In a move that shocked baseball experts just five days ago, the Los Angeles Dodgers designated the former No. 1 prospect in their organization for assignment. The Dodgers signed catcher Diego Cartaya out of Maracay, Venezuela, in 2018.
They handed him a $2.5 million signing bonus and for a few years, the investment seemed well worth it. By 2022, the 6’3″, 219 pound catcher had climbed rapidly through the Dodgers’ farm system and was ranked as the organization’s top prospect by Baseball America, and one of the top 25 prospects in baseball.
Keith Law of The Athletic put Cartaya in the No. 6 spot among all prospects in 2022, and the MLB.com ratings had Cartaya ranked as high as No. 14 throughout baseball heading into the 2023 season. But 2023 was also the year that the Dodgers promoted Cartaya to the Tulsa Drillers at the Double-A level of their system. And that’s when his offensive output began to drop. After posting a robust .955 OPS the previous year with the Single-A Rancho Cucamonga Quakes, Cartaya managed only a .656 number at Tulsa, with an anemic .189 batting average.
Rushing Rushed Past Cartaya on Dodgers Depth Chart
He found himself left in the dust created by Dalton Rushing, a catcher taken by the Dodgers with the first pick of the second round in the 2022 draft. Rushing is now ranked by MLB.com as the No. 1 prospect in the Dodgers system.
Cartaya didn’t do much better at the Triple-A level in 2024, with a slash line of .208/.293/.350 (.686) at Oklahoma City. When the Dodgers signed Korean Baseball Organization star Hye-seong Kim to a three-year, $12.5 million contract, they needed to open up a space on their 40-man roster and Cartaya became expendable.
As disillusioned as the Dodgers became with Cartaya, that skepticism was shared by other teams as well, because when Cartaya was finally traded, the return was not of any significant value. Had the Dodgers failed to trade him, he would have become a free agent, but now at least the 23-year-old has a new baseball home and at least potentially a new chance at establishing himself as a potential big league quality player.
New Dodgers Minor League Pitcher Jose Vasquez
The Dodgers shipped Cartaya out on Thursday, receiving in return a single, right-handed pitcher from the Minnesota Twins’ low minor leagues. Jose Vasquez is a 20-year-old from the Dominican Republic who so far has pitched only for the Twins’ Dominican Summer League affiliate. The DOSL is rated as a rookie league, a step below short-season Single-A classification.
While it is difficult to judge the potential of a prospect at that low level, Vasquez has done little to distinguish himself, compiling an 8.05 ERA in 57 innings over two seasons for the Twins DOSL team.
“Command was a major issue for Vasquez in â23, evidenced by a ghastly 21.9 percent walk rate,” according to a report on the trade by MLB Trade Rumors. “He made major strides in 2024, however, cutting that mark in half (10.7 percent) while nearly doubling his strikeout rate from 17.8 percent to 32.1 percent. He was a bit older than the average DSL player last year and figures to head to one of the Dodgersâ full-season affiliates in 2025.”
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