By Scott Barancik, Editor
We’ve been saving up news to share with you, dear readers. In other words, procrastinating. But Alex Bregman’s signing by the Cubs has forced our hand.
Check out these highlights from the past few months.
Bregman Bolts Boston
Reports surfaced on the night of January 10 that the Chicago Cubs had signed 3B Alex Bregman to a 5-year, $175-million deal, the biggest annualized salary in team history. The 31-year-old had played one season with the Red Sox before opting out of his 3-year contract, and Boston continued to court him, but the franchise’s refusal to insert a no-trade clause was a dealbreaker. Bregman has two young children and reportedly didn’t want to risk disrupting his family with yet another move.
“Bregman carries a reputation as an exceptional clubhouse leader, someone who sets a strong example for young players and shares valuable information during hitters’ meetings and in the dugout,” said the Chicago Daily Herald. “Bregman already earned two World Series rings with the Houston Astros, and he has performed on the postseason stage in each of the last nine years, continually adding to his baseball IQ.”
The acquisition puts Bregman and SS Dansby Swanson—the #1 (Diamondbacks) and #2 (Astros) picks in the 2015 Draft—side-by-side in the Chicago infield.
Other Major- and Minor-League News
- Speaking of free agents, CF Harrison Bader has yet to land a deal, despite ranking #26 on FanGraphs’ list of 2026’s Top 50 MLB Free Agents. And it seems unlikely the 31-year-old will return to the Phillies, where he enjoyed a standout 2025—including a career-high 3.2 WAR. According to The Athletic, Bader is the best remaining center fielder in the class.
- 1B Matt Mervis, fresh off a disappointing season in Miami, signed a minor-league contract with the Nationals on December 31. It is a homecoming of sorts for Mervis, who was born in Washington, DC, drafted by the Nats in the 39th round of the 2016 draft, and chose to go to Duke University instead. Mervis will compete at Spring Training to fill Washington’s first-base vacancy.
- The Mets signed RHP Robert Stock to a minor-league contract on November 25. (Thank you to JBN reader Jeff F. for the tip.) The irrepressible 36-year-old is coming off a busy 2025, adding to a resumé that includes 4 major-league teams, 14 minor-league teams (including 4 as a catcher), 5 foreign-league clubs (across Mexico, Korea, and the Dominican Republic), and 2 indy-league teams. Stock began the 2024-25 season in the Mexican Pacific Winter League, where he won the pitching equivalent of the Triple Crown: most wins (10), best ERA (1.60), and most strikeouts (78). The performance earned him a contract with the Red Sox, which saw him appear in two games for Boston and the rest of the season in the minors before being released in August. In November, Stock joined a Dominican Winter League team but lasted only 2 games before signing with the Mets on November 25. This will be Stock’s second stint with New York—he appeared in two Mets games in 2021.
- C Garrett Stubbs, who has been with the Phillies franchise since 2022, reportedly re-signed with the team. According to The Athletic, the unusual split contract will pay Stubbs $925,000 for the majors and another $575,000 for the minors. After averaging 47 games in the major leagues from 2022-24—and appearing in a total of 8 lost-cause games as a pitcher—he played just 5 games with the Phillies in 2025, all as a late-inning pinch runner or defensive replacement.
- In November, the Marlins named former outfielder Gabe Kapler, 50, the team’s general manager. According to JBN reader Ethel H., Kapler is only the third person in MLB history to have played in the majors, managed two major-league teams, and served as a major-league GM.
- CF Kevin Pillar, who retired in 2025 after playing for 10 major-league teams over 13 seasons, is serving as an analyst on Foul Territory—the very show where he announced his retirement back in July.
- Baseball America recently ranked RHP Harrison Cohen (AAA) the Yankees’ 20th-best prospect. The publication described Cohen—a 26-year-old reliever who went a combined 3-2 with a 1.76 ERA across Double-A and Triple-A in 2025—as a “near-ready big-leaguer best suited for a role in middle relief.” Surprisingly, New York left Cohen unprotected for December’s Rule 5 Draft, leading Baseball America to rank him one of the top players available. (Under MLB rules, a team that signs a player in the Rule 5 Draft must keep him on its 26-man Active Roster the entire following season.) Cohen wasn’t selected, but that may be good news for New York fans eager to see a Jewish pitcher back up Cy Young Award finalist Max Fried.
- Alon Leichman, a native Israeli who grew up on Kibbutz Gezer, joined the Colorado Rockies as their pitching coach on December 8. It will be quite a challenge: the team’s starting rotation had a combined 6.65 ERA in 2025, a mark described as the “ugliest…since both leagues started tracking ERA officially in 1913.” The only downside of getting hired is that Leichman subsequently withdrew as Team Israel’s pitching coach for the 2026 World Baseball Classic, citing a need to focus on one job.
- 3B Steve Hertz, who was just 19 when he appeared in 4 games for the Houston Colt .45s in 1964, died in Miami at age 80 on December 4. Born in 1945 at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio, Hertz spent 6 years in the minors after his brief major-league stint before becoming a legendary baseball coach in Miami. According to a moving tribute in the Miami Herald, Hertz mentored hundreds of players over more than four decades of coaching, including 26 years at Miami Dade College, a program he led to a fifth-place finish in the 2001 National Junior College Athletic Association Division I World Series. “He was a great quarterback in football and a great basketball player, too,” said son Darren, the head basketball coach at Wittenberg University (Division III). “But he knew his ticket was in baseball.” Rest in peace, Steve.
Independent and Foreign Leagues
- 2B Michael Wielansky has become a standout star in Mexico. A former prospect for the Astros and Giants, Wielansky led Los Charros de Jalisco to a Mexican Pacific Winter League championship in the 2024–25 season. His performance was dominant, leading a team that included five MLB veterans in several key categories, notably batting average (.329), walk-to-strikeout ratio (1.19), and OPS (.936). Now 28, Wielansky followed that up with a .365 average in the 2025 summer league. He is currently maintaining his momentum in the 2025–26 Winter League, hitting .303 with a team-high 21 stolen bases.
- Meanwhile, the independent Pioneer League—an MLB Partner League located in four Mountain West states—saw several Jewish players post elite numbers in 2025. INF Benjamin Rosengard of the Idaho Falls Chukars hit a league-record .463, to which he added 10 HRs, 6 triples, 57 RBIs, and a league-leading .558 OBP. Noah Millikan, a 6-foot-5-inch RHP with the Oakland Ballers, went 7-1 with a 2.12 ERA (#3 in the league), 96 strikeouts (tied for #7), and just 12 walks across 14 starts—quite a feat for what is widely considered a hitter-friendly league. OF Adam Fogel—who told JBN he identifies both as Jewish and Christian and hopes to play for Team Israel—hit .388 for the Missoula PaddleHeads in 2025, with 34 HRs (#3), 108 RBIs (#6), and a .789 slugging percentage (#2). A year prior, Baseball America named Fogel its 2024 Independent Player of the Year. “My hope, as our manager, is that he’s not with us,” PaddleHeads manager Michael Schlact told BA then. “Quite honestly, if Adam Fogel does this and doesn’t get signed [with an MLB team], what are we doing?”
- IF Chase Engelhard, a Florida International University alum who hit .242 for the Trenton Thunder of the MLB Draft League in 2024, signed with the Cleburne Railroaders of the independent American Association in early January. He will join RHP Aaron Mishulam, a 6-foot-7-inch alum of Michigan State University who made five relief appearances with the Railroaders in 2025, his rookie season.
Team Israel
- Brad Goldberg, the Cleveland Guardians’ assistant pitching coach, will replace Colorado Rockies pitching coach Alon Leichman as Team Israel’s pitching coach in the 2026 World Baseball Classic. Goldberg, a right-handed pitcher, pitched in 11 games for the Chicago White Sox in 2017. A January 9 article on Goldberg began with the headline: “Brad Goldberg’s rapid rise: Is the Guardians’ pitching factory grooming its next leader?”
- Simon Rosenbaum, the Tampa Bay Rays’ director of baseball development, has agreed to serve as Team Israel’s general manager for the 2026 World Baseball Classic. Rosenbaum was an infielder and RHP for Pomona College (Division III) from 2013 to 2016.
# # #
