{"id":350544,"date":"2025-12-17T06:42:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T06:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/350544\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T06:42:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T06:42:07","slug":"steven-matz-to-compete-for-rotation-spot-with-rays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/350544\/","title":{"rendered":"Steven Matz To Compete For Rotation Spot With Rays"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Rays finalized their two-year, $15MM deal with\u00a0Steven Matz<\/a> on Tuesday afternoon. The veteran lefty came out of the bullpen for all but two of his 53 appearances this past season, but he\u2019ll have a chance to win a rotation spot out of Spring Training.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a real desire on his end to want to start and give that a real shot again, despite his success last year out of the bullpen, and we just believe that he has the the ability to do it,\u201d president of baseball operations Erik Neander told Marc Topkin of The Tampa Bay Times<\/a>. \u201cSo we\u2019re going to give him the opportunity to prepare as a starter, to come in and try to lock down a day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matz signed as a starter with St. Louis over the 2021-22 offseason. He battled injuries in each of the first three seasons of that four-year contract. He suffered a shoulder impingement and a knee sprain in \u201922. A lat strain shelved him the following season, while it was his back that proved problematic in 2024. The stop-and-start seasons and inconsistent production quickly pushed him into a swing role. Matz wound up making just 35 starts \u2014 compared to 48 relief outings \u2014 over three and a half seasons with the Cardinals. He pitched to a 4.68 ERA despite solid strikeout (22.6%) and walk (6.4%) rates out of the rotation. The Red Sox used him in short relief after picking him up at last summer\u2019s trade deadline.<\/p>\n

The 34-year-old Matz held up as a starter earlier in his career. He topped 150 innings each full season between 2018-21. He allowed around four earned runs per nine in each year, generally performing at a league average level. Matz still has plus command and hasn\u2019t much changed his repertoire even when pitching in shorter stints. He leans most heavily on a 94 MPH sinker while mixing in a curveball and a changeup, the latter pitch almost exclusively against right-handed batters. Righties have posted a .276\/.322\/.446 line over the past four seasons, while he has held same-handed opponents to a .225\/.280\/.339 mark.<\/p>\n

At the moment, Matz projects as the fifth starter behind Drew Rasmussen<\/a>,\u00a0Ryan Pepiot<\/a>,\u00a0Shane McClanahan<\/a> and\u00a0Shane Baz<\/a>. Virtually none of that is set in stone. Rasmussen is a top-of-the-rotation caliber starter but has a lengthy injury history. McClanahan hasn\u2019t thrown a major league pitch in two seasons. Pepiot and Baz have come up in trade rumors. The former has only been mentioned in the context of a potential\u00a0Ketel Marte<\/a> blockbuster, but the Rays could be more open to a change-of-scenery deal on Baz given his inconsistency. It\u2019s possible the Rays acquire another starter via trade or free agency. Second-year lefty Ian Seymour<\/a> would be Matz\u2019s top competition for a rotation spot if they don\u2019t make any further moves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Rays finalized their two-year, $15MM deal with\u00a0Steven Matz on Tuesday afternoon. The veteran lefty came out of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82,16154],"class_list":{"0":"post-350544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-steven-matz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}