Red Sox (Tolle) vs Blue Jays (Scherzer): 08/13/26, 3:07 PM

[Laika]

59 minutes ago, jaysblue said:

Defensively, Gimenez is a wizard, and he’s actually having an even better season in the field than he did last year. He’s already up to 2.1 WAR and should probably finish somewhere around 3 WAR. Offensively, if he ends up around .250 with 10–12 HR, 20 SB and an 80–90 wRC+, I can live with that considering everything he gives you defensively. He's a solid player and the Jays could do a lot worse at shortstop. 

The bigger issue is that the Jays simply have too many noodle bats in the lineup at the same time: Clement (98 wRC+), Lukes (96), Straw (70), Bateman (83), Kirk (95), Vladdy (97) and Springer (100).

Obviously, Kirk, Vladdy and Springer regressing this badly has hurt them tremendously. But even coming into the season, the Jays were still planning on regularly running out Gimenez, Clement and Lukes. That worked last year because they had Vladdy, Kirk, Springer, Bo and a healthy Barger producing at a high level, along with Varsho when he was healthy.

That’s why the priority this offseason has to be adding as much offense as possible, regardless of where it comes from. If Gimenez and Clement are both going to be everyday players again, you need to compensate for that elsewhere in the lineup and if the plan is also to give Bateman or Straw significant everyday ABs in CF, then yikes. At that point, adding a legitimate bat in LF becomes even more important.

This free agent crop is setting up to be a disaster for whoever plays around, for bats

The Jays would risk another Santander situation 

Jazz, Randy, B Lowe, Arraez, Happ, Grisham, Suzuki, Torres, Varsho, Ward, Springer...

 

I don't want ANY PART of that list other than short term commitments. If someone like Taylor Ward signs a pillow contract I am all over it but otherwise it's Lane Thomas and trade explorations, for me. 

Rando Arozarena is obviously good and desirable but in this climate he is probably getting paid huge. 

[Brownie19]

5 minutes ago, Laika said:

This free agent crop is setting up to be a disaster for whoever plays around, for bats

The Jays would risk another Santander situation 

Jazz, Randy, B Lowe, Arraez, Happ, Grisham, Suzuki, Torres, Varsho, Ward, Springer...

I don't want ANY PART of that list other than short term commitments. If someone like Taylor Ward signs a pillow contract I am all over it but otherwise it's Lane Thomas and trade explorations, for me. 

Rando Arozarena is obviously good and desirable but in this climate he is probably getting paid huge. 

I tend to agree. Randy or Suzuki are both pretty good fits for us in LF, but both are entering their age 32 season.  You'd love either on a 3 year deal, but there's a lot of risk in something more - and as the top 2 bats on the market, I fully expect they're going to get more - probably a lot more term.

I know there's often very little good new for the Jays, but the positions we're looking to fill are LF and maybe DH.  Those positions are often some of the easiest to fill and don't required huge doll hairs.

That said, we may also need to fill CF, and that's going to be hard and costly...(c'mon Batman - we need you to be the guy)

[max silver]

17 hours ago, Masterbather said:

Well at least we got rid of Hoffman eh? Thank goodness we don't have him as an option anymore😒

I'd happily take Nance back as well. The Jays lower leverage group is downright horrible at the moment and it's too damn bad Nance was out of options as he was a solid contributor for the club.

[Laika]

Cease, Soriano, Yesavage, Ponce, Miles, Spaghetti (options), Berrios, Bloss (am told he will get a 4th option), Bowden (will he get an option?), King, Stanifer --> ROTATION IS MOSTLY FINE, JUST NEEDS DEPTH PIECES

Varland, Rogers, Fluharty, Fisher --> BULLPEN NEEDS WORK IN OFFSEASON, TIME FOR RICKY T TO JUST RELIEVE I THINK. THIS SUCKS TO BE HONEST. 

Oka 3B, Gime SS, Clem 2B, Vlad 1B, Kirk C, Bateman CF, Lukes LF, Barger RF, Santa DH
BN - Val, Smith, McAdoo, Keys

THIS TEAM WILL SCORE NO RUNS. 
OFFENSE NEEDED - RHB PREFERABLE - OF THE OBVIOUS HOLE

Maybe it does make sense to just spend on Randy or Suzuki...