The Mets announced a series of roster moves today, placing Eduardo Nunez on the 10-day injured list with a left knee contusion and selecting the contract of veteran second baseman Brian Dozier in his place. In order to open a spot on the roster for Dozier, New York designated right-hander Hunter Strickland for assignment. Lefty Daniel Zamora is up from the team’s alternate training site to take Strickland’s spot on the 30-man roster.
Dozier, 33, inked a minor league deal with the Mets midway through Summer Camp after being let go by the Padres. He’s already in tonight’s lineup and will give the club some thump against lefty starter Martin Perez. Dozier, a former All-Star with the Twins, is a lifetime .270/.354/.500 hitter against southpaws. For a brief stretch from 2014-17, he was among the league’s best second basemen, hitting a combined .254/.338/.476 with 127 home runs in that four-year stretch. That included a monstrous 42-homer effort in 2016, which he followed up with a 34-dinger season in 2017.
A knee injury hobbled Dozier for much of the 2018 season, which surely contributed to a dismal .215/.305/.391 showing. He bounced back a bit with the World Series-winning Nationals in 2019, slashing .238/.340/.430 in 482 plate appearances. However, Dozier’s role shrunk late in the regular season and in the postseason. This winter, with an abundance of supply and considerably less demand on the second base market, Dozier settled for a minor league deal — but he’s quickly worked his way back to the bigs.
As for Strickland, he’ll depart after surrendering four runs (three earned) on six hits in just 2 1/3 frames as a Met. The 31-year-old posted terrific numbers with the Giants from 2014-17 before slipping a bit in 2018 and completely cratering in 2019. Strickland still has a 3.24 ERA in 252 2/3 Major League innings, but his recent track record is concerning, and he’s had some issues off the mound. The righty broke his hand when he punched a door after blowing a save back in 2018, and he’s previously incited a benches-clearing brawl by throwing at Bryce Harper (widely believed to be in response to Harper homering off him twice in the postseason three years prior).
Dozier kills lefties hope he platoons with Cano
Yea, platoon-mate for Cano hopefully. Much better player than Nunez.
Strickland might be taking a flight to Miami to join the Marlins.
Do you mean he might be Sentenced to Miami
Dozier vs. Cano would have been a Battle Royale in 2016. Crazy, the difference four years can make.
Agreed. Dozier is a little more shocking as he was only 29 in 2016 and Cano was 33.
Beginning to wonder if some of these minor looking 10 day injuries from many MLB teams are covid in disguise?
For what it’s worth, Nunez actually did get hurt, He hit the bag awkwardly running out an infield hit on Sunday night.
His knees are gone. Shame, I really like the guy, but he can’t really move much now to either side and doesn’t take much to injure his knee from when got hurt sliding at HP believe it was 3y back.
still cant find a sucker, i mean team for cano to be traded to, even if mets eat half the contract?
Forget about the Mets eating half of Cano’s contract. The only way they get rid of Cano is if they could eat Cano. Literally.
The only hope is a PED suspension for Cano.
I still find this funny-
world series rings with the nationals:
Hunter Strickland – 1
Bryce Harper – 0
Ha!
Even with expanded rosters, Strickland was a waste of a roster spot
I feel happy for Mets fans.
Cano needs to DH. McNeil at second, Davis at third. Go get a left fielder betterthan Cespedes. Don’t worry I won’t suggest they trade for Clint Frazier. Haha
Cespedes is the dh. Do you even know what you’re talking about?
and even there Dom Smith should be getting most of those ABs
Hallelujah! Strickland is awful!
What is with all of the hate? I guess a 1.36 FIP doesn’t get what it used to! Zero home runs allowed, 11.57 ERA, and a 1.36 FIP conspire to point to one enormous anomaly somewhere in the data. A cursory glance thereupon finds a .545 BABIP wreaking havoc all over the record ledger. When placed against Strickland’s career BABIP of .276 one wonders why the juggernaut that is the 2020 Metropolitans don’t simply keep running him out there expecting that number to normalize. For certain there is no such thing as “it’s still early” during a sixty game season but scrapping a seven year vet after a mere 46 pitches is quite capricious. The Mets don’t need middle relief help. They need to hire someone who knows the definition of BABIP.
is this a bit
Adios, Hunter Strychnine. Don’t punch any walls on the way out.
Good for Dozier for finding a team, but I kind of lost all respect for the guy considering he felt the need to trash the Padres. Kind of a slimy move on his part to call his time there a debacle, not to mention its also super ironic for him to say “I’m a big transparency guy” while not being transparent at all about his problem with them was.
Maybe the Padres didn’t want a .239 hitter on their 2020 team. Sour grapes, who likes getting discarded?
Yeah it’s 100% that he is probably just mad that he didn’t make the team, but he could at least act professional about it.
He signed a minor league deal, that doesn’t give him a monopoly on the Padres 2B position. If they want to acquire other players who they think are more worthy of roster spots than him, that’s just part of the business of baseball.