{"id":574684,"date":"2026-02-15T23:27:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-15T23:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/574684\/"},"modified":"2026-02-15T23:27:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-15T23:27:11","slug":"rays-garrett-cleavinger-drawing-trade-interest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/574684\/","title":{"rendered":"Rays’ Garrett Cleavinger Drawing Trade Interest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Teams interested in left-handed bullpen help have been calling the Rays about Garrett Cleavinger<\/a>, The Athletic\u2019s Ken Rosenthal<\/a> writes.\u00a0 There isn\u2019t any indication that a deal is close, and Rosenthal didn\u2019t specify any clubs in pursuit of Cleavinger\u2019s services.<\/p>\n

Cleavinger (who turns 32 in April) is entering his seventh MLB season, and his fourth full season in a Rays uniform.\u00a0 Tampa Bay acquired the southpaw from the Dodgers at the 2022 trade deadline, and while Cleavinger showed some promise in the early stages of his big league career, he became one of many pitchers to hit another level of production after joining the Rays.\u00a0 Cleavinger has a 2.96 ERA over 152 relief innings since arriving in Tampa.<\/p>\n

In 2025, Cleavinger enjoyed his best season yet, posting a 2.35 ERA, 33.7% strikeout rate, and a 7.4% walk rate over 61 1\/3 innings.\u00a0 Just about all of his Statcast<\/a> metrics were solidly above average or (in the case of his strikeout and whiff rates) elite, plus Cleavinger enjoyed some good luck in the form of a .244 BABIP and a whopping 91.6% strand rate.\u00a0 Cleavinger has delivered strong results against both left-handed and right-handed batters over his career, and 2025 was no exception \u2014 righty-swingers had a .602 OPS against Cleavinger, while left-handed hitters did slightly better with a .620 OPS.<\/p>\n

There wasn\u2019t much that seemed fluky Cleavinger\u2019s 2025 performance, so even if the Rays feel they would be selling high on the lefty, there\u2019s no reason to believe Cleavinger wouldn\u2019t still be a valuable reliever in 2026 or beyond.\u00a0 Broadly speaking, the Rays are always open for trade talks on any player, so it wouldn\u2019t be entirely shocking if Cleavinger was dealt prior to Opening Day.\u00a0 However, there doesn\u2019t seem to be any real pressing reason for Tampa to move on from Cleavinger right now, given both his importance to the Rays\u2019 bullpen and his modest salary situation.<\/p>\n

Cleavinger is earning $2.4MM in 2026 and has one year of arbitration eligibility remaining before he qualifies for free agency following the 2027 campaign.\u00a0 Even though Tampa Bay is forever looking to limit its budget, Cleavinger is a bargain at $2.4MM if he duplicate anything close to last year\u2019s numbers, and an arbitration raise next winter may be limited due to a relative lack of saves.<\/p>\n

The Rays don\u2019t have a set closer heading into the 2026 season, as Cleavinger, Edwin Uceta<\/a>, Griffin Jax<\/a>, and Bryan Baker<\/a> are all expected to earn save opportunities.\u00a0 It is possible one of these pitchers emerges from the committee to become more of a full-time closer, but Cleavinger\u2019s status as the only left-handed reliever projected to be part of Tampa\u2019s bullpen could make him more suited for situational work rather than save situations.\u00a0 The relative lack of left-handed relief depth is another reason the Rays would be hesitant to deal Cleavinger for anything less than a superb offer.<\/p>\n

Speaking of the Rays\u2019 bullpen mix, Uceta is dealing with some shoulder soreness, manager Kevin Cash told MLB.com\u2019s Adam Berry<\/a> and other reporters.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re totally not concerned at all and have every intention of him being ready for Opening Day,\u201d Cash said, though as a precaution, Uceta won\u2019t pitch for the Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic.\u00a0 Cleavinger and Jax are both slated for WBC duty as part of the United States team\u2019s bullpen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Teams interested in left-handed bullpen help have been calling the Rays about Garrett Cleavinger, The Athletic\u2019s Ken Rosenthal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":574685,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5,6925,1099,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-574684","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-edwin-uceta","10":"tag-garrett-cleavinger","11":"tag-mlb"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116077241663989275","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574684","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=574684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574684\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/574685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=574684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=574684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=574684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}