Blue Jays: Dexter Fowler Released from Contract

The Dexter Fowler experiment in Buffalo has come to a close as per Sportsnet’s Ben Nicholson-Smith this afternoon.

The Blue Jays had signed Fowler to a Minor League Contract at the end of March in hopes of giving him an opportunity in Toronto.  Fowler started three games for the Buffalo Bisons from Thursday to Saturday this past week and was impressive collecting five hits in 12 at bats (.412), which included a pair of walks, three RBI and one sacrifice fly, while also scoring five runs.  Fowler hit lead-off in each of the three games and helped the Bisons win two of the three games prior to being released.

The release, according to Nicholson-Smith comes at the request of Fowler; and to me likely means he has a different team ready to give him a Major League opportunity.  One of the factors to the request is like that the Blue Jays recently sent Teoscar Hernandez to Dunedin on a rehab assignment, and according to Monday night’s broadcast, the team was hoping to have him back in the upcoming weekend series.

Just over a month after signing a minor league contract with the Toronto Blue Jays, Dexter Fowler has asked for his release

Fowler signed on with the Blue Jays organization with the hopes of resurrecting his career as he had suffered a season-ending surgery last year within the first two weeks of the season.  Fowler has played just 38 major league games since the conclusion of the 2019 MLB Season.

Had Hernandez not been close to returning, Fowler may had an opportunity sooner than later, as Bradley Zimmer has been unimpressive as the fourth outfielder.  Through 15 games, he is just 2-30 (.067) with 13 strikeouts in elevated playing time.  With Hernandez’s return, Zimmer will likely be pushed off the active roster and Raimel Tapia will be pushed back to the fourth outfielder spot.

This was not the first time that the Blue Jays had been rumoured to be looking at Fowler.  Jon Morosi had previously reported as far back as 2014 that the Blue Jays were trying to acquire Fowler for Dalton Pompey, however, the trade never materialized.  Two-years after that, Morosi also reported the Blue Jays had offered Fowler a four-year, 60 Million deal, however, he chose to take a more lucrative deal from the St. Louis Cardinals.

My assumption is that he will sign a Major League deal within the next day or two.  If you were the Blue Jays would you have given him a spot on the active roster to see if he could have helped the club right now, or are you more confident with Zimmer over the next few games?