According to Steve Adams of mlbtraderumors.com, the Toronto Blue Jays have signed designated hitter Justin Turner of Long Beach, California on Tuesday. The terms of the deal are for one year and $13 million. The Blue Jays are the fifth Major League Baseball team Turner has played for. He was previously with the Baltimore Orioles from 2009 to 2010, the New York Mets from 2010 to 2013, the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2014 to 2022, and the Boston Red Sox in 2023.
This past season with the Red Sox, Turner batted .276 with 23 home runs and 29 runs batted in. During 146 games, 558 at bats, and 626 plate appearances, he scored 86 runs and had 154 hits, 31 doubles, four stolen bases, 51 walks, 254 total bases, and six sacrifice flies, to go along with an on base percentage of .345, and a slugging percentage of .455.
Twice Turner was an All-Star with the Dodgers. The first time came in 2017, when he batted .322 with 21 home runs and 71 runs batted in. The second time came in 2021, when he batted .278 with 27 home runs and 87 runs batted in. During the postseason, Turner was the 2017 National League Championship Series Most Valuable Player with the Dodgers and won a World Series with the Dodgers in 2020.
It now appears that Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins is done when it comes to major signings for the Blue Jays in the offseason. One word comes to mind in assessing his performance. That is incomplete. Atkins was hired to improve the Blue Jays offensively from their dreadful American League Wildcard Series against the Minnesota Twins where they predictably only scored one run in 18 innings. The bottom line is Atkins has not done enough. The first four batters in the Jays lineup (George Springer, Bo Bichette, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and Turner) is steady, but after that there is a gigantic dropoff between five and eight. Danny Jansen and Cavan Biggio can show flashes of brilliance, while Daulton Varsho and Isiah Kiner-Falefa do not provide Toronto with any offensive punch at all. Meanwhile, Kevin Kiermaier should be fifth in the lineup and not ninth.
