; Verlander was great down the stretch. I&#8217;m a little surprised no one traded for him before the deadline. &#8230; I think both of them will find a way to pitch in 2026.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-8\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6v\">The free agent market has moved slowly in general this offseason and this is yet another example of how. Both were important pieces for their respective teams in 2025. The market has been confusing this winter, but there are just a couple of weeks to go until Spring Training. If there was a time for movement in the market, it would be now.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-9\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-secondary my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6y\">More MLB: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.si.com\/fannation\/mlb\/fastball\/news\/cody-bellinger-yankees-signing-leaves-one-elite-free-agent-left-pat3\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cody Bellinger-Yankees Signing Leaves One Elite Free Agent Left<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There are two clear-cut future Hall of Famers available in free agency right now in Justin Verlander and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":440018,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85],"class_list":["post-440017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440017","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=440017"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440017\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/440018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}