The free agent frenzy is about to start in Main League Baseball, as groups scramble to safe the very best out there gamers in an try to problem the World Collection champion Texas Rangers in 2024. Among the many prime free brokers this winter is closing pitcher Josh Hader, who’s coming off an All-Star season in San Diego — the place he posted a 1.28 ERA and 33 saves.
To get groups within the temper to signal him, Hader‘s representatives on Thursday circulated a 105-second spotlight reel amongst all 30 main league groups. It is one of many extra distinctive methods a participant has tried to generate a bidding conflict for his companies.
Hader will get an iconic narrator
Hader‘s “hype video” is titled “Ode to the Nearer.” It’s narrated by Trevor Hoffman — who, like Hader, pitched for the Padres and the Milwaukee Brewers in his profession. Hoffman, although, is a Corridor of Fame inductee who recorded 601 saves throughout 18 main league seasons and is broadly thought to be one of many recreation’s best reduction pitchers.
“As a more in-depth, we’re given crucial alternative for our staff,” Hoffman says in the beginning of the video. “(We’ve to) end the sport and safe the victory.”
Hoffman goes on to say that baseball’s finest closers are “wired in a different way,” and Hader is not any exception. The left-handed Hader has recorded 165 profession saves and has averaged an MLB-record 15 strikeouts per 9 innings throughout his seven seasons. Opponents have hit solely .156 towards him — additionally an MLB report.
“Josh Hader defines the trendy nearer, along with his fashion, stuff, and toughness,” Hoffman says. “Fairly actually, the toughest pitcher to hit in baseball historical past.”
A wild celebration ensued among the many wives and girlfriends of Texas Rangers gamers after Wednesday’s World Collection win
Madisyn Seager leads Texas Rangers celebrations with plenty of tequila and dancing after World Collection
What sort of contract may Hader get?
Hader is a uncommon commodity — a left-handed reliever with a blazing fastball and a monitor report of shutdown. Even throughout his outlier 2022 season, wherein he completed with a 5.22 ERA, Hader nonetheless recorded 36 saves and 81 strikeouts in 50 innings, and he did not permit a single run in the course of the 2022 postseason.
Hader may problem Edwin Diaz for essentially the most profitable contract ever doled out to a closing pitcher. Final yr, Diaz signed a five-year, $102 million contract with the New York Mets — however he missed all the 2023 season after struggling a tear in his patellar tendon.
Diaz is maybe a cautionary story for groups sniffing round Hader, however the 29-year-old could signal a contract near 9 figures anyway.
