*Photo from the New York Post*
The Tampa Bay Rays have designated OF Hunter Renfroe for assignment in order to add prospects to their 40 man roster, according to the Rays. Last night at 6:00 PM was the deadline for teams to add prospects to their 40 man roster to protect them from being taken by other teams as part of the rule 5 draft, and Renfroe was one of the cuts the Rays made to open up a roster spot for one of those prospects.
Renfroe was a likely non-tender candidate later down the road for the Rays, as he had a subpar season with the Rays, his only season with them. Renfroe hit .156 with 8 homers and 22 RBI over 42 games played in the short 60 game regular season. In Renfroe's 5 year major league career, he is a .228 hitter with 97 homers and 226 RBI in 432 games played. Renfroe spent the first 4 years of his career with the Padres.
Rays vice president of baseball development Peter Bendix said of the decision to DFA Renfroe that "I don’t think we would go back and do anything differently, and I think we were very happy with the contributions that Hunter added this year, and we all saw it in the playoffs, I think we got what we were hoping to get from him and some other guys also stepped up, and we made other moves that added to our outfield logjam in a way that I don’t think we would’ve anticipated a year ago."
Indeed, the Rays did have a outfield logjam on their roster last season, as Renfroe, breakout postseason star Randy Arozarena, Austin Meadows, Yoshi Tsutsugo, Manuel Margot, Brett Phillips, and Kevin Keirmaier all got playing time in the outfield last season, with more prospects on the way. Renfroe was acquired by the Rays last December in a trade that saw Xavier Edwards go to the Rays with Renfroe, and Tommy Pham and Jake Cronenworth, who finished 3rd in NL rookie of the year voting, went to the Padres.
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