The Tigers have signed right-hander Ricky Vanasco to a minor league deal, according to his transactions tracker at MLB.com. The Full Circle Sports Management client has been assigned to Triple-A Toledo for now but will presumably receive an invite to major league spring training.
Vanasco, 26, finished the 2024 season with the Tigers. They acquired him from the Dodgers in a July cash deal and largely kept him in the minors on optional assignment, only giving him two major league appearances. Detroit then non-tendered him last week, sending him to free agency without exposing him to waivers, which allowed them to bring him back via this deal.
The righty now has just four major league appearances under his belt, two of those coming with the Dodgers prior to the two he made with the Tigers. That’s obviously not a large enough sample to draw any conclusions from, but there are other reasons why the Tigers are interested.
Vanasco was drafted by the Rangers back in 2017 and put up some good numbers in the lower levels of the minors. Baseball America ranked him that club’s #12 prospect going into 2020. Unfortunately, he required Tommy John surgery in September of that year and missed the entire 2021 season. Still, the Rangers didn’t want him to be left exposed in the Rule 5 draft, so they added him to their 40-man roster in November of 2021.
Recovered from his surgery, he was back on the mound in 2022. He made 23 starts that year between High-A and Double-A, throwing 92 1/3 innings with a 4.68 earned run average. His 28.9% strikeout rate was strong but he also gave out walks at a 12.7% clip. In 2023, knee surgery forced him to miss a few months but he had some encouraging results while switching to a relief role. He tossed 32 1/3 innings that year with a 2.78 ERA, 31.9% strikeout rate and 9.9% walk rate, getting acquired by the Dodgers midway through that year.
In 2024, as mentioned, he made four major league appearances between the Dodgers and Tigers. Most of his time was spent in Triple-A, where he logged 40 1/3 innings with a 2.45 ERA. His 26.4% strikeout rate was good but the 16.5% walk rate very much on the high side.
The lack of control could make Vanasco a bit of a project for the Tigers, but there’s no real risk on a minor league deal and there could be long-term benefits if it works out. Vanasco is out of options but has less than a year of service time and is still relatively young. That means he could be cheaply retained for years into the future if things click for him and he gets a roster spot.
