Laika

One more point on the "they need to add a bat" argument. Last year they did desperately add TWO bats and neither worked out. Gimenez and Santander. Instead, what worked out last year was their ability to produce and develop talent from AAA. The heroes were Barger, Clement, Lukes, and to a lesser extent Heinemann, Straw and Schneider. And improve what they had (Kirk, Springer). It may be reasonable for the organization to lean into that strength, not panic, and instead properly value their unseen but MLB ready guys like Kasevich and Schreck. Or properly project for internal growth from certain players.

Maybe more of a Bo vs Gimenez thing Steamer says Gimenez is fine and will be a 95 wRC+ bat but he was a 70 last year and 83 the year before. Clement's projection range is wild. 78 wRC+ from The Bat and 100 from Steamer. Logically Bo covers off THREE separate risks: That Ernie is a bench player who just had a good run from 2024-2025. He's 30 soon, so this is possible. That Gimenez just cannot hit anymore. Obviously possible. That Okamoto won't transition to MLB. Obviously possible. Without Bo the Blue Jays can only cover one of these downsides, probably by sliding Barger to 3rd and moving other parts around. You also don't really want Barger to be a critical depth piece for both the OF and IF, and he presently is one in the OF because Santander is a pile of poo.

I think there must be something to the idea that "elite players are more likely to perform against elite opponents" and that those situations would come up more often in the playoffs but it's just a premise, and of course anecdotes and problematic sample sizes make it noisy to examine

It would mostly be an October signing. In the playoffs you want the peak talent guy who can hit a 3 run homer off Ohtani

The Roster Resource payroll pages have the annual breakdown and it is even worse. Dude could make $152m in two years and then opt out and try for a $300m contract into retirement. At $76M I don't even understand it for the Dodgers. You are paying a guy to be worth 6+ WAR and he has never done it? And that's before the luxury tax cost. $76,000,000 $76,000,000 $44,000,000 $44,000,000

At least some of these Dodgers contracts are actually massive, and the league has appropriately price-enforced. They are rich as hell but every organization has a limit and who knows, maybe some of these players crumble and they end up with an inflexible and less competitive roster for years. Ohtani could break. Mookie already looks a bit old. Scamamoto is a pitcher. Tucker doesn't even like baseball and might be the biggest Rendon risk since Rendon himself. Snell is a stoner frog.

The deferred money would be specific to a year and earned in that year, just paid later. If there is $5 deferred from 2026, then yeah he earns that money in 2026 by playing so he gets it down the line.

I just don't think they need to panic for a bat. Bo and Bellinger and flawed players. There is a price point where they make sense. Let's see what they get first. I would hate to see a panic contract for Bo where he gets some massive 8 year deal from Toronto. There will be other chances to add talent. Trades, etc. The free agency lists in 2027 and 2028 look weaker but a lot can change, players develop etc.

You could say that his plate discipline skills are elite. Maybe "barrel control" or something like that. As far as traditional tools go, no nothing is elite. One of those soft five tool guys where it is more 50s and 60s across the board. He's actually quite similar to Alex Bregman, except Bregman has the plus 3B defense as an additional carrying tool.

Would not say needed. Here are the team fWAR projections: The Jays are already slight favourites in the AL. It would be nice to add 1 or 2 WAR there and become the favourites by a bit more, but I am not sure they need to be desperate to add those wins. The team is already solid and the depth chart is solid. Dodgers 32.6 21.9 54.4 Blue Jays 28.1 18.6 46.7 Braves 28.1 18.1 46.1 Yankees 29.8 16.3 46.1 Mariners 27.9 17.1 45.0 Red Sox 21.8 22.4 44.2 Mets 28.6 14.8 43.4 Orioles 29.1 14.0 43.1 Phillies 22.9 20.2 43.0 Astros 27.4 14.9 42.3 Cubs 27.4 13.9 41.3 Padres 26.4 14.6 41.0 Royals 24.0 16.8 40.9 Tigers 21.6 19.1 40.7 Brewers 23.7 16.7 40.4 Rangers 24.4 14.7 39.1 Twins 22.8 16.0 38.8 Diamondbacks 26.3 11.8 38.2 Rays 21.4 15.6 37.0 Athletics 24.9 10.7 35.6 Reds 19.4 15.9 35.4 Giants 23.6 11.3 34.9 Pirates 17.9 16.7 34.6 Guardians 22.3 12.0 34.3 Cardinals 23.8 9.4 33.2 Marlins 17.8 14.6 32.3 Angels 17.7 13.3 31.0 Nationals 17.8 11.5 29.2 White Sox 18.6 10.0 28.6 Rockies 12.3 7.1 19.4

The weird thing about this, and why it sits so poorly with MLB fans other than Dodgers fans, is that Kyle Tucker is NOT A SUPERSTAR. Why should a 4 win player with below average bat speed and average corner OF defense be setting AAV records? If someone like Soto or Ohtani took a bonkers AAV on a short term deal, sure fine, but this is just WEIRD. Much easier to wrap your head around a 10 year deal for a normal AAV like $35M, since he is young and should be solid for a while. But this contract is WEIRD.

Bo and Bellinger are salivating but the last thing you want is to see your team panic and overpay one of them

Guy is a clown for tweeting about this at all lmao.

Tucker to Toronto is guaranteed now. Cohen would not say that if he was going to the Mets. He would know what was going on if that were the case.

Bellinger is just a bizarre free agent. His seasons have been so up and down and his splits (L v R and home v road) in recent years are all over the place. He also looks like a stoner. I don't really want him on a deal like he is rumoured to get (5 years+ $30m+) I would assume he's a minus CF going forward as well

BA Blurbs In 2025, the Blue Jays signed Dominican shortstop Juan Sanchez, who hit .341/.449/.565 in 253 plate appearances in the Dominican Summer League. He’s already a top 10 prospect in the organization and tracking as one of the best Latin American position prospects Toronto has signed in several years. This year’s international class for the Blue Jays again leans heavily into hitters. Venezuelan catcher Juan Caricote ($1.95 million) has a good balance of skills in the batter’s box and behind the plate. He projects to stick at catcher, where he’s an advanced receiver comfortable handling high-end velocity. He’s athletic and agile, helping him block balls in the dirt. It’s not elite raw arm strength, but he projects to have at least an average arm once he’s physically mature. Caricote has a lean build for a catcher with a swing that’s loose, fluid and whippy from the left side and the strength projection to grow into a 15-plus home run hitter. Michael Mesa, signing for $900,000, is a lefthanded outfielder from the Dominican Republic with a strong, physically mature build for his age at 6-foot-1, 190 pounds who stood out early in the scouting process for his offensive upside. It’s a sound, slight uppercut lefthanded stroke, and while he’s still learning to recognize breaking stuff, he has the strength behind that swing to drive the ball well to both gaps and over the fence to his pull side. Mesa likely settles into an outfield corner, but he has improved his speed over the past year to become an average runner, giving him a chance to move around all three outfield spots at the lower levels. Dominican outfielder Aneudy Severino, signing for $700,000, is a talented player with an unconventional look. At 5-foot-9, he’s on the shorter side, but it’s a powerful build that’s extraordinarily strong for his age. His strength and bat speed allow him to drive the ball with high-end exit velocity from the right side of the plate, albeit with a flatter path for now that’s more conducive to loud line drives than loft. Severino is an above-average runner, though with a thicker body type that should get wider and could lead his speed to back up, there’s a good chance he gravitates to an outfield corner. Shortstop Sebastian Casanova from Venezuela is an excellent athlete with premium speed. At 5-foot-10, 175 pounds, he’s a plus-plus runner with explosive lower-half athleticism to play all over the field. He has experience both in the infield and in center field and should play somewhere up the middle, whether it’s a shortstop, second base or in center. He’s a hard-nosed player with good all-around instincts, a line-drive approach and gap power with an all-fields approach from the right side of the plate. Venezuelan shortstop Gabriel Porras is just 5-foot-7, 160 pounds, but he could end up a sneaky value signing. He has a relatively clean swing from both sides of the plate and good bat control to make contact at a high clip with gap power. It’s a good blend of game skills and athleticism with above-average speed and a middle infield profile, whether it ends up being at shortstop or second base.

good thing I'm not a whiny pissant anyway

perfectly fine! not my money!

8*40 = 320 10*32 = 320 You could think about B as A with deferrals.

Ugh the Red Sox rotation + rotation depth is annoyingly good Outside looking in: all of Early, Tolle, Crawford, Harrison, Sandoval, Houck I guess they might trade Bello. Some rumours they wanted to.

91 poo in the AL East Dude's gonna age like Nestor Cortes

The annoying thing is that the Dodgers SHOULD. Their OF is kind of poo for a team that should be elite everywhere. LF and RF both project to be just average

Translation - Tucker is signing with Toronto but using the Mets to try and milk more money out of Rogers

Feels like teams were trying to hold the line on contracts for the big bats but are now panicking and looking at the next two free agency classes and we might see some silly numbers 4/$200 for Tucker 8/$240 for Bo 6/$180 for Belllinger stuff like that

Carlos are you okay