General Blue Jays Discussion Thread (2022)

[Laika]

"filling out the bullpen should not be difficult"

 

Remember that Toronto has been at a severe free agent disadvantage since the onset of COVID and this continued over last offseason because of the rule differences between the countries, certain players not being vaccinated, or perhaps having unvaccinated family members, etc.

 

They don't have the benefit of a level playing field unfortunately.

 

I would imagine this type of disadvantage hurts even more when trying to sign smaller contracts like with relievers and bench/depth players...

[BigCecil]

I'm starting to think we should be selling - not buying. When Biggio is hitting better than Bo, Teo, Chapman and Espinal - you know we're in trouble. Unless magic Pete Walker can fix Berrios and/or Kikuchi REALLY soon - this team has too many holes.

 

Maybe...just maybe 'fixing' pitchers is essentially a crapshoot and Pete Walker isn't god - he just got lucky a few times in a row.

 

FWIW I think Walker is a good pitching coach but its been way overblown. For every Ray or Manoah over his tenure there have been a lot of toads. You

can't give credit for those guys without criticism for the other body of work. I just think it gets over blown either way with tons of bias. Same for hitting coaches. This phenomena seems worse for Walker though, where CW is he has some kind of magic pixie dust to "fix" pitchers since Ray. Read the posts in reaction to the Kikuchi signing. A lot of people thought he was Ray/Walker V 2.0. Worse on social media.

 

Mr. Walker, please "fix" Kooch, Pearson, Berrios and Merryweather and ensure Gausman has no more dud outings. Borucki is gone. We wont fix him anymore than we did. The list is getting longer.

[BigCecil]

Schwarber would be a nice fit in the Jays lineup as a DH/1B/LF bat. If the Phillies want to get rid of his contract, probably can get him at a fair price.

 

He would be the big LHH threat in the middle of our order I think we need badly.

 

I can't see them dumping him but with Harper out and their season going up in flames, maybe we can work out something reasonable for him. He sucks on D but we can work with DH to get him PAs.

[Brownie19]

Lol fangraphs thinks we have a 93.5% chance of making the playoffs

 

We'll see what that projection system says after the next 8 games. We're now 4-8 in our last 12 games and I'm fully prepared to go 2-6 v. BOS/TB. The good news is that in the new system, you basically just have to finish above .500 and you have a great shot at making the playoffs (my how the bar has dropped). I'd rather see sustainable winning and I'm worried we'll have to gut the system again to fill all the holes we have to 'win' this year. It will be interesting to see what they do, but if I were betting, I suspect they'll hedge their bets a bit. I doubt we'll see them be super aggressive, adding the top arms and bats. I suspect we'll move some middling prospects.

 

And yes I'm just very pessimistic right now. I just finished up my 8th youth tournament in the past 9 weekends so I'm exhausted. I finally put my feet up yesterday and got to watch Berrios pitch like Josh Towers again.

[jaysblue]

"filling out the bullpen should not be difficult"

 

Remember that Toronto has been at a severe free agent disadvantage since the onset of COVID and this continued over last offseason because of the rule differences between the countries, certain players not being vaccinated, or perhaps having unvaccinated family members, etc.

 

They don't have the benefit of a level playing field unfortunately.

 

I would imagine this type of disadvantage hurts even more when trying to sign smaller contracts like with relievers and bench/depth players...

 

That's a shame!

 

I remember when everyone at first on here were jumping for joy that some players or pitchers weren't able to play in Toronto when the Yankees and Boston came to town and thought what a huge advantage for the Blue Jays. Quite the opposite haha.

 

I'm still sure they could have improved the bullpen whether through free agency or through trade.

[Laika]

That's a shame!

 

I remember when everyone at first on here were jumping for joy that some players or pitchers weren't able to play in Toronto when the Yankees and Boston came to town and thought what a huge advantage for the Blue Jays. Quite the opposite haha.

I'm still sure they could have improved the bullpen whether through free agency or through trade.

 

Yeah Shapiro and Atkins laughed at this publicly, and said people had no idea how big of a disadvantage Toronto was subject to as far as roster construction goes

[Brownie19]

That's a shame!

 

I remember when everyone at first on here were jumping for joy that some players or pitchers weren't able to play in Toronto when the Yankees and Boston came to town and thought what a huge advantage for the Blue Jays. Quite the opposite haha.

 

I'm still sure they could have improved the bullpen whether through free agency or through trade.

 

I mean - of course they could have. But there are things such as budgets and a desire to win more than 1 year. Pretty easy to simplify this and say "they should have signed or traded for better pitchers"

[jaysblue]

I mean - of course they could have. But there are things such as budgets and a desire to win more than 1 year. Pretty easy to simplify this and say "they should have signed or traded for better pitchers"

 

Trading for a solid bullpen arm or two or signing them via free agency wouldn't have hindered their future for the next 3 to 4 years in terms of depleting the farm system or taking up a huge portion of their spending budget. Where did I suggest they go out and trade/sign superstar and expensive talent?

 

Solidifying the bullpen won't break the bank or deplete the farm system.

[Laika]

Yimi Garcia was probably a desperation signing. I bet no other team was offering him two years but Toronto felt backed into a corner, after being spurned by dozens of free agent RPs.

[Brownie19]

Trading for a solid bullpen arm or two or signing them via free agency wouldn't have hindered their future for the next 3 to 4 years in terms of depleting the farm system or taking up a huge portion of their spending budget. Where did I suggest they go out and trade/sign superstar and expensive talent?

 

Solidifying the bullpen won't break the bank or deplete the farm system.

 

Guess it depends who you thought we could add. I don't think adding another David Phelps type is what most think this team needs. A guy like Bednar probably costs Groshans + and signing someone like him would cost $$$ on a multi year deal. I think most expected that Shatkins spent 'close' to the budget already, while leaving themselves some wiggle room to add players during the season.

[Eat My Shatkins]

Didn't Liam Hendricks take a tour of the Jays Dunedin facility back when he was a free agent? I think the Jays tried pretty hard to sign him, and I bet there were others as well.

 

I want to criticize the Jays FO as much as anyone for the s***** bullpen, but it's hard to justify that when you don't know the whole story of which guys they tried to bring in, how much term/money was offered and the player just wasn't willing to come to TO.

 

I mean, does anybody here really believe the Jays didn't try to sign a guy like Collin McHugh this past off season?

 

If you add Hendricks and McHugh to the Jays bullpen right now, it instantaneously gets bumped up several notches.

[BigCecil]

I'm not sure what he did to impact Manoah. The guy was signed sealed and delivered as soon as we picked him. He told Ray to go back to his old delivery, good job.

 

I don't know how this guy cops a DUI and is so irreplaceable that the PC Blue Jays don't even bat an eye. Our pitching development is bad and the guys we sign go backwards usually.

 

I agree on Manoah. I just threw him on the list so a Walker fanboy wouldn't post "ya you forgot about Manoah". Guy threw like 25 minors IP.

 

If you look at Minor and MLB pitching development, Walker or not, body of work, I'm not sure how you can make the case in 7 years this FO has done a good job. I just don't.

[Ray]

Yimi Garcia was probably a desperation signing. I bet no other team was offering him two years but Toronto felt backed into a corner, after being spurned by dozens of free agent RPs.

 

[Solaxys]

Pete Walker is definitely headed towards a Rothschild situation if Berrios is not 'fixed' or at the least returned to his consistency of yesteryears.

Kikuchi is gone in 2.5 yrs but Berrios is here for 6.5 more years and a heavy contract (15M next year increasing to ~25M in the last two years - 2027/2028, which is obscene for a 4th starter/inning eater).

 

Either Berrios is just bad and has gotten lucky with AL Central (which doesn't exactly make sense since he did pitch for us and only had one bad start in 12 games) or Pete is tweaking him to turn him into the promised ace making him worse and worse.

 

I was skeptical when the trade was made for him but he did really well over the starts in Toronto - typically 3 ER in 6-7IP (no Ace stuff, but solid/consistent).

This contract + opening day bid made me think that maybe they unlocked something Ace-esque in him but he isn't even close to being himself (with savant metrics doing a full 180) let alone a #1/#2 starter. Obviously we don't know anything of what happens internally, but someone's going to get fired if Berrios doesn't start earning that contract, irrespective of us making playoffs or not.

[Jays24]

Who thought we'd be 4th in our division while being closer to the Orioles than Yankees in the standings. Aaron Judge is having the season we all thought that Vlad would be having...

 

Still a lot of room to turn the season around but we have a lot of holes to patch up. Let's see what Shatkins can do because there are no more excuses this year.

[Jays24]

Yimi Garcia was probably a desperation signing. I bet no other team was offering him two years but Toronto felt backed into a corner, after being spurned by dozens of free agent RPs.

 

Garcia has been one of the better bullpen arms. There's plenty of other pieces of turd to replace before complaining about him.

[Laika]

Pete Walker is definitely headed towards a Rothschild situation if Berrios is not 'fixed' or at the least returned to his consistency of yesteryears.

Kikuchi is gone in 2.5 yrs but Berrios is here for 6.5 more years and a heavy contract (15M next year increasing to ~25M in the last two years - 2027/2028, which is obscene for a 4th starter/inning eater).

 

Either Berrios is just bad and has gotten lucky with AL Central (which doesn't exactly make sense since he did pitch for us and only had one bad start in 12 games) or Pete is tweaking him to turn him into the promised ace making him worse and worse.

 

I was skeptical when the trade was made for him but he did really well over the starts in Toronto - typically 3 ER in 6-7IP (no Ace stuff, but solid/consistent).

This contract + opening day bid made me think that maybe they unlocked something Ace-esque in him but he isn't even close to being himself (with savant metrics doing a full 180) let alone a #1/#2 starter. Obviously we don't know anything of what happens internally, but someone's going to get fired if Berrios doesn't start earning that contract, irrespective of us making playoffs or not.

 

Maybe he's hurt. Losing his release point because of a chronic mild injury

[Laika]

Garcia has been one of the better bullpen arms. There's plenty of other pieces of turd to replace before complaining about him.

 

Yeah he's been a god send

[Laika]

 

Forgot about this.

 

I am wrong, as usual

[Solaxys]

Maybe he's hurt. Losing his release point because of a chronic mild injury

 

Maybe but how does he go absolutely lights out against Twins with 13 strikeouts and forget how to do half as well two games later.

It seems to be the story this year - 1-2 bad starts followed by 2-3 good starts and then to the top

Just feels like they are constantly trying to tweak him (which leads to the bad starts) and then he sort of finds it. After seeing the consistency in next two-three games, they tweak something again.

 

[bad] TX/NY; [Good] BOS/BOS/HOU; [bad] CLE/NYY, [Good] SEA/STL; [bad] LAA; [Good] MIN/DET/BAL; [bAD] CHW/MIL

 

Its like f***in clockwork. At this point, I fully expect him to put up a sub 3 xFIP against the Rays in the coming start.

 

---

 

The 8 'good' games: 3.54 xFIP; the 6 'bad' games (I am excluding the TX game 'cause that'd make this argument pointless): 6.13 xFIP.

Can make the case that the good games were against bad teams or teams that were struggling offensively (the Sox & Astros at the start of the season & Mariners in general) but he kept STL/MIN in check and BAL was no slouch offensively in our 4-set.

Edited June 27, 2022 by Solaxys

[Laika]

Looking at Berrios' vertical release point on the fastball (grouping four seamer and two seamer together)

 

2019:

lowest: 5.35 feet

highest: 5.6 feet

 

 

2020:

lowest: 5.45 feet

highest: 5.62 feet

 

2021:

lowest 5.41 feet

highest 5.67 feet

 

2022:

lowest: 5.28 feet

highest: 5.53 (first start)

highest since: 5.49 feet

 

Maybe there is something there? His average vertical release point on all of his pitches = lowest of his career.

Nagging arm injuries can make it harder to find that high release point. You see people mention a declining release point as an early sign of injury.

 

Sometimes there is not even PAIN it's just that the shoulder or whatever is weakened.

[Laika]

[Solaxys]

Nagging arm injuries can make it harder to find that high release point. You see people mention a declining release point as an early sign of injury.

 

Well if it is, I hope they've seen it and are talking plans - because, I rather he get miss some starts to get patched up and get back to last year's Berrios for the remainder of his contract then keep pushing himself with this injury and make it worse.

 

It's just such an oddball case. He does well, then badly, then well, then badly.

 

This isn't like Kikuchi who has seemingly straight up lost it 5 starts ago and only went 6 innings twice in all his starts (not even the losses or runs given, its the f***ing IP with this guy - literally have to make it a bullpen game 90% of the time).

[Solaxys]

In other news, the matchups for the Sox series:

 

Seabold v Gausman

Seabold is a rookie, top 14 MLB prospect.

This year in AAA he is putting up some stellar numbers: 11 G (51 IP), 2.09 ERA, 0.987 WHIP, ~4K/BB.

We should be able to take this ... but we don't do well against rookies (Graham Ashcraft from earlier this year, for example), so here's hoping the tides change

Also Kev's FIP is f***in 1.75. Wtf. Even in the game against Os where he gave up 5 ER, 1.84 FIP. Kevin has been a f***ing godsend.

 

Wacha v Stripling

Wacha has been pitching well but his savant page is eh, lots of contact.

Sox have hit Stripling well over his career. Doesn't matter though, I trust Stripling; we take this if the offense shows up.

 

Pivetta v Manoah

Pivetta has been pitching ridiculously well since May; 2.12 ERA, 2.83 FIP, 70 Ks to 16 BBs and 5 HRs.

And Manoah is Manoah.

This can go either way and will be an exciting game, hopefully it doesn't turn into shitshow the Yankees game was.

[Laika]

so a sweep

[gruber92]

No Moreno again tonight but the line up looks solid. Probably best of the year so far.

[Olerud363]

In other news, the matchups for the Sox series:

 

Seabold v Gausman

Seabold is a rookie, top 14 MLB prospect.

This year in AAA he is putting up some stellar numbers: 11 G (51 IP), 2.09 ERA, 0.987 WHIP, ~4K/BB.

We should be able to take this ... but we don't do well against rookies (Graham Ashcraft from earlier this year, for example), so here's hoping the tides change

Also Kev's FIP is f***in 1.75. Wtf. Even in the game against Os where he gave up 5 ER, 1.84 FIP. Kevin has been a f***ing godsend.

 

Wacha v Stripling

Wacha has been pitching well but his savant page is eh, lots of contact.

Sox have hit Stripling well over his career. Doesn't matter though, I trust Stripling; we take this if the offense shows up.

 

Pivetta v Manoah

Pivetta has been pitching ridiculously well since May; 2.12 ERA, 2.83 FIP, 70 Ks to 16 BBs and 5 HRs.

And Manoah is Manoah.

This can go either way and will be an exciting game, hopefully it doesn't turn into shitshow the Yankees game was.

 

Just to clarify Seabold is the Red Sox 14th best prospect not 14th overall in MLB or anything. Doesn't really change tonights game, in fact probably makes it a bit worse. Jays would lose7-2 if it was a top 14 22 year old fire baller debuting... Will lose 7-1 with this crafty 26 year old debuting.

 

Only good news is Seabold may get rocked next start and probably isn't a super star... though you never know.

[JFD]

Just to clarify Seabold is the Red Sox 14th best prospect not 14th overall in MLB or anything. Doesn't really change tonights game, in fact probably makes it a bit worse. Jays would lose7-2 if it was a top 14 22 year old fire baller debuting... Will lose 7-1 with this crafty 26 year old debuting.

 

Only good news is Seabold may get rocked next start and probably isn't a super star... though you never know.

 

Chi Chi Gonzalez will also get annihilated in his next start and forced to retire

 

...or maybe Atkins will sign him after he gets released

Edited June 27, 2022 by JFD

[Solaxys]

...or maybe Atkins will sign him after he gets released

 

Don't threaten me with a good time. A starting pitcher going 4 innings in this economy?!

[JFD]