Third Base Is A Spot The Blue Jays Can & Should Upgrade

17 minutes ago, Terminator said:

This whole special budget thing is odd. I get it for Ohtani, who is a legitimate global superstar that would unlock more marketing opportunities for the team.

But Soto is just a really good player. He's not a global superstar and frankly most people wouldn't even recognize him on the street in the US or Canada.

You're telling me that the team can afford to spend 765 mil on Soto but not fractions of that on other good players? Like 180 on Bregman or 100 on Flaherty? Or even 60 on Scott? Or even 400 on Vlad?

Further, given all of Bregman's playoff runs, he's probably just as recognizable as Soto and the marketability gap between the two isn't that great.

Racist! I agree though... they have "deep" pockets for "special" players. Who says Vladdy's not special? I think signing 2-3 big free agents is pretty special. 

Let's say the Jays go out and get Bregman and Santander and somehow manage to find someone to close games without s***ing the bed. Then, miraculously make it into a wildcard spot for the playoffs. Like that is the Uber best case scenario and we would still have to start at minimum a retool for the following years based on the current pipeline. So what's the upside?  I don't get it.  Just start the teardown now.  I don't care how many loony dogs you sell in 2025 or how many sexy wardrobe changes we see from Emily Agard in the Flightdeck. Get to the heart of the matter and start the rebuild from A-ball on up. Every other course of action is just delaying the inevitable. 

37 minutes ago, Omar said:

Let's say the Jays go out and get Bregman and Santander and somehow manage to find someone to close games without s***ing the bed. Then, miraculously make it into a wildcard spot for the playoffs. Like that is the Uber best case scenario and we would still have to start at minimum a retool for the following years based on the current pipeline. So what's the upside?  I don't get it.  Just start the teardown now.  I don't care how many loony dogs you sell in 2025 or how many sexy wardrobe changes we see from Emily Agard in the Flightdeck. Get to the heart of the matter and start the rebuild from A-ball on up. Every other course of action is just delaying the inevitable. 

Best case scenario is the team also signs Vlad to an extension and the team has a pretty solid core for the immediate future. 

22 minutes ago, Laika said:

As a Ross Atkins apologetic maybe I can contort myself into enough of a pretzel to present what they may be thinking. This of course assumes they are acting in pure good faith to the organization and its fans, and not acting in the more likely and obvious way of job preservation or whatever.

The thesis would be twofold:
1) the pipeline isn't as bad as people think
2) the financial flexibility will let them do a quick re-load in any event

RE 1) we will know during 2025 if this is the case because it probably requires several of the guys at or near the MLB level turning into solid long-term regulars. Baseball prospects are just so fickle, a few helium guys or the industry being too low on certain players can move the needle so much. Example, in Feb. 2021 Kiley McDaniel ranked the Astros and Brewers as the 28th and 29th best farm systems and both of those farms ended up producing lots of talent and some star power. 

RE 2) much discussed but Rogers has money and lots of the MLB payroll expires after this year or next, so the team could re-load quickly in free agency, taking on bad contracts to get young players, or diverting resources to the amateur side or pro scouting side somehow. 

Yeah, I don't think the farm is nearly as bad as people are saying. We're lacking the potential star power, but being able to fill in a bunch of slots from the farm with major league regulars and buying stars could definitely work. A lot of highly touted guys struggle at the major league level anyway.

I kind of like the Cards approach from a number of years ago. They drafted "safe" high floor guys and they hit on a decent percentage of them. They didn't have loud tools, but I think many of them became solid MLB regulars.

46 minutes ago, max silver said:

Best case scenario is the team also signs Vlad to an extension and the team has a pretty solid core for the immediate future. 

Well I would dispute that signing Vlad is the best case scenario, there are strong opinions both ways. 

Given that they sign Vlad, who would you list as a pretty solid core  Max, please don't list Gimenez, Varsho, Kirk. 

14 minutes ago, Abomination said:

Yeah, I don't think the farm is nearly as bad as people are saying. We're lacking the potential star power, but being able to fill in a bunch of slots from the farm with major league regulars and buying stars could definitely work. A lot of highly touted guys struggle at the major league level anyway.

I kind of like the Cards approach from a number of years ago. They drafted "safe" high floor guys and they hit on a decent percentage of them. They didn't have loud tools, but I think many of them became solid MLB regulars.

Sure this is sound player management.  But safe high floor guys don't include, Luke's, Tiedmann, Orelvis, Barriera, Maroudis, Bloss.   Not by my reckoning. I'm willing to be corrected here but I just don't see it. 

Perhaps Nimmala becomes a thing but...

13 minutes ago, Omar said:

Well I would dispute that signing Vlad is the best case scenario, there are strong opinions both ways. 

Given that they sign Vlad, who would you list as a pretty solid core  Max, please don't list Gimenez, Varsho, Kirk. 

That core would obviously include the guys you were discussing a best case scenario if they signed with the Blue Jays. Recall that I said that the best case scenario with a Bregman and Santander signing would *also* include a Vlad extension. A core of position players including Vlad, Bregman, Santander, Gimenez, Varsho and Kirk would be a very solid group.

5 hours ago, Omar said:

Let's say the Jays go out and get Bregman and Santander and somehow manage to find someone to close games without s***ing the bed. Then, miraculously make it into a wildcard spot for the playoffs. Like that is the Uber best case scenario and we would still have to start at minimum a retool for the following years based on the current pipeline. So what's the upside?  I don't get it.  Just start the teardown now.  I don't care how many loony dogs you sell in 2025 or how many sexy wardrobe changes we see from Emily Agard in the Flightdeck. Get to the heart of the matter and start the rebuild from A-ball on up. Every other course of action is just delaying the inevitable. 

Well in that scenario the upside would be winning a world series. That’s kinda the goal of all this

12 minutes ago, Stangstag said:

Well in that scenario the upside would be winning a world series. That’s kinda the goal of all this

That's the point. They don't win the WS even if they do all that.

12 hours ago, Omar said:

That's the point. They don't win the WS even if they do all that.

Gotta beat the Dodgers. 

1 hour ago, wilko said:

Gotta beat the Dodgers. 

Like the Diamondbacks did in 2023?  3-0 sweep.

GREAT teams only win a playoff series about 65% of the time.

1 minute ago, Brownie19 said:

Like the Diamondbacks did in 2023?  3-0 sweep.

GREAT teams only win a playoff series about 65% of the time.

Yup, this idea/concept of “a WS contender team” is a myth.

You only need to be a playoff team to win the WS.

You can quickly look at recent winners like the Rangers, Braves, and Nationals to see that a borderline playoff team can still win it all.

The Braves and Nationals specifically had way better teams in other years and didn’t make it to the WS. They both won with pretty weak teams in their respective years.

Just make the f’ing playoffs and hope a guy gets hot.

The Dodgers didn’t win the WS last year because they were the best team. They won the WS because guys like Freeman/Edman/Betts got blazing hot at the right time.

Stroman reunion? Yanks are willing to eat some salary... There's worse #5's out there.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2025/01/marcus-stroman-trade-rumors-yankees-willing-eat-salary.html

Trading for Stroman might make this team unwatchable 

Stroman thought he was gonna go home and be the king of NYC 

Instead he’s left off the playoff roster and they’re gonna pay to have him play for somebody else 

I totally put that in the wrong sub. f***. 

1 hour ago, Stangstag said:

Yup, this idea/concept of “a WS contender team” is a myth.

You only need to be a playoff team to win the WS.

You can quickly look at recent winners like the Rangers, Braves, and Nationals to see that a borderline playoff team can still win it all.

The Braves and Nationals specifically had way better teams in other years and didn’t make it to the WS. They both won with pretty weak teams in their respective years.

Just make the f’ing playoffs and hope a guy gets hot.

The Dodgers didn’t win the WS last year because they were the best team. They won the WS because guys like Freeman/Edman/Betts got blazing hot at the right time.

They won 98 regular season games, the most in the league

1 minute ago, wilko said:

I totally put that in the wrong sub. f***. 

Frick I hate when that happens!

7 minutes ago, L54 said:

Stroman thought he was gonna go home and be the king of NYC 

Instead he’s left off the playoff roster and they’re gonna pay to have him play for somebody else 

Seems a bit like karma biting him in the ass. I recall he trashed the Blue Jays clubhouse years ago when the team dared to trade him to the Mets instead of his preferred New York team in the Yankees. I loved watching that guy pitch when he was a Jay but the massive Napoleon complex and constant chip on his shoulder and associated drama got old in a real hurry.

Just now, Laika said:

Dude soft-ruined his career with a few weird choices. 

He could have been a power pitcher with tons of whiffs but intentionally became a groundball pitch-to-contact guy. This made his numbers boring and probably kept his upside down. 

That's certainly possible. I think he had a bit of a Halladay light package in that he could paint both sides of the plate with sinkers and cutters but I agree it's like he basically turned himself into an innings eater instead of a true top of the rotation guy. He's still had a very nice career at any rate although he may be reaching the end of it pretty quickly. Perhaps he can transition to a pen guy eventually to see if the stuff ticks up a bit in shorter (pun intended) outings where he can air things out a bit.

Stroman's velocity drop last year is a bit concerning.  He's annoying on social media, but a pre-2024 Stroman could definitely help this team. 

Honestly, I'd rather sign Quantrill at a fraction of the price, but I'm not about to turn down upgrades right now (unless it comes at the expense of a big bat).

On 1/10/2025 at 1:51 PM, Laika said:

Dude soft-ruined his career with a few weird choices. 

He could have been a power pitcher with tons of whiffs but intentionally became a groundball pitch-to-contact guy. This made his numbers boring and probably kept his upside down. 

I agree, what an odd choice to knowingly move to a contact pitcher early in his career, he's no Doc Halladay... he should've been adjusting to command and contact at this point in his career now.

1 hour ago, max silver said:

Seems a bit like karma biting him in the ass. I recall he trashed the Blue Jays clubhouse years ago when the team dared to trade him to the Mets instead of his preferred New York team in the Yankees. I loved watching that guy pitch when he was a Jay but the massive Napoleon complex and constant chip on his shoulder and associated drama got old in a real hurry.

It was hilarious to watch Atkins trade him to the Mets, almost as if it was an F U to him. Probably the most alpha thing he has done and it was HIGH on the alpha scale 

1 hour ago, Laika said:

Dude soft-ruined his career with a few weird choices. 

He could have been a power pitcher with tons of whiffs but intentionally became a groundball pitch-to-contact guy. This made his numbers boring and probably kept his upside down. 

Ive never thought of this I always just thought he was great at getting GB’s

You think he could’ve gotten more whiffs?