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The Dodgers have avoided arbitration with reliever Hong-Chih Kuo by
agreeing to a one-year, $2.725MM contract with the southpaw, reports
MLB.com's Ken Gurnick. The contract also contains incentives that
could add another $500K to Kuo's salary, tweets Dylan Hernandez of
the L.A. Times. This was Kuo's second year of arb-eligibility and
he is represented by the Octagon sports agency.
Kuo, 29, is coming off an All-Star season that saw him post a 1.20 ERA,
a 4.06 K/BB ratio and an 11.0 K/9 rate in 56 relief appearances with
L.A. The 56 games pitched was a career-high for Kuo, who was pitched
on consecutive days just four times all season in an attempt to keep
him fresh, given Kuo's past elbow injuries. Over the last three
seasons, Kuo has a 1.96 ERA in 133 games and has averaged 10.6 strikeouts
per nine innings.
The Taiwanese left-hander recorded 21 holds and also 12 saves, taking
over the closing job from Jonathan Broxton in mid-August. Broxton has
been pencilled into the closer's job headed into Los Angeles' Spring
Training, but Kuo performed well enough that the Dodgers wouldn't
hesitate to put him at the back of their bullpen if Broxton struggles
again.
As you can see on MLBTR's Arbtracker, the settled contract is worth
slightly below the midpoint of the numbers submitted by Kuo and the
club earlier this month