The Mets have claimed left-hander Locke St. John off waivers from the Cubs, who designated St. John for assignment last week. To create space on the 40-man roster, New York moved Jacob deGrom to the 60-day injured list.
St. John signed a minor league deal with Chicago in December, and his tenure with the club consisted of seven innings over five Triple-A games, and a single inning in the majors. It was a second cup of coffee for St. John, whose previous MLB experience was seven games with the Rangers in 2019. A longtime Tigers farmhand before Texas selected him away from Detroit in the December 2017 Rule 5 Draft, St. John returned to the Tigers on another minors deal last winter but didn’t see any big league action in 2021.
The waiver claim adds a bit more left-handed depth to the Mets’ relief corps, with Joely Rodriguez and Chasen Shreve serving as the only southpaws in the Amazins’ bullpen. Elsewhere on the 40-man roster, the only other left-handers are starter David Peterson and Thomas Szapucki, who is working his way back after having his 2021 season cut short by ulnar nerve transposition surgery.
For deGrom, the shift to the 60-day IL doesn’t much change his situation, and he is still around another week away from further imaging on his throwing shoulder. A stress reaction in that shoulder sidelined deGrom for yet another extended absence, and since he’ll require quite a bit of ramp-up before finally taking to the mound, it is seems like deGrom will be out until late June at the earliest.