John_Havok

Fair to call Cease a right handed version of Snell? with a bit of a difference in how pitches are mixed. Comparatively... Snell's career stuff+ 103, Location+ 104, Pitching+ 110 (main pitches in descending order of % thrown- 4seam, change, curve, slider) Cease's career stuff+ 107, Location+100, Pitching+ 107 (main pitches, 4seam, slider, curve - then sinker/sweeper/change)

Until you supplement those kids with proven talent, they have all the prospects they want, most of them will fail. Granted, even proven talent doesnt guarantee WS wins, but its sure more fun as a fan to watch repeated playoff runs and knowing your GM is ready to go get what they need when they need it. Also, bear in mind with all the extra picks every year, their development system may not even be that much better, its just a numbers game. After 10 years of 2+ extra picks every year, most of them in the top 70... youre gonna hit on a few more just on dumb luck alone

As with many guys, his stuff would likely play up as a 1 inning guy where he can air it out. Can you imagine that bi-eye colored nutcase staring you down in the 7th or 8th? Plus, he very clearly wants to come back to Toronto. Yes, theres plenty of reasons this wouldn't happen, but its not a terrible idea and shouldnt be Plan A, but as far as backup plans go when other options disappear... sure

Perhaps when pitchers get hurt there might be an opportunity, but I largely agree the Jays are stuck with him, and its not the worst problem to have. In a perfect world, his arm heals fully and he gets back to his norms for 2026, opts out, declines a QO and gets signed elsewhere. Granted at point the rotation will need to replace Gausman and Berrios, but theres lots of time to solve that eventuality

Why do you think this? Backing up opinions with rationale is usually helpful in creating discourse.

With Vlad Sr's propensity to procreate with multiple women (not judging) Vlad Jr is probably cousin or cousin-in-law to half the DR.

Scherzer coming back as a leverage reliever would be the tits if he was willing (maybe he would?) I'm okay with moving on from Bassitt as it looks incredibly unlikely Berrios can be moved. One can hope, but the chances seem remote.

Not gonna bother looking up average # of starts over the past few years for Gausman, Berrios and Cease because it would probably be quicker to count the # of starts they didnt make. All extremely durable. Bieber's health will be a concern no doubt Yesavage likely won't have much in the way of limitations ... 98 IP in the minors, 14 reg season and just short of 28 in the post-season so... 140 IP in 2025. some turns skipped here and there down the stretch to keep him fresh for the playoffs but other than that.... That's a pretty worry-free rotation when it comes to overall pitcher health.

I mean, if there was a signing other than Imai where you now feel fantastic with Lauer in the pen, this would be it. 2 lost picks but hey, the chips are going into the middle now.

The IED of baseball.

they've got plenty to throw around yet, especially with the deferrals. Bo or Tucker are still very gettable

Gotta be close to the top for MLB alone. Adjusting Chris Davis' contract to current dollars probably makes it arguably worse than Rendon's but ... its gotta be top 1-3 worst in MLB history for sure. i don't follow the NFL or NBA close enough to make judgements there, but Rick Dipietro's 15 year deal when it was signed... That's easily the worst one in NHL history, though Alexei Yashin's 10 year was also a massive bust. With the cap era and new limits on contracts in the NHL it's pretty hard to sign anything that completely hamstrings a team now.

First off, I am generally the smartest guy in every room. Deal with it. My brain works on a level that is so wildly different from normals it's incredibly tedious to dumb things down suitably enough to be understood. There's no irony involved. You stated " i don't see why they would do this unless they think Bo is gone" Hence, me teaching you why they would do this without knowing a damn thing about where Bo is signing. It was 100% a teachable moment, because you overtly displayed ignorance of why a GM in baseball would want to have options. Your statement suggests that unless they know Bo isn't signing, there's no reason to be checking in on other players and/or getting a feel for the landscape of who other GMs may or may not be willing to deal. That's dumb. That's literally 90% of the FOs job. Their job is literally to prepare for as many situations as possible and have backup plans for their backup plans backup plan. Excuse me now, Ross and I are having dinner later. I'll tell him your thoughts on his process in case he wants to hear a joke.

I didn't say he was 90% of Marte AT THIS MOMENT. Just that going forward, looking at the 2 guys, taking expected age related decline into account for Marte and the best years of Barger coming up...he could be 90% of Marte fairly quickly. And getting that for league min and a few arb years sure beats paying Marte till he's 38. Age 32 season is 2026. I suppose a lot would depend on whether you believe Barger has improvement upcoming or not. I do. The way he performed in the playoffs shows there's more there. It would not shock me in the slightest to see Barger drop 30 HRs in 2026 while playing acceptable to plus D at 3b/RF. Probably wouldn't have Marte's avg or walk rate thought that's less likely. Marte is the better player now, you're right and I don't think that's arguable. But projecting who I'd rather have on the Jays for the next 6 seasons, when taking salary, age and other variables into account... I'll take Barger.

I don't think you'd even put Barger on the table. He's got every tool to produce 90% of Marte with 6 more seasons of control, half of them at league minimum. The value offset in contract status and age is pretty immense, not to mention they kinda need Barger to play the field somewhere going forward. I would expect Nimmala + someone else to be in the deal but Barger would not be the main piece. Barger is a no go for many reasons.

From Keegan Matheson mlb.com on the jays and Imai: puff piece with nothing substantive of course, but here it is. TORONTO -- Tatsuya Imai wants to do what the Blue Jays just came so close to doing. The 27-year-old Japanese star is coming to Major League Baseball, posted earlier this month by the Saitama Seibu Lions with a signing window that expires Jan. 2. Even with the Dodgers already so rich in starting pitching, Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki have made it easy to draw a straight line between “star Japanese free agent” and Los Angeles. Well, maybe not this time. Recently, Imai appeared on the show “Hodo Station” and spoke with Daisuke Matsuzaka ahead of his decision. "Of course, I’d enjoy playing alongside Ohtani, Yamamoto and Sasaki," Imai told Matsuzaka, "but winning against a team like that and becoming a world champion would be the most valuable thing in my life. If anything, I'd rather take them down." Enter the Blue Jays, who have long been interested in landing a Japanese star. This isn’t just about Ohtani and that failed pursuit from the 2023-24 offseason, either, it’s about a broader, organizational desire to establish the Blue Jays as a brand in Asia. It’s about baseball, yes, but it’s also about business, trying to find their own slice of Japan’s baseball culture, eyeballs and dollars included. "If there were another Japanese player on the same team, I could just ask them about anything, right?" Imai continued. "But that’s actually not what I’m looking for. In a way, I want to experience that sense of survival. When I come face-to-face with cultural differences, I want to see how I can overcome them on my own -- that’s part of what I’m excited about.” It’s a fascinating look into the mind of Imai. At the core of this is still a young man leaving his home -- and his team of nine years -- to move to a foreign country where he doesn’t speak the language. The cultural norms are different. The food is different. The cities are different. The game itself is different, so targeting a team with a fellow Japanese player would be completely understandable. That’s clearly not a concern for Imai, though, another point in favor of the Blue Jays if they choose to pursue Imai more aggressively as his market unfolds over the next six weeks. The Blue Jays have no Japanese players on their current 40-man roster, their last being Yusei Kikuchi, who was signed in 2022 and traded to the Astros in ‘24. Both Kikuchi and Korean lefty Hyun Jin Ryu commanded their own travelling press corps in their time with Toronto, Ryu’s often pushing well past a dozen reporters and cameras. Kikuchi, even on road trips, could have four, six or 10 reporters following his every move. The spotlight would shine even brighter on a pitcher of Imai’s talent, which is all part of what the Blue Jays are chasing. Wins. Whiffs. Strikeouts. Eyeballs. On the mound, the 5-foot-11 Imai is no intimidating physical force, but his fastball reaches into the upper-90s with a slider, changeup and splitter. Last season in Japan, he posted a 1.92 ERA with 178 strikeouts over 163 2/3 innings. He won’t land a megadeal like Yamamoto’s (12 years, $325 million), but perhaps something in the range of Kevin Gausman’s five-year, $110 million deal is a better starting point for conversations, at least in terms of annual value The Blue Jays have major rotation questions beyond 2026, which is work they’ll need to get ahead of. The market offers Dylan Cease, Ranger Suárez, Framber Valdez, Michael King and others on top of trade candidates, but at 27, Imai is one of the few available pitchers entering his physical prime years. The variable, of course, is how Imai will adapt to Major League hitters. "In MLB, the average height for a hitter is higher than in Japan, so I focus on throwing a rising, high fastball from that low release -- almost like I’m driving it upward from below,” Imai told Matsuzaka. “I’m very conscious about not throwing downhill from over the top.” From what little we know of Imai in North America so far, he’s taken an intriguing, impressive approach to this jump to MLB. He’ll need to land in the right situation to continue his development, but the Blue Jays offer so much of this at the highest levels, from their facilities to a coaching staff with a track record of taking solid starting pitchers and turning them up a notch. The Blue Jays were, on a dozen different occasions, an inch away from beating the Dodgers. The entire baseball world saw it. Imai had to see it, too.

TODAY: Imai has officially been posted, as the league informed teams today. Imai’s posting window opens tomorrow at 7am CT and closes on January 2 at 4pm CT. Let the games begin. The usual suspects will be present... Giants, Phillies, Jays, Dodgers, Mets, Yankees, Cubs maybe. Any dark horses worth mentioning? MLBTR is predicting a 6 year 150m type of deal.

i love you man

Yep, pretty much par for the course from the end of world series to the start of Spring Training. Team X is interested in free agent player Y. Team X is checking in with Team Z about Player Y but nothing is considered serious at this time. A bot could write these tweets with just a list of player and team names, hit randomize. Just eliminate all the ones that deal with Baltimore, Kansas City, Pittsburgh and Colorado and free agents and they'd probably be accurate

Dammit Spanky, this is a direct reference to the other thread.

Counterpoint though, as you said the age difference is significant in that the downturn of Marte is probably a lot closer than the downturn of Bo. You'd likely project Bo to give you more seasons of impact than Marte. Don't know why were even talking about it though. Bo hasn't signed elsewhere yet, this is something they shouldn't even be considering until it's confirmed Bo isn't coming back. That's when you start looking for solutions, only after the problem is confirmed.

Javy Baez-lite?

I fully own that I was being a dick. Because your post was dumb. If calling a dumb post dumb hurts your feelings... life sucks, get a helmet. The FO is running a multi-billion dollar franchise, they don't just sit around waiting for things to happen for certain before they start gathering information on possible pivots if plan A doesn't work. This isn't unique to baseball either, this is probably the most common concept in every business or even an everyday person's normal life. It's actually mind-boggling to suggest that kicking the tires on some player is something you would wait to do before a certain player has signed elsewhere. They'll have an entire list of players they want to pursue at every position on the diamond if things go certain ways. So much random s*** can happen it's a basic expectation to be at least semi-prepared for very obvious potential outcomes. In any case, I still should have asked some questions to you first before stating my opinion on your post. Next time I will probe further to determine your knowledge level before assuming it's in the 3rd or 4th percentile of baseball knowledge and reacting accordingly.

going over there will hopefully help with his control/command, then he comes back in a year or two as a beast

get Trey McNutt out of retirement immediately for a coaching position.