Brewers: Trio of Former Prospects Added to 40-Man MLB Rosters

The deadline to protect Rule 5 eligible players from the draft by adding them to a team’s 40-man roster passed this last Friday afternoon. From a Milwaukee Brewers standpoint, they were quiet and for the first time in recent memory did not add any players.

However, other MLB teams showed quite a bit more activity at Friday’s deadline. In fact, a trio of former Brewers prospects happened to be added to other teams’ 40-man rosters for the 2022 season, as noted by Jim Goulart of Brewerfan.net.

Former Brewers players added to other teams’ 40-man rosters were Cooper Hummel, Bowden Francis, and Logan Gillaspie.

Utility player Cooper Hummel was added to the Arizona Diamondbacks roster. Hummel was a key piece in the trade to acquire Eduardo Escobar at the trade deadline. He was a player experiencing success at the upper levels of the minor leagues, but was blocked from advancing further. He may now potentially get a chance at the MLB level with the Diamondbacks next season.

Bowden Francis is a starting pitcher who likely has the ceiling of a back end of the rotation pitcher. At the time he was traded, along with teammate Trevor Richards, he had a 3.49 ERA at the Triple-A level in seven starts. Post trade, he pitched 73 more innings at the Blue Jays’ Triple-A affiliate and had a 4.19 ERA.

Lastly, 24-year-old right-handed pitcher Logan Gillaspie was added to the Baltimore Orioles’ roster. The Brewers released him after the 2019 minor league season in which he pitched 109 innings for the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers and had a 3.96 ERA. In 2021, he pitched his way up to the Orioles’ Double-A level. He likely will not be MLB ready to begin the 2022 season.

There is a slight chance that the Brewers could lose prospects currently within their system to the Rule 5 draft in December. Four out of their top 30 prospects per MLB Pipeline were left unprotected, but are not viewed as MLB ready. For a complete list of players who are Rule 5 draft eligible, check out our complete offseason preview.

In the end, the Brewers should not worry about having former prospects being added to opposing 40-man rosters. The Brewers pride themselves on depth and their top prospects will all remain within the organization as they do not need to be protected yet. This includes Ethan Small, Garrett Mitchell, Joey Wiemer, and others.

The next biggest date to look forward to is the non-tender deadline which is on December 1st, which also marks the end of the current CBA. There has already been talks of a lockout and a potential freeze on all MLB transactions, but we will have to wait and see what actually ends up happening.