Jon Heyman reports that Jayson Werth has decided to retire from baseball. His quote: “I’m done … whatever you want to call it.”
Werth, 39, had been at Triple-A Tacoma in the Mariners organization on a minor league contract but recently suffered a hamstring injury. It was unlikely enough that the Mariners were going to give him a real shot at a lot of big league playing time, but the injury sealed the deal. If anything, the M’s deal was something of a surprise, actually, after Werth received little if any interest from major league clubs last winter.
Ignominious though his career’s end may be — and almost all baseball careers end like this — Werth has nothing to be ashamed of as he hangs up his cleats. He played 15 years in the bigs, posting a .267/.360/.455 career batting line with 229 home runs. He had the good timing of putting up his best season up to that point in his free agency walk year in 2010 and landed a seven-year, $126 million deal with the Nationals as a result. It ended up being the last guaranteed contract he’d sign, but as far as those things go it was pretty sweet.
Werth made an All-Star team and finished in the top-20 in MVP voting three times. Most significantly, he won a World Series ring with the 2008 Philadelphia Phillies. All-in-all not a bad career.
Happy trails, Jayson.
