The Cubs have signed right-hander to a minor league deal, according to his at MLB.com. He started yesterdays game for Triple-A Iowa, to sing 46 pitches over 2 2/3 innings. Houser, 31, started the year in the Mets rotation but was later bumped to the bullpen and eventually off the roster entirely. By the first week of May, he had made six starts but allowed 26 earned runs in 28 2/3 innings for an 8.16 earned run average. He then made two relief appearances before making his seventh start of the year, in which he allowed six earned runs in five innings. He only pitched Jim Davenport Jersey in relief from that point forward and had much better results. From May 26 to July 24, he to sed 31 2/3 relief innings with a 3.41 ERA. His 18.6% strikeout rate was low but his 6.2% walk rate and 51.6% ground ball rate were both strong. Those numbers were roughly in line with his previous track record. From 2019 to 2023 with the Brewers, he made 120 appearances, 97 of those being starts. In that time, he had a 4.04 ERA, 19.2% strikeout rate, 9.2% walk rate and 52.5% ground ball rate. That suggests Houser was more or le s the same guy with the Mets this year, apart from the rough start to the campaign. Though he had gotten things back on track, the Mets were getting various injured pitchers back from the IL and needed roster spots, nudging Houser off. Since Houser has more than five years of major league service time, he had the right to reject an outright a signment while retaining all that remained of this years $5.05MM salary. Since he was bound for the open market anyway, the Mets simply released him. That leaves them on the hook for whats left of that salary while the Cubs will only have to pay him the prorated league minimum for any time spent on the roster, with that amount subtracted from what the Mets pay. The Cubs major league rotation is in a decent spot, consisting of , , , and . But they have some starting depth on the shelf right now, as each of , and are on the IL. Prospects like and are also injured at the moment, further thinning out the emergency options. Based on yesterdays usage, it seems the Cubs will stretch Houser out and he will give them some experienced non-roster depth who can be called upon for e sentially no cost at some point. Trenton Brooks Jersey