After the trade that sent Jack Flaherty to the Dodgers was announced right at 5:59 p.m. ET, the Detroit Tigers had one more deal to announce. They moved 1B/OF Mark Canha to the San Francisco Giants in exchange for 21-year-old right-hander Eric Silva.
Canha did a nice job for the Tigers overall, providing them with strong on-base ability, veteran leadership, and depth at first base which proved necessary as Spencer Torkelson flamed out. His numbers were mediocre, but he also wasn’t well suited to play as much as the Tigers ended up needing him to play. He was a quality pickup for a team working on the cheap, and in the end he netted them a decent project pitcher to try and develop.
Silva is currently the Giants 25th ranked prospect according to Baseball America. They drafted him out of high school in the fourth round back in 2021 on a significantly overslot deal to get him to pass on his UCLA commit.
The right-hander is a touch on the smaller side at 6’1”, but he’s very athletic with a loose free arm motion, and he gets good extension to the plate with a low release height that pairs well with his fourseam shape. He generally sits 92-94 mph as a starter, but he’s touched as high as 97 mph and still has some room to develop physically.
He has a quality set of secondary pitches, led by a slider/curveball combo that both flash above average at times, but he hasn’t been very consistent with any of them yet, leading to the move to the bullpen. The Tigers may well see his role differently and convert him back, particularly if they can improve his changeup or teach him the split-change that’s become all the rage in the system recently.
Silva has a good deal of potential, but he is certainly a raw arm with control issues. Fortunately he’s still pretty young and has a developing track record of durability. We’ll see if the Tigers player development staff, led by Gabe Ribas on the pitching side, can get him tuned up.