General 2019 Blue Jays Discussion Thread

[max silver]

of course its better to keep them all so many develop into AAA stars.

 

If you trade them all away then any that develop into stars do so in somebody else's organization, and they get to enjoy having stars at pre-arb pay levels. I'm not saying you don't trade any prospects, but the really high ceiling guys you really gotta hold onto. Noah Syndergaard ring a bell by any chance?

[DigitalRock]

of course its better to keep them all so many develop into AAA stars.

 

Is this Carlos Dangers Alt account? Awful argument.

[keggy]

It's so funny how for such a HUGE trade, pretty much none of the players ended up being all that good.

 

Agreed, and there's a lot of 20/20 hindsight over process being used to evaluate this particular trade. Just to add some unbiased historical perspective here:

 

1) Reyes was considered a borderline superstar at the time. After being traded his value cratered by getting hurt, forgetting how to throw, and beating up his wife, in that order

 

2) Johnson was considered a legit ace when healthy. His arm predictably fell off. He was damaged goods before the trade but so was Alvarez, who was a key young piece going back

 

3) Buerhle was reliable but added entirely to make the deal more financially palatable for Miami

 

4) Bonifacio was fast and exciting and occasionally good. He was horrible for Toronto

 

5) Hechavarria was a glove first Cuban SS prospect. He value was somewhere along the lines of Gurriel before he started hitting

 

6) Yunel Escobar had value but wrote offensive stuff about gays like 3 weeks before being traded

 

7) You guys are talking like Nicolino versus Syndergaard was like comparing Josh Towers to Pedro Martinez.

 

At the time Syndergaard was a generic huge arm with good success in Low A. Many, many people argued that Nicolino was better than Syndergaard, and even more people thought Sanchez was going to be better than them both.

 

Offering Syndergaard at the time would have been somewhere along the lines of offering Simeon Woods Richardson today.

 

I just wanted to present these facts before the historical misinformation got out of control.

[EMK19]

My only positively remembered moment with Bonifacio with our team is him being in the background during the legendary Munenori dance taking place in our dugout. Ironically Mune probably made more positive on field contribution than Bonifacio did during their time here...

[Jimcanuck]

Agreed, and there's a lot of 20/20 hindsight over process being used to evaluate this particular trade. Just to add some unbiased historical perspective here:

 

1) Reyes was considered a borderline superstar at the time. After being traded his value cratered by getting hurt, forgetting how to throw, and beating up his wife, in that order

 

2) Johnson was considered a legit ace when healthy. His arm predictably fell off. He was damaged goods before the trade but so was Alvarez, who was a key young piece going back

 

3) Buerhle was reliable but added entirely to make the deal more financially palatable for Miami

 

4) Bonifacio was fast and exciting and occasionally good. He was horrible for Toronto

 

5) Hechavarria was a glove first Cuban SS prospect. He value was somewhere along the lines of Gurriel before he started hitting

 

6) Yunel Escobar had value but wrote offensive stuff about gays like 3 weeks before being traded

 

7) You guys are talking like Nicolino versus Syndergaard was like comparing Josh Towers to Pedro Martinez.

 

At the time Syndergaard was a generic huge arm with good success in Low A. Many, many people argued that Nicolino was better than Syndergaard, and even more people thought Sanchez was going to be better than them both.

 

Offering Syndergaard at the time would have been somewhere along the lines of offering Simeon Woods Richardson today.

 

I just wanted to present these facts before the historical misinformation got out of control.

 

Horrible trade for the Jays when the financial commitment is taken into account.

[max silver]

Horrible trade for the Jays when the financial commitment is taken into account.

 

Seeing as how both Johnson and Alvarez failed their respective physicals, I wonder how the trade could have been reconfigured without those two involved?

[Laika]

Seeing as how both Johnson and Alvarez failed their respective physicals, I wonder how the trade could have been reconfigured without those two involved?

 

Johnson was arguably the main point of the trade for Toronto. I doubt it would have happened at all without him.

 

God that trade was so obviously horrendous from day 1

[saskjayfan]

Horrible trade for the Jays when the financial commitment is taken into account.

 

Reyes was the prize in the trade. We took on 92 mil for 5 years of Reyes who was 30 in the first year of that commitment and would have been 34 in his last year. The idea that you knew Reyes was going to fall apart the moment the trade was announced is laughable. Buehrle put up almost 8 wins in 3 years. We just spent 80 mil on a pitcher who will be 33 in the first year of this deal. Please state your opinion of the Ryu deal now, because it's going to be really easy to state whether it's a good deal or not 4 years from now. I personally love the Ryu deal. There's risk in taking on any big money player. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't.

[saskjayfan]

Johnson was arguably the main point of the trade for Toronto. I doubt it would have happened at all without him.

 

God that trade was so obviously horrendous from day 1

 

Johnson was the guy they initially targeted, but how can you say johnson who had 1 year of control was the center piece. AA gambled that he would be healthy come spring and that he would return to be an ace. He was definitely a key cog, but Reyes was close to a 6 win player in 4 of his previous 7 years and he was the glittering gold.

[Jimcanuck]

Reyes was the prize in the trade. We took on 92 mil for 5 years of Reyes who was 30 in the first year of that commitment and would have been 34 in his last year. The idea that you knew Reyes was going to fall apart the moment the trade was announced is laughable. Buehrle put up almost 8 wins in 3 years. We just spent 80 mil on a pitcher who will be 33 in the first year of this deal. Please state your opinion of the Ryu deal now, because it's going to be really easy to state whether it's a good deal or not 4 years from now. I personally love the Ryu deal. There's risk in taking on any big money player. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't.

 

Plenty thought it was a bad trade when it was announced. Then the Dickey trade made some heads explode.

 

Ryu deal is fine. Does not detract from the rebuild in any significant way.

[Dick_Pole]

Johnson was arguably the main point of the trade for Toronto. I doubt it would have happened at all without him.

 

God that trade was so obviously horrendous from day 1

 

I recall the Jays were briefly Vegas favourites to win the World Series after the trade was made, so it apparently wasn't a horrendous trade from day one to very many people.

 

The trade is vilified in hindsight. I never really liked the trade, but I liked what it represented. The Jays FO and ownership were finally willing to go all out to build a winner. It didn't work in 2013 but it did work reasonably well in 2015 and 2016. Even if not sustained.

 

Yeah I know, it's always better to build a sustained winner through a young core, but with Ricciardi's s***** drafting that was never, ever going to happen. It was about time to end the 20 year playoff drought.

[saskjayfan]

Plenty thought it was a bad trade when it was announced. Then the Dickey trade made some heads explode.

 

Ryu deal is fine. Does not detract from the rebuild in any significant way.

 

So just so we're clear. You like the Ryu deal. If it doesn't pan out we can look back at this day and call you an idiot.

[EMK19]

Out of our 4 major “off-season push” post world series years, the 2013 attempt probably ranks about 3?

 

1997 Ash: Clemens signing, The Pittsburgh trade for Merced/Garcia/Plesac, Santiago, Person etc... this sh*t the bed the worst except for Clemens signing.

 

2006 JP: AJ, BJ, Overbay, Glaus, Molina... Ok I guess, we did have our best season since the world series year (though still nowhere close to playoffs)... didn’t age well though after that.

 

2013: AA Marlins trade, Dickey trade, Melky; really only salvaged 2 guys for our later 2015 run, (and I guess Reyes turned into Troy) and they still ended up being non-factors in playoffs.

 

2015: AA Donaldson, Travis, Estrada, Saunders Trades, Martin signing; still needed deadline help but worked out the best.

 

We’ll see how 2020 works out.

[Jimcanuck]

So just so we're clear. You like the Ryu deal. If it doesn't pan out we can look back at this day and call you an idiot.

 

lol, deal

[Terminator]

Out of our 4 major “off-season push” post world series years, the 2013 attempt probably ranks about 3?

 

1997 Ash: Clemens signing, The Pittsburgh trade for Merced/Garcia/Plesac, Santiago, Person etc... this sh*t the bed the worst except for Clemens signing.

 

2006 JP: AJ, BJ, Overbay, Glaus, Molina... Ok I guess, we did have our best season since the world series year (though still nowhere close to playoffs)... didn’t age well though after that.

 

2013: AA Marlins trade, Dickey trade, Melky; really only salvaged 2 guys for our later 2015 run, (and I guess Reyes turned into Troy) and they still ended up being non-factors in playoffs.

 

2015: AA Donaldson, Travis, Estrada, Saunders Trades, Martin signing; still needed deadline help but worked out the best.

 

We’ll see how 2020 works out.

 

That 2015 one is pretty nails

[TheHurl]

Whoever wrote that for such a big trade most players were horrible couldn't have been more correct.

 

Seven seasons after the trade we have the following fWAR leaderboard:

 

Reyes 9.6

Disco 8.5

Yunel 8.1

Buehrle 7.9

Marisnick 6.1

Alvarez 5.2

Hech 4.6

Bonificio 0.7

Mathis 0.6

Josh Johnson 0.4

John Buck -0.6

 

Not too much

[Grant77]

Out of our 4 major “off-season push” post world series years, the 2013 attempt probably ranks about 3?

 

1997 Ash: Clemens signing, The Pittsburgh trade for Merced/Garcia/Plesac, Santiago, Person etc... this sh*t the bed the worst except for Clemens signing.

 

2006 JP: AJ, BJ, Overbay, Glaus, Molina... Ok I guess, we did have our best season since the world series year (though still nowhere close to playoffs)... didn’t age well though after that.

 

2013: AA Marlins trade, Dickey trade, Melky; really only salvaged 2 guys for our later 2015 run, (and I guess Reyes turned into Troy) and they still ended up being non-factors in playoffs.

 

2015: AA Donaldson, Travis, Estrada, Saunders Trades, Martin signing; still needed deadline help but worked out the best.

 

We’ll see how 2020 works out.

 

I remember that Plesac/Merced trade and after looking up the details, it wasn't really that bad. Both of them played quite well for us and in trading Plesac a couple of years later, we got the legend that is Tony Batista and his 40+ home runs. We gave up a particularly useful player in Craig Wilson, but the trade overall was pretty even. For some reason, I also remember Merced gunning down a player at first on a 'single' to right. That's always really fun to see.

[Laika]

Johnson was the guy they initially targeted, but how can you say johnson who had 1 year of control was the center piece. AA gambled that he would be healthy come spring and that he would return to be an ace. He was definitely a key cog, but Reyes was close to a 6 win player in 4 of his previous 7 years and he was the glittering gold.

 

Reyes and Buehrle were free agent contracts. Almost by definition they projected to have no surplus value; they were each non-assets in a nutshell. Johnson was the only one who realistically could have brought the Blue Jays some trade profit, if he beasted in 2013 like he had in two or three prior seasons.

 

If Toronto tried to trade Ryu right now and asked for nothing in return they would get no interest. Non-asset. Reyes and Buehrle were the same thing.

 

I recall the Jays were briefly Vegas favourites to win the World Series after the trade was made, so it apparently wasn't a horrendous trade from day one to very many people.

 

The trade is vilified in hindsight. I never really liked the trade, but I liked what it represented. The Jays FO and ownership were finally willing to go all out to build a winner. It didn't work in 2013 but it did work reasonably well in 2015 and 2016. Even if not sustained.

 

Yeah I know, it's always better to build a sustained winner through a young core, but with Ricciardi's s***** drafting that was never, ever going to happen. It was about time to end the 20 year playoff drought.

 

It's definitely not just hindsight. Many people (mostly here, it seemed) panned the trade from the jump, realizing how bad it was on paper and pointing out that AA was likely just setting money and prospects on fire. To me the trade only ever represented that our front office was kind of stupid and way behind the times. Some people like you didn't like the trade but were excited to watch the players / were excited that the team was trying to win.

 

It's actually a small miracle that the team ended up making the playoffs in two subsequent years after such a disaster. Goes to show that you do not need to be anything close to perfect to win in the AL East anymore.

[max silver]

Reyes and Buehrle were free agent contracts. Almost by definition they projected to have no surplus value; they were each non-assets in a nutshell. Johnson was the only one who realistically could have brought the Blue Jays some trade profit, if he beasted in 2013 like he had in two or three prior seasons.

 

If Toronto tried to trade Ryu right now and asked for nothing in return they would get no interest. Non-asset. Reyes and Buehrle were the same thing.

 

 

I would think certain free agent contracts would still have some inherent trade value. Let's say in a purely hypothetical scenario that the Yankees decided they didn't want to pay Geritt Cole $300 million anymore, are you saying that the Yankees would receive no offers because has has no trade value? Before you scoff at the notion, recall the the Yankees traded for Giancarlo Stanton and his $325 million contract (not a free agent contract but he got paid like a free agent). Sure they didn't give up a package with huge value, but they gave up actual assets to trade for him. The Astros traded for Zack Greinke, and included some actual valuable prospects in doing so. They received some cash to help to make the trade more equitable for both sides of course, but this is a great example that illustrates that players with big free agents are still valuable.

[Laika]

I would think certain free agent contracts would still have some inherent trade value. Let's say in a purely hypothetical scenario that the Yankees decided they didn't want to pay Geritt Cole $300 million anymore, are you saying that the Yankees would receive no offers because has has no trade value? Before you scoff at the notion, recall the the Yankees traded for Giancarlo Stanton and his $325 million contract. Sure they didn't give up a package with huge value, but they gave up actual assets to trade for him.

 

Well I couched the statement as "almost by definition" because there are rare exceptions for exceptional players or players who have had skill changes, etc. None of those apply to the Marlins deal.

 

Stanton is an exceptional player but his contract is also unique in that there is, or at least was, an expectation that he will opt out after 2020. It's actually part of the deal that if he does NOT opt out Miami has to pay the Yankees like a $30M penalty.

[Deadpool]

Out of our 4 major “off-season push” post world series years, the 2013 attempt probably ranks about 3?

 

1997 Ash: Clemens signing, The Pittsburgh trade for Merced/Garcia/Plesac, Santiago, Person etc... this sh*t the bed the worst except for Clemens signing.

 

2006 JP: AJ, BJ, Overbay, Glaus, Molina... Ok I guess, we did have our best season since the world series year (though still nowhere close to playoffs)... didn’t age well though after that.

 

2013: AA Marlins trade, Dickey trade, Melky; really only salvaged 2 guys for our later 2015 run, (and I guess Reyes turned into Troy) and they still ended up being non-factors in playoffs.

 

2015: AA Donaldson, Travis, Estrada, Saunders Trades, Martin signing; still needed deadline help but worked out the best.

 

We’ll see how 2020 works out.

 

To be fair, the Jays did have a better record in 2006 than the eventual World Series winners...

[dineke]

Those mid/late 2000s teams were good. I remember one of them had the best offense then the next year they had the best pitching. Just couldn't put it together because of injuries and being in the same division as the Yanks and red sox.

[Laika]

Those mid/late 2000s teams were good. I remember one of them had the best offense then the next year they had the best pitching. Just couldn't put it together because of injuries and being in the same division as the Yanks and red sox.

 

2005 team had 80 wins but deserved 88 wins by run differential. Unluckiest team in the league. 16-31 in one run games - worst in the league!

 

2008 had 86 wins but deserved 93! Again, tied for the unluckiest team in the league.

[dineke]

2005 team had 80 wins but deserved 88 wins by run differential. Unluckiest team in the league. 16-31 in one run games - worst in the league!

 

2008 had 86 wins but deserved 93! Again, tied for the unluckiest team in the league.

 

And in 2015 they should have won 100 games. Just once I want them to have great luck in one run games and make the playoffs like the f***ing Orioles did that one year.

[polar bear]

2005 team had 80 wins but deserved 88 wins by run differential. Unluckiest team in the league. 16-31 in one run games - worst in the league!

 

2008 had 86 wins but deserved 93! Again, tied for the unluckiest team in the league.

 

No such thing as luck guy.Everything is what it is.

[Dick_Pole]

Well, in 1992 and 1993 the Jays both outperformed their run differential by a few games. Not the team's fault that you guys were born too late to witness those great years.

 

Check the all-time franchise stats the Jays' W-L record is 3,383-3,458 despite scoring 31,599 runs and giving up 31,485 so it has been a problem throughout the team's existence. Must be the weather.

[Dick_Pole]

If we want to talk about luck, the team had the best pitcher willing to be very patient and stay here below market value throughout the 2000's.

 

We could also say that had Bautista learned how to hit a month earlier in 2009, that may have been enough to keep Halladay for the 2010 season and compete. Then the team would have had that ace going into 2013 and feel less compelled to make the Marlins or Mets trades.

 

Different forms of luck.

[EMK19]

While ‘93 will probably always be remembered by most as the best Blue Jay team ever, I do recall they actually had to struggle through most of the year until mid September, after which we proceeded to finish the stretch drive strong... we were lucky that the Yankees struggled over exactly the same periods that we did. Pitching had gone down to sh*ts for most of the year (Guzman was solid but Stew was inconsistent + missed some time, Morris declined rapidly and the back end was a mess... imagine if Hentgen hadn’t rose to the occasion), had a lot of injury issues and we had to rely on our offence to carry us through many of the games.

[Krylian]

While ‘93 will probably always be remembered by most as the best Blue Jay team ever, I do recall they actually had to struggle through most of the year until mid September, after which we proceeded to finish the stretch drive strong... we were lucky that the Yankees struggled over exactly the same periods that we did. Pitching had gone down to sh*ts for most of the year (Guzman was solid but Stew was inconsistent + missed some time, Morris declined rapidly and the back end was a mess... imagine if Hentgen hadn’t rose to the occasion), had a lot of injury issues and we had to rely on our offence to carry us through many of the games.

 

'93 was a wonderful offensive team. '92 was a more balanced team. Solid offense. Good rotation. Great pen.

[Bobthe4th]

Is the lack of a Forum Poster Awards thread this year another sign that the board is slowly dying, or will we look back on this year as a low point in participation?