The Orioles have outrighted Corbin Martin off the 40-man roster and assigned the right-hander to Triple-A Norfolk. It wasn’t known that Martin had been designated for assignment, but he’ll now head to Triple-A since he doesn’t have the requirements (i.e. service time or a past outright) to reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency.
Martin has already had a busy season on the transactional front, as he has twice been DFA’ed and then claimed off waivers by new teams. The Orioles claimed him away from Milwaukee a month ago, while the Brewers themselves claimed Martin off the Diamondbacks’ waiver wire in mid-April. Martin yet to see any big league action amidst these moves, as he hasn’t done much to force the issue by posting a 7.32 ERA with more walks (22) than strikeouts (17) over 19 2/3 combined innings for three different Triple-A affiliates.
Control has been for Martin in his 57 2/3 career MLB innings, as he has a 13.6% walk rate to go along with a 6.71 ERA over his time with the Astros and Diamondbacks. However, injuries have been the bigger story for the former top-100 prospect, as he missed some of the 2019 season and all of the 2020 season recovering from Tommy John surgery, and Martin also didn’t pitch at all in 2023 due to shoulder surgery.
At age 28, Martin is already in the “late bloomer” phase of his career if a breakout is still to come, and there’s no harm for the Orioles in keeping him in the minors to see if Martin can still regain some of his old top-prospect form. Perhaps more intriguingly, today’s move opens up a 40-man roster spot for Baltimore, which perhaps hints that the team could be again looking to dip into its loaded farm system.