Tampa Bay Rays sign RHP Luis Santos to a minor league deal

According to Matt Eddy of Baseball America, the Tampa Bay Rays have signed RHP Luis Santos to a minor league deal.

Santos will turned 28 in February, and was formerly an international signing by the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2011. He would eventually be dealt to the Kansas City Royals in a four player trade in November of 2012.

He slowly climbed the ranks in the Royals system before being released at the end of spring training in 2015, and then picked up by the Toronto Blue Jays.

Santos stuck with Toronto for a few years, making his big league debut in 2017. He pitched for Toronto some in 2018 and in total, has made 25 appearances, registering a 5.15 ERA / 5.04 FIP along with a 25. K% / 8.8 BB%.

Brooks baseball has his repertoire as follows:

Luis Santos threw 651 pitches that were tracked by the PITCHf/x system between 2017 and 2018, all of them occuring in the MLB Regular Season. In 2018, he relied primarily on his Fourseam Fastball (94mph), Curve (84mph) and Change (87mph), also mixing in a Sinker (94mph).

His fourseam fastball generates an extremely high number of swings & misses compared to other pitchers’ fourseamers, results in more flyballs compared to other pitchers’ fourseamers and has slightly above average velo. His curve is thrown extremely hard, has very little depth, has primarily 12-6 movement and results in somewhat more flyballs compared to other pitchers’ curves. His change generates a high number of swings & misses compared to other pitchers’ changeups, is much firmer than usual, has slight armside fade and has some natural sink to it. His sinker generates an extremely high number of swings & misses compared to other pitchers’ sinkers, is an extreme flyball pitch compared to other pitchers’ sinkers, has slight armside run, has slightly above average velo and has some natural sinking action.