MLB Rumors: Yoán Moncada Interests Yankees, Blue Jays, More in 2024 Free Agency
Timothy Rapp@@TRappaRT
Featured Columnist IVNovember 13, 2024
The free-agent market for Chicago White Sox third baseman Yoán Moncada is heating up.
According to baseball reporter Francys Romero, "more than five MLB teams are interested in Moncada. Among the teams that have monitored him are the Toronto Blue Jays, New York Yankees and Seattle Mariners."
Moncada, 29, missed the majority of the 2024 season with an adductor strain, appearing in only 12 games. He hit .275 in his limited game time with no homers or RBI and four runs, and the White Sox chose to move on in the offseason, declining a lucrative team option.
Spotrac @spotracThe Chicago <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WhiteSox?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#WhiteSox</a> declined a $25M club option for 3B Yoán Moncada, taking on a $5M buyout instead.<br><br>The 29-year-old heads to free agency for the first time after missing most of 2024 with a hip injury.<br><br>The WhiteSox project to a $75M tax payroll, which ranks 29th in MLB.
"It's been a really difficult year for everybody," he told reporters in late September. "For the team. For myself. Just seeing the struggles that the team had, because everybody is trying to do their best, and in my case not being able to do anything to help, I think it added a whole another layer of difficulty to the rehab process. At some point, that was on my mind, like, am I gonna be able to get back? I don't know. The road was difficult, but I worked hard and advanced to where I'm here right now."
The White Sox set a new MLB record with 121 losses in 2024.
Injuries have become a theme of Moncada's career. He only appeared in 104 games in 2022 due to oblique, quad, hamstring and foot injuries, while his 2023 season was limited to 92 contests due to a back issue.
His best season came in 2019, when he hit .315 with 25 homers, 79 RBI, 83 runs and a .915 OPS in 132 contests. He's never come close to replicating that level of production in the years since.
But MLB teams nonetheless are reportedly showing interest, and he'll be a name to monitor once higher-profile free agents in the infield like Alex Bregman, Willy Adames, Pete Alonso and Christian Walker (among others) are off the board.