A’s avoid salary arbitration with deals for Pinder, Smith, Kemp

The A’s announced oneyear deals with utilityman Chad Pinder and reliever Burch Smith on Tuesday and agreed to a oneyear deal with infielder Tony Kemp, The Chronicle confirmed, avoiding salary arbitration with three eligible players.

Pinder signed for $ 2.275 million, a strong deal for a player who was not a lineup regular for Oakland in 2020. Kemp’s deal is for $ 1.05 million.

Smith, 30, signed for $ 705,000, according to USA Today’s Bob Nightengale.

Pinder, 28, played in 24 regularseason games, batting .232 with two home runs and missing time late in the season with a hamstring injury. He hit .318 with two homers in seven postseason games.

In each of the previous three seasons, Pinder hit at least 13 home runs while playing seven defensive positions. Mostly an outfielder in 2019, Pinder played primarily infield in 2020 and has played both shortstop and second base for the A’s — who are unsettled at both positions with Marcus Semien and Tommy La Stella hitting free agency.

Kemp, in his first season with Oakland, started 31 games at second base before La Stella arrived in a trade and took over the everyday role. In 49 games, Kemp batted .247 with 15 runs scored and more walks ( 15) than strikeouts ( 14), hitting mostly in the No. 8 or 9 spot.

Smith, traded from the Giants to the A’s in February, started his season with 101⁄

3 scoreless innings before allowing three runs in his sixth and final outing and leaving

with a forearm strain.

The A’s said at the time that Smith’s injury did not involve his elbow ligament, on which he’d had Tommy John surgery in 2015. The righthander was a pleasant surprise in a short 2020 sample size for Oakland, given his 6.57 ERA in 65 majorleague appearances entering the season.

The A’s announced the deals Tuesday, one day before the deadline for teams to tender contract offers to their unsigned players or allow them to become free agents. Following a pandemicshortened season in which revenues

plummeted, teams are widely expected to nontender more players than normal, which would add to an already large freeagent market.

Seven other A’s players are arbitrationeligible: Chris Bassitt, Mark Canha, Matt Chapman, Sean Manaea, Frankie Montas, Matt Olson and Lou Trivino.

Harry How / Getty Images The A’s Chad Pinder homers against the Astros in Game 3 of the AL Division Series.

D. Ross Cameron / Special to The Chronicle Oakland pitcher Burch Smith started his season with 101⁄ 3 scoreless innings before allowing three runs in his last outing.