Mets Designate Gabriel Arias For Assignment

The Mets announced Monday that infielder Gabriel Arias has been designated for assignment. His spot on the 40-man roster goes to fellow righty-swinging infielder Christopher Morel, whose contract has been selected from Triple-A Syracuse. (The Morel portion of today’s transaction was originally reported last night.)

It was a short stay in Queens for Arias. The Mets picked him up off waivers after the Guardians designated him for assignment prior to the trade deadline. He appeared in only two games, took five hitless plate appearances, and will now head to back to DFA limbo to see if another club will claim him or if he’ll pass through waivers and head to Triple-A.

The 26-year-old Arias was a high-end prospect prior to his major league debut, landing on several top-100 lists in the 2021-22 offseason. The Guardians originally acquired Arias, Josh Naylor, Cal Quantrill, Joey Cantillo and Austin Hedges in a 2020 trade sending Mike Clevinger and Matt Waldron to San Diego. The Guardians received plenty of value from that trade, but despite Arias logging 1168 plate appearances for them from 2022-26, he didn’t account for much of it.

Including his brief cup of coffee with the Mets, Arias is a career .218/.274/.358 hitter in 1173 plate appearances as a big leaguer. That’s 24% worse than league-average output, by measure of wRC+. He’s a right-handed hitter who has reverse platoon splits and has logged a .163/.229/.292 batting line (41 wRC+) with a 40.7% strikeout rate against opposing lefties. Arias has never walked much (career 6.5%). He hits the ball fairly hard when he makes contact, but he’s fanned in an untenable 34.3% of his career plate appearances, which undercuts the raw power he posseses.

Arias can play all over the infield and has more nominal experience across all three outfield spots (173 total major league innings). He’s primarily played shortstop, but if he catches on elsewhere it’ll very likely be in a bench role, given his lack of offense. Metrics like Defensive Runs Saved and Outs Above Average feel he’s playable at any of the four infield positions.

Arias is out of minor league options, so if he lands with another club he’ll have to go right onto that team’s 40-man roster. Given the persistent strikeouts and general lack of offense, there’s a chance he goes unclaimed and is assigned outright to Triple-A Syracuse. He has more than three years of big league service, meaning he can reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency. Since he entered the year on a pre-arbitration salary, there’s no major financial consideration that’d make it a no-brainer to accept. If he does land with another team, Arias is controllable for three more years via arbitration, but he’d be a clear non-tender candidate barring a surprising surge of offense in the season’s final six weeks or so.