Former Blue Jays Thread

[Masterbather]

Varsho has 267 more plate appearances than Moreno over that span, and a lower wRC+ (89 vs 103 for Moreno), which makes the WAR comparison worse for Varsho.

 

Moreno is not the 2nd coming of Jason Kendall like some Jays fans were acting like last year, but the Jays clearly whiffed on this deal. Not only did they miscalculate what Varsho is offensively, but they intentionally put him in LF for reasons that I still can't comprehend, so it was just doomed to fail from the beginning.

Varsho is a defensive specialist with occasional power. Very good bench depth for a contending team.

[max silver]

Varsho has 267 more plate appearances than Moreno over that span, and a lower wRC+ (89 vs 103 for Moreno), which makes the WAR comparison worse for Varsho.

 

Moreno is not the 2nd coming of Jason Kendall like some Jays fans were acting like last year, but the Jays clearly whiffed on this deal. Not only did they miscalculate what Varsho is offensively, but they intentionally put him in LF for reasons that I still can't comprehend, so it was just doomed to fail from the beginning.

 

Varsho is coming off of a 4 month stretch where he was a 115 wRC+ bat (August of last season until mid June of this season). He's a streaky hitter and prone to stretches where he's legitimately awful at the plate. He was sitting at 115 as late as June 16 and then ripped off a two week stretch where he lost the ability to even make contact and puked out a -38 wRC+. He had a similar stretch last season but it lasted about 6 weeks in totality. He's shown signs of turning around his fortunes in recent games so hopefully he can go back to producing at the plate again as the 6 week mega slump last year essentially ruined his overall numbers.

[glory]

Varsho is coming off of a 4 month stretch where he was a 115 wRC+ bat (August of last season until mid June of this season). He's a streaky hitter and prone to stretches where he's legitimately awful at the plate. He was sitting at 115 as late as June 16 and then ripped off a two week stretch where he lost the ability to even make contact and puked out a -38 wRC+. He had a similar stretch last season but it lasted about 6 weeks in totality. He's shown signs of turning around his fortunes in recent games so hopefully he can go back to producing at the plate again as the 6 week mega slump last year essentially ruined his overall numbers.

 

Varsho is closing in on 900 PA since the trade. Streaky or not, the 89 wRC+ combined with the horrid expected/statcast data is probably more in line with what he is. Still a useful player, probably around a 2.5-3 WAR as long as his defense remains, but clearly not the type of player the Jays were envisioning when they traded Moreno for him. At least I hope not.

[Laika]

Varsho is or was a good talent. Then the Jays hitting coaches got to him.

 

Nobody has a f***ing chance when Don Mattingly is there telling you that "damage is kind of a scary word" and s***.

[BigCecil]

Varsho is closing in on 900 PA since the trade. Streaky or not, the 89 wRC+ combined with the horrid expected/statcast data is probably more in line with what he is. Still a useful player, probably around a 2.5-3 WAR as long as his defense remains, but clearly not the type of player the Jays were envisioning when they traded Moreno for him. At least I hope not.

 

He has 2000 PAs as a 96 bat. Currently right at 95. His statcast page is a nitemare. His average and max EVs in '24 - less than Morenos. Hot or cold streaks are irrelevant with that sample size.

[AMS528]

Varsho is a defensive specialist with occasional power. Very good bench depth for a contending team.

 

Wouldn't he be starting for Cleveland, is basically worth the same as Perkins in Milwaukee, is worth more than all of Seattles OF, is 100% better than Mullins in Baltimore, would definitely start somewhere in the OF for Philly over Rojas or Castellanos, better than Kelenic or Harris in Atlanta as well.

 

It sounds mostly actually like it's the exact opposite of what you're saying, Varsho would start for almost every single playoff team in the league right now.

 

I don't think you've followed the other teams, or are aware of the types of guys other teams are trotting out there some of whom are bad both defensively and offensively. Are you under the impression all the contenders are running out all-star level players across their outfields?

[max silver]

Varsho is or was a good talent. Then the Jays hitting coaches got to him.

 

Nobody has a f***ing chance when Don Mattingly is there telling you that "damage is kind of a scary word" and s***.

 

I recall Varsho had a stated goal of reducing his pop up rate but that's been an abject failure as he's hitting them at the highest rate of his career. Assuming he's not already doing this he's a guy that needs to spend an offseason at Driveline or somewhere similar working on his swing as what he is doing presently isn't working particularly well.

[Masterbather]

Wouldn't he be starting for Cleveland, is basically worth the same as Perkins in Milwaukee, is worth more than all of Seattles OF, is 100% better than Mullins in Baltimore, would definitely start somewhere in the OF for Philly over Rojas or Castellanos, better than Kelenic or Harris in Atlanta as well.

 

It sounds mostly actually like it's the exact opposite of what you're saying, Varsho would start for almost every single playoff team in the league right now.

 

I don't think you've followed the other teams, or are aware of the types of guys other teams are trotting out there some of whom are bad both defensively and offensively. Are you under the impression all the contenders are running out all-star level players across their outfields?

 

Indeed, some contenders need to fix the OF situation and they better get going on that.

 

He wouldn't play over Kelenic btw. He'd be a late game defensive sub.

[Laika]

I recall Varsho had a stated goal of reducing his pop up rate but that's been an abject failure as he's hitting them at the highest rate of his career. Assuming he's not already doing this he's a guy that needs to spend an offseason at Driveline or somewhere similar working on his swing as what he is doing presently isn't working particularly well.

 

Yeah he had some focus on leveling out his swing so he could hit high fastballs better. Or returning to his "old self" that wasn't as pull happy? You can't see it in the results at all.

 

He needs to pick a lane and do one of the following contradictory things:

 

- develop a viable "B swing" so that he can put the ball in play more on tough pitches and avoid some of the terrible contact results he gets

 

OR

 

- just become an absolute barrel monster who does one thing only and that is hunt dingers. if he is going to be only capable of pulling flyballs, then f*** every other kind of trajectory just become a guy who can pull 30 homers a year.

 

either way an offseason doing driveline type stuff is the method, the goals would just be different.

 

i dunno

[AMS528]

Indeed, some contenders need to fix the OF situation and they better get going on that.

 

He wouldn't play over Kelenic btw. He'd be a late game defensive sub.

 

He's been worth decently more than Kelenic by fWAR and bWAR. Maybe he still wouldn't start over him, but overall he's been worth more. It is what it is.

 

He'd also start over Siani in St. Louis.

 

Those two statements don't align very well. You said he wouldn't start for contenders in the league, but he'd start for most of the playoff teams in the league. How could all these playoff teams be contending while having worse than defensive bench depth levels of outfielders they're starting? Does that mean they're not contenders, do contenders not require good outfielders. Or does the premise not make much sense?

 

I think you made a hyperbolic statement because you dislike Varsho and you're sticking to it even though it doesn't make much sense.

[BigCecil]

Wouldn't he be starting for Cleveland, is basically worth the same as Perkins in Milwaukee, is worth more than all of Seattles OF, is 100% better than Mullins in Baltimore, would definitely start somewhere in the OF for Philly over Rojas or Castellanos, better than Kelenic or Harris in Atlanta as well.

 

It sounds mostly actually like it's the exact opposite of what you're saying, Varsho would start for almost every single playoff team in the league right now.

 

I don't think you've followed the other teams, or are aware of the types of guys other teams are trotting out there some of whom are bad both defensively and offensively. Are you under the impression all the contenders are running out all-star level players across their outfields?

 

I think he could be a fixture on a lot of playoff teams. Just depends on their roster construction. Maybe they have heavy bats in the corner OF spots etc? His CF D and ability to run into 20+ HRs is valuable. He is a 2-3 WAR player, who if hot at all could be playoff series force both ways. If he is cold at the plate, his D doesn't slump.

[AMS528]

I think he could be a fixture on a lot of playoff teams. Just depends on their roster construction. Maybe they have heavy bats in the corner OF spots etc? His CF D and ability to run into 20+ HRs is valuable. He is a 2-3 WAR player, who if hot at all could be playoff series force both ways. If he is cold at the plate, his D doesn't slump.

 

I don't even think that trade was great for the Jays, I think his bat could be worse than it is right now, I think it's just a genuinely ridiculous statement to make that he's a bench depth piece on contenders when you actually look at the players that start on those teams.

[Masterbather]

He's been worth decently more than Kelenic by fWAR and bWAR. Maybe he still wouldn't start over him, but overall he's been worth more. It is what it is.

 

He'd also start over Siani in St. Louis.

 

Those two statements don't align very well. You said he wouldn't start for contenders in the league, but he'd start for most of the playoff teams in the league. How could all these playoff teams be contending while having worse than defensive bench depth levels of outfielders they're starting? Does that mean they're not contenders, do contenders not require good outfielders. Or does the premise not make much sense?

 

I think you made a hyperbolic statement because you dislike Varsho and you're sticking to it even though it doesn't make much sense.

 

No it makes perfect sense, no contending team would want to roll out Varsho as a starter, but obviously even contenders usually have achilles heels. So it's possible some would be forced to, they can survive it if they are good enough in other areas, but they wouldn't want to have to start him. Like Ryan Goins for the 2015 Jays.

 

Teams don't value defense as much as offense no matter the metrics, but if they don't have an offensive force and they're good enough offensively in other areas, they can carry the defensive guy.

 

So ideally he's a fourth outfielder on a contender, but he could sneak his way into the starting lineup on some contenders if that's where they're weak.

[AMS528]

No it makes perfect sense, no contending team would want to roll out Varsho as a starter, but obviously even contenders usually have achilles heels. So it's possible some would be forced to, they can survive it if they are good enough in other areas, but they wouldn't want to have to start him. Like Ryan Goins for the 2015 Jays.

 

Teams don't value defense as much as offense no matter the metrics, but if they don't have an offensive force and they're good enough offensively in other areas, they can carry the defensive guy.

 

So ideally he's a fourth outfielder on a contender, but he could sneak his way into the starting lineup on some contenders if that's where they're weak.

 

Don't be obtuse. Goins produced 1.3 WAR in 128 games for the Jays in his career year. That's a bad comp given he's performed better than that multiple seasons including already in this one in many less games. Second many contending teams have had defense first players at positions like CF and SS.

 

You're saying 60% of playoff teams in the league all just happen to not have enough OFs, and they are surviving with their OFs.

 

I don't think you're understanding that he's outperforming various starting outfielders on more than half the playoff teams. It does not make sense to describe that as the level of surviving it when it's not a couple of teams dealing with that. It's not surviving if it's most of them. That's not like a super complex thing.

 

Teams would want to start Aaron Judge at every position but they can't, and they'll have starter level or above average starter level guys as well, which is exactly what Varsho tracks as.

 

Surviving would be what Philly is doing with Castellanos and Rojas. That's one of those teams. Varsho would be a vast upgrade over Castellanos and Rojas.

[John_Havok]

Yeah he had some focus on leveling out his swing so he could hit high fastballs better. Or returning to his "old self" that wasn't as pull happy? You can't see it in the results at all.

 

He needs to pick a lane and do one of the following contradictory things:

 

- develop a viable "B swing" so that he can put the ball in play more on tough pitches and avoid some of the terrible contact results he gets

 

OR

 

- just become an absolute barrel monster who does one thing only and that is hunt dingers. if he is going to be only capable of pulling flyballs, then f*** every other kind of trajectory just become a guy who can pull 30 homers a year.

 

either way an offseason doing driveline type stuff is the method, the goals would just be different.

 

i dunno

 

I think Varsho's biggest issue is that he can't hit anything on the inner half... or up. He's basically too easy to pitch to in todays game. He's 0-2 in virtually every PA because pitchers can just lob whatever they want to 75% of the strike zone.

[BigCecil]

I think Varsho's biggest issue is that he can't hit anything on the inner half... or up. He's basically too easy to pitch to in todays game. He's 0-2 in virtually every PA because pitchers can just lob whatever they want to 75% of the strike zone.

 

I haven’t looked at his heat map but he seems that he can be deadly down in the zone yanking balls to RF.

[John_Havok]

I haven’t looked at his heat map but he seems that he can be deadly down in the zone yanking balls to RF.

 

Yes, basically his two hottest zones are middle down and middle middle. Anything inner third from top to bottom is a barren wasteland, anything outer third from the middle to up is a barren wasteland. Lower and outer is ... not quite a wasteland but it's not great either.

 

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/daulton-varsho-662139?stats=statcast-r-zones-mlb

Edited July 5, 2024 by John_Havok

[Masterbather]

Don't be obtuse. Goins produced 1.3 WAR in 128 games for the Jays in his career year. That's a bad comp given he's performed better than that multiple seasons including already in this one in many less games. Second many contending teams have had defense first players at positions like CF and SS.

 

You're saying 60% of playoff teams in the league all just happen to not have enough OFs, and they are surviving with their OFs.

 

I don't think you're understanding that he's outperforming various starting outfielders on more than half the playoff teams. It does not make sense to describe that as the level of surviving it when it's not a couple of teams dealing with that. It's not surviving if it's most of them. That's not like a super complex thing.

 

Teams would want to start Aaron Judge at every position but they can't, and they'll have starter level or above average starter level guys as well, which is exactly what Varsho tracks as.

 

Surviving would be what Philly is doing with Castellanos and Rojas. That's one of those teams. Varsho would be a vast upgrade over Castellanos and Rojas.

The only point I'm making is he's not a guy you look at and think wow there's a championship piece, but that's not to say that he can't find himself starting on a championship team. The bottom line is the dude has not proven to be a good hitter at all, he can play great defense, is a smart base runner even if he's not going to get you a lot of stolen bases. I just think most teams would prefer something more as a starter even though it's impossible to fill your team with ace players.

 

If he's starting on a championship caliber team I think many teams would identify him as a player to potentially upgrade in the offseason unless the rest of their lineup is really good, I'll put it that way.

 

But hey, if demand and supply makes it so that he has some good value, I'm more than happy for someone to overpay for his services.

[Omar]

Varsho is not the albatross around this teams neck. The necessity to regurgitate the value of his acquisition means that some don't see the forest from the trees. Like in what way could have Moreno made a difference to this team in any real sense? The need to keep reconsidering his value is one of the howlers of this board. Like throwing up your dinner and eating it, again and again.

 

This team/organization is in dire straits. They have a manager who doesn't know how to fill in a lineup card and maybe the worst I've seen in terms of bullpen managment in the history of this team. A general manager who in eight years has drafted and developed almost nobody of significance while unable to recognize the teams deficiencies and address them year in and year out all the while fielding a team with a payroll north of $230M! A president who is MIA and has a resume of little to no accomplishments other than being a polished executive yet seems to have this city and more importantly the Rogers Board fooled. Fire all three of them into the sun for all I care. But Varsho is not the reason that this team is performing like a one legged man in an ass kicking contest. Let's move on ffs!

[Spanky99]

Varsho is not the albatross around this teams neck. The necessity to regurgitate the value of his acquisition means that some don't see the forest from the trees. Like in what way could have Moreno made a difference to this team in any real sense? The need to keep reconsidering his value is one of the howlers of this board. Like throwing up your dinner and eating it, again and again.

 

This team/organization is in dire straits. They have a manager who doesn't know how to fill in a lineup card and maybe the worst I've seen in terms of bullpen managment in the history of this team. A general manager who in eight years has drafted and developed almost nobody of significance while unable to recognize the teams deficiencies and address them year in and year out all the while fielding a team with a payroll north of $230M! A president who is MIA and has a resume of little to no accomplishments other than being a polished executive yet seems to have this city and more importantly the Rogers Board fooled. Fire all three of them into the sun for all I care. But Varsho is not the reason that this team is performing like a one legged man in an ass kicking contest. Let's move on ffs!

 

Amen.

[Pendleton]

[BatFlip]

Varsho is not the albatross around this teams neck. The necessity to regurgitate the value of his acquisition means that some don't see the forest from the trees. Like in what way could have Moreno made a difference to this team in any real sense? The need to keep reconsidering his value is one of the howlers of this board. Like throwing up your dinner and eating it, again and again.

 

This team/organization is in dire straits. They have a manager who doesn't know how to fill in a lineup card and maybe the worst I've seen in terms of bullpen managment in the history of this team. A general manager who in eight years has drafted and developed almost nobody of significance while unable to recognize the teams deficiencies and address them year in and year out all the while fielding a team with a payroll north of $230M! A president who is MIA and has a resume of little to no accomplishments other than being a polished executive yet seems to have this city and more importantly the Rogers Board fooled. Fire all three of them into the sun for all I care. But Varsho is not the reason that this team is performing like a one legged man in an ass kicking contest. Let's move on ffs!

 

Amen.

 

If Varsho was starting CFer, the Jays would probably be 5th or 6th out of all 30 MLB teams at CF by WAR. Yet there are some guys around here that just can't let go of their Varsho bashing. Saying that he has little value or wouldn't start on a playoff team just shows a stunning lack of baseball knowledge.

[BigCecil]

SWR FIP 3.95. Worth 3 times the fWAR of Berrios for ML min. Might stick as a 4-5.

[jaysblue]

SWR FIP 3.95. Worth 3 times the fWAR of Berrios for ML min. Might stick as a 4-5.

 

SWR doesn't get talked about much on here. He has had a really nice season so far for Minny. Looks like he could stick as a backend or mid-rotation starter.

[Spanky99]

Are we comparing trades again? lmao... never ends.

 

Berrios bWAR and RA9 beat SWR handedly.

[connorp]

Varsho is coming off of a 4 month stretch where he was a 115 wRC+ bat (August of last season until mid June of this season). He's a streaky hitter and prone to stretches where he's legitimately awful at the plate. He was sitting at 115 as late as June 16 and then ripped off a two week stretch where he lost the ability to even make contact and puked out a -38 wRC+. He had a similar stretch last season but it lasted about 6 weeks in totality. He's shown signs of turning around his fortunes in recent games so hopefully he can go back to producing at the plate again as the 6 week mega slump last year essentially ruined his overall numbers.

 

You never disappoint

[connorp]

Jays quite clearly whiffed on their assessment of Varsho.

Either A) They thought there was upside where he was a legit Corner OF bat

He is what they thought. And their idea of next level was KK in CF and great D in the Corner.

 

Bad move either way

[Spanky99]

Jays quite clearly whiffed on their assessment of Varsho.

Either A) They thought there was upside where he was a legit Corner OF bat

He is what they thought. And their idea of next level was KK in CF and great D in the Corner.

 

Bad move either way

 

Tips.

[Stangstag]

Jays quite clearly whiffed on their assessment of Varsho.

Either A) They thought there was upside where he was a legit Corner OF bat

He is what they thought. And their idea of next level was KK in CF and great D in the Corner.

 

Bad move either way

 

They clearly thought Varsho was more, but still not a bad move. We had 3 above-average C and 0 capable CF/OF/LHH. Basically trading 6 years for 4 in a position of need.

 

The throw-in of Gurriel kinda hurt a bit because if you value him about the same as Teo, he should have been able to net a similar return on his own.

[max silver]

They clearly thought Varsho was more, but still not a bad move. We had 3 above-average C and 0 capable CF/OF/LHH. Basically trading 6 years for 4 in a position of need.

 

The throw-in of Gurriel kinda hurt a bit because if you value him about the same as Teo, he should have been able to net a similar return on his own.

 

The issue with this line of thinking was that Gurriel was never in the same tier as Teoscar as he simply didn't offer the same kind of offensive upside. It's key to remember that he was coming off of a season where he hit all of 5 home runs and that likely factored into the type of trade value he had to offer.