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<\/p>\nDENVER \u2014 After adding a starting pitcher Sunday, acquiring Freddy Peralta, the Rays addressed two other areas of need Monday, upgrading at catcher by acquiring Liam Hicks from the Marlins and in the bullpen by getting Tyler Wells from the Orioles.<\/p>\n
Right before the\u00a06 p.m.\u00a0deadline, the Rays also made a small deal to add outfield depth. They acquired\u00a0Jack Suwinski, who was with the Dodgers\u2019 Triple-A team, in exchange for\u00a0Hunter Feduccia, who had lost his job with the acquisition of Hicks. Suwinski, 28, has played parts of four seasons in the majors with the\u00a0Pirates.<\/p>\n
The Hicks deal was done early Monday. Word of the acquisition of Wells, which has not yet been announced by the team, spread in the late afternoon.<\/p>\n
The 32-year-old right-hander, who is 6-foot-8, has spent six seasons with the\u00a0Orioles. After missing much of 2024-25 due to elbow surgery, he is having arguably his best year.<\/p>\n
Over 43 appearances covering 54 innings, Wells has a 2.67 ERA, 53 strikeouts compared to 13 walks, and a 0.963 WHIP (walks and hits per innings pitched). He is 2-2 with four saves.<\/p>\n
To get Wells, the Rays sent pitching prospect\u00a0Michael Forret\u00a0back to the\u00a0Orioles.<\/p>\n
The Rays got Forret as part of their impressive haul in the December trade of\u00a0Shane Baz\u00a0that also included three prospects \u2014 catcher\u00a0Caden Bodine\u00a0and outfielders\u00a0Slater de Brun\u00a0and\u00a0Austin Overn\u00a0(minors) \u2014 and the No. 33 pick in this year\u2019s draft, which the Rays used on prep shortstop\u00a0Taj Marchand.<\/p>\n
Forret, ranked the Rays\u2019 No. 8 prospect by\u00a0mlb.com, did well this season, starting with Double-A Montgomery and moving up to Triple-A Durham. Overall, he has a 7-2 record and 3.29 ERA in 19 starts.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Julio Cortez\/AP<\/p>\n
Relief pitcher Tyler Wells was acquired by the Tampa Bay Rays from the Baltimore Orioles on Monday. (Julio Cortez\/AP file)<\/p>\n
Wells is making $2.445 million this season, will be arbitration eligible again in 2027 and then a free agent in 2028.<\/p>\n
To get Hicks, the Rays are sending three minor-leaguers to Miami: infielders\u00a0Brayden Taylor\u00a0and\u00a0Adrian Santana, and pitcher\u00a0Jacob Kisting.<\/p>\n
As the Rays made the Hicks deal, the\u00a0Orioles\u00a0traded All-Star catcher\u00a0Adley Rutschman\u00a0to the division-rival Red Sox.<\/p>\n
Hicks, 27, is a left-handed hitter from\u00a0Canada\u00a0who was drafted out of Arkansas State in the ninth round in 2021 and signed by Texas. He was traded to Detroit in\u00a0July 2024, then taken in the\u00a0December 2024\u00a0Rule 5 draft by the Marlins. He made his major-league debut with Miami in 2025.<\/p>\n
The Rays had interest in taking Hicks in the 2024 Rule 5 draft, but the Marlins beat them to it, and kept him \u2014 until Monday.<\/p>\n
This season, Hicks is hitting .282 with 14 homers, 62 RBIs and a .795 OPS over 101 games. The Marlins made him available following the emergence of another lefty-hitting catcher, rookie\u00a0Joe Mack.<\/p>\n
Hicks, who is under team control through 2030 (and not eligible for arbitration until 2028), will replace Feduccia, the lefty-hitting part of the current platoon with Nick Fortes, who was acquired from Miami at last year\u2019s deadline.<\/p>\n
Feduccia, acquired from the\u00a0Dodgers\u00a0at last year\u2019s deadline, is hitting .234 with two homers, 12 RBIs and a .646 OPS. He also has made a series of defensive misplays. He is now headed back.<\/p>\n
Taylor, ranked No. 16 on mlb.com\u2019s list of top Rays prospects, is the highest rated of the three being sent to the Marlins, whose president of baseball operations is\u00a0Peter Bendix, a longtime Rays executive.<\/p>\n
Taylor, 24, was the Rays\u2019 first-round pick in 2023 out of TCU and got off to a good start in his pro career before struggling mightily at Double-A Montgomery in 2025. The lefty swinger rebounded strongly after returning to the Biscuits this season, hitting .284 with 17 homers, 56 RBIs and an .897 OPS.<\/p>\n
Kisting, a 23-year-old right-hander acquired from Minnesota in the November trade of reliever\u00a0Eric Orze, was ranked 26th in the Rays system by\u00a0mlb.com. He has had a dominant season at High-A Bowling Green, going 6-0 with a 1.67 ERA over 18 games (16 starts), striking out 96 over 86 innings while walking just 18. He was a 14th-round pick out of\u00a0Bradley University\u00a0by the Twins in 2024.<\/p>\n
Santana, 21, was drafted 31st overall in 2023 by the Rays out of Miami\u2019s\u00a0Doral Academy. He is still at the Class A level but doing well and ranked 27th among their prospects by\u00a0mlb.com. In his second season with Bowling Green, he is hitting .316 with three homers, 23 RBIs, 23 steals and a career best .781 OPS.<\/p>\n
None of the three prospects are included in Baseball America\u2019s top 30 list, which was updated to include several players from the recent draft.<\/p>\n
Also Monday:<\/p>\n
Reliever\u00a0Alex Cook, who made his debut over the weekend, was optioned back to Durham, and\u00a0Michael Grove\u00a0was recalled.
\nVeteran reliever Craig Kimbrel was designated for assignment, as reported Sunday, to make room to add Peralta to the active roster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER \u2014 After adding a starting pitcher Sunday, acquiring Freddy Peralta, the Rays addressed two other areas of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362109,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3817,139,141,140,76046,110,3815],"class_list":["post-362108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-mlb","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-social-sports","tag-sports","tag-tampa-bay-rays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}