The San Diego Padres have an agreement in place to acquire former Cy Young pitcher Blake Snell from the Tampa Bay Rays in exchange for prospects, according to multiple reports.
The deal involves the Padres sending pitcher Luis Patiño, catcher Francisco Mejía, catcher Blake Hunt and pitcher Cole Wilcox to the Rays, pending the review of medical records.
Snell, the 2018 AL Cy Young winner, owns a 3.24 ERA over five seasons with the Rays, who drafted him 52nd overall in the 2011 draft out of high school. The Seattle native is signed through 2023, with three years left on a five-year, $50 million deal.
This past season, Snell was controversially pulled from Game 6 of the World Series by manager Kevin Cash after allowing just his second hit of the game. The Rays were leading at the time, but they immediately fell behind and lost that series-clinching game to the Dodgers.
The Padres and Rays participated in a major trade last winter, too, when outfielder Tommy Pham was sent to the Padres in exchange for outfielder Hunter Renfroe and infield prospect Xavier Edwards.
At the time that trade was being reported, Snell was streaming on Twitch and blurted out a reaction: “We gave Pham up for Renfroe and a slap-(expletive) prospect?”
Now Snell will join Pham on the Padres, who presumably look at him as the replacement for pitcher Mike Clevinger — a starter who is lost for the season after undergoing Tommy John surgery.
The return for the Rays in the Snell deal centres on Patiño, the Padres’ No. 3 prospect according to MLB Pipeline. Mejía is the elder statesman of the bunch, at 25, while the others are all 22 or younger.
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