Jays sign Anthony Santander

[Orgfiller]

17 minutes ago, jerb said:

 

This is a pretty significant amount deferred, I wonder what this entails for tax calculations. Pulling this out of my ass, if we use similar convertion rates for Ohtani's 10/700 figure to the "actual" 10/460 that it costs the Dodgers, the original 5/92 guarantee is actually more like a 5/60-75 deal in terms of what the team has to actually pay? That's substantial for the AAV hit in the CBT.

[glory]

9 minutes ago, Terminator said:

They could try and run some sort of DH rotation with Taters, Vlad and Pete.

With a groundball pitcher: Taters in LF, Vlad at 1B, Alonso at DH, Clement at 3B

With a flyball pitcher: Taters at DH, Vlad at 3B, Alonso at 1B, Loperfido (or whoever) in LF

Vlad isn't going to want to DH much in his walk year, and if Alonso's deal has any sort of short term opt out, then he probably wouldn't either. Ideally you split them between 1B/DH and have a competent defender at 3B, but not sure that's feasible if you want to do right by the players.

Of course if the Jays end up giving Polar Bear a 5 year deal or something with no opt outs, then all bets are off. 

[Terminator]

3 minutes ago, glory said:

Vlad isn't going to want to DH much in his walk year, and if Alonso's deal has any sort of short term opt out, then he probably wouldn't either. Ideally you split them between 1B/DH and have a competent defender at 3B, but not sure that's feasible if you want to do right by the players.

Of course if the Jays end up giving Polar Bear a 5 year deal or something with no opt outs, then all bets are off. 

It's not a clean fit by any means but it's doable.

Polar Bear's market seems to be pretty limited. If we are offering him top dollar and give him the opt outs he'll want I bet he'll play here, even if he's going to DH quite a bit.

[Laika]

HEAVY DEFERRALS is my new kink 

[Laika]

Hi, I'm Laika, a 39 year old greeter at Sam's Club.

I like Godzilla movies on VHS, factory sealed Pokemon card collecting, and HEAVY DEFERRALS

[max silver]

4 minutes ago, Terminator said:

It's not a clean fit by any means but it's doable.

Polar Bear's market seems to be pretty limited. If we are offering him top dollar and give him the opt outs he'll want I bet he'll play here, even if he's going to DH quite a bit.

I'd be thrilled with Polar Pete on a deal with an opt out after 3 years similar to Santander.

[Laika]

Offer Peter Alons-y some HEAVY DEFERRALS and get it done. 

[Jimcanuck]

Gotta wonder if the cdn dollar being in a trough is another reason for the deferrals

[Bone R]

5 minutes ago, max silver said:

I'd be thrilled with Polar Pete on a deal with an opt out after 3 years similar to Santander.

Pete will want a 3 year deal with player opt outs after each season. 

[max silver]

1 minute ago, Bone R said:

Pete will want a 3 year deal with player opt outs after each season. 

Seems that way which I think limits the appeal quite a bit.

[glory]

8 minutes ago, max silver said:

I'd be thrilled with Polar Pete on a deal with an opt out after 3 years similar to Santander.

Boras is going to want an opt out after year 1 unless Pete gets the long term contract he/Boras want. Shapiro was against player options years ago, but seems like he's open to them as long as he gets 3+ years out of it (Berrios, Santander). Now that I think about it, maybe Alonso isn't all that likely for that reason, but Ross has lost his mind now so maybe he's going all in. 

[SuperBlackhawk]

2 hours ago, max silver said:

Vlad had a bad first 4 weeks to start the season. His first half still saw him produce a 135 wRC+, and from April 28-end of season he was MLB's second best hitter behind Aaron Judge with an MVP level 181 wRC+.

Who cares about individual stats. Team still finished last. 

[jaysblue]

1 hour ago, Laika said:

Ready to roll*




*to another wild card sweep 

I actually like their odds in a WC matchup better with Santander in the lineup. The 2023 team lacked a big power bat and we saw that being a difference in which the Jays only scored 1 run in 2 games. 

[Jays24]

How the Jays went from 4/84 to 5/92 with heavy deferrals is amazing.  We went from one of the most absurd deals with Straw to this was much needed for my Jays fandom.  

While id love Alonso, Begman just makes so much more sense defensively.  We saw how important defense at 3B with Chapman vs the crap we had before there.  Vlad being there for majority of the season might make people go crazy lol. 

[jaysblue]

1 hour ago, John_Havok said:

Careful comparing Kim and Clement, the pitchforks will come out, despite the statement being incredibly accurate

Just stop it. 

Give me Kim all day over Clement. Heck, having both around considering a Bo departure at the end of 2025 actually would be a good thing. 

Can Clement steal 35+ bases? Just curious. 

[max silver]

3 minutes ago, SuperBlackhawk said:

Who cares about individual stats. Team still finished last. 

Who cares about the team's win loss record when evaluating a single player's performance? Vlad was fantastic last season and was the primary reason that the club was actually just a tad below average offensively last season despite most of the key bats floundering. The team would have been far worse without him as he provided a 5.5 win season. 

[Jays24]

5 minutes ago, jaysblue said:

I actually like their odds in a WC matchup better with Santander in the lineup. The 2023 team lacked a big power bat and we saw that being a difference in which the Jays only scored 1 run in 2 games. 

A couple more signings and our Jays future bets are gonna look great lol. 

[G-Snarls]

1 hour ago, glory said:

Gotta add wins where you can. Bregman would make more sense positionally but Alonso should be a much shorter contract and adds more of what the Jays need on offense (not so much on defense).

Ultimately, they just need to add one more impact guy. It sucks they are in a position where they have to spend obsessively to improve, but it is what it is. You don't want to rebuild then pay to add wins. 

It would just be funny/annoying to see the flip flopping on run prevention vs run production that this front office can't seem to get right.  Ever.

[jaysblue]

2 minutes ago, Jays24 said:

A couple more signings and our Jays future bets are gonna look great lol. 

I already cashed out and got my $100 back haha. 

[jaysblue]

You get the sense the Jays had to do something big on Monday after the negative headlines they've been receiving from the Sasaki fiasco over the weekend. Heck, when Mike Wilner is even critical and calls for Shatkins to be fired, you know it's bad. 

Signing Santander today makes Sasaki old news and definitely acts a distraction. 

[Brownie19]

6 minutes ago, jaysblue said:

Just stop it. 

Give me Kim all day over Clement. Heck, having both around considering a Bo departure at the end of 2025 actually would be a good thing. 

Can Clement steal 35+ bases? Just curious. 

He has the ability to (I think).  78th percentile sprint speed, essentially the same as Kim.  Of course instincts and stuff matter too - as does getting on-base a lot (something Clement doesn't do, that Kim does).

[max silver]

53 minutes ago, Orgfiller said:

I wonder how bad it can get for Vlad at 3B. He's already pretty much as bad as it gets at 1B, which is insane to think about, but he legitimately has a good arm. There's like a +10 run adjustment between 1B and 3B, the worst case scenario here is 2007 Ryan Braun at -32 DRS (lol) good for -27 runs of value defensively, i.e. 2.7 WAR lost to defense. Would Vlad be the worst 3B defender ever, or can he hide his brutal range with enough arm strength to "only" provide -15 to -20 runs of defensive value.

It wouldn't help of course that his current projected partner at SS is Bo Bichette, it would be a complete nightmare on the left side of the infield.

I don't see any conceivable way Vlad would be 2007 Ryan Braun level of bad at third base, at least in the short term. Even as a raw rookie in 2019 he still managed a -3 DRS mark. In his small sample of innings last season he was an even 0 by DRS and a plus 1 defender by OAA. I think the club made a mistake in not deploying him with more frequency at third base last season in a lost season as that was a perfect opportunity to get a better read on the level of defense he could provide in a larger sample. 

[Jimcanuck]

Sign Kim for 2B.  Put Gimenez SS.

Reasonable speed, good tracker of the ball, mediocre to s*** arm Bo to LF.  That's where guys with his defensive skills belong.

Santander can be primary DH.

With this scenario, Bregman at 3B would make this a top defensive squad.  If not Bregman, Clement i guess

[Orgfiller]

25 minutes ago, Jimcanuck said:

Gotta wonder if the cdn dollar being in a trough is another reason for the deferrals

For who? There's basically no downside to the team doing deferrals, they have to put the money into escrow anyway, so for them it means paying less now and pocketing/investing the savings into something else.

[jaysblue]

3 hours ago, Brownie19 said:

This is certainly what some fans wanted.  They wanted us to add power.  We got our power hitting LFer and a closer.  Another bat another starter and let's see if the armchair GM's got it right.

We may not be that far away from a Santander, Alonso, Scherzer, Hoffman, Gimenez, Straw offseason if Rogers has lost their marbles and wants to burn cash and assets.

It would be incredible interesting for this board if that's how this offseason concluded.

This lineup needed a power bat spanning over the last two years regardless. Don't have to be an armchair GM to recognize that.

Whether Santander is the right fit, we'll see. Could backfire if he all of a sudden just becomes a .290 OBP guy with 25 HR's. Let's hope not. Hopefully we get a couple more 40+ HR seasons from him! 

Would be nice if Atkins could continue to add. Alonso or Bregman + Mad Max would be nice final touches! Definitely would bring some excitement heading into the 2025 season!

 

[MikeM2]

22 hr, .310 obp, multiple IL stints

[Jimcanuck]

Just now, Orgfiller said:

For who? There's basically no downside to the team doing deferrals, they have to put the money into escrow anyway, so for them it means paying less now and pocketing/investing the savings into something else.

Of course there is no downside.  Players get paid in USD though.  The money in escrow would be Cdn equivalent.  You can expect the cdn dollar to rebound to its historical norms.  When that happens, the surplus amount in escrow goes to the jays

[Orgfiller]

5 minutes ago, max silver said:

I don't see any conceivable way Vlad would be 2007 Ryan Braun level of bad at third base, at least in the short term. Even as a raw rookie in 2019 he still managed a -3 DRS mark. In his small sample of innings last season he was an even 0 by DRS and a plus 1 defender by OAA. I think the club made a mistake in not deploying him with more frequency at third base last season in a lost season as that was a perfect opportunity to get a better read on the level of defense he could provide in a larger sample. 

You're gonna have a hard time convincing me that a player who is in the 2nd percentile of range at 1B might actually be a viable option at a more difficult position. Vlad, 100 lbs lighter in 2019, was a -20 OAA defender holy s*** that's bad. I hadn't even looked at the data from that far back. Now that he's even less mobile, I'm just not picturing him magically being even a -5 defender level of bad.

[Jays24]

17 minutes ago, jaysblue said:

I already cashed out and got my $100 back haha. 

Haha chicken.  I was being offered 30 bucks from my original 50 bucks and said screw it, let it ride.  If we make the additions we're still being rumored on then I'm gonna feel great lol.

[jaysblue]

7 minutes ago, Brownie19 said:

He has the ability to (I think).  78th percentile sprint speed, essentially the same as Kim.  Of course instincts and stuff matter too - as does getting on-base a lot (something Clement doesn't do, that Kim does).

Yeah Kim's OBP is also far superior, which does allow him to steal more. Makes a difference. You can also hit Kim near the top of the lineup, whereas Clement on a contending team at best could only hit at 8th or 9th. 

I don't have an issue with Clement starting at 3B if the Jays added other bats in the lineup to make up for his spot in the lineup. Ideally, Clement as a super utility guy who can play all over the field and work his way into 300-400 AB's would be better. As well, with Bo likely leaving after 2025, signing Kim might not be a bad thing.