ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Two-time All-Star pitcher Johnny Cueto agreed to a minor league contract on Tuesday with the Texas Rangers, the organization where he has a connection to the big league team's manager and general manager.
Cueto would get a $1.6 million salary while in the major leagues if added to the 40-man roster.
The 38-year-old Cueto was 1-4 with a 6.02 ERA in 10 starts and three relief appearances for Miami Marlins last season, when the right-hander was on the injured list more than three months with a biceps injury. He was left off the team's postseason roster.
Cueto's latter All-Star season was 2016, when he was 18-5 with a 2.79 ERA in 32 starts for the San Francisco Giants with manager Bruce Bochy, who is now in his second season in Texas. Cueto had five complete games and two shutouts that season, the first of four he spent with Bochy.
That was a year after Cueto was a trade deadline acquisition by Kansas City and part of the Royals' World Series championship. That pitching staff also included Chris Young, now general manager of the Rangers.
The best season for Cueto was with Cincinnati in 2014, when he was 20-9 with a 2.25 ERA and 242 strikeouts over 243 2/3 innings. He made a career-high 34 starts and finished second in the NL Cy Young Award voting behind Clayton Kershaw of the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Cueto is 144-111 with a 3.50 ERA in 368 games (363 starts) over 16 big league seasons with Cincinnati (2008-15), Kansas City (2015), the Giants (2016-21), the Chicago White Sox (2022) and the Marlins.
The Rangers said Cueto is expected to report to the club's complex in Surprise, Arizona, before being assigned to one of their affiliate teams.
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FILE -Miami Marlins relief pitcher Johnny Cueto throws during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Baltimore Orioles, Sunday, July 16, 2023, in Baltimore. Two-time All-Star pitcher Johnny Cueto has signed a minor league contract with the Texas Rangers, Tuesday, April 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Terrance Williams, File)
JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli army on Monday ordered tens of thousands of people in the southern Gaza city of Rafah to begin evacuating, signaling that a long-promised ground invasion could be imminent.
The announcement complicated last-ditch efforts by international mediators, including the director of the CIA, to broker a cease-fire. Hamas and Qatar, a key mediator, have warned that an invasion of Rafah could derail the talks.
Israel has described Rafah as the last significant Hamas stronghold after seven months of war, and its leaders have repeatedly said they need to carry out a ground invasion to defeat the Islamic militant group.
Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an army spokesman, said some 100,000 people were being ordered to move to a nearby Israel-declared humanitarian zone called Muwasi. He said Israel was preparing a “limited scope operation” and would not say whether this was the beginning of a broader invasion of the city. But last October, Israel did not formally announce the launch of a ground invasion that continues to this day.
The move comes a day after Hamas militants carried out a deadly rocket attack from the area that killed three Israeli soldiers.
Shoshani said Israel published a map of the evacuation area, and that orders were being issued through leaflets dropped from the sky, text messages and radio broadcasts.
He said Israel has expanded humanitarian aid into Muwasi, including field hospitals, tents, food and water.
Israel's plan to invade Rafah has raised global alarm because of the potential for harm to more than a million Palestinian civilians sheltering there.
About 1.4 million Palestinians — more than half of Gaza’s population — are jammed into the town and its surroundings. Most of them fled their homes elsewhere in the territory to escape Israel’s onslaught and now face another wrenching move, or the danger of facing the brunt of a new assault. They live in densely packed tent camps, overflowing U.N. shelters or crowded apartments, and are dependent on international aid for food, with sanitation systems and medical facilities infrastructure crippled.
The United States, Israel's closest ally, has repeatedly urged Israel not to carry out the invasion, saying it does not have a credible plan to protect civilians.
But even as the U.S., Egypt and Qatar have pushed for a cease-fire agreement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated last week that the military would move on the town “with or without a deal” to achieve its goal of destroying the Hamas militant group.
On Sunday, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed Hamas wasn’t serious about a deal and warned of “a powerful operation in the very near future in Rafah." His comments came after Hamas attacked Israel’s main crossing point Sunday for delivering assistance, killing three soldiers.
Shoshani would not say whether the upcoming Rafah operation is a response to Sunday's killing. He said the incident would have no effect on the amounts of badly needed aid entering Gaza because other crossing points remain operational.
He wouldn't comment, however, on U.S. warnings not to invade and wasn't clear on whether the evacuation was coordinated with Egypt.
Egypt, a strategic partner of Israel, has said that an Israeli military seizure of the Gaza-Egypt border — which is supposed to be demilitarized — or any move to push Palestinians into Egypt would threaten its four-decade-old peace agreement with Israel.
The Qeshta family is seen in body bags at the morgue of Al Najjar hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, Sunday, May 5, 2024. The family was killed in an Israeli bombardment on a residential building in Rafah. (AP Photo/Ismael Abu Dayyah)
A Palestinian woman mourns her relative, 7-month old baby Hani Qeshta, who was killed in an Israeli bombardment on a residential building with Qeshta's family, at the morgue of Al Najjar hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, Sunday, May 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Ismael Abu Dayyah)
