Longtime Giants outfielder Gregor Blanco has agreed to a minor league contract with an invitation to Major League Spring Training, Blanco’s agent, Wil Polidor, tells Manolo Hernandez of BeisbolPorGotas.com (Twitter link). SB Nation’s Chris Cotillo tweets that Blanco would receive a $1MM base salary upon making the Major League roster. He adds that the deal contains $2.7MM worth of incentives and an April 1 opt-out date.
Just this afternoon, Blanco had been linked to the Tigers, but it instead appears that he’ll remain in the NL West and compete for a backup job with the D-backs. Arizona is slated to deploy David Peralta, A.J. Pollock and Yasmany Tomas in the outfield. Jeremy Hazelbaker and Socrates Brito are among the fellow outfielders against whom Blanco will compete for a reserve job under new manager Torey Lovullo. While each is already on the 40-man roster, the veteran Blanco could certainly give him a run for that roster spot in Spring Training.
Blanco, who turned 32 last month, has spent the past five season in San Francisco. Though he struggled to a .224/.309/.311 batting line last season, he’s been a largely productive reserve outfielder with the Giants. From 2012-15, Blanco slashed .264/.343/.367 with 18 homers and 69 stolen bases across 1780 plate appearances while spending time at all three outfield spots. The bulk of his outfield work in the Majors has come in center field, where he’s graded out as a roughly average defender, but Blanco has more than 2000 innings in left field and another 900+ in right field as well.
Another outfielder?
Good move to add some depth behind Pollock and Peralta. The lack of OF depth was a huge problem last season.
Good! I was nervous the A’s were going to give him a 100 million dollar contract
A’s aren’t super smart but they aren’t stupid enough to do that lol
That was sarcasm Megadope
kind of like the giants at times.
kind of like the giants at times. I love Blanco and he will truly be missed
Solid move by the Arizona Diamondbacks, Gregor Blanco is an excellent player who can play any position in the outfield. In the past years I have seen a lot of games of the San Francisco Giants and it has been great seeing him over there.Definitely, he will be missed in San Francisco.
I truly agree with you.
WAS a solid replacement player — never an excellent player, unless you are hallucinating.
Only so many excellent players around these days. Blanco’s not one of them. Especially now that he is three or more years removed from his best performances, which were solid, never great.
I’ll never forget the catch he made to save Cain’s perfect game. Guy was a good Giant.
Or all the fine defensive plays he made in the 2012 postseason.
Good Giants splay out to save no-hitters. They are the good, blessed by the god of our fathers, and beloved. Crappy, evil Giants make errors, are reviled forever, and spat upon..
Seriously, better for Cain, Giant fans, and all concerned if Gregor had dropped the ball.that day. Cain’s been a mediocrity since then, and has been given 114 chances to regain his “Perfect Game” form. The Giants front office would love a comeback story, because they unwisely invested $100 million in the bust that is Matt Cain.five years ago.
Nobody since Zito has produced less than Cain when given the big contract.
G’nite Matt. Even the Cactus League is proving too much for you.
Hopefully he makes the team. He’s done so much, I’d be great if he stays in the show. If not, then that’s the way it is.
Such wisdom. It is what it is.
it may be wisdom unless it is not
Solid defensive replacement for Drury or Tomas in the late innings
Drury hopefully won’t be making any starts in the OF, if Tory Lovullo’s comments about him concentrating on the IF (specifically 2B) during the offseason are anything to go by.
Hes got a legit shot:
Hazelbaker, Brito, Arcia and Fuentes can all theoretically be sent to AAA while Blanco can’t.
Worked with Rickie last year-
Best of luck to Gregor! He will be missed.
Socrates Burrito. My new favorite player. In all honesty, good signing by the Dbacks.
They should sign Tebow
Music to my ears. Now SF won’t have him as a fallback and must move on from him. He was a serviceable 4th OF during his time with the Giants who got WAY more playing time than he should have.
I think he earned it in 2012 when he had to step in for melky after the PED fiasco, and a lot of it was covering for an injured or defensively poor pagan. Last year you saw him so lillte that you almost forgot he was on the roster at all.
Truly, the almost unknown Blanco was a vastly superior outfielder to whatever the Giants had in left, center or right. Defensively, he was better than all of ’em.. No comparison.
But at the plate, Blanco was a little guy with a big, sweeping swing that mostly.missed. It was unfortunate for Gregor and watchers that he connected once in a while. The next few weeks would be a fanfest, in the worst possible sense. He kept his King-Kong swing until the end of his San Francisco era.
May his majestic swings-and-misses cool the AZ fans in their swelter of a city.
Blanco will truly missed.
He will be missed about as much as Michael Morse, who has also not helped the Giants for quite a time.
Goodbye Gregor, we hardly knew ye. Please warm the bench in Arizona for us.