{"id":28618,"date":"2020-02-04T19:00:02","date_gmt":"2020-02-05T00:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/?p=28618"},"modified":"2020-02-04T19:00:02","modified_gmt":"2020-02-05T00:00:02","slug":"greg-bird-signs-minor-league-deal-with-the-texas-rangers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2020\/02\/04\/greg-bird-signs-minor-league-deal-with-the-texas-rangers\/","title":{"rendered":"Greg Bird Signs Minor League Deal With the Texas Rangers"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1>Greg Bird Signs Minor League Deal With the Texas Rangers<\/h1>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/b\/birdgr01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Greg Bird<\/strong><\/a> has officially signed a minor league contract with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/texas-rangers\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Texas Rangers<\/a>. Bird was originally drafted in the fifth round by the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/new-york-yankees\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">New York Yankees<\/a> in 2011.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Greg Bird to Rangers. Minors deal. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/GeorgeAKingIII?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@GeorgeAKingIII<\/a> 1st<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/JonHeyman\/status\/1224788283005243397?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">February 4, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Early Days<\/h2>\n<p>Bird first appeared for the Yankees in late August of 2015 as a backup to both <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/t\/teixema01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Mark Teixeira<\/strong><\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/search\/search.fcgi?pid=rodrial01,rodrig026ale,rodrig022ale,rodrig025ale,rodrig021ale,rodrig011ale,rodrig023ale&amp;search=Alex+Rodriguez&amp;utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Alex Rodriguez<\/strong><\/a><strong>.<\/strong> An injury to Teixeira thrust Bird into the starting lineup for the remainder of the season and Bird didn&#8217;t disappoint. in 46 games, Bird hit .261 with 11 home runs and 31 RBIs.<\/p>\n<p>The future looked bright for Bird&#8217;s Yankee career. His most memorable moments came in the 2017 playoffs where Bird had ten hits in 14 games including two doubles, three home runs, and six RBIs.<\/p>\n<h2>Injuries<\/h2>\n<p>Unfortunately for Bird, his career has been fraught with injuries. After a promising brief 2015 campaign, he missed all of 2016 with a right shoulder injury. In 2017 Bird played in only 48 games due to multiple right ankle surgeries. However, he played fairly well in the playoffs. He only appeared in 82 games in the 2018 season. The Yankees acquired <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/v\/voitlu01.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Luke Voit<\/strong><\/a> midway through the season and he stabilized first base for the Yankees.<\/p>\n<p>Bird was expected to compete for at-bats with Voit at first base last season but he lasted only 10 games before being placed on the IL. He never appeared in another game for New York.<\/p>\n<p>With Voit<strong>,<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/f\/fordmi01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Mike Ford<\/strong><\/a> and now potentially <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/a\/andujmi01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Miguel Andujar<\/strong><\/a> emerging as options for the first base job, Bird was seen as expendable. The Yankees designated Bird for assignment on November 20th, 2019.<\/p>\n<h2>The Future<\/h2>\n<p>Bird is a very interesting buy-low option for the Rangers. Bird&#8217;s pop is intriguing and cannot be ignored by power-hungry clubs. He will have a legitimate shot at holding down a spot with the big club. His competition will be left-hander <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/g\/guzmaro01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Ronald Guzman<\/strong><\/a> and utility man <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/s\/santada01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Danny Santana<\/strong><\/a><strong>.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Bird has landed in a very good place to potentially rejuvenate his career. He now has an opportunity to reach the potential the New York Yankees saw in him. Bird will have to prove he can stay healthy and avoid the long injury stints he is prone to having.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Greg Bird Signs Minor League Deal With the Texas Rangers Greg Bird has officially signed a minor league contract with the Texas Rangers. Bird was originally drafted in the fifth round by the New York Yankees in 2011. Greg Bird to Rangers. Minors deal. @GeorgeAKingIII 1st &mdash; Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) February 4, 2020 Early Days [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3322,"featured_media":27572,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18,5],"tags":[892,41,259],"class_list":["post-28618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rangers","category-yankees","tag-greg-bird","tag-new-york-yankees","tag-texas-rangers"],"modified_by":"Jared Cantatore","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3322"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}