{"id":555516,"date":"2026-02-05T04:45:22","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T04:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/555516\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T04:45:22","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T04:45:22","slug":"framber-valdez-joining-tigers-on-115m-deal-to-end-long-free-agency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/555516\/","title":{"rendered":"Framber Valdez joining Tigers on $115M deal to end long free agency"},"content":{"rendered":"

The top remaining free agent pitcher has a new home. <\/p>\n

Framber Valdez has agreed to a three-year, $115 million contract with the Tigers, The Post\u2019s Jon Heyman confirmed.<\/p>\n

The deal includes an opt-out after year two.<\/p>\n

\"FramberFramber Valdez is signing with the Tigers. Charles Wenzelberg\/New York Post<\/p>\n

The deal has the highest average annual value ($38.3 million) for a left-handed pitcher in MLB history, according to ESPN\u2019s Jeff Passan. <\/p>\n

The Blue Jays were among several teams interested in Valdez as recently as Tuesday<\/a>, The Post reported. <\/p>\n

But it\u2019s the Tigers<\/a>, who already have two-time defending Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal in the rotation, who land Valdez.<\/p>\n

The 32-year-old Valdez has been a reliable workhorse for the Astros over the last eight years, but really stepped up his game in 2021. That season, he started a five-year stretch of reaching at least 134 innings, hitting the 190-inning threshold three times. He was twice named an All-Star and helped the Astros win the 2022 World Series over the Phillies.<\/p>\n

In 2025, Valdez went 13-11 with a 3.66 ERA over 192 frames.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Instead of overpowering velocity, Valdez primarily wields a sinker-curveball combination. With that arsenal, his ground-ball rate ranked in the 97th percentile in baseball last season.<\/p>\n

Valdez now slots into the Tigers\u2019 starting rotation, presumably as the No. 2 hurler behind Skubal and ahead of righties Casey Mize and Jack Flaherty.<\/p>\n

Skubal, notably, is waiting for an arbitration decision \u2014 which is expected Thursday \u2014 after he filed at $32 million and the Tigers at $19 million. The $13 million gap is an MLB record<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Detroit, despite a horrific final stretch in October that saw the division title slip away, still made the playoffs as a wild-card entrant and beat the American League Central-winning Guardians in the first round before getting eliminated by the Mariners in the ALDS.<\/p>\n

Now armed with one of the deeper pitching staffs in the AL, the Tigers should firmly be in the mix as one of the contenders in the junior circuit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The top remaining free agent pitcher has a new home. Framber Valdez has agreed to a three-year, $115…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555517,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2290],"tags":[5,53,4,2046,37650,185],"class_list":["post-555516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-baseball","tag-baseball","tag-detroit-tigers","tag-mlb","tag-mlb-free-agency","tag-mlb-hot-stove","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116016207359704417","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555516"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555516\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}