The Orioles announced that they have agreed to terms with right-hander Rico Garcia on a one-year deal for the 2026 season. The club didn’t announce salary figures but Josh Tolentino and Matt Weyrich of The Baltimore Sun report that the righty will get a $900K salary.
It’s an unusual deal. Garcia, 32 in January, was already on the Baltimore roster, having been claimed off waivers from the Mets in August. He has less than two years of service time. That means he hasn’t yet qualified for arbitration. The O’s could have set his salary around the league minimum, which will be $780K next year. Bumping up to $900K is obviously attractive to Garcia but the O’s also expect some kind of benefit from it as well.
It’s likely the first step in a plan to have Garcia serve as non-roster depth. The O’s could put him on waivers and hope that the slightly elevated salary dissuades the other 29 clubs from putting in a claim. If Garcia passed through waivers unclaimed, he would have the right to elect free agency since he has a previous career outright. However, since he has less than five years of service time, he would have to walk away from his remaining salary commitments in exercising that right. Since Garcia is out of options, this potentially gives the O’s a way to move him to Norfolk and back, while getting around his out-of-options status.
The O’s have tried similar things before, usually with arbitration-eligible players. They agreed to a $1MM salary with infielder Emmanuel Rivera for the 2025 season. He was outrighted off the roster before the season began. During the season, he was added back to the roster and then outrighted again on three further occasions, giving the O’s an extra depth option. It doesn’t always work this way, however. The O’s and Jake Cave avoided arbitration in November of 2022, agreeing to a $950K salary for 2023. About a month later, they tried to pass him through waivers but the Phillies claimed him.
Garcia has seen limited action in five big league seasons but 2025 was his largest workload and his best performance. He tossed 34 1/3 innings for three different clubs, allowing 3.15 earned runs per nine. His 26.8% strikeout rate, 7% walk rate and 48.4% ground ball rate were all above average. Since he’s out of options, he bounced around the waiver wire, pitching for the Mets, Yankees and O’s last year. Perhaps the increased salary will help the O’s keep him as an up-and-down arm but it’s also possible some other club claims him and he gets paid his slightly elevated salary somewhere else.
Photo courtesy of James A. Pittman, Imagn Images