The Orioles have acquired outfielder Dwight Smith Jr. from the Blue Jays, the Baltimore organization announced. International pool money will go to Toronto in return, with Scott Mitchell of TSN Sports tweeting the Jays will pick up half a million dollars in spending capacity. The O’s designated lefty Josh Osich to open a 40-man roster spot.
With the move, the O’s add an optionable 26-year-old player who has hit well in 104 MLB plate appearances. He owns a solid (albeit modest) .271/.354/.401 batting line in his 810 trips to the plate at the highest level of the minors. A left-handed hitting outfielder who can at least serve as a reserve in center.
It seems the Baltimore org had some competition for Smith, who was recently designated for assignment. The cost is relatively stout for an acquisition of a player out of DFA limbo. $500K in international spending availability is nothing to sneeze at in a world where hard caps tamp down the overall outlay. In this case, the O’s likely did not feel they had terribly productive places to invest their leftover funds, which were accumulated in an ultimately unsuccessful pursuit of top young international free agents Victor Victor Mesa and Sandy Gaston.
As for Osich, he’s the second southpaw removed from the Baltimore 40-man in recent days. The club lost Donnie Hart on waivers; it remains to be seen whether Osich will pass through. Now 30 years of age, Osich is looking to regain his form after a series of rough campaigns. He owns a 5.01 ERA with 7.9 K/9, 4.6 K/9, and a 51.8% groundball rate in 120 1/3 career innings in the majors.
small sample size but orioles may get a steal
I think that is the motto for almost every commenter on this site.
Idk if you meant to include yourself on the insult
I see what you did there.
Jays management is dumb.. I would of kept him and let Dalton go
presumably nobody was offering international bonus money for him.
I would of said “would have”, but keep calling people dumb.
You do realize you also said “would of” instead of “would have”, so that’s double dumb?
Trey doesn’t appreciate the written word enough to get the joke.
It is better to remain silent and have people assume you are ignorant, than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.
All you have to do is become a big league general manager, then you can make your own dumb moves.
I agree, letting go of Dalton Pompey is the right move. Dwight Smith is going to be a decent poiece in the Majors for a while.
Pompey has been much better than DSJ this spring.
Spring stats mean nothing.
Just like minor stats…
I can see Josh heading over to the Pirates. They like that kind of stuff.
Bad relief pitchers, you mean ?
As a long-suffering Bucs fan, I laughed out loud at this one, nice work. Cheap, bad… six of one, half-dozen if the other.
Orioles probably thought they were ridding themselves of Slot Money in exchange for Smith’s father……..
Seriously, tho, good move. He’s better than what they got. Which says more about the later than the former.
Dwight Smith was never given a real shot in the first place. For anyone that hates the move by management not to keep him around, did you like the Granderson signing or the Grichuk trade last offseason? Because those two acquisitions killed any chance he had to start in the majors last year. And, since the Jays didn’t want to begin the teardown it prevented a guy like Smith to get major league playing time last year.
He isn’t a strong defender and that hurts Smith.
Pompey has the support of the pro-Canada upper management that hope to utilize his talent. Pompey has always had an issue between the ears which is why he’s made OF blunders that make Jays fans shake their head. I wish the team had kept Harold Ramirez to compete for the final OF bench spot.
In other news, Anthony Alford’s about to reach a season high in homeruns by the end of Spring Training at this current pace.
The lack of properly timed teardown, end of 2016 in my book and called then, will hurt this club for a while: lost players, delayed winning, poorer draft picks.
How can anyone trust Atkins to bring the Jays to the promised land?
It’s not 100% Atkins making the calls,,,,of course he is the the gym but these days it’s a “committee”, rarely one dude calls the shots,,,,,lack of timed teardown is always easy to judge when the team makes a call to do it and things don’t work out,,,,,but you are the king of “I told you” !!!!!
This is a nice return for someone they were prepared to lose.
Comments getting cleaned up quickly.
I like it
Now can Dwight Smith Jr. sing the National anthem like his dad did back in the day?
I forgot about that, nice memory.
He’s 26 and has developed at a snail’s pace. Truth is, Jays have too many better options and considering none of those options are very appealing I think that speaks volumes to how little they thought of DSJ. Good luck in Baltimore, or wherever else, but Jays did well to add to their intl spending budget. There’s this guy Guerrero who they signed thru that channel who’s expected to be pretty good.
Guerrero? Never heard of him. He have any relatives that played in MLB?
Yeah, his uncle Wilton.
With all the unemployed FA talent, it’s offensive that a bum like Osich has had a job while so many more talented players sit and wait. Osich belongs in an independent league, get him out of professional baseball.
Some of those guys choose to be free agents. How many contracts have to bust before people realize it’s a business. Just cant throw money to every guy who’s a free agent.
I loved watching his dad during his runner up rookie of the year campaign in 1989. And he can sing too! Dwight Smith was the man!
That was a heck of a Cubs team. Jerome Walton with his funky batting stance. Sandberg in his prime. Girardi as a rookie catcher. Dawson hitting bombs. Maddux and Sutcliffe fronting the rotation. Wild Thing Williams closing. Grace breaking the 1st baseman mold with a high average, high OBP, and modest power and a cranky old school manager in Don Zimmer. I really thought they were going to win it all that year. That is when my hatred for Will Clark began. I think he hit some ridiculously high number around .650 in their playoff series with an OPS of 1.800 (not sure if that is correct but I remember it being crazy high like that).
Nice pick up.