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Former big-league outfielder Fred Lewis has signed a one-year deal worth at least $550k with the Hiroshima Carp of the NPB in Japan, reports Patrick Newman of NPB Tracker (embedded link in Japanese):
Hiroshima reaches agreement with Fred Lewis: approx $400k base + $150k signing bonus, club option for 2nd year. sanspo.com/baseball/news/…
— Patrick Newman (@npbtracker) November 9, 2012
Lewis, 31, appeared in only eighteen games for the New York Mets in 2012, hitting just .150/.320/.150 in twenty-five plate appearances. The lefty hitter spent most of the year at Triple-A Buffalo, where he lit up the competition to the tune of .294/.379/.482 with thirteen home runs in one hundred eight games.
A fourth outfielder with the Giants and Blue Jays from 2008-2010 -- when Lewis saw most of his big-league playing time -- he hit .269/.344/.418 those three years and averaged one hundred twenty-two games a year. Lewis' playing time has dwindled significantly over the last two seasons, enough so to apparently push him to try his luck in Japan.