General Blue Jays Discussion Thread (2023)

[Frenchsoup]

I'm good Maxy do u

[Brownie19]

Pretty much my opinion too. Schneider, Biggio, Espinal, Barger, Orelvis, Clement can all do it at 2B to some extent.

 

3B is a tougher defensive position for most of those guys (noodle arms, mostly) and the MUCH bigger hole.

 

Can Polanco play 3rd? I think he's a great little short term fix (2 years of control). Switch hitter who's currently projected to come off the bench for the Twins.

[wamco]

Adames is an elite SS with a missile for an arm, he can definitely play 3B.

 

Your dad has a missile.

[Frenchsoup]

2 years of Bo at 11mill for 1 year of Adames at 13-16 mill

[Carlos Danger]

I posted this a week or two ago late night, deep in the Ohtani thread. It might have been behind a paywall. I figured it is a good time to cut and paste and post again.

 

A SF Giants beat reporter telling fans they don't want Bellinger and Chapman and why. Now, the Rogers center is not Oracle park, where hitters go to die, but still some good cautionary info...

 

By DIETER KURTENBACH | dkurtenbach@bayareanewsgroup.com | Bay Area News Group

PUBLISHED: December 11, 2023 at 1:07 p.m. | UPDATED: December 12, 2023 at 4:03 a.m.

 

Shohei Ohtani was everything the Giants needed.

 

He was a middle-of-the-lineup bat with the kind of pop that could tame the right-field winds of Oracle Park.

 

He was a top-of-the-rotation arm (in 2024, at least) who could pair with Logan Webb to give San Francisco the best 1-2 punch in the National League.

 

He would have brought MVP credentials to a roster seeking respect and legitimacy. And man, would he have brought people out to the corner of Third and King.

 

But Ohtani is going to sign with the Dodgers, pending a physical (we know how those can go), and the Giants are still looking for all of those things.

 

It’s just another offseason letdown for Giants fans. And worse yet, with this free agent of all free agents, the Giants didn’t seem to be serious contenders for his services.

 

I hear the cries for “spread the $700 million around” from the true believers.

 

That’s a good idea in theory, but a terrible idea in reality.

 

This is how you end up with Michael Conforto, Mitch Haniger, and a trade that sends Bryan Reynolds to Pittsburgh for Andrew McCutchen.

 

That’s not budgeting — that’s spending because it’s payday.

 

That’s how you live paycheck to paycheck — or, in the Giants’ case, year to year.

 

Unless the Giants can land the second-best free agent in this year’s class, Japanese starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto (as broken down by my new colleague Danny Emerman) they should skip signing a big-money free agent.

 

Yes, I’m suggesting that the Giants — who have a massive capacity for spending but a moderate big-market payroll — hold onto their money. I’m giving them permission to break even.

 

The fact of the matter is that there is no middle class in baseball.

 

The free agency system has been broken for decades, but neither the league nor the player’s association wants to fix it.

 

And what it leaves us is offseason after offseason of one or two worthy players landing massive, record deals, and bevy of others — typically on the downslope of their careers — landing their one big payday by riding that wake.

 

In short, good money (Ohtani, Aaron Judge, Bryce Harper, Gerrit Cole) is only spent by one team. The rest of the league (or at least the half of the league that spends money in free agency) chases with bad money, overpaying for players who will be under contract for their decline years.

 

This season is the perfect example.

 

After the two Japanese stars, there are big names, sure.

 

But there’s no one worthy of a nine-figure deal. Yes, you can quote me on that.

 

Two players stand out: Matt Chapman and Cody Bellinger.

 

But the Giants signing either player would be a textbook case of chasing with bad money — again.

 

Let’s start with Bellinger, because that’s the most frightening outcome. He, like Ohtani, carries an MVP pedigree, having won the award in 2019, and his counting stats from last season indicate that he has bounced back from the three-year slump that followed that MVP win.

 

But while Bellinger was, indeed, better last season for the Cubs, he’s still miles away from the player he was in 2019.

 

That 2019 Bellinger is the player the Giants need, not the current edition.

 

The case against Bellinger is simple: He doesn’t hit the ball hard enough.

 

Last year, Bellinger was 186th in baseball in barrels per batted ball event. He was 200th in average exit velocity. He was in the bottom 10 percent of baseball in hitting the ball hard.

 

That’s a massive dropoff from 2019, when he was in the 86th percentile.

 

When you’re a power hitter, that’s a big red flag.

 

When you’re a lefty at Oracle Park, it’s death. MLB’s Statcast website says he would have only hit 16 home runs last season if every game was in San Francisco. (Compare that to the 30 he’d have hit with 162 games in Cincinnati.)

 

The Giants cannot sign Bellinger. Whether the contract is one year or 10, it’ll be an albatross deal, weighing down the entire operation.

 

It’s bad money.

 

And what would be even more concerning about such a deal, were it to happen, is that we would know that the Giants are chasing a headline. If I can see that Bellinger provides false promise, you’d think Farhan Zaidi’s army of quants would, too. Signing Bellinger despite that would indicate an organization that is misaligned and doing things for all the wrong reasons.

 

Which brings us to Chapman.

 

The former A’s third baseman does hit the ball hard. Harder than just about anyone in the game.

 

His issue is that he doesn’t hit it as frequently as he used to, and he didn’t have much room for error.

 

The highs are spectacular — three or four-week benders where he hits 10 homers and laces the ball to every field.

 

The lows are low indeed. He might as well be at the plate with a chopstick.

 

But he’s clearly a player in decline.

 

At one point, you could count on him to be the best third baseman in the game. He’s still excellent, but he’s lost something in the field, too.

 

He’s 30. He has played seven years of ball. It’s all pretty typical.

 

If the Giants were to land Chapman, they would be buying one or two good seasons — at best — but likely paying for more.

 

Yes, it might seem like a positive to sign a player you can count on to be in the lineup every day for the next half-decade, but the new-car smell will wear off, and like with a car, depreciation on these kinds of baseball players comes fast.

 

Will you still feel good about the purchase three years from now, when it’s in the shop — again — and it’s showing more wear and tear than it should?

 

Is it a pessimistic viewpoint? Yes, but the world is a bummer sometimes.

 

Free agency might work for teams at the high end (it certainly works for the players). It works for teams at the low end of money, term, or both.

 

Unless Yamamoto is coming to the Bay, the Giants have already lost.

 

And spending what was budgeted for the Japanese stars on the “next-best” players would only worsen the situation.

 

Giants HQ

Edited December 21, 2023 by Carlos Danger

[Spanky99]

Your dad has a missile.

 

f***ing retard. f*** off.

[Jimcanuck]

I hope every other team out there is thinking like the Giants writer.

[Marew]

Ohtani contract is going to be mostly bad money. He is the only one to really put them over the top, so they kind of want a championship while mookie and Freddie are good and hope their pitching doesn’t suck again. So they are paying 460m to get a couple good years.

 

Don’t care about the marketing of ohtani, that’s been overblown otherwise the angels would have been willing to pay to keep him

[deanmike]

It reduces the long term payroll commitments but does nothing in the short term except most likely make the team noticeably worse.

 

It actually does help them short term financially as well. Springer makes 24.1M in 2024, compared to Yelich at 26M and Adames with an arb projection of 12.4M. Even with major salary retention on Yelich (which I imagine would be spread out among the 5 remaining guaranteed years on his deal) Brewers would save money in salary commitments for 2024.

 

Springer and Leo Jimenez for Adames and Yelich (20M out of 130M retained) works out to a gain in surplus value of 5.7 for the Jays (barely clearing the minimum acceptance threshold of +5 that Atkins gets in almost every trade he makes). Thoughts on this hypothetical Max? If the salary retention is spread out evenly Brewers save roughly 10-10.5M in 2024, not even factoring the future savings (which I'm guessing Brewers ownership would view as at least a slight positive).

[jaysblue]

Adames could be a nice target if you moved him to 3B. Only one-year of control left, so he wouldn't be that expensive to acquire. Target him or Polanco.

[max silver]

It actually does help them short term financially as well. Springer makes 24.1M in 2024, compared to Yelich at 26M and Adames with an arb projection of 12.4M. Even with major salary retention on Yelich (which I imagine would be spread out among the 5 remaining guaranteed years on his deal) Brewers would save money in salary commitments for 2024.

 

Springer and Leo Jimenez for Adames and Yelich (20M out of 130M retained) works out to a gain in surplus value of 5.7 for the Jays (barely clearing the minimum acceptance threshold of +5 that Atkins gets in almost every trade he makes). Thoughts on this hypothetical Max? If the salary retention is spread out evenly Brewers save roughly 10-10.5M in 2024, not even factoring the future savings (which I'm guessing Brewers ownership would view as at least a slight positive).

 

It's technically fair by BTV but this trade would seriously weaken the Brewers chances to compete.

[Jays24]

Man, maybe I should tone down my criticism of Shatkins after watching the Raptors. Now that's true incompetence...

[Grant77]

Can Polanco play 3rd? I think he's a great little short term fix (2 years of control). Switch hitter who's currently projected to come off the bench for the Twins.

 

That's an obvious no if you watched him in the playoffs. He made like 4 errors.

[The Cats Ass]

The more I think about it the more I think the Jays should bite the bullet and sign Bellinger. Unless they're planning to pony up for Luis Robert in trade. The FA market for OFers isn't looking good for the next few years. Soto probably ends up back with the Yankees after they outbid themselves. When guys like Schwarber and question marks like Jung-hoo Lee are getting ~20M/yr; $25/year for Bellinger isn't looking so bad.

[RobinThicc]

Tiedemann and Martinez for Kyle Tucker

 

Get it done Ross

[Olerud363]

Man, maybe I should tone down my criticism of Shatkins after watching the Raptors. Now that's true incompetence...

 

The Raptors won a ring though and have a long run of making the playoffs most years. Too bad it's not working out this year.

 

Losing VanVleet for nothing was I guess a big thing. Relevant because could see the same thing happening with Bo and/or Vlad. Like they play out their contracts and the year after it 'seems' like they can be replaced cheaply, but things just don't work out. So basically Jays could be headed to same place as Raptors in 2026 but will they have a ring? (Or even a playoff win).

[Brownie19]

The Raptors won a ring though and have a long run of making the playoffs most years. Too bad it's not working out this year.

 

Losing VanVleet for nothing was I guess a big thing. Relevant because could see the same thing happening with Bo and/or Vlad. Like they play out their contracts and the year after it 'seems' like they can be replaced cheaply, but things just don't work out. So basically Jays could be headed to same place as Raptors in 2026 but will they have a ring? (Or even a playoff win).

 

Raps have the 2nd most wins in the NBA over the last 10 years, plus a championship. Suggesting the organization is incompetent is laughable. Jays24 is a moron. Ignore him.

[L54]

Raps have the 2nd most wins in the NBA over the last 10 years, plus a championship. Suggesting the organization is incompetent is laughable. Jays24 is a moron. Ignore him.

 

Wow second most in the league?

[The Cats Ass]

Wow second most in the league?

 

Checks out.

 

https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/nba-most-wins-last-10-years

[Dick_Pole]

Raptors have been good forever. Not sure how that's much of a surprise. Most other good teams had a couple of really s***** years while the Raptors had just one and that was a shortened season.

[deanmike]

Tiedemann and Martinez for Kyle Tucker

 

Get it done Ross

 

There is no way Ross would do both for Tucker. The Jays would be losing 4.4 BTV surplus value in that deal, while in reality Atkins gains between 5-10 surplus value on almost every trade he makes (at the time these trades are made).

 

Something like Tiedemann plus Kasevich is way closer to realistic in terms of something the Jays could actually consider pulling the trigger on.

[Jays24]

Raps have the 2nd most wins in the NBA over the last 10 years, plus a championship. Suggesting the organization is incompetent is laughable. Jays24 is a moron. Ignore him.

 

They went from being elite to a joke pretty fast. They will always be loved for 2019 but if we are talking about from 2021 onwards and what their future outlook is, you should probably get more clued into the team and the media/fanbase instead of pulling up numbers from a different era of Raptors basketball.

 

The Raptors also don't have their 1st round pick this upcoming season and have 2 of their 3 best players headed into unrestricted feet agency while making win NOW moves. It's been laughable move after laughable move in recent years and they got their extension to be a near top paid management group during this time. I wouldn't expect you to understand that though.

Edited December 21, 2023 by Jays24

[Brownie19]

There is no way Ross would do both for Tucker. The Jays would be losing 4.4 BTV surplus value in that deal, while in reality Atkins gains between 5-10 surplus value on almost every trade he makes (at the time these trades are made).

 

Something like Tiedemann plus Kasevich is way closer to realistic in terms of something the Jays could actually consider pulling the trigger on.

 

Thanks for the daily reminder.

[Frenchsoup]

Rossy do something your a very boring gm.....

[deanmike]

Thanks for the daily reminder.

 

When people stop proposing trade ideas that Atkins wouldn't realistically pull the trigger on himself I'll stop with the daily reminders. Minimum +5 surplus value for the Jays on all future trade proposal ideas (until Atkins is no longer GM I guess).

[BatFlip]

When people stop proposing trade ideas that Atkins wouldn't realistically pull the trigger on himself I'll stop with the daily reminders. Minimum +5 surplus value for the Jays on all future trade proposal ideas (until Atkins is no longer GM I guess).

 

That's basically all Atkins has to do. Jump on his chromebook, push up his glasses, and type http://www.baseballtradevalues.com. +5 on this one? Checks out, we got a deal.

[BatFlip]

Wow second most in the league?

 

I was shocked too. Good run.

[Marew]

Since we can’t get ohtani we could get Aaron judge. I think manoah would get it done, assuming the Yankees eat 150m because of his injured foot. If they get Soto they are probably hinting he’s not welcome anymore and Soto could be the new captain.

[DonJays]

Since we can’t get ohtani we could get Aaron judge. I think manoah would get it done, assuming the Yankees eat 150m because of his injured foot. If they get Soto they are probably hinting he’s not welcome anymore and Soto could be the new captain.

 

Great idea French Soup

[Stangstag]

I think dogg has successfully infiltrated the board once again