ST. PETERSBURG -- After he was sidelined by injuries the past two seasons, there will be a fair amount of uncertainty surrounding Shane McClanahan entering next year.
How will he look in Spring Training? How many innings can he pitch? How will he hold up over the course of a long season? Can he return to his All-Star form?
But McClanahan’s salary will not be a question. The Rays on Wednesday avoided arbitration with the left-hander by signing him to a contract for next season. McClanahan will make $3.6 million guaranteed, according to a source, with no other provisions in the deal.
Next year will be McClanahan’s third season of arbitration-eligibility. He also earned $3.6 million each of the past two seasons under a two-year, $7.2 million contract, and players who miss a full season due to injuries typically repeat their previous year’s salary the following year. McClanahan is under club control through the end of the 2027 season, and he can become a free agent heading into the ‘28 campaign.
The Rays have 11 more arbitration-eligible players: Griffin Jax, Garrett Cleavinger, Steven Wilson, Shane Baz, Nick Fortes, Josh Lowe, Bryan Baker, Ryan Pepiot, Kevin Kelly, Richie Palacios and Edwin Uceta.
McClanahan hasn’t pitched in the Majors since Aug. 2, 2023. He underwent his second Tommy John surgery later that month and spent the ‘24 season recovering from that procedure. He was fully healthy and looked ready to go this past Spring Training, only to be derailed in his final tuneup outing by a freak injury that turned out to be a nerve issue in his left triceps.
It took months for the 28-year-old left-hander to work his way back to the mound, and he only made three Minor League rehab starts in July before he was shut down again. He has resumed throwing on flat ground this offseason, and the Rays hope he will be ready for a relatively normal Spring Training.
Speaking at the Winter Meetings last week, Rays manager Kevin Cash said McClanahan was “having a really good offseason” and “feels really good.”
“He's worked his tail off,” president of baseball operations Erik Neander said last week. “If everything goes the way that it's expected, he's got a day [in the rotation], and we take care of him, we build him back up, and he's the pitcher that he's worked so hard to be and was prior.”
That pitcher, of course, was one of the best in baseball. McClanahan totaled 8.8 WAR, according to Baseball Reference, while posting a 3.02 ERA with 456 strikeouts in 404 2/3 innings over 74 starts from 2021-23. He was the American League’s starting pitcher in the 2022 All-Star Game and finished that season sixth in the AL Cy Young Award voting. He earned another All-Star nod in ‘23.
If all goes according to plan, McClanahan will rejoin a Rays rotation next year that also includes 2025 All-Star Drew Rasmussen, Ryan Pepiot, Baz and free-agent signee Steven Matz. Tampa Bay has depth behind that group in the form of Ian Seymour, Joe Boyle, Yoendrys Gómez and Jesse Scholtens, and the club will be open to further additions this offseason.