Brandon Belt signing with the Jays

[Eat My Shatkins]

They might just be planning on using Kirk/Jansen 50/50 to keep them both as fresh as possible, and instead of DHing guys like Kirk/Vladdy/Springer on their days off from the field, maybe they just give them an actual day off.

[Jonn]

The great thing is with our depth he can be kept healthy. DHing more will help him. He’s also a compliment to the lineup. With the Giants he’s been a main guy. He’s gonna get plenty to hit and his swing is tailored perfectly for this division. Its great deal for both sides because he can use this year to platform himself into one last pay day.

[Jimcanuck]

Belt was signed just a few days after Pollock was signed. Possible the Jays wanted Pollock as a better team fit, and pivoted to Belt after he signed elsewhere.

[John_Havok]

They might just be planning on using Kirk/Jansen 50/50 to keep them both as fresh as possible, and instead of DHing guys like Kirk/Vladdy/Springer on their days off from the field, maybe they just give them an actual day off.

 

Well, his quote didn't say he would be the DH most of the time, just that he would mostly DH, meaning the majority of his PAs will come as a DH. It doesnt say how many PAs he was led to believe he would get. I suspect he's really just a hedge against a Jansen and/or Kirk injury, which seems inevitable.

[Omar]

Seems weird… either one of Kirk/Jansen has an undisclosed injury or there’s a trade in the works. Or they’re somehow going to shuffle the DH between Kirk, Jansen, Springer and Belt. Which doesn’t leave Belt with much playtime

 

Kirk's decline the last third of the season sent a message to the front office. Fat boy has to sit and get rest cause that body doesn't perform over 162 game season. Either that or he drops 40lbs.

[connorp]

Seems weird… either one of Kirk/Jansen has an undisclosed injury or there’s a trade in the works. Or they’re somehow going to shuffle the DH between Kirk, Jansen, Springer and Belt. Which doesn’t leave Belt with much playtime

 

Danny Jansen is a career .731 OPS guy, Kirk had a bad finish. In a perfect world, both of them end up being great but the team clearly wanted to hedge their bets. Now there’s a third guy with upside in the mix. If Belt hits like a couple years ago, he’ll get the bulk of the playing time there. It seems this is what they sold him on. Don’t think he came to be a bench player

[Captain_Obvious]

Danny Jansen is a career .731 OPS guy, Kirk had a bad finish. In a perfect world, both of them end up being great but the team clearly wanted to hedge their bets. Now there’s a third guy with upside in the mix. If Belt hits like a couple years ago, he’ll get the bulk of the playing time there. It seems this is what they sold him on. Don’t think he came to be a bench player

 

Jose Bautista was a career sub 100 wRC+ when he was 29. You can easily misjudge a player's ability by looking career numbers alone without considering recent trends of those numbers.

[jaysblue]

Kirk's decline the last third of the season sent a message to the front office. Fat boy has to sit and get rest cause that body doesn't perform over 162 game season. Either that or he drops 40lbs.

 

Terminator coming after you now.

[connorp]

Jose Bautista was a career sub 100 wRC+ when he was 29. You can easily misjudge a player's ability by looking career numbers alone without considering recent trends of those numbers.

 

200 ABs lol. He wasn’t even league average hitting for a C the last week of August. For every Bautista, there’s a thousand guys that don’t follow the same path

[Captain_Obvious]

Try again. Most recent 350 PAs.

[L54]

Belt will get most of his AB’s at DH which makes sense because the only other position he can play is first. Doesn’t mean he’s going to be the team’s exclusive DH.

 

There will be more than enough at bats to go around. Guys get hurt, slump, platoon advantages, pinch hitting opportunities. Good teams assemble depth like this to mitigate risk.

[Jays24]

Seems like we're all over analyzing the playing time issues. Sure it'll start off with Kirk/Jansen/Belt splitting time at DH but in the end it'll be the best player for the position.

 

Their performances will determine how much they play so whoever starts off slow will see their playing time drastically reduced. This is all assuming everyone will stay healthy, which we know isn't likely.

 

It is great to have internal competition between expected above average players. No more Zimmer's/Tapia's where we expect suckage from the start.

[WryNGinger]

The great thing is with our depth he can be kept healthy. DHing more will help him. He’s also a compliment to the lineup. With the Giants he’s been a main guy. He’s gonna get plenty to hit and his swing is tailored perfectly for this division. Its great deal for both sides because he can use this year to platform himself into one last pay day.

 

Can't wait to see him hit in Yankee stadium.

[Ehjays]

Belt meets the Press in Toronto

 

[Benito]

Belt will get most of his AB’s at DH which makes sense because the only other position he can play is first. Doesn’t mean he’s going to be the team’s exclusive DH.

 

There will be more than enough at bats to go around. Guys get hurt, slump, platoon advantages, pinch hitting opportunities. Good teams assemble depth like this to mitigate risk.

 

Add to this, Belt's performance will ultimately determine how much playing time he gets. If he's hitting like in 2020-2021, he's going to be in the lineup over pretty much everyone other than Vlad. But if he's closer to 2022 level, I don't see the team being patient and continue giving him at bats.

[connorp]

Seems like we're all over analyzing the playing time issues. Sure it'll start off with Kirk/Jansen/Belt splitting time at DH but in the end it'll be the best player for the position.

 

Their performances will determine how much they play so whoever starts off slow will see their playing time drastically reduced. This is all assuming everyone will stay healthy, which we know isn't likely.

 

It is great to have internal competition between expected above average players. No more Zimmer's/Tapia's where we expect suckage from the start.

 

Yeah Belt could struggle and the other guys will get ABs in that case. All of them have some questions marks, so one of them not performing well isn’t a long shot.

[max silver]

Try again. Most recent 350 PAs.

 

I firmly believe Jansen has reached a new level of performance at the plate as well. He's been mashing across 2 seasons now and it's become more than a short hot streak. He's also had something like 3 trips to the disabled list during this time and after each of these he's returned to the lineup and eventually resumed mashing home runs.

[L54]

Add to this, Belt's performance will ultimately determine how much playing time he gets. If he's hitting like in 2020-2021, he's going to be in the lineup over pretty much everyone other than Vlad. But if he's closer to 2022 level, I don't see the team being patient and continue giving him at bats.

 

For sure. It’s a 10M dice roll basically. If he sucks then his role is diminished, limited to PH duties against righties. If he’s great the upside is a middle of the order masher from the left side to break up all the Jays right handed hitters.

 

Best part of the signing is the Jays spending cash to add depth. It might work and it might not, but the process is correct.

[Ehjays]

[WryNGinger]

Belt meets the Press in Toronto

 

 

My 2 take-aways are:

 

Shi Davidi needs to get his fireplace vent fixed.

 

Is Varsho the third option behind the plate? An injury to a catcher or an outfielder makes the outfield depth pretty thin right now. I think they still add on OF...is it more likely to be a trade or a signing at this point? I'm thinking it will be a trade. I do like this signing, it just made me wonder why it wasn't a similar profile OF instead of 1B/DH they got.

[Laika]

My 2 take-aways are:

 

Shi Davidi needs to get his fireplace vent fixed.

 

Is Varsho the third option behind the plate? An injury to a catcher or an outfielder makes the outfield depth pretty thin right now. I think they still add on OF...is it more likely to be a trade or a signing at this point? I'm thinking it will be a trade. I do like this signing, it just made me wonder why it wasn't a similar profile OF instead of 1B/DH they got.

 

they aren't done.

 

still have one obvious demotion on the projected 25 man roster (Lukes)

a couple trade candidates on the 25 man (Biggio, Richards)

 

and some 40 man guys who are DFA candidates (Thornton, Gage, Hatch)

[G-Snarls]

OF depth chart:

 

Springer

Varsho

Keirmaier

Merryfield

Biggio

?? In AAA

[L54]

OF depth chart:

 

Springer

Varsho

Keirmaier

Merryfield

Biggio

?? In AAA

 

Lukes

Lopez

Horwitz

 

And someone not on the team yet. Would be great to get someone who can platoon with KK and mash lefties.

[Jimcanuck]

Brian Anderson is still out there. Has battled injuries the last few years but if healthy is an above average bat. Should be fairly cheap, the kind of risk a team can take for the last bench piece.

[glory]

Kyle Garlick was DFA’d by the Twins. His only redeeming quality so far seems to be hitting LHP so there might be a fit there.

[The Cats Ass]

I honestly think we see him bounce back to near 2021 levels. Sounds like his knee was giving him pain all year. Speeds not a part of his game so we don't have to worry about that declining. And he'll be DHing most if not all the time he's in the lineup, so that should allow his knee to rest/heal even more.

 

https://www.nbcsports.com/bayarea/giants/how-brandon-belts-chronic-knee-injury-plagued-disappointing-2022-season

 

"I was just in pain the entire year and there was nothing we could do to get rid of it," Belt said. "The most important thing for me was the swelling, we couldn't get the swelling to go down. We did everything imaginable, we drained it multiple times ... we did pretty much everything you could outside of surgery and the swelling would go down for maybe a day or two and then it would come right back. So at that point, I felt no strength in my knee, no strength in my leg and I really got to a point where -- even if I wanted to and swung as hard as I could -- I couldn't hit the ball out of the ballpark. That was kind of the moment where I was like you know what, I don't think I have any more in me this year, it needs to be taken care of."

[Laika]

Belt has had surgery on his right knee three times.

 

2015 minor meniscus tear repair

2018 "major microfracture surgery to stimulate cartilage growth"

2022 "Sept. 3 surgery to clean out cartilage and scar tissue"

 

The 2022 surgery does not sound "major" but of course with his age and repeated problems I would not exactly expect a fully healthy Brandon Belt. He will have chronic issues in this knee forever, I think.

[Brownie19]

Belt has had surgery on his right knee three times.

 

2015 minor meniscus tear repair

2018 "major microfracture surgery to stimulate cartilage growth"

2022 "Sept. 3 surgery to clean out cartilage and scar tissue"

 

The 2022 surgery does not sound "major" but of course with his age and repeated problems I would not exactly expect a fully healthy Brandon Belt. He will have chronic issues in this knee forever, I think.

 

Didn't you hear Belt tell everyone he feels better than ever - better than he did when he tore the league a new ******* in 2020 and 2021? You take your wet blanket home and dry it out sir. Let us live the fantasy that we just added a 140-155 wRC+ left handed bat to our lineup.

[Krylian]

Didn't you hear Belt tell everyone he feels better than ever - better than he did when he tore the league a new ******* in 2020 and 2021? You take your wet blanket home and dry it out sir. Let us live the fantasy that we just added a 140-155 wRC+ left handed bat to our lineup.

 

LOL. Every player in the history of the world starts every season saying they're in the best shape of their career and feel 110%.

[Brownie19]

LOL. Every player in the history of the world starts every season saying they're in the best shape of their career and feel 110%.