Reed Johnson Is Your New Backup Outfielder

February 1, 2010 at 7:21 pm | Posted in Reed Johnson | 8 Comments

Dylan Hernandez answers my question from yesterday by tweeting that Reed Johnson has passed his physical, making his deal with the Dodgers official. No terms announced, but the Chicago Tribune reported earlier that the deal would be for about $800k, which sounds about right to me.

As I said yesterday when the rumors first came down, I don’t mind Johnson as a gloveman for Manny who can also spot for Ethier against lefties. It just remains to be seen whether what Johnson brings to the table makes up for what could be seen as the questionable decision to add yet another righty bat.

In my search for more information on Johnson, I polled via Twitter two of my favorite bloggers from his previous teams, Toronto and the Cubs.

DrunkJaysFans:

You should roll your eyes at everyone who’s going to love how scrappy he is despite the fact that he can’t hit RH pitching. Then you should point out that people only love him because he’s a white guy who plays like that.

Wrigleyville23:

indifferent. doesn’t hurt too much, doesn’t help at all. he’ll fall down making catches, which fans like.

Glowing endorsements? We’ll see.

8 Comments »

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI

I must admit I am having a hard time understanding the thought process of the front office. Reed seems ok, but wouldn’t paul or repko be as good. Also, am I strange? I would think a good way to develop guys like paul or Dewitt would be to let them be the main backup and play in the pro league rather than AAA. That way they get real at bats, and we see what they can and can’t do. my thought process on this is that if last year Dewitt had been doing castro’s job we would know this year if we wanted to commit to him. Instead, we don’t really know how good he is and went out and signed two guys to play 2b. is my logic off?

Comment by gillbert— February 1, 2010 #

Reply
- For Paul, I can understand that they’d rather have him play every day. He did miss basically the entire season from May on after getting that staph infection and then breaking his ankle. As for Repko, I’m beyond caring about him. Johnson may not have more talent, but he’s at least been able to stay healthy enough to stick in the bigs.
  
  Comment by Mike Scioscia's tragic illness— February 1, 2010 #
  
  Reply
Hey, we couldn’t afford Eric Byrnes, so we went for his clone, Reed Johnson. Should we call him Crash Test Dummy Lite or Highlight Reel?

Comment by grabarkewitz— February 1, 2010 #

Reply
White people do love their scrappiness though.

Regardless of who it comes from, be it Pierre or Johnson.

FREE XAVIER PAUL.

Comment by KempKershaw— February 1, 2010 #

Reply
I don’t like the deal, but now that he’s on the team, I guess I’ll have to root for him.

Comment by Johnny— February 2, 2010 #

Reply
Why did they re-sign Repko if they weren’t going to give him a shot to be the 4th OF? Is it just me, or do front office decisions get stranger each day?

Comment by Wes— February 2, 2010 #

Reply
- I agree. I guess they didn’t want to let him go for nothing, though.
  
  Comment by Mike Scioscia's tragic illness— February 2, 2010 #
  
  Reply
  - Maybe they were too afraid of him becoming the next Jayson Werth. :o
    
    Comment by Trevor— February 2, 2010 #
    
    Reply