Sorrow

I wouldn’t be surprised if we go for a corner OF with poor D like Soler or Hernandez to play a bit of OF and it lets Springer get more rest days. Either way out OF is improved on Lukes being our starting LF as of yesterday.

I'd much rather sign Chapman to play 3B. Teoscar to play a corner OF and Pederson to DH vs righties and maybe see if you can get Michael A Taylor as a 4th OF who starts against LHP. I like Bellinger and I genuinely hope he goes on to have a great rest of his career but for the money he's expected to get there are far too many red flags for me.

Isn’t Kikuchi being paid 10m for 2024? It was 14/12/10 as a breakdown I thought.

I don't disagree with that. I enjoy both because it's fast to get Jays stuff immediately on the Jays reddit (as someone who doesn't use social media) so seeing twitter posts and stuff is useful but the user base is god awful.

Anyone relying on reddit for anything deserves a swift kick between the legs. They're currently discussing extensions for Bichette and Guerrero and they believe Guerrero is worth something like 10/300.

How many teams need a DH that cannot field at all.

I wouldn’t be surprised if small and mid market teams in the next CBA insist on a salary cap with no deferrals. I think we’re due for a big lockout and I don’t think it’s a lockout that is going to end quickly. Seeing s*** like this makes me not even want to watch baseball. I can’t even put how upset this makes me into words.

That’s absolute horseshit. You shouldn’t be able to defer more than something like 10% of the contract but your salary towards the luxury tax should be an average for the contract length less deferrals per year. If any other team did this I guarantee the MLB wouldn’t approve it. I imagine next CBA is going to have a massive lock out.

I wouldn’t be surprised if we sign two of Soler, Chapman and Lee and I think Manoah and Tiedeman are traded for other holes.

I can fairly confidently say that it was around 600m for 10 or 11 years. My friends plans have changed and he is no longer travelling for vacation at this time. There is some thought among our chat that CAA may have made some leaks to certain sources to scare the Dodgers into upping their ante even higher when they wouldn’t move because they thought the interest in Toronto was minimal. This is purely speculation in a chat among friends and not something coming from the team.

On the losing FA to other teams we were the runners up twice for Verlander, Cole, Seager and Semien. It’s frustrating but this front office has been willing to spend huge money on the right players and I certainly think that all those contracts are going to age awfully in the later half, excluding Verlander with the one to two year deals. I think the front office is going to do something good, we may not end up with a single super star but we could certainly add a bunch of good pieces that balance out the complete roster a lot more.

So I was able to reach my friend and he’s surprised as well. His impression and understanding was the Ohtani was going to sign in Toronto for 10/600ish but the Dodgers came back last night with the 700m to just get it done. Front office does have some pivot plans but they’re a bit surprised as well.

This one hurts but at the same time 700m is insane.

I think we'll see a SP signed and maybe a LF on a budget but the team will trade for a 3B.

I was looking through texts and my friend thinks if they get Ohtani they have $40m to work with and if they don't $50m

My understanding is that the money they had to work with outside of Ohtani is still available to them. I won't have a chance to talk to my friend who knows more than I in regards to this for a few weeks as he's taking the remainder of the month off and going remote somewhere with limited reception.

Now I feel fat lol. I'm 6'2" 275ish though I do work physical labour (previously a brick and stone mason).

The Dodgers guy and the on the plane tweets are what got me really thinking this was happening today. Now I am just sad.

Likely an announcement of the signing and an announcement of the press conference if he does sign. My guy knows nothing so I cant even get early information.

Last night was the latest I was awake for the last two weeks I made it until 1030. Learning a new trade is exhausting lol.

I chatted with my buddy today. He has no news on Ohtani but thinks the Jays are a likely landing spot but he hasn’t heard anything this week. He was saying that the Yamamoto camp has requested a meeting with the Jays. Jays likely have 40m to work with even if they sign Ohtani. Jays had interest in Soto but his understanding was the ask was Manoah, Vlad and Tiedeman for Soto + and when the Jays hard noed on Tiedeman and Vlad the talks basically ended. They did put on offer across before the Yankees finalized that did include Tiedeman. Interest in Lee for LF is legit. May end up spending on a SP and him and go cheap or trade for 3B. Team is impressed with the work Vlad is doing in Florida.

I have a weird feeling that he’s going to end up in Toronto. I know that the Dodgers make a lot of sense but I think the Hopium going through my veins has clouded my judgement.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Verdugo is now part of a potential Soto package.

I think it’s really going to come down to the Dodgers and Jays and how far Rogers is willing to go on this. I’d hope the pitch of a lower key setting in Toronto and the newly renovated ballpark with renovated amenities and the complex in Florida are all strong draws.

I had dinner last night with my friend who has been letting me know about call ups and trades for a few seasons, I've discovered how he knows so much information for someone who doesn't work in baseball and I'm not going to state anything that could dox him but it's cool. We chatted life in general but always end up coming back to baseball and here's the general run down of what he has passed along to me, as always take with a bit of a grain of salt. Last winter the Jays tried to trade Jansen first because he had the most interest of their catchers, the Cardinals and Braves were the two teams that were into him before the Braves went for Sean Murphy and the Cards signed Contreras. The Jays did ask for Nootbaar and the cards countered with Helsely, he doesn't know what the Braves offered or if it got far enough along in talks to actually specify names. This was the best offer the team got for Jano so they tried to move Kirk and had no good or fair offers. Teams were concerned about his conditioning and were concerned about how dramatically the offence dropped off in the second half. When they pivoted to Moreno they had very little interest. Teams were concerned about the dramatic drop off in power from the broken thumb and had concerns about the defence. The original deal the Diamondbacks approached the Jays with was Jake McCarthy for Moreno straight up, the talks fell apart when the Jays countered with either Varsho or Thomas. The only way they would move Varsho was getting another MLB OF back in Gurriel so this was the end trade. Toronto was hoping to have Gurriel play last season out in LF/DH. The Jays wanted to end up with an OF of Gurriel, a CF, Springer and Grossman or another bat that could cover the corners and DH but this fell apart when Gurriel needed to be included in the Varsho trade. Team is still happy with the trade and their own internal defensive metrics agree with that we see on FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus that Moreno had a poor defensive season. Alek Manoah and the Jays are fine, Manaoh was suffering a shoulder injury early in the off season last year and it took him a while to get underway and he arrived at Spring Training out of shape and not game ready and the Jays were pissed as he didn't disclose the injury. The Jays are open to moving Manoah but they want fair return. Bo Bichette is available for trade but the asking price is quite high, two MLB ready players one of who can play SS and a prospect. They Jays have approached Bichette twice about long term deals and he wants to try free agency. Vlad Guerrero has asked for an extension and the Jays have not come to the table. He thinks the Jays would move Vlad tomorrow if a trade that made sense based on his potential came up. The FO doesn't know what to expect year to year with him from a fitness or performance standpoint. The Jays want to sign Jansen to an extension but want to see if he can stay healthy. The FO no longer sees Orelvis Martinez or Barger as SS/3B but as a 2B and RF respectively. FO is really high on Alan Roden - think he makes it up in 2024. The Jays are in on Ohtani and they have legitimate interest in Yamamoto, they would love to sign both. The rumblings of an Ohtani payroll and a non-Ohtani payroll are accurate. His understanding is the team has 40M-50M to work, if they sign Ohtani that drops but not dramatically. This lets them trade pitching for bats. The front office is not sold on Bellinger, they liked the bounce back season but have concerns about the quality of the contact. The FO wants one of Chapman or Candaleiro and has had extensive talks with both. Seems like all FA are waiting to see what happens with Ohtani to set the market. FO doesn't see any internal depth at 3B that is ready in the next 2-3 seasons. FO expects a bounce back season offensively for the team. Too many voices speaking to the players so they're hoping that by having Mattingly and Martinez it helps focus it down.