NOVEMBER 30: The deal is official, Hague himself announced on Twitter.
NOVEMBER 25: The Blue Jays have reached an agreement with the Hanshin Tigers of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball that will send Triple-A International League MVP Matt Hague to Hanshin in exchange for $300K, reports Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet. The deal isn’t yet complete, according to Nicholson-Smith, but Hague has been removed from Toronto’s 40-man roster.
In situations such as this, the money exchanged will typically serve as compensation for the team’s agreement to release the player, who is then free to sign a new, more lucrative contract with the overseas club. It’s not clear what type of contract Hague will receive in Japan, but he’ll certainly earn more than he would have with another up-and-down season with a Major League organization and could very well secure $1MM or more.
Hague, 30, had the best all-around Triple-A season of his career in 2015, batting .338/.416/.468 with 11 home runs in 596 plate appearances. While the home runs were shy of his previous career-highs, he’s never hit for the type of average or gotten on base at that lofty a rate previously. Hague split his time evenly between first base and third base this past season but has a good deal more experience playing first base in his career as a whole.
The Blue Jays claimed Hague off waivers from the Pirates in 2014 based on the strength of his Triple-A numbers, but while he continued his excellent minor league production with Toronto, he received just 15 plate appearances on a Major League club rife with potent corner options (most notably Josh Donaldson and Edwin Encarnacion but also Chris Colabello, Justin Smoak and, earlier in the season, Danny Valencia as well). Hague is a career .226/.286/.262 hitter in a small sample of 91 Major League plate appearances but has a far more robust triple-slash of .302/.377/.433 across parts of five seasons at the Triple-A level.
I recall numerous Pirate fans who were so upset that the Pirates wouldn’t give Hague more of a chance to become their first baseman. Well, the AAA numbers are nice, but he just doesn’t hit for enough power or play defense well enough to justify getting too much of a chance (as I recall, his 1B defense is merely OK, his 3B defense not too good). If he had ever been that much of a prospect, I have to think that the Bucs would have given him a shot over the Ike Davis’s and Gaby Sanchez’s of the world. He’s a “AAAA” talent, and that’s not a bad thing, especially if you can make some dough playing overseas. Good luck to him, and I hope that maybe he eventually proves me wrong.
There were Jays fans doing the same, talking about him replacing Bautista or EE in the lineup with little dropoff in production. It’s tempting for casual fans to say “hey, he hit .338/.416/.468 in AAA, so even if he hits just .308/.386/.438 in the bigs that’s still great!”
In reality there is always a 30 year old guy crushing AAA, and there’s a reason teams don’t bring them up. They’re just really, really good at hitting AAA pitching and often have some deep flaws in their swing. There are plenty of scouts and plenty of good coaches working the AAA levels. If they thought a guy like this could hit they would give him a chance. They’re not just overlooking him.
There were not any Jays fans saying that Matt Hague was going to take over for Bautista or EE, what site did you get this “information” from, I’m curious?
It wasn’t “information” from a news story or anything. Just what a couple fans were talking about on random message boards I frequent and Twitter. I didn’t mean to imply it was a common thought, just that I had tired of hearing his name by seasons end.
Maybe they continued to use him in honor of his clothes lining Nyjer Morgan of the Nationals back in 2010. One of the greatest takedowns in baseball history by someone who stopped a fight by a guy who nailed the instigator.
Well now I have to move to Japan, lovely.