Noah Syndergaard has been hired for assignment by the Guardians – Phillies Nation

It wouldn’t even be 13 months before the Phillies traded Mickey Moniak to the Los Angeles Angels for Noah Syndergaard, but for the 6-foot-6 right hander, it might have seemed outdated.

Syndergaard will now be looking for his fifth team in the last 13 months, because the Cleveland Guardians named him for assignment on Sunday. Cleveland acquired Syndergaard a month earlier, when the Dodgers sent him there for shortstop Amed Rosario.

To put it simply – and as the team-hopping might suggest – 2023 hasn’t been Syndergaard’s year. He posted a 7.16 ERA in 12 starts with the Dodgers from preseason through July, then clipped a slightly better 5.40 in six games with Cleveland before the DFA. He signed a one-year, $13 million contract with the Dodgers in the offseason after a short stint in Philadelphia last year.

Although Syndergaard isn’t quite as fiery a player as he once was at the New York Met, the Phillies’ stint has provided some reason for optimism about the Dodgers’ one-year contract. Syndergaard made nine starts and 10 total starts for the Phillies in the regular season, posting a 4.12 ERA—which was nearly everything the Phillies expected in exchange for the Moniacs, who looked unlikely to find their footing (as they have since) without a change of scenery. Syndergaard has also made some crucial runs in the postseason as well, throwing three one-run home runs in an NLDS playoff over Atlanta and earning a hold against the Padres in NLCS Game 4. He even started World Series 5 that most Phillies fans would like to purge from memory, allowing two to three frames to be played back.

No, Syndergaard wasn’t a star for the Phillies, but he did help them win postseason games and at least looked like he was going to stick around in the Majors as a viable starter.

But things took a turn for the worse. Now, Syndergaard is five years and four teams away from his last electric season with the Mets, when his ERA barely passed three in 2018 — and four years of pitching nearly 200 innings in 2019.

Injuries, of course, are largely responsible for falls. Syndergaard is still only 30, so this is unlikely to be the end for him in the Majors – but he will have to fight to get back into the starting rotation, and the kind of top form he once enjoyed looks like a ship has sailed since long time.

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