The Diamondbacks have released veteran infielder Kolten Wong, per the transaction log at MiLB.com. Wong had been playing with their Triple-A affiliate in Reno after signing a minor league contract. He’s now a free agent.
A two-time Gold Glove winner at second base, the now-33-year-old Wong entered the 2024 campaign in hopes of rebounding from a disastrous 2023 season that saw him bat just .183/.256/.263 in 250 plate appearances between the Mariners and Dodgers. Wong signed a minor league deal with Baltimore and spent spring training with the Orioles but opted out of that pact when he didn’t make the team.
He subsequently signed with the D-backs, putting pen to paper on a second minor league deal back on April 10.
Through 31 games, Wong has turned in a .271/.339/.383 batting line that looks respectable enough relative to MLB batting lines but is about 18% worse than average (by measure of wRC+) in the supercharged offensive environment of Triple-A’s Pacific Coast League. He’s homered twice, swiped a pair of bags and collected six doubles.
Wong has also shown modest improvements in his strikeout and walk rates, which sat at 21.2% and 7.2% in the big leagues last year but are at 18.2% and 8.3% in Reno.
Miserable as Wong’s 2023 season was, the veteran infielder is still just one season removed from a .251/.339/.430 performance with the 2022 Brewers — a season that saw him swipe 17 bases and club a career-best 15 home runs with a strong 9.3% walk rate and considerably lower-than-average 17.7% strikeout rate. From 2017-22, Wong was an above-average regular at second base between St. Louis and Milwaukee, hitting a combined .269/.349/.414 with 54 homers, 72 steals, a roughly average walk rate, strong bat-to-ball skills and plus defense.
The D-backs haven’t needed any help at second base with Ketel Marte logging a .275/.322/.493 slash in his first 233 trips to the plate this season, and there are other second base options on the 40-man roster ahead of Wong on the depth chart as well. But there are plenty of teams around the game — Red Sox, White Sox and Angels, to name a few — that have struggled to get much of anything out of their second basemen this season.
Wong could make sense as a depth option with any of those clubs or even an immediate big league replacement in some spots if a team wants to send a struggling young player back to Triple-A for some more seasoning.
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