Laika

And there's a chance he rebounds. He was a 3 WAR pitcher for four years in a row before 2018. He was excellent in Toronto so obviously likes pitching here. If he bounces back high enough, that 2021 vesting option might not look that bad. Biggest reason to avoid doing it at this juncture is that it would still be preferable to land, say, Ryu and Lindblom. Happ should be more of a "well, f*** - we got nobody" move.

I don't even think Andujar should have huge value. He was above average in 2018 but had some big flaws - a brutal fielder who does not walk. It's unsurprising that he projects poorly. I don't think he's obviously the type of position player that even gets tendered all the way through arbitration. Happ + Andujar for some token player that New York finds useful seems fair enough to me. Alternatively, Toronto could try to involve Ken Giles while getting significant prospect capital either instead of Andujar or along with him. Happ + Andujar + Frazier + Clarke Schmidt for Giles + filler. It will never happen because it would make New York look weak but I honestly think it's fair. That's $9M in 2020 salary relief for New York plus relief from Happ's potential 2021 salary. Andujar does not project well despite his strong 2018. Frazier does not project well despite his pedigree and he's also out of favour in New York. Their bullpen would be f***ing insane.

I'm down for taking Happ if the Yankees make it worth the Blue Jays' while. Heck, if he bounces back the 2021 option vesting would not be a horrible thing. They can make it worth it for Toronto with a B/B+ prospect or like, $7M.

This reminds me of several guys in our dynasty leagues. Honestly I think it's great news that the Blue Jays do due diligence on the entire market. Why would you want a team to do anything less than that? That's sublime coverage and their sense of the market probably helped them pull the trigger on the Chase Anderson move, which I think was good. There's a lot of time to add SP talent and free agent talent. If the 2021 roster has holes in it then the process has been flawed, but until then we can't say that. There's a chance that they strike out on significant additions this offseason but they are not really in a position where they should be doing anything over the top anyway so that might be fine.

Apparently the draft event will be in Omaha instead of New Jersey and a little bit later this year. More prospects are expected to attend now.

Not really, the variance is just higher in either direction; they could very well be much better or much worse.

Yeah I don't think this is trending well for Toronto. Once Cole and Strasburg are off the board, LAD will probably re-sign Ryu and some other teams like the White Sox or Twins will overpay for Keuchel and Bumgarner. Then Lindblom will probably break Toronto's hearts (and mine). I feel like this is trending towards, at best, a couple of awkward pacts with ugly has-beens like Wacha, Teheran, Jimmer Nelson, Matty Moore, or Kevin Gooseman.

To a lesser extent the Liriano - McGuire deal is an example. Hilarious how the Pirates are now looking for a decent young C. The Cubs would probably add grade B or C prospects to shed enough salary.

Also this guy's name is Yoshi Sugo. C'monnnn just sign him now

The general sentiment about supplementing now is correct, but I think the Lester hypothetical is taking it a bit too far.

In free agency there are no other options that combine what Yoshi would offer: a position player under 30 years old with upside, no demonstrated MLB failure, team control, at a potentially reasonable rate. This is as close as you can get in free agency: Addison Russell - 26, 4.118 service time, big off-the-field warts Jose Peraza - 26, 3.141 service time Domingo Santana - 27, 4.024 service time, replacement level two seasons in a row Maikel Franco - 27, 4.157 service time, replacement level over the last three seasons Ryon Healy - 28, 3.080 service time, sucks Greg Bird - 27, 4.053 service time, replacement level career and has had 12 surgeries Yolmer Sanchez - 28, 4.143 service time, one dimensional player already too expensive through arbitration Guillermo Heredia - 29, 3.054 service time, replacement level He also fits the roster (team need) and the timeline. It will be egregious if Yoshi is not a Blue Jay this month.

Brennen Davis is one of the Cubs' only really intriguing prospects. I know this is all just hypothetical but they really aren't shipping him out to save money. In looking to dump salary the Cubs will be trying to offload Darvish, Heyward, and Chatwood. They would give Lester away or pay some cash considerations for someone to take him. You might be able to talk them into offloading Kyle Hendricks' contract for a prospect, which is what I would be most interested in.

Even if some of the concerns are with merit he could be a useful long-term player especially with the 26th man. The shiny comparison would be the man himself, Eric Thames, who has 4.9 fWAR over the last three years in about ~1200 PA, so not a full time role for most of it but the strong side of a platoon. Yoshi could be worse than that and still worth keeping. If it's a simple 2 or 3 year deal the team would retain six years of control over him through arbitration. I think it's a pretty standard clause though for foreign veterans to negotiate that the team can't offer them arbitration at the end of the contract term (has to non-tender and let them be a free agent). So what you can see with younger players is multiple years of team options (see Kikuchi.) It's like a right of first refusal on an extension, if he's any good. We might see something similar. I think Kikuchi's deal is 3 years guaranteed, then basically a four year extension past that at 16.5 AAV that the team has to exercise all at once at the end of the third year. Or you might just see a longer term deal like with Maeda. I think if a team is investing in Yoshi they want a chance to profit if the upside comes to fruition so a basic 2 year deal isn't the goal.

With any luck you'll croak this season and then you won't have to suffer the Blue Jays anymore

interesting also, hendricks

Yoshitomo Tsutsugo is really a great target for Toronto for so many reasons.

It was a joke projection. Next time I will make it more obvious and say he will hit .420 with 69 homerz or something nice like that.

Not many qualified NPB hitters have come to MLB in recent years. There's Ohtani, but he's incomparable. Dae-Ho Lee came for one year but he was 34. Gurriel spent a season in Yoshitomo Tsutsugo's league in 2014, two years before he came to MLB, so if you want to use one guy as a projection basis he would be the one.

.220 with 23 home runs and 69 runs batted home and 3 steals

Cool if true.

Going over my depth chart. I think I'd like to trade for a SP upgrade over Eric Lauer or even an elite RP. Willing to move Jarren Duran who hit .387/.456/.543 in A+ last year as part of the deal. Can also include Clint Frazier, Christian Walker, Posey, certain others.

If only you were a mod and could do something about useless troll posters

Toronto is kind of being pinched out of the upper and middle portions of the free agent SP market. Cole and Strasburg are not on the table, Ryu probably isn't, Bumgarner is a scary thought, and who knows about Keuchel. There are lots of options left - dozens of veteran starting pitchers looking for teams. A good portion of them are reclamation project types though. If you sort by projected WAR, immediately after Bumgarner you get to guys like Porcello, Wood, Martin Perez - guys all coming off of mediocre or bad seasons. There is a lonnnnng list of these guys though. Like I said, dozens and dozens. Toronto is going to be in the Dollarama free agent SP market in all likelihood, picking their favourite two reclamation project dudes. Rick Porcello SP R R BOS 31 10.170 1.8 1.9 3 $36.0M $12.0M Martín Pérez SP L L MIN 29 7.038 1.9 1.9 Kevin Gausman SP/RP L R CIN 29 5.151 1.6 1.7 Alex Wood SP R L CIN 29 6.123 -0.2 1.7 Homer Bailey SP R R OAK 34 11.017 2.9 1.6 1 $5.0M $5.0M Tanner Roark SP R R OAK 33 6.055 2.0 1.6 2 $20.0M $10.0M Wade Miley SP L L HOU 33 8.025 2.0 1.6 2 $16.0M $8.0M Brett Anderson SP L L OAK 32 10.135 2.0 1.5 1 $5.0M $5.0M Gio Gonzalez SP R L MIL 34 10.146 1.4 1.5 2 $20.0M $10.0M Rich Hill SP L L LAD 40 10.127 0.9 1.4 1 $10.0M $10.0M Jordan Lyles SP R R MIL 29 8.002 1.6 1.4 2 $12.0M $6.0M Iván Nova SP R R CHW 33 9.024 2.0 1.3 2 $14.3M $7.2M Jhoulys Chacín SP R R BOS 32 9.054 -0.1 1.2 1 $4.0M $4.0M Matt Moore SP L L DET 31 8.000 0.5 0.9 1 $2.0M $2.0M Michael Wacha SP R R STL 28 6.062 -0.2 0.9 Jimmy Nelson SP R R MIL 31 5.107 -0.1 0.9 Taijuan Walker SP R R ARI 27 5.142 0.0 0.9 Drew Smyly SP L L PHI 31 7.143 -0.3 0.8 1 $3.0M $3.0M Félix Hernández SP R R SEA 34 14.060 -0.1 0.8 1 $2.5M $2.5M Jason Vargas SP L L PHI 37 12.114 1.8 0.8 Clay Buchholz SP L R TOR 35 11.021 0.1 0.6 1 $4.5M $4.5M Tyson Ross SP R R DET 33 8.118 -0.0 0.6 Clayton Richard SP/RP L L TOR 36 9.160 -0.2 0.6 1 $2.0M $2.0M Robbie Erlin SP/RP R L SDP 29 5.045 0.5 0.6 Andrew Cashner SP/RP R R BOS 33 9.126 1.8 0.6 Collin McHugh SP/RP R R HOU 33 6.085 0.5 0.6 2 $10.0M $5.0M Aaron Sanchez SP R R HOU 27 5.069 0.8 0.5 Julio Teheran SP R R ATL 29 7.062 1.6 0.5 Josh Lindblom SP R R KBO 33 1.151 0.4 2 $8.5M $4.3M Cody Anderson SP R R CLE 29 3.116 0.1 0.4 Jesse Hahn SP R R KCR 30 4.067 -0.1 0.4 Matt Harvey SP R R OAK 31 7.016 -0.3 0.4 Chad Bettis SP/RP R R COL 31 5.096 0.1 0.3 Jeremy Hellickson SP R R WSN 33 9.041 0.1 0.3 Edinson Vólquez SP/RP R R TEX 36 11.059 -0.2 0.3 Wade LeBlanc SP L L SEA 35 6.131 -0.3 0.3 Derek Holland RP/SP S L CHC 33 10.105 -1.0 0.3 Tommy Milone SP L L SEA 33 6.113 0.1 0.2 Trevor Cahill SP/RP R R LAA 32 10.098 -0.8 0.2 Shelby Miller SP R R TEX 29 6.093 -0.2 0.2 Ross Detwiler SP/RP R L CHW 34 7.011 -0.6 0.2 Ervin Santana SP R R NYM 37 13.123 -0.4 0.1 Jerad Eickhoff SP/RP R R PHI 29 4.028 -0.4 0.1 Wei-Yin Chen SP R L MIA 34 8.000 -0.4 0.1 Edwin Jackson SP R R DET 36 12.158 -1.1 0.1 Marco Estrada SP R R OAK 36 10.018 -0.2 0.0 James Shields SP R R CHW 38 12.125 0.0 Steven Wright SP/RP R R BOS 35 5.012 -0.3 -0.0 Rico Garcia SP R R SFG 26 0.034 -0.3 -0.0 Kohl Stewart SP R R MIN 25 0.094 -0.2 -0.0 Josh Tomlin RP/SP R R ATL 35 9.033 0.2 -0.1 Danny Salazar SP/RP R R CLE 30 5.162 -0.2 -0.3

Demar Derozan was the Raptors' Joe Carter. A sports franchise can only have one Joe Carter. Kyle Lowry is the Raptors' Jose Bautista.

Marte is real good and if Pittsburgh wants catching prospects Toronto has them. Jansen, McGuire, Moreno, Kirk, and Adams. I don't think Toronto will be super into it though. Marte with the option exercised is 2/$24. Trading prospect capital to pay Marte that much and then have him leave might not make sense. I think Toronto would be more inclined to just get a one year stop-gap bat from free agency. Marte is a real nice finishing piece on a competitive team but is he what Toronto needs? Brett Gardner might sign a one year deal for $10M. Avisail Garcia is a cheaper/worse FA option. Kole Calhoun, Corey Dickerson... there are options that wont cost prospects so won't sacrifice any potential future.