Turns out the New York Mets weren’t done tweaking their roster this spring.
Let me assure you though, it’s not going to break the internet.
The Mets signed veteran right-handed pitcher AJ Griffin to a minor-league deal on Monday, with an invite to spring training.
At 30 years old, Griffin has yet to find any sort of consistent success in the majors where he’s been a starter for a majority of his four seasons because of injuries.
After going 21-11 with a 3.60 ERA over two years with the Oakland Athletics, Griffin was forced to undergo Tommy John surgery and did not make a return to a big-league mound until 2016 as a member of the Texas Rangers. In 38 starts over the last two years, he went 13-10 with a 5.41 ERA.
It will be interesting to see what the Mets decide to do with Griffin should he make a serious push for the major-league roster. New York is laden with prospective starters with Noah Syndergaard, Jacob deGrom, Matt Harvey, Zack Wheeler, Steven Matz, Seth Lugo, Robert Gsellman and even Rafael Montero. So there’s plenty of starting depth should the injury bug strike once more.
That means the Mets could be looking at Griffin for a possible role out of the bullpen.
He’s only made three relief appearances in his career, all coming last season, and it didn’t go well. In 5.1 innings of work, which in his defense is a limited sample size after entering a role never experienced before, he allowed seven runs for a whopping ERA of 11.81.
Or New York could look to use him as more of a hybrid; someone who could make the occasional spot start or be a long man in relief to preserve the bullpen.
Either way for Mets fans trying to make sense of the deal, this could be nothing more than added depth to ensure the pitching staff has enough experienced arms to step in should there be a repeat of 2017.
