Veteran RHP Matt Magill announces retirement

Right-hander Matt Magill has announced his retirement, as per his personal Twitter account.  The 32-year-old is calling it a career after 13 professional seasons in total, and parts of five MLB seasons.

It was quite a nice run for a 31st-round draft pick, as Magill was selected out of high school by the Dodgers in 2008.  Magill made his Major League debut in the Dodger Blue in 2013, tossing 27 2/3 innings for the club before returning to Triple-A for the entirety of the 2014 season.  That winter saw Magill dealt to the Reds in exchange for Chris Heisey, but Magill’s Cincinnati tenure was marked by a Tommy John surgery that wiped out almost all of his 2015-16 seasons.

Magill finally gained a foothold in the big leagues in 2018, appearing in 90 games and pitching 107 1/3 innings with the Twins and Mariners over the course of the 2018-19 seasons.  While his Statcast numbers weren’t pretty, Magill outpitched his metrics by rather a stunning amount, posting a 3.94 ERA over those two seasons despite some of the league’s worst hard-contact and xwOBA totals.  Magill also allowed an above-average number of home runs, but struck out batters at a solid 25.1% rate.

The abbreviated 2020 season saw Magill post a perfect 0.00 ERA over his first eight outings before he ran into some serious struggles, quite possibly due to a shoulder injury that eventually brought an early end to his campaign.  The Mariners released Magill and then quickly re-signed him at the end of last year’s Spring Training, but the righty didn’t see any action at either the MLB or minor league levels in 2021.  Magill ends his career with a 4.63 ERA and 23.2% strikeout rate over 149 2/3 innings in the bigs.