The exceptional left-hander has chosen to opt out of the Rangers’ minor league contract, according to Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News. He can now sign a free agent contract and join the Blue Jays.
Shreve, 33, signed a minor league deal with the Rangers in February but didn’t break camp with the club. Towards the end of March, Jeff Wilson of Rangers Today reported that Shreve, Danny Duffy and Shane Greene were free to explore opt-outs in their deals, since none of that trio would be making the big league team.
It seems that Shreve decided not to opt out at that time, since he reported to Triple-A Round Rock. He has made ten appearances already this year with a 2.61 earned run average. He has nine strikeouts but has issued five walks.
The Rangers are fairly light in terms of left-handed relievers. Brock Burke is on the injured list after punching a wall and requiring surgery to address a broken bone on his non-throwing hand. That left Jacob Latz, who came into this year with just four major league appearances, as the only healthy southpaw in the bullpen.
Regardless, they don’t seem to have a spot for Shreve, so he’ll try his luck on the open market. He has appeared in 367 major league games, debuting back in 2014 with Atlanta and subsequently bouncing to the Yankees, Cardinals, Mets, Pirates, Tigers and Reds.
He has a 3.97 ERA in his career, striking out 25.3% of batters faced while giving out walks at a 10.8% clip and getting grounders on 41.6% of balls in play. That walk rate is a tad high but he kept it to 8.8% in 2022 and just 7.3% last year, still striking out about a quarter of batters faced.
