{"id":28114,"date":"2025-01-21T21:41:39","date_gmt":"2025-01-21T21:41:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=28114"},"modified":"2025-01-21T21:41:39","modified_gmt":"2025-01-21T21:41:39","slug":"cubs-sign-trevor-richards-to-minor-league-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=28114","title":{"rendered":"Cubs Sign Trevor Richards To Minor League Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"<article>\n<header>By Steve Adams | <time datetime=\"2025-01-21T09:38:15-06:00\">January 21, 2025<\/time> at <time datetime=\"2025-01-21T09:38:15-06:00\">9:38am CDT<\/time><\/p>\n<\/header>\n<div>\n<p>The Cubs have agreed to a minor league contract with right-hander <strong>Trevor Richards<\/strong>, reports Aram Leighton of Just Baseball. Richards, a client of Apex Baseball, will be in big league camp as a non-roster invitee this spring.<\/p>\n<p>The 31-year-old Richards has spent the bulk of the past four seasons with the Blue Jays but was traded to the Twins just prior to the 2024 trade deadline. He posted a 4.55 ERA with a 22.4% strikeout rate and a career-high 12.6% walk rate between Toronto and Minnesota this past season and carries a 4.60 earned run average over the past four seasons.<\/p>\n<p>Richards has posted a combined 29.1% strikeout rate in 266 1\/3 innings dating back to 2021, showing a clear ability to miss bats. He\u2019s battled command troubles along the way, however, both in terms of finding the strike zone at all (11.3% walk rate, 29 wild pitches) and in terms of precision when he does put the ball over the plate (1.39 HR\/9).<\/p>\n<p>Although Richards is right-handed, he\u2019s been far more effective against lefties than against righties, due in large part to his top secondary offering being a plus changeup. Lefty batters have hit just .220\/.315\/.371 against Richards in his career, while righties have a more productive .248\/.320\/.433 slash.<\/p>\n<p>The Cubs have worked to add to their bullpen this offseason but thus far have made primarily marginal acquisitions. Chicago bid aggressively on top closer <strong>Tanner Scott<\/strong> \u2014 a notable departure from president Jed Hoyer\u2019s aversion to multi-year deals for relievers \u2014 but were reportedly the runner-up prior to the Dodgers. The Cubs have signed <strong>Caleb Thielbar<\/strong> and acquired <strong>Eli Morgan<\/strong> from the Guardians. They\u2019ll both be in the Opening Day bullpen. Other offseason pickups include DFA additions <strong>Matt Festa<\/strong> (acquired for cash) and <strong>Rob Zastryzny<\/strong> (claimed off waivers). Richards joins a group of non-roster signings also featuring <strong>Phil Bickford<\/strong>, <strong>Ben Heller<\/strong> and <strong>Brooks Kriske<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<p>View Comments (45)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Cubs signed veteran reliever Trevor Richards to a minor league contract and invited him to spring training. Read more at MLB Trade Rumors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":28115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[830],"class_list":["post-28114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb","tag-trevor-richards"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Cubs Sign Trevor Richards To Minor League Deal - NEWS USA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=28114\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cubs Sign Trevor Richards To Minor League Deal - NEWS USA\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Cubs signed veteran reliever Trevor Richards to a minor league contract and invited him to spring training. 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