Mets Rumors: Blue Jays showing interest in reliever Jerry Blevins

Toronto is looking to pick up the lefty who pitched for the Mets the last two seasons

One of the most useful pieces in the Mets bullpen for the past couple of seasons has been lefty Jerry Blevins.

Blevins officially became a free agent this offseason, and the speculation about whether he’d return to the Mets next season has been understandably on fans’ minds.

Blevins, who turned 33 years old in September, is getting some interest from clubs in both leagues, but a new report published Wednesday has put the Blue Jays as a leading contender to win Blevins’s services.

After losing out on Brett Cecil, who ultimately signed with the St. Louis Cardinals for four years and $30.5 million, Toronto has shifted its focus to Blevins.

While he pitched for the Mets for two seasons, Blevins’ 2015 was cut short due to a couple of fractures on his non-throwing arm. This past season was definitely an improvement as he managed to stay relatively injury-free while still posting a pretty good 2.79 ERA.

His splits were strange, though, as he fared better against righties than lefties – the complete opposite of what you’d expect a lefty reliever to accomplish. Righties hit just .182/.266/.345 against Blevins, while lefties were much better, slashing .255/.313/.324 against him.

Career-wise, Blevins is still overall a better matchup against southpaws, but it was still interesting that his 2016 season came out that way.

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Unfortunately for Jerry Blevins fans in Queens, it doesn’t look like the lefty will be back.

At the beginning of November, the Mets brass was pretty sure Blevins would be walking away and signing with another team. That doesn’t seem to have changed in these last few days. Thankfully, the Amazin’s have some solid options for replacing Blevins in the bullpen. Both Josh Smoker and Josh Edgin are on the team’s 40-man roster, and could be very valuable in 2017.