The Padres have signed right-hander Brent Honeywell Jr. to a minor league deal, as reported by Jordan Shusterman of Yahoo Sports. Honeywell last pitched in the majors in 2024. He’ll presumably report to Triple-A El Paso and try to work his way onto the big league roster down the stretch run.
Honeywell, now 31, was a consensus Top 100 prospect in the Rays’ system around a decade ago. Tampa Bay initially selected his contract in November 2017 to protect him from the Rule 5 Draft, though a brutal series of injuries delayed Honeywell’s big league debut until the 2021 season. He underwent Tommy John surgery in 2018 and suffered an elbow fracture the following year, followed by nerve decompression surgery in 2020. The righty finally reached the majors in 2021, but only for 4 2/3 innings. The Rays traded Honeywell to the A’s following the season, and a stress reaction in his throwing elbow caused him to miss the entire 2022 campaign.
San Diego brought in Honeywell for the first time on a big league deal entering 2023. In 46 2/3 innings for the Padres that year, he posted a 4.05 ERA out of the bullpen with serviceable strikeout and walk numbers, plus an excellent 48.9% ground ball rate. On the down side, Honeywell was allowing 1.54 home runs per nine innings and stranding 81.0% of opposing runners, which was sure to come down. His 5.13 expected ERA and 4.33 SIERA further suggested that he was getting lucky on the mound. A brief late-season stint with the White Sox was even worse, with Honeywell giving up seven earned runs in 5 2/3 innings.
The 2024 campaign was the best of Honeywell’s injury-plagued career to date. He put up a 2.63 ERA in 37 2/3 innings that year, 34 1/3 of them coming with the Dodgers. He allowed just three home runs all season (or 0.72 HR/9) and cut his walk rate to 7.4% after sitting 2.4% higher the previous season. Working off a mid-90s four-seamer and his signature low-80s screwball, Honeywell continued to generate ground balls at an above-average 42.2% clip.
However, his 12.1% strikeout rate was troublingly low, and his 4.97 xERA and 5.00 SIERA put his true performance about two and a half runs higher than the 2.63 ERA. The bottom fell out for Honeywell in the postseason. He gave up nine earned runs in 8 2/3 innings combined, including five earned runs in an inning of mop-up duty in Game 4 of the World Series. The Dodgers non-tendered him during the offseason, and Honeywell did not appear in affiliated ball in 2025.
There’s little harm in the Padres reuniting with Honeywell as a depth option for the bullpen. Even after the host of injuries, he showed no loss of velocity in the 2024 campaign, so he’s still a hard thrower with an intriguing breaking pitch in the screwball. Honeywell has shown a knack for inducing ground balls in his limited big league action, so he might have a decent floor even if the strikeouts don’t fully recover, and of course, if he can stay healthy.
The Giants signed Honeywell to a non-roster deal during spring training, though he didn’t make an appearance before getting released at the end of March. As such, when he appears in a game for El Paso, he’ll be pitching for the first time in almost two calendar years. He’ll need a good amount of time to build up after that kind of layoff, so he could be ready for a big league call-up, however brief, around the end of September.
The 66-57 Padres have won six straight and currently hold the second NL Wild Card spot. Led by flamethrower Mason Miller, their bullpen has a 3.57 ERA on the season and leads the majors with 6.8 WAR, according to FanGraphs. They’ve kept that up since the trade deadline, posting a 2.50 ERA in 39 2/3 innings since August 4th. With that kind of performance from the bullpen, there may not be much incentive to bring Honeywell up in the middle of a postseason race. His likeliest path to a big league return is if Griffin Canning or another fringe arm struggles or suffers an injury.
Photo courtesy of Charles LeClaire, Imagn Images
