Brewers To Acquire Antonio Senzatela

Senzatela, 31, is in the final guaranteed season of a five-year, $50.5MM extension that didn’t pan out at all how the Rockies hoped. Originally signed to anchor the back end of the rotation, Senzatela instead struggled through injuries and poor performance for most of the deal. He was bounced from the rotation late last year after logging an ERA north of 6.00 from 2022-25. Senzatela looked intriguing in 22 frames as a reliever, however, and he’s broken out as a genuine late-inning arm in 2026.

This season, Senzatela has pitched exclusively as a reliever for the first time and turned in a sharp 3.61 ERA in 52 1/3 innings. He’s averaging a career-high 97.3 mph on his four-seamer and has delivered career-best marks in strikeout rate (21%) and swinging-strike rate (10.6%). Those are both a hair below average but up considerably from Senzatela’s prior levels. He’s also showing better-than-average walk and ground-ball rates.

Milwaukee already has a powerhouse bullpen anchored by closer Trevor Megill and setup ace Abner Uribe. Hard-throwing lefty Aaron Ashby has worked in a variety of roles, including high-leverage work. Senzatela adds another big arm, giving the Brewers a fourth bullpen piece who’s averaging better than 97 mph on his primary heater this season. Colorado has used Senzatela in all manner of spots; he’s frequently worked more than an inning at a time, evidenced by his 52 1/3 frames but only 37 appearances. Senzatela has saved three games and tallied another four holds on the year. He can be a bridge from any short start to the Brewers’ formidable endgame options — or he can jump right into late-inning setup spots himself.

Senzatela is earning $12MM this year. There’s about $3.66MM of that sum still to be paid out. It’s not clear if the Brewers are taking on any of the salary just yet, but they were reportedly willing to absorb the remainder of Tarik Skubal‘s $32MM salary in a trade. Perhaps taking on that big a sum was an exception willing to be made only for Skubal, but it showed that Milwaukee clearly has room to add to the payroll — and Senzatela is only just over one-third as much as Skubal. They’ll have a $14MM club option on Senzatela for next season, but there’s no buyout on that option and a net $14MM seems steep for a good but non-elite reliever (especially in Milwaukee). The Brewers seem likely to buy that option out.

Neither Manfredi nor Martinez ranked among the Brewers’ top 30 prospects at Baseball America, MLB.com or FanGraphs. Manfredi is a 26-year-old southpaw that Milwaukee selected in the ninth round of the 2023 draft. He’s a pure bullpen prospect who’s having a nice season between Double-A and Triple-A: 3.35 ERA, 35.2% strikeout rate, 11.4% walk rate, 40.9% ground-ball rate, 0.39 HR/9. He’s sitting 94.6 mph on his four-seamer, primarily complementing the pitch with an 82.8 mph slider but also mixing in very occasional sinkers and changeups.

Martinez, 19, was signed out of the Dominican as an amateur free agent a couple years back. He spent the 2024-25 seasons in the Dominican Summer League before moving to the Brewers’ Complex League club to begin the season. The Brewers had just bumped him to Class-A after a big showing in Rookie ball (.356/.476/.598, six homers, 21 steals in 40 games). He hasn’t hit much there yet, but it’s only a three-week sample (18 games) and he’s quite young for the level, so there’s not much to glean there.