11:54am: Smith is indeed set to join the Red Sox’ big league roster, per the Globe’s Julian McWilliams. The Sox will need to make a corresponding 40-man roster move to make his signing official.
11:32am: The Rays granted first baseman Dominic Smith his release after he triggered an opt-out in his minor league deal, reports Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times. A big league opportunity with another club arose for Smith, per Topkin. Pete Abraham of the Boston Globe further reports that the Red Sox “look like the next destination” for Smith after he opted out of that deal with Tampa Bay. He’ll be the second addition to the big league roster for the Sox, who acquired infielder Zack Short from the Mets in exchange for cash less than one hour ago.
Boston recently lost first baseman Triston Casas to a rib fracture that’s expected to sideline him for a considerable period of time. The Sox acquired veteran Garrett Cooper in the aftermath of that injury, but he took a 95 mph fastball off his wrist/forearm last night and exited the game. MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo tweets that Cooper is thankfully only bruised and does not have any fractures following that incident. Smith will give Boston some additional depth and a potential platoon partner for the righty-swinging Cooper.
Through 29 games and 81 plate appearances with the Rays’ Triple-A affiliate in Durham, Smith had posted a .263/.337/.375 batting line with a pair of homers and three doubles. He’s fanned in an uncharacteristic 29.2% of his plate appearances, but strikeouts typically haven’t been a glaring concern for the veteran, who’s fanned in 21.7% of his nearly 2000 MLB plate appearances.
Smith, 28, was a first-round pick, longtime top prospect and (more briefly) a quality run producer for the Mets prior to being non-tendered in the 2022-23 offseason. From 2019-20, Smith treated the Mets to a stellar .299/.366/.571 batting line in 396 trips to the plate. He swatted 21 homers and connected on 31 doubles in that time before stumbling to a .643 OPS over his next two seasons and being cut loose. He signed with the Nationals in the 2022-23 offseason but posted a middling .254/.326/.366 batting line with a dozen homers in his lone year in the nation’s capitol.
Unfortunate what happened to Cooper last night.
Reported just a bruise should be fine. Smith will probably platoon with Cooper until Casas back.
Wow
It’s a revolving door in Boston
Very astute.
Bye bye Bobby Dalbec, back to AAA for you!
Dorothy, that is where that stuff should languish for the remainder of his career. He certainly is not a Major Leaguer.
Might be, but they’ve been proactive through this whole thing, so I commend them for that
Injury Bug pandemic might need to shorten this season to 60 games again
Baseball gods not favoring BoSox 1B this season. Wow!
Dont do it, you’ll be injuried by the end of your first game!!!
I think this is the final nail in the coffin for Dalbec.
Dalbec and Hamilton probably sent down for Smith and Short. But who goes for Grissom? Valdez?
“Final nail in the coffin for Dalbec”…Dalbec is probably the worst player I’ve ever seen get over 1000 plate appearances in MLB. That being said, the guy’s got more lives than a warlock, vampire or witch and just may resurface again. I’m thinking he must be an incredible teammate and great guy to be around to last this long. That and the Redsox talent level has clearly fallen off the last 5+ years.
Or maybe its the career .883 OPS he put up in the minors, and the team was hoping he would figure it out at the big league level.
He will never go away. Seem to remember when was drafted was a 2 way player and reached mid 90’s with his heater.
u watch.. When the organization has finally seen enough of his 0-fers, they will “see what he can do” still from the mound.
It’s nothing personal, never is. This guy must have some kind of super positive outlook on everything for the team to continually give him chance after chance, after chance and so on.
Could be an IL stint for Yoshida?
I like the signing, and the fit is good. Unfortunately, he’ll be passing by a schoolyard game and a stray throw will take him out for two weeks.
Dom Smith. You could do worse. But you could do so much better. There is no permanent home for a good-defense 1B whose power is mediocre and who has no knack for driving in runs with his mediocre batting average. He has after-thought offense; it almost always proves meaningless. He seems like a nice guy, but his ultimate value as a 1B doesn’t wear well. But a desperate team will put up with it. For a while.
If you think the Red Sox are planning on being this dudes “permanent home” you’re not paying attention.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, here’s your starting Redsox first baseman, Ted Stevens from seat #32, row A”.
The cool thing is..they have been fun to watch latley..and they are winning..this keeps up cora will get votes for manager of the year
More like Breslow for executive of the year.
Although voting bodies can and will do *anything* many of the pitching-side players who are performing have been available in years past, but, were not used as well, coached as well, or performing the way they currently do. It wasn’t cora’s staff selections that have helped most. Breslow made a number of low-key moves that seem to be paying off.
Breslow, and his bringing in Bailey and Boddy, have much more to do with red sox improved results from young players than anything Cora has changed.
Depth could be better, and will get there.
Im def on board with what you say about the pitching dept..and the new people breslow was allowed to add..but make no mistake the team that scores the most runs wins..every time.. and whether people like it or not cora is running the show we see on the field..he deserves any credit thrown his way as well as the others , its a team effort..and that is why i think they are fun to watch
whether people like it or not cora is running the show
====================
100% correct. The manager gets blamed for things beyond his control, and will get credit for the same. Further, and knowing full well it makes no sense, they will be judged against how they performed in the prior year.
Francona was pretty much always the same manager, but he didn’t win MOTY award until he left Boston, and then he won it three times.
I mean, he was never better than 4th with the RS, and didn’t even get votes 3 of those years. Did the writers think he suddenly became a genius after he left Boston?
Joe – one good recent sports personality that may explain the Francona situation comes in football…
Brock Purdy.
Everyone says he’s a game manager. His numbers aren’t good because he’s good, the team doesn’t win from his talent. Instead, it’s the cast around him making him look good.
Franconia had a lot of hyped execs around him from Theo etc, to high end talented players to plug in the rosters, etc. I.e. the idea that in his time in boston the results made the manager look good because of the talent, and, any average or better manager would extract that level of results.
I’m not saying there weren’t good players in Cleveland. Don’t get me wrong. And its not excess red sox pride or anything thinking the Bos rosters were so much better than the Cle ones.
Like the drummer in Spinal Tap.
Like a John ‘Stumpy’ Pepys or a Joe “Mama” Besser. Good call.
Too funny that Cooper and Smith are platooning in Boston after they were both fighting for roster spots with the Cubs in Spring Training.
Dom is overrated.
Not by Mets and Nats fans.
He opted out of a AAA deal.
Who is overrating him?
They might be better off with Mike Ford.
The Red Sox have become the Ellis Island of MLB
FULL THROTTLE
took longer than I thought for the first chuckle head to make this comment
Let’s go Dom! Take this opportunity and run with it
Well, I have to say one thing. Complain all you want, but Sox have been proactive in securing a first basemen since the injuries have happened.