Greg Bird is getting another shot, returning to the AL East after signing a minor-league deal with the Blue Jays.
Bird, the hyped Yankee prospect who saw his promising career derailed by injury, hasn’t played a major league game since playing in 10 contests with the Yanks back in 2019. He played nearly a full 2021 season with the Rockies’ Triple-A affiliate, where he smacked 27 home runs and posted an .894 OPS across 112 games.
Bird, a fifth-round pick in the 2011 draft, burst onto the scene in 2015 with his smooth lefty power stroke, hitting 11 home runs in 46 games and was expected to be a big contributor for the Bombers in 2016. But he suffered a torn labrum in February and missed the entire season. He returned in spring training of 2017 and put up otherworldly numbers, but after leading the league in spring home runs, fouled a ball off his ankle in the final days of spring training action. He wound up needing surgery to remove a bone in his foot after months of mystery regarding the injury, but returned down the stretch and was a major contributor for the Bombers in the playoffs.
That was enough to restore promise for Bird, until a bone spur in his right ankle limited him to a career-high 82 games in 2018, where he hit .199 with 11 home runs. In 2019, it was a plantar fascia tear that limited him to just 10 games, and that was the end of his Yankee tenure.
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