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Yankees sign Kenta Maeda to minor league deal, add veteran rotation depth

Gary Phillips, New York Daily News on

Published in Baseball

NEW YORK — The Yankees Maeda move for some starting pitching depth on Monday.

The Bombers announced that Kenta Maeda has signed a minor league deal with the club. The Japanese right-hander was assigned to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.

Now in his ninth MLB season, the 37-year-old Maeda began the year with the Detroit Tigers before posting a 7.88 ERA over eight innings and seven games. He didn’t make any starts for Detroit and was released in May.

Maeda then signed a minor league deal with the Chicago Cubs. He started 12 games for their Triple-A squad, but he recorded a 6.12 ERA before being released again on Saturday.

Maeda’s struggles date back to last year, as he had a 6.09 ERA over 112 1/3 innings with the Tigers. Prior to that, he had a 65-49 record, 3.92 ERA, 248 walks and 951 strikeouts over 866 1/3 innings for the Los Angeles Dodgers and Minnesota Twins from 2016-2023.

Maeda tallied a 97-67 record, 2.39 ERA, 319 walks and 1,233 strikeouts over 1,509.2 innings for Nippon Professional Baseball’s Hiroshima Carp before coming stateside.

 

If all goes well, the Yankees won’t have to see what, if anything, Maeda has left in the tank, as their rotation is currently full with Max Fried, Carlos Rodón, Luis Gil, Will Warren and Cam Schlittler. However, Brian Cashman failed to acquire a starter prior to the trade deadline last week. The Yankees also released Marcus Stroman and traded Carlos Carrasco recently.

While neither is an effective big league pitcher at this point, those moves ate into the Yankees’ limited rotation depth. Maeda replaces one of those arms, though he’s not an inspiring option at this point, either.

Allan Winans and Brendan Beck are also among the Yankees’ depth options at Triple-A.

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