Twins Designate Alex Jackson For Assignment

The Twins designated catcher Alex Jackson for assignment Monday, per a club announcement. His spot on the 40-man roster goes to first baseman Aaron Sabato, whose previously reported promotion from Triple-A St. Paul has now been made official by the club.

It’s the third DFA of the season for Jackson. He’s cleared waivers on both prior occasions and accepted outright assignments to the minor leagues. That’s to be expected, as he’s earning a $1.35MM salary with Minnesota this season and would forfeit the remainder of that salary if he rejected an outright assignment in favor of free agency.

The 30-year-old Jackson is a former No. 6 overall draft pick and top prospect who has never settled in as a big league regular but has accrued nearly four years of service in journeyman fashion. He’s played for six big league teams across seven partial seasons at the MLB level, hitting .175/.254/.305 with a massive 39.6% strikeout rate along the way.

Jackson obviously hasn’t provided much with the bat — though he does sport a .256/.312/.444 batting line (112 wRC+) in 173 plate appearances between the Twins and Orioles across the past two seasons. That solid-looking output belies a 35.3% strikeout rate and has been buoyed by a .376 average on balls in play that he’s not going to sustain over a larger sample. He’s a quality defender behind the plate, particularly when it comes to controlling the run game.

Minnesota’s handling/usage of Jackson has been peculiar. The team designated him for assignment ten days after the trade deadline but immediately re-selected him to the majors a few days later when he passed through waivers unclaimed. As longtime Twins scribe Aaron Gleeman points out, the Twins carried Jackson on the roster for 44 games dating back to Aug. 1 but gave him only five plate appearances in that time. He was their third catcher behind Ryan Jeffers and Victor Caratini and a backup option at first base but was generally kept around as an insurance policy while manager Derek Shelton operated with an effective 25-man roster.

In all likelihood, Jackson will once again clear waivers and accept an outright assignment. He has about $50K remaining on his guaranteed salary that he’s not going to forfeit to elect free agency a week before season’s end. If another club is looking for some affordable, glove-first catching depth, they could place a claim on Jackson — but he’d be owed a modest raise on this year’s $1.35MM salary in arbitration this winter, making him a clear non-tender candidate.

If Jackson goes unclaimed on waivers and accepts his assignment to St. Paul, he can become a minor league free agent at season’s end — as is true of all players with three-plus years of major league service who are removed from a 40-man roster and not added back to the roster prior to the offseason.