{"id":41196,"date":"2020-12-01T21:06:34","date_gmt":"2020-12-02T02:06:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=41196"},"modified":"2020-12-01T21:06:34","modified_gmt":"2020-12-02T02:06:34","slug":"catcher-luke-maile-agrees-to-deal-with-milwaukee-brewers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2020\/12\/01\/catcher-luke-maile-agrees-to-deal-with-milwaukee-brewers\/","title":{"rendered":"Catcher Luke Maile Agrees to Deal with Milwaukee Brewers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Defensive-minded catcher <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/m\/mailelu01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Luke Maile<\/strong><\/a> agreed to a major-league contract, terms unknown, with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/mlb-teams\/milwaukee-brewers\/\" target=\"_self\">Milwaukee Brewers<\/a>, according to a report Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>Maile did not play in 2020 after fracturing a finger during a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/mlb-teams\/pittsburgh-pirates\/\" target=\"_self\">Pittsburgh Pirates<\/a> intrasquad game. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic was the first to report the deal, which is pending a physical. The Brewers have not announced the signing as of yet.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Free-agent catcher Luke Maile in agreement with Brewers on major-league contract, pending physical, sources tell The Athletic.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Ken_Rosenthal\/status\/1333923873700581380?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">December 2, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Catcher Conundrum<\/h2>\n<p>The move comes a day before the Brewers must decide whether to tender contracts to their two primary catchers from 2020. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/n\/narvaom01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Omar Narvaez<\/strong><\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/p\/pinama01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Manny<\/strong> <strong>Pina<\/strong><\/a> are arbitration-eligible and one or both are candidates to be non-tendered.<\/p>\n<p>Narvaez was a disappointment offensively, with a .562 OPS, including just two home runs and 10 RBIs in 40 games. Pina, 33, is also a defense-first catcher, but he is coming off a knee injury that cut his season short. Narvaez made $2.725 million in 2020 and Pina $1.85 million.<\/p>\n<h2>No Offense<\/h2>\n<p>Maile is likely a cheaper option than Narvaez or Pina after missing all of 2020 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2020\/07\/pirates-luke-maile-undergoes-finger-surgery.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">following surgery<\/a> in July. He signed a one-year, $900,000 contract with the Pirates.<\/p>\n<p>A right-handed batter, Maile has hit .198 with 10 homers and 60 RBIs in 605 at-bats over five seasons in the majors. He has a career OPS of .556. The Pirates released Maile in October.<\/p>\n<h2>Backup Option<\/h2>\n<p>Luke Maile, who turns 30 in February, has been a career backup with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/mlb-teams\/tampa-bay-rays\/\" target=\"_self\">Tampa Bay Rays<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/mlb-teams\/toronto-blue-jays\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">Toronto Blue Jays<\/a>. He was expected to be the backup to Pirates starting catcher <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/s\/stallja01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Jacob Stallings<\/strong><\/a> in 2020 before he was hit by a pitch and broke his right index finger. Maile played in a career-best 68 games in 2018 with the Jays.<\/p>\n<p>He was drafted in the eighth round of the 2012 draft by the Rays, whose front office included Matt Arnold, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2020\/11\/19\/matt-arnold-promoted-to-general-manager-by-milwaukee-brewers\/\" target=\"_self\">recently promoted<\/a> by the Brewers to general manager.<\/p>\n<p>Main Image<br \/>\n<a id=\"OcVpXedkRnZLEJrjAs4Kig\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/957508310\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'OcVpXedkRnZLEJrjAs4Kig',sig:'xRkZoErKjk7QhrOyLBF5Lf6YkoxMsI85zrkPf3AW7jA=',w:'594px',h:'418px',items:'957508310',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Defensive-minded catcher Luke Maile agreed to a major-league contract, terms unknown, with the Milwaukee Brewers, according to a report Tuesday. Maile did not play in 2020 after fracturing a finger during a Pittsburgh Pirates intrasquad game. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic was the first to report the deal, which is pending a physical. The Brewers [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3698,"featured_media":41209,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[4363,2230,4328,3236],"class_list":["post-41196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-brewers","tag-luke-maile","tag-manny-pina","tag-matt-arnold","tag-omar-narvaez"],"modified_by":"Jared Cantatore","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3698"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41196"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41196\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}