The Blue Jays announced that they’ve re-signed catcher Josh Thole to a one-year contract that will guarantee him $800K in 2015. Thole, a client of Excel Sports Management, had been non-tendered earlier this week and will make less than his previously projected arbitration arbitration price of $1.8MM.
Thole, 29, has batted just .212/.283/.258 across parts of three seasons with the Blue Jays but is highly experienced when it comes to catching R.A. Dickey’s knuckleball. He’s a career .249/.319/.314 hitter between parts of seven seasons at the Major League level and will give the Blue Jays an option as a backup to Russell Martin, though the club may continue to search for further catching help.
I think it should probably read that he gives the Blue Jays a backup option, not the Mets.
If he’s the backup catcher next year that’s a pretty big step down from Navarro.
On defence it’s not, offence, yes but they don’t need offence out of their back up catcher.
Who’s out there as a viable backup option that wouldn’t be a downgrade from Navarro?
And besides Navarro signed for 4 million.
Who cares? It’s a backup catcher lol, he will play once every 5 days or day games after night games
I cannot believe he was actually able to secure an MLB contract. I thought for sure he was going to wind up signing a minor league deal with an invite.
The MLB minimum is $507,000, so, he’s not far from that.
True, not so much the money was my point, but the guaranteed roster spot. They would have to DFA him now to remove him from the roster and he would still be owed money. Why waste all of that on Thole? I get that a “good” or solid backup catcher is rare in this game, but still. There are better options than Thole, and perhaps some that could be had on a minor league deal. My only thought is that maybe they plan on him being Dickey’s personal caddy. How was Martin catching Dickey last season?
Should say “guarantee him $800K in 2016” rather than 2015.
He’s a guy who won’t rock the boat in the clubhouse and most importantly, he should keep Martin’s offensive numbers up by allowing him to avoid catching the knuckler.
I like this deal, Thole is a decent defensive guy, who even though his offense isn’t ideal he’s a good option, I think at least, for the blue Jays especially cutting his arb price more than in half
After the team’s brief season in the sun all we see so far is the start of the slide back to mediocrity.
This is a great signing by the jays. Sure Thole doesn’t have great offensive numbers but he’s a good club house guy, he can catch a knuckle ball which also means the wear and tear on Martin should go down, his defence is decent and he signed on for only 800k. He does everything a back up is asked to do. I also believe that if he’s given some actual playing time his offensive numbers will go up.