Mets Claim Kyren Paris From Angels

The Mets announced they’ve claimed infielder/outfielder Kyren Paris off waivers from the Angels. New York also designated outfielder Cristian Pache for assignment. Paris, who turns 25 next month, is a former second-round pick who has played parts of four big league seasons. He’s a good athlete with speed and raw power who’ll need to dramatically cut down on the strikeouts to even carve out a career as a bench player. The righty-swinging Paris owns a .147/.238/.272 slash line with seven home runs and 11 stolen bases across 263 career plate appearances. He has gone down on strikes in 38% of his trips to the plate. New York is evidently intrigued enough by the tools and Paris’ minor league production. While he barely factored into the Halos’ big league plans this season, he’s coming off a .274/.384/.458 showing with 13 homers and 24 steals between Double-A and Triple-A. Paris has played mostly middle infield in his minor league career but has the speed to factor into the outfield mix as well. This was Paris’ final minor league option season. He’ll either need to break camp or be placed back on waivers at some point before Opening Day. The latter outcome is more likely, and there’s a decent chance the Mets will attempt to sneak him through waivers during the offseason. Pache is also out of options. The former top prospect is a pure depth player at this stage of his career. He joined the Mets on an offseason minor league deal and was called up after they moved Tyrone Taylor at the trade deadline. Pache held a bench spot for the final two months of the season but only started one game. He went 1-8 with four strikeouts and is a career .181/.242/.273 hitter over 618 plate appearances. Pache is likely to clear waivers this weekend and opt for minor league free agency in search of a non-roster invite to Spring Training. The Mets will need to make three more cuts from their 40-man roster by Monday evening. They’ll need to activate Tylor Megill, Jorge Polanco and Reed Garrett from the 60-day injured list. The Halos also dropped Sebastián Rivero and Sammy Peralta from their roster this afternoon. They’re down to either 36 or 37 players on their roster, depending on whether they pick up a $2.5MM option on reliever Robert Stephenson. View Comments (6)