The Pittsburgh Pirates have signed 27-year-old right-hander Chase De Jong to a minor league deal, writes John Dreker of pittsburghbaseball.com. The 6’4″ De Jong has bounced around the league since the Blue Jays made him a second round pick out of high school in the 2012 draft. He never played in the Majors for Toronto, nor for his second organization, the Los Angeles Dodgers. After reaching Triple-A, the Dodgers traded De Jong to the Mariners, where he eventually made his debut during the 2017 season. He exceeded rookie requirements in 2020 with 0.110 days of service time in the Majors.
Despite just 15 career appearances, the California native has appeared in the Majors in each of the four seasons since his debut – never making more than seven appearances in a year. Overall, De Jong owns a 7.12 ERA/6.00 FIP in 54 1/3 innings, including 10 starts. At 27-years-old, De Jong is young enough to develop into something other than what we’ve seen of him thus far, especially being as he hasn’t seen much opportunity in terms of volume while appearing for the Mariners, Twins, and Astros. De Jong was a ranked prospect by Baseball America every season from 2013 to 2018, when he was the No. 16 ranked prospect in the Mariners’ organization.
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