Better Know Your Blue Jays 40-man: Randal Grichuk

I’ve had a rough couple of days fighting computer troubles. I’m hoping they are behind me. Either that, or I’m going to be taking up drinking as a sport.

Randal Grichuk came over to the Blue Jays in a trade with the Cardinals. The Jays sent Conner Greene and Dominic Leone to St. Louis. We liked the trade here, in our poll we had:

• 13% loved it.
• 57% liked it.
• 22% neutral.
• 6% disliked it.
• 2% hated it.

The numbers kind of surprised me. I figured there would be more who didn’t like it, but I think we were right, it looks like a good trade. Randal is 26 and should be coming into his prime years.

Grichuk has played over 100 games in each of the last three seasons. He hit:

• .276/.329/.548 in 2015
• .240/.289/.480 in 2016
• .238/.285/.473 in 2017.

Grichuk strikes out more than you would like (30.1% of the time in 2017) and doesn’t walk enough (5.9% in 2016). He’s been saying all the right things about improving his batting eye. I like that he acknowledges that it has been a problem, but, like Kevin Pillar last year, I think talking about it and actually doing something about it are two different things. Of course, a little improvement would be a nice thing. For comparison, Kevin walked 5.2% of the time last year.

Defensively, he’ll be a big improvement over Jose Bautista. Career he has a 7.2 UZR/150 in the outfield. And he’s played 162 MLB games in CF. He’d be a much better choice to spell Kevin Pillar when Kevin needs a day off.

PECOTA predicts that he will play 70% of the Jays games in RF, hitting .239/.287/.464 with 23 home runs, good for a 1.9 WAR. I’m hoping for a few more home runs. I’m thinking Rogers will be a better park, for him, compared to Busch.

Let’s do two.