Joey Wendle (34), an infield utility man who built Tampa Bay’s heyday with him, got a job again, signing with Atlanta just three days after he was released from his former New York Mets.
“Atlant has made a change to the 26-man major roster ahead of the three-game weekend series,” U.S. online media “Trade Lummers” reported on the 25th (Korea Standard Time). “We are sending infielder Luke Williams (28) down to Triple-A in the minor league to make his place on the 26-man roster by recruiting Wendle, who was released from the New York Mets earlier this week.”
A native of Des Moines, Wendle made his Major League debut as a member of Oakland in 2016. However, he spent more time in the Minor League than in the Big League in the first two years. In the two seasons of 2016 and 2017, he played only 36 games in the Major League.
However, when he was traded to Tampa Bay in 2018, he became a completely different player. Given constant opportunities, Choi appeared in 139 games that year, recording a batting average of 0.300, seven homers and 61 RBIs. His OPS, which combined his on-base plus slugging percentage, was also good at 0.789. Choi was traded to Tampa Bay from Milwaukee in the middle of the same year, and was able to become a key player.
Since then, Wendle has been a regular starter in the Tampa Bay infield, and has displayed consistent performances. He also had the advantage of being able to cover all the infield positions except for the first base. He did not have strong slugging ability, but he had good contact skills. Along with Choi Ji-man, he built Tampa Bay’s heyday from 2019 to 2021, before being traded to Miami, contributing to making it to the postseason every year.
However, as he was traded to the Miami Marlins, his performance began to decline. Notably, he played in 112 games last year, showing poor performance with a batting average of 0.212 with two homers and 20 RBIs. The performance was the lowest since his Major League debut in 2016.
After the end of the season, Wendle became a free agent in the Major League for the first time in his life, but due to his poor performance, he could not expect a good contract. Despite strange trends in the FA market, which is different from previous years, due to the “scarcity” of utility men, he was able to sign a one-year contract worth 2 million dollars with the New York Mets. 안전놀이터
However, due to the limited playing time of 18 games this season, he failed to play his part in the batter’s box. Wendle was released on Monday after a slump in batting average of 0.222 and OPS of 0.493. However, Atlanta reached out to play in the big league again.
I’ve been experiencing ups and downs over the past few years due to my poor grades, but I’m doing well enough to hear “master” at least as much as job hunting.