Former Los Angeles Dodgers quarterback Game Pederson has agreed a one-year, $ 7 million contract with the Chicago Cubs, sources told ESPN.
Pederson, 28, hit .234 / .339 / 479 with 123 homers and 108 doubles in 687 regular-season games for the Dodgers from 2015 to 2019, was elected to an All-Star team and recorded an OPS of 864 against rights.
While the teams showed significant interest in Pederson as a committee specialist, the Puppies plan to use him as an everyday player. Pederson’s desire to have consistent bat turns, as well as the dimensions of Wrigley Field conducive to his swing, elevated Chicago above other teams. In 2019, when Pederson recorded his most plate appearances, he recorded the best homers of his career with 36 and OPS of 876.
Pederson, originally selected in the eleventh round of the draft from a Northern California high school in 2010, was used in committee in the left field by the Dodgers and provided exceptional power from the first batting spot. He stopped being placed in that spot when Mookie Betts joined the team and had trouble in the 2020 season shortened by the pandemic, beating only 190/285/397 to 138 appearances on the plate.
But Pederson continued to be a force in the postseason, with 382/432/559 numbers in four rounds in 2020 and playing a major role in the first Dodgers World Series championship since 1988. At the end of the season, Pederson’s Dodgers teammates had invented a new month in his honor: “October.”
The Athletic portal was the first to announce the deal.
Alden Gonzalez and Jeff from ESPN contributed to this report.