THE CANADIAN PRESS
TORONTO — The Toronto Blue Jays signed hard-luck right-hander Dustin McGowan to a one-year deal worth US$450,000 Thursday ahead of a midnight deadline for offering players 2011 contracts.
Reliever Jeremy Accardo and outfielder Fred Lewis were non-tendered and are now free agents.
McGowan, a first-round pick in 2000, hasn’t pitched in the majors since leaving a July 8, 2008 start against Baltimore after five innings due to shoulder pain.
Surgery followed soon after and he wasn’t able to pitch until last spring before more problems surfaced. The 28-year-old underwent a second shoulder surgery June 22 and recently began a throwing program, but there is no timetable for his return.
Had the Blue Jays not offered him a contract before the deadline McGowan would have become a free agent too, but general manager Alex Anthopoulos is not ready to give up on the once-rising star.
Burned in the franchise’s memory is the departure of Chris Carpenter after the 2002 season, and his subsequent emergence into a Cy Young Award winner with the St. Louis Cardinals.
McGowan made $500,000 during 2010 in his first year of arbitration eligibility.
The Blue Jays extended offers to eight of their 10 other arbitration-eligible players, with only Accardo and Lewis cut loose.
Accardo made $1.08 million last year while spending most of the campaign with triple-A Las Vegas, and appears to have fallen out of favour with the organization. He collected 30 saves in a breakout 2007 but was injured for most of ’08 and was unable to stick with the big club the past two years.
Accardo may have sealed his fate in an August interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal interview, when he said: "I was lied to a lot last year (2009), where I was told one thing and something else ended up happening. That didn’t sit well with me, but I turned (over) a (new) leaf and we talked and (Anthopoulos) told me everything’s going to change, and really things haven’t changed."
Lewis, who earned $455,000 in 2010 and was headed into his first year of arbitration, became redundant when the Blue Jays acquired speedy outfielder Rajai Davis from Oakland last month.
He batted .262 with eight homers, 31 doubles, 70 runs scored, 36 RBIs and a team-high 17 stolen bases.
Davis, home-run king Jose Bautista, starters Shaun Marcum, Brandon Morrow, Jesse Litsch, relievers Shawn Camp, Casey Janssen, and shortstop Yunel Escobar are the club’s other arbitration-eligible players.
