Sorrow

I’m pro extending Vladdy but it needs to have risk for both parties not just the Jays. Guerrero has had two good seasons in his career and been league average or worse every other season, he’s a poor defender at 1B but looked better at 3rd in 2024 so maybe you move him over. He’s also had a number of leg and wrist injuries which is a concern. People keep comparing him to someone like Ramirez but Ramirez is more like Soto. Poor D but an elite bay year after year while Guerreros best offensive seasons are an average Soto season.

If Jansen was hitting like he had from May 2021 end of 2023 I'd want him back but he's not a good defender and if he's not an elite bat for a C he's not worth rostering.

He's played every IF position as a professional but primarily 2B/3B/1B. His swing, not the setup but the physical swing, reminds me a lot of Daniel Murphy.

He’s worth about 6+ runs on scoops which is pretty impressive. I think I’d really like to see him at 3rd again even if he’s bad he may actually be better than at 1st now. You just need a competent SS beside him.

You can play with it through here to see it yourself. I'm going from 2021-2024 and only qualified 1B. I'll admit the 3' is a bit of an overstatement on my part. He's fine until he gets to about 6' and then he craters. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/visuals/statcast-infield-defense?type=Fielder&playerId=665489&startYear=2021&endYear=2024&result=&direction=&normalize=undefined&roles=&esrGT=0&esrLT=1&evGT=0&evLT=125&distGT=0&distLT=2&batside=&viz=intercept_fielder_starting_position_ Distance Travelled Attempts Outs (%) Estimated Outs (%) Outs Above Average 0-3ft 123 117 (95%) 104 (85%) +13 3-6ft 152 130 (86%) 129 (85%) +1 6-10ft 179 143 (80%) 144 (80%) -1 10ft-13ft 136 91 (67%) 95 (70%) -4 13ft-16ft 112 56 (50%) 66 (59%) -10 16ft-22ft 141 74 (53%) 82 (58%) -8 22ft-32ft 127 68 (54%) 73 (58% -5 32ft-51ft 104 76 (73%) 81 (78%) -5 51ft+ 149 125 (84%) 130 (87%) -5 I'm not sure how good that is going to look, I'm on my phone and I'm not going to spend more time trying to make the s*** line up. Alonso IIRC is the 2nd worst defender by OAA in that time frame at -13 OAA. From 6'-51'+ Alonso is at 67% success with -19 OAA. Guerrero is at 67% with -39 OAA. When we get into the more nitty gritty details to see where the difference in actual performance is Alonso is better defending straight up and close to the line and similar into the 2B hole but more importantly he has better range. He's worth 6 OAA at 3-6 feet compared to Guerrero's 1 and he gets to 90% of balls and from 6-10' he's worth +8 compared to Guerrero's -1 with an 86% success rate. Like Guerrero Alonso really drops off at the 10'+ range and in that same 10-13 foot he's actually worse than Guerrero but as a whole beyond that 3-6' range he out performs Guerrero. Vladdy looking good on defence is due to the fact that we as fans aren't properly able to judge his range. Its very much like the outfield defence problem, Varsho can make this 70% catch (4.1s, 63ft travelled) look easy standing up and camping under it. While Tyler Freeman has to do an incredible dive to make this 85% catch (4.0s, 55ft travelled). Ask any fan and they will call Freeman's catch better even though the dive was only making up for a horrible jump and slow foot speed. As well Guerrero is far and away the best 1B in baseball at picks/scoops and it's not really close. I'm not going to say that Statcast is perfect but the eye test is even worse. Varsho: https://sporty-clips.mlb.com/MzVCa1FfWGw0TUFRPT1fVlFoUlZnQlZVQVlBQ2xzRVV3QUFCUUlBQUFBRVVWRUFVQU1NQndNQUFnb0VDUUZX.mp4 Freeman:https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=76e627f2-21b9-49c5-847f-c78e4a67e5e0

If you can wait until next week I can, pulling them up on my cellphone is not pleasant. The general gist is he has a 100% success rate on balls hit within 0-4 feet of him while league average is 86.2% On balls beyond 4 feet his success rate falls to 58% and league average is 67% Using the data readily available with DRS and OAA he is at or near the bottom in basically all defensive categories outside of scoops.

He was also a better defender and base runner in 2021. He’s f***ing garbage at both today. If the ball isn’t within 3’ of him he is quite literally the worst defender at 1B in baseball. I don’t think he ever gets near 6 wins again unless he somehow becomes an average defender or ends up at 3B and is somehow not the worst at that.

I think that once the deadline is settled we'll see Phil Clarke added to the 40 man roster and called up.

Even being an elite bat this year he's likely going to be a 3.5 win player because everything else is so bad which is a bit disappointing.

Jansen wasn't playing so he could have simply walked into the club house during the game, saw the rumour that he was traded on TV and after the deal was confirmed Schneider told him. Until the deal is confirmed there's no point in letting anyone know.

I find a lot of the pieces we have coming back as relatively interesting as well. I don’t think any are 3+ win player ceilings but a lot of them seem like they could be solid league average to slightly above average players or role players on a good team which you need to supplement good talent.

Is Adam’s now arb eligible? If he is it’s a payroll dump.

It's generally accepted that a team won't fire a GM before the trade deadline - frankly I don't think Atkins gets fired this year, maybe he gets moved into another front office role and Click takes over as GM in the winter. People seem to think the Atkins era is one of the worst in franchise history but in the regular season they've been the second most successful from a winning perspective in franchise history.

I'll see if I can find it but there was an article about Guerrero's D and it is basically broken down like he's the best at scooping - so balls in the dirt and stretches to save errant throws and balls within three feet of him he's the best defender in baseball. Anything beyond that he drops off basically immediately to the worst defender at the position.

I think he likely just needs to get bigger and stronger, probably work on his mechanics as well, do exercises to help with flexibility. I think the biggest issues are he had a massive velocity jump after signing into pro-ball and put on a lot of mass and weight and he was still young enough to be growing that his body just needs to catch up. It also wouldn't surprise me if he does actually have a problem that requires surgery.

It does if they don't have the grades or stats to get themselves a partial or full ride scholarship. If he wants to work in the trades if baseball doesn't work out him going and spending a few years in college is a waste.

I can say with absolute certainty that the Jays have been discussing Bassitt, Bichette, Berrios and Guerrero trades and that while none are likely the irons are in the fire. Don't be surprised if Jansen and Kikuchi are dealt as a package. My next door neighbours brother is a member of the Brewers front office and they've had scouts at Jays games recently as well - not really sure what they'd been looking for off our roster as I don't know their roster well. NL West teams (plural) have been asking about Bichette for a while and AL teams have been inquiring on Guerrero with the resurgence this season.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic but before his injuries started at 26 he put up 30.4 fWAR with two seasons at 7+ WAR. If he had a normal decline post him being 27 he likely finishes his career around 70-75 fWAR and a likely HoF calibre player. But injuries happen so we can only theory craft on what could have been.

I heard on MLB Network Radio this week that the Jays and Guerrero are now close dollar figure wise on an extension but it likely wouldn't be done until the off season.

Is anyone else finding Olerud almost as bad as FrenchSoup recently? Just constantly quoting themselves and typing the equivalent of verbal diarrhea. f*** just take 5 minutes and consolidate your thoughts into a single coherent post.

fWAR for pitchers is a better predictor of future success IMO than what they've done present year. Using RA9-WAR also on FanGraphs puts Berrios at 2.2 WAR and Gausman at 0.2. Kikuchi is 1.2 and Bassitt 1.9. This tends to line up with the eye test this year that Berrios has been a solid pitcher, as has Bassitt. Kikuchi was doing really well before imploding and Gausman has been ass. Yariel Rodriguez is at 0.5 and Manoah was -0.1 (2022 he had 6.6). I find RA9-WAR is really similar to bWAR which I think tells a better picture about what a pitcher has done this season. My only issue with bWAR is it doesn't account for framing in their WAR calculation and when you have a skillet that we can contextualize and track statistically it seems like a glaring oversight and it makes the entire system useless for position players and since I'm lazy I'd rather just use FanGraphs.

Romano is off to see Dr. Meister as he's having more elbow pain during long toss. Likely the end of his Jays tenure.

I was hanging out and watching the game with a few of my casual baseball fans. They watch a lot and know a lot about MLB teams but aren’t into sabr or the minors. They all think Guerrero is a superstar lol. He’s basically been a Josh Naylor or Nathaniel Lowe since the start or 2022. I don’t think his trade value is as high as a lot of fans will think it is, I also think if we could get him for 10/200-250 it’s probably a good investment from a marketing and fan perspective. He’s on pace for another 135 wRC+ season and 3.5 fWAR to go with his league worst base running and defence but this is what he did in 2022 and if it’s repeatable he becomes a really solid part of a team even if he doesn’t reach his full potential ever again. If you can’t sign him and can’t get a few good pieces for him the comp pick may be better than trading him for a bunch of questionable pieces. I do think we will see Bichette moved though if he has a hot next 3 weeks, unless of course Toronto wins something like 17 of their next 20 games.

He's taken his time to decompress and is now ready to get to business.

There's no chance in hell that Atkins is let go before the trade deadline is complete. There may be an internal thing with Shapiro, Tinnish and Click taking more responsibility from Atkins but allowing Atkins to be the face and voice still until probably the end of the season unless he gets one more kick at the can in 2025. I do think we will see the Jays start trading pieces after July 1st if we get hosed in the next week or so. I'm not sure whether I'd expect a full rebuild or just finding depth and options to start building for a 2025 retool. I personally think that we'll see Kikuchi, Richards and if he's healthy Garcia traded from the pitching staff with a smaller chance that Green and Pearson are moved. I don't see the team moving Gausman, Berrios or Bassitt especially if they intend to contend in 2025. From the position player side I wouldn't be shocked to see IKF moved as a sell high thing. I think Jansen ends up traded, KK and Turner are moved to contenders looking for bench depth. I don't think we will Bichette traded based on the last 400+ PA of being s*** and I think if they do move on it's going to be this winter if he rebuilds value in the second half. I could see Vladdy being moved though for a few near MLB ready pieces.