Pirates Acquire Mitch Jones; Blue Jays Pick Up Mike Jacobs

Two very minor moves happened in the flurry of Edwin Jackson, Adam Dunn, and Lance Berkman rumors today. The Pirates acquired Triple-A and former Dodger outfielder Mitch Jones from the Braves for cash, and the Blue Jays picked up veteran first baseman Mike Jacobs from the Mets for a player to be named later.

A quick breakdown of those two follows after the jump.

Mike Jacobs, 29, is a career .253/.313/.475 hitter in the majors. A poor defender at first base, his lack of defensive ability or plate discipline has prevented him from being that useful of a player–he has just 1.4 career WAR after 556 MLB games.

He does have good raw power, as the .475 slugging indicates, and popped 32 homers with the Marlins in 2008. Shockingly, poor defense and a .299 OBP made him below replacement level that year anyway.

Jacobs spent most of this season at AAA Buffalo, hitting .260/.313/.478. He could put up some gaudy numbers at the Blue Jays’ AAA affiliate in Las Vegas, which features a homer-happy ballpark, but with his age, defensive woes, and impatience, he’s nothing more than a filler player at this point, best suited as an occasional lefty power source off the bench.

Mitch Jones, 32, is similar offensively to Jacobs, but the 2009 minor league home run leader may have even more power, and he can play all four corner positions, so he has more defensive value than Jacobs does. Jones was 4-for-13 for the Dodgers last year in his only big league experience, but slugged .651 in Triple-A, bashing 35 homers. He was hitting .250/.292/.494 in Triple-A this year, his first season in the Braves organization. Jones has hit 18 homers this year. For just cash, he’s a nice pickup for a Pirates team that needs all the power it can get, and could be useful as a platoon outfielder–he hit .338/.372/.700 off of lefties this year.