The Mariners have signed reliever Scott Effross to a minor league deal, per MLB Trade Rumors, giving the 32-year-old right-hander another shot at cracking a big league bullpen.
Effross was a surprise breakout for the Cubs as a rookie in 2022, riffing a sidearm sinker into one of the more fun relief arms in baseball before the Yankees traded for him that same deadline, sending prospect Hayden Wesneski to Chicago. It's been mostly bad luck since. Tommy John surgery wiped out his 2023, back surgery pushed his return all the way to September 2024, and last season with New York he managed just 10 2/3 MLB innings in an up-and-down bullpen role before getting non-tendered.
This year he'd been trying to rebuild value in Detroit's system on a minor league deal, but the Tigers released him after he posted a 4.46 ERA over 27 appearances and 36 1/3 innings for their Triple-A club. The strikeout rate was down too, just 16% of batters, with a league-average 42% ground-ball rate — not the bat-missing, worm-burning version of Effross that flashed in Chicago.
Seattle's timing makes sense. The bullpen has been banged up for weeks, with Matt Brash still working back from a lat strain, Cole Wilcox sidelined by oblique tightness, and Brooks Raley reportedly done for the season with a forearm injury. Andres Munoz is still the closer and guys like Jose Ferrer, Eduard Bazardo and Gabe Speier have held the bridge together, but the depth chart behind them has been thin all year.
For Effross, it's a straightforward opportunity: report to Triple-A Tacoma, get outs, and hope Seattle's stretch-run needs open a path to a fifth big league season. For the Mariners, it's zero-risk lottery-ticket depth at a position where they've had to cycle through arms all summer trying to find something that sticks.