The Blue Jays traded minor leaguer Gustavo Pierre to the Philadelphia Phillies for outfielder John Mayberry, Jr.
John Mayberry, Jr has played parts of 6 seasons with the Phillies, hitting .242/.304/.429 with 53 home runs in 500 major league games. He has played all three outfield spots and first base. Fangraphs has him at a -6.3 UZR/150 in the outfield.
He is a 30 year old, right handed hitter. he has been on the DL with 'wrist inflammation' since July 20th, but he is currently on a rehab assignment and will join the Jays in Tampa.
Mayberry, of course, is the son of former Blue Jay John Mayberry, who played first base for the Jays from .1978 to 1982. He hit .256/.352/.450 with 92 home runs, 272 RBI in 549 games as a Blue Jay. I think this is the first father/son duel to play for the Jays. He was a favorite of mine, big guy, big smile, he seemed happy to be playing for Toronto, even though we were a pretty lousy team back then. Before the Jays, he had spent 6 very good seasons with the Royals, and making the All-Star team twice and getting MVP votes 4 teams, finishing 2nd in MVP balloting in 1975, when he hit .291/.416/.547 with 34 home runs and 106 RBI.
He does hit left-handed pitching. He is .272/.323/533 against lefties, with 29 home runs in 475 at bats, which likely explains why the Jays were interested in him.
Pierre is a fringe prospect, He hit .263/.2/8/.390 in 107 games at Dunedin this year, playing mostly third base. On defense, he made too many errors, 24 in 104 games at the position this year.
Mayberry would be under team control for 2 more years. He gets his first shot at arbitration after this season.
Welcome to the team John. Your dad was 29 when he joined the Jays, maybe you can have a similar level of success.