Blue Jays sign Joe Smith

[Laika]

 

Ken Rosenthal ✔ @Ken_Rosenthal

Source: #BlueJays in agreement with free-agent reliever Joe Smith on one-year, major-league contract.

12:16 AM - 5 Feb 2017

[Spanky99]

Woohoo!

 

[L54]

Cool! BTS will be happy

[BTS]

f*** yes.

[BTS]

Osuna

Grilli

Biagini

Smith

Howell (L)

Loup (L)

Sparkman/Bolsinger/Floyd

 

That's a deep bullpen.

[THANOS]

s*** K/9 but he seems to be a groundball machine. Am I missing something here with him?

[Bobthe4th]

Osuna

Grilli

Biagini

Smith

Howell (L)

Loup (L)

Sparkman/Bolsinger/Floyd

 

That's a deep bullpen.

 

That's so much better than a month ago.

 

Patience pays off!

[Laika]

From 2011-2015, Smith was tied for 27th in reliever fWAR with 4.0.

 

An extreme groundball pitcher (56.2%), his career FIP is 0.72 runs higher than his career ERA.

If you slot his RA9-WAR (8.3) into that leaderboard, he would have ranked 6th. If you look at the RA9-WAR leaderboard itself, he was 11th from 2011 to 2015.

 

Smith's career ERA is a cool 2.93. That's 65th out of 454 "qualified" relievers on Fangraphs since 2007, when he came into the league.

 

As a low velocity sinker/slider pitcher, Smith is not your typical setup reliever.

 

He was awful by FIP (4.99) in 2016 but decent by ERA (3.46).

His 88-90mph sinker didn't lose any velocity from 2014 and 2015, so there aren't any glaring signs of decline. His K and BB% were very close to his career rates. His GB% was a bit lower than normal, but still well above average.

His HR/FB rate was extreme compared to his career rate - probably just bad luck.

 

This signing is very good.

 

On this turf, with a strong defense, Smith is a great fit for Toronto.

[Jonn]

Osuna

Grilli

Biagini

Smith

Howell (L)

Loup (L)

Sparkman/Bolsinger/Floyd

 

That's a deep bullpen.

 

Looks like it will be pretty decent pen heading into the season if used correctly. Would still be nice to add a legit setup man with great strikeout numbers mid season however. We really don't know if we can ride Grilli the way we did last year at 40. He was gassing out at the end of the year.

[BTS]

From 2011-2015, Smith was tied for 27th in reliever fWAR with 4.0.

 

An extreme groundball pitcher (56.2%), his career FIP is 0.72 runs higher than his career ERA.

If you slot his RA9-WAR (8.3) into that leaderboard, he would have ranked 6th. If you look at the RA9-WAR leaderboard itself, he was 11th from 2011 to 2015.

 

Smith's career ERA is a cool 2.93. That's 65th out of 454 "qualified" relievers on Fangraphs since 2007, when he came into the league.

 

As a low velocity sinker/slider pitcher, Smith is not your typical setup reliever.

 

He was awful by FIP (4.99) in 2016 but decent by ERA (3.46).

His 88-90mph sinker didn't lose any velocity from 2014 and 2015, so there aren't any glaring signs of decline. His K and BB% were very close to his career rates. His GB% was a bit lower than normal, but still well above average.

His HR/FB rate was extreme compared to his career rate - probably just bad luck.

 

This signing is very good.

 

On this turf, with a strong defense, Smith is a great fit for Toronto.

 

There's a decent chance that Smith becomes the second-best arm in the pen this year. He should see lots of high-leverage innings. I really like this signing.

[Laika]

Looks like it will be pretty decent pen heading into the season if used correctly. Would still be nice to add a legit setup man with great strikeout numbers mid season however. We really don't know if we can ride Grilli the way we did last year at 40. He was gassing out at the end of the year.

 

Smith lets them really back off Grilli.

 

I think I like Smith more than Grilli.

[THANOS]

There's a decent chance that Smith becomes the second-best arm in the pen this year. He should see lots of high-leverage innings. I really like this signing.

 

I can't see him being the 2nd best from FIP but maybe ERA if luck goes his way.

[fatcowxlive]

The bullpen looks really damn solid now! The holes are being plugged up like Shapiro said, can't wait to see what the next month has in store I don't think we're done here

[Laika]

The offseason has been quietly superb for Toronto.

 

From Bautista and Pearce at great value, to these fantastic late bullpen signings of Howell and Smith, to the responsible investment and upside play with Gurriel, all the way to the attractive minor league deals (Salty, Oberholtzer, House, Harrell, Floyd.)

 

You can gripe about one year too many for Morales all you want, but the front office has earned that value back ten-fold over the entirety of the offseason.

[burlingtonbandit]

I wouldn't call the pen great by any means but for how little $ they spent building it, looks pretty decent.

 

I wonder if Biagini is the 6th starter and they send him to Buffalo to keep Sparkman and Bolsinger on the team.

[Laika]

It's not about assuming anything. Obviously we don't know what will happen. It's about objective talent analysis, reasonable expectations, and a basic consideration of regression to the proper means.

 

If Howell or Smith are terrible then that will be terrible luck.

If they are good then it will have been reasonably foreseeable.

 

No assumptions necessary.

[Farm]

It's not about assuming anything. Obviously we don't know what will happen. It's about objective talent analysis, reasonable expectations, and a basic consideration of regression to the proper means.

 

If Howell or Smith are terrible then that will be terrible luck.

If they are good then it will have been reasonably foreseeable.

 

No assumptions necessary.

 

Or there are still things we don't know yet.

[Laika]

Or there are still things we don't know yet.

 

This sentence is literally true about literally everything in the world.

[RealAccountant]

ok.

[SAAviour]

The offseason has been quietly superb for Toronto.

 

From Bautista and Pearce at great value, to these fantastic late bullpen signings of Howell and Smith, to the responsible investment and upside play with Gurriel, all the way to the attractive minor league deals (Salty, Oberholtzer, House, Harrell, Floyd.)

 

You can gripe about one year too many for Morales all you want, but the front office has earned that value back ten-fold over the entirety of the offseason.

 

No loss of any prospects makes me appreciate the off season more and more by the day. The front office is doing a great job patching together a team to keep the window open while letting the minors build up.

[GodDonaldson]

Man, this is a great signing again!!

 

If he can be consistent, we can compare him to Darren O'Day.

[RealAccountant]

That rumour about Rogers forcing Shapiro to sign Bautista was probably untrue.

[Chappy]

No loss of any prospects makes me appreciate the off season more and more by the day. The front office is doing a great job patching together a team to keep the window open while letting the minors build up.

 

Bingo. The front office is doing a phenomenal job of transitioning this team without committing any crippling long term deals. The future looks bright.

[Farm]

This sentence is literally true about literally everything in the world.

 

I actually agree with you completely. Let's just say that we fast forward one year and it turns out Howell and Smith both sucked and we have no new information beyond that.

 

Should we chalk it up as bad luck and sign two players identical to February 5, 2017 Howell and Smith or do something else?

 

I'm not sure what I would do in that case.

[Grant77]

Decent signing in Smith, he probably bumps our pen up to average. If we had afforded ourselves the same patience in the DH market, it could have been a very good offseason.

 

I would have preferred Salas or Blanton at the prices we have seen, but who knows if they would have signed here. The contrast in styles between Smith and Grilli gives Gibby some nice matchup options. I recall him successfully using a similar guy (Shawn Camp) in DP situations in the late innings.

[Spanky99]

This sentence is literally true about literally everything in the world.

 

lol

[Governator]

Man, this is a great signing again!!

 

If he can be consistent, we can compare him to Darren O'Day.

 

Stop comparing our players to the O's.

[FrozenRopes]

A terrific signing that will go under the radar until he is killing guys in T.O trying to tie the game up with one swing.

[Jimcanuck]

No loss of any prospects makes me appreciate the off season more and more by the day. The front office is doing a great job patching together a team to keep the window open while letting the minors build up.

 

Exactly this. And also, these value signings have trade value if it comes to that.

[G-Snarls]

Yeah

 

A trade for a legit full time LF (making Upton an excellent 4th OF) and then I'd call it a superb off season 100%