Blue Jays sign Tyler Clippard to a minor league deal

The Blue Jays have signed Tyler Clippard to a minor league contract with a spring training invite.

Clippard is a right-handed reliever. He’s 33-years old and has been in the majors for 11 seasons, playing for 7 teams, but spending most of his time with the Nationals. In total he has a 3.11 ERA in 625 MLB games. He has 756 strikeouts in 685.1 innings with 287 walks.

Last year he split time between the Yankees, White Sox and Astros. In total he had a 4.77 ERA in 67 games, with 5 saves. In 60.1 innings, he allowed 47 hits, 31 walks and 72 strikeouts. I like guys who strikeout 27% of the batters they face, but the number that sticks out is the 10 home runs allowed.

FanGraphs shows he averaged 91.2 MPH on his fastball. He also threw a split-finger fastball, a changeup and slider.

Tyler has 3 weeks to impress the Jays management, but it’s as likely that he’ll start the season in Buffalo and try to put up numbers that force the team to call him up.