FEB. 24: Boyer would earn $950K in the Majors and has another $250K worth of incentives built into his contract, reports Mike Berardino of the St. Paul Pioneer Press (via Twitter).
FEB. 12: The Brewers announced on Friday that they have signed right-hander Blaine Boyer to a minor league contract with an invitation to Major League Spring Training.
Boyer, 34, spent the 2015 season in the Twins’ bullpen and put up outstanding bottom-line results in spite of a notable lack of strikeouts. The Aegis Sports Management client appeared in 65 games with Minnesota, tallying 68 innings with a sparkling 2.49 ERA. He averaged 2.6 walks per nine innings and recorded a strong 47.6 percent ground-ball rate, but Boyer also averaged just 4.6 strikeouts per nine with the Twins. The lack of missed bats led metrics like FIP, xFIP and SIERA to peg him in the 4.00 to 4.40 range.
Those numbers aside, Boyer was an effective member of the Twins’ bullpen last season, marking his second straight year of quality contributions in a big league ’pen after a long layoff from the game. As Boyer explained to MLBTR’s Zach Links in Spring Training with the Twins last season, he actually retired from baseball following the 2011 season, but his love for the game brought him back to the Majors in 2014. Since resurfacing in the Majors, Boyer has a 2.91 ERA in 105 1/3 innings between the Padres and Twins. Considering the large number of open spots in the bullpen behind Jeremy Jeffress, Will Smith, Corey Knebel and Michael Blazek, Boyer seems to have a solid chance at cracking the big league roster if he enjoys a strong Spring Training.
A guy with a 2.49 ERA can’t even get a major league contract. Those strikeout totals are pretty low, though.
Either way – solid move by the Crew.
Relievers are a notoriously volatile bunch in terms of production and even in this current offseason market. He probably deserves a major league deal simply for throwing 65 innings last year though. I love how Cliff Lee and Yadier Molina were drafted after him too.
This signing has Pat Murphy’s finger prints all over it.
Another piece to possibly trade at the break. A few lean years and then saddle up for a few great ones.
Boyer is almost loogy-like effective vs. LHP. Could mean they are shopping Smith or they’d aren’t sold on Cesar Jimenez as 2nd lefty..
I’m pretty sure Smith will be traded. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him packaged with Lucroy to Texas…
He isn’t a lefty there slick….
It’s gonna be a few lean years but I trust in the burn it down and rebuild philosophy. As long as this guy brings his beard it will give us something to root for.
Twins are really going the addition-by-subtraction route to improve the pen. Boyer wasn’t mind-blowing or anything last year, but held his spot down. Have fun over there, Ginger Blaine.