The Arizona Diamondbacks have acquired their Christian Walker replacement. The D-backs have added Josh Naylor in a two-player, three-asset trade with the Cleveland Guardians, reports The Athletic. Cleveland will receive righty Slade Cecconi and Arizona’s competitive balance draft pick in the trade. Neither team has announced the deal.
Naylor, 27, was a trade candidate coming into the offseason because he is a year away from free agency and projected to make $12 million or so through arbitration. That would have made him Cleveland’s second highest-paid player behind José Ramírez. Soon after the trade, the Guardians signed Carlos Santana to replace Naylor. It will be his third stint with Cleveland.
This past season Naylor authored a .243/.320/.456 batting line with a career-high 31 home runs. He’ll help Arizona replace the power they lost when Walker signed with the Houston Astros, though Naylor is not nearly the defender that Walker is (few are), so he could see plenty of action at DH with Pavin Smith seeing time at first base.
Arizona’s lineup with Naylor could look like this in 2025:
- RF Corbin Carroll, LHB
- 2B Ketel Marte, SHB
- LF Lourdes Gurriel Jr., RHB
- DH Josh Naylor, LHB
- 3B Eugenio Suárez, RHB
- 1B Pavin Smith, LHB
- C Gabriel Moreno, RHB
- CF Jake McCarthy, LHB
- SS Geraldo Perdomo, SHB
Cecconi, 25, was the No. 33 pick in the 2020 draft. He’s allowed 70 runs in 104 big league innings spanning the last two seasons, though he has the talent to be much better than that. The Guardians are arguably the best pitcher development team in baseball. They’ll turn Cecconi over to their pitching folks and hope to max out his talent.
Competitive balance draft picks are extra picks given to small-market and low-revenue teams. They are baseball’s only tradeable draft picks. The final draft order is still to be determined as qualified free agents sign, though the traded pick will likely fall in the 70-75 overall range. Cleveland now has two competitive balance picks, their own and Arizona’s.
The D-backs went 89-73 in 2024 and missed the postseason one year after going to the 2023 World Series. Naylor joins Zac Gallen, Merrill Kelly, and Jordan Montgomery on Arizona’s list of free agents-to-be. The Guardians went 92-69 in 2024 and won the AL Central.
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