Olerud363

Vlad is hitting .285

 

But his slugging is only .385

 

ISO of .110 lol

 

For comparison's sake, Joe Panik has a career ISO of .108

He also is on track for 3X as much fWAR as last year.... If he keeps it up I think it actually works out that he's worth his contract. A .280 hitting no power first basemen with walks and OK defense (for a first basement) works out as an OK player.

On the other hand Spencer Horwitz may be able to do this for 20 million less.

Jays for half a billion, lol.

He will be a Yankee. No doubt they will use the Jays to get the Yankees up to 600 million, but he will be a Yankee.

At least weÂ’d have something to look forward to?

The first pick is no guarantee of anything...

Spencer Torkelson for example - as much as we complain about Vlad this dude is far far worse. Vlad with a .220 average and twice as many Ks

Jays blew their last top 5 pick. They'd do it again.

Yeah but none of that would have fixed what ails this offense, which is Vlad being a .700 OPS singles hitting double play machine, Bo a .550 OPSer, Springer a .550 OPSer and Kirk a .550 OPSer.

 

You don't recover from that unless you have the Orioles pipeline spilling onto the MLB roster.

My first point, 1. Replace Mattingly with a SOTA hitting coach, might address this.

Since we don't know why Vlad/Bo/Springer/Kirk have a combined .600 OPS we can't say for sure that a different hitting coach would fix them, but it might.

What are the chances that Vlad/Bo/Springer/Kirk hit like .220 .300 .300 combined for 600 at bats? If you did a simulation of 1000000 600 at bat seasons based on a true talent .280 .340 .500 hitter how many times would they hit .220 .300 .300 just by chance? Probably never. So there is a reason. Could be injury, could be mental, but it wouldn't be random but be something management should know about.

The other things I mentioned would help a bit around the margins, and maybe a lot. Another thing that would have helped is playing Schneider more. And based on minor league stats Barger and Horwitz might be just as good hitters as Schneider. So replacing Turner/IKF/Biggo/Kiermaier with better hitters helps.

I can't believe they didn't fix the offense this off season. What were they thinking?? The options were endless and they did NOTHING!!!!

 

Lmao

They could have....

1. Replaced Mattingly with state-of-the-art hitting coach

2. Replaced Biggio with Barger

3. Had faith in Horwitz and not signed Turner.

4. Not signed IKF and just realize Clemente had similar skill set for cheaper.

5. Give Clemente the IKF job and find another minor league vet to replace Clemente.

6. Use IKF and Turner money to sign Teoscar.

7. KK becomes redundant do something else with that money (take on money in trade)

Some may argue this is all in hindsight, especially 2 (Barger over Biggio). However progressive organization should have understanding of the new bat speed stats, exit velocities, and inside knowlege of Barger's injury and recovery (which may have knocked him numbers down in 2023).

They're not complaining about it NOW. They did when those players signed with the Giants though and basically all off season too.

Well there are 2 camps. There might be some people complaining about the roster moves. That is a different issue.

There is another camp complaining about the development, which includes ongoing development of major league players.

There is like a meme going around in a couple of variations, one by I think 70s supersports which goes like this

1980 - That guy looks like he can hit (Mattingly)

2000 - That guy takes some walks it's our secret (Stairs/Money Ball As)

2024 - Looks like that guy has good expected hsquared v and if we video-trance him with YETI3 pitch anticipation protocol, video dataset 5, get him on the biomechanics 12.2 protocol, we might have something. Also get Rick to get all players over 27.4 years on the updated nutrition and sleep protocols for post-prime maintenance.

They are missing whatever is SOTA (State of the Art) in 2024. They probably have something but it isn't SOTA, and it isn't implemented well.

Yeah the Jays should have offered Ohtani 1.5 billion to get him to pick the Jays and they should have given up their top 5 prospects for one year of Soto.

 

They also should have offered Soler 3 years 50 million and brought his 94 wRC+ and 0 fWAR to the Jays.

 

They also should have given Chapman 5 years 100 million and kept his 70 wRC+ and 0.1 fWAR around.

 

I mean what a bunch of idiots. They had to have known that a quarter of the way into the season that Bo, Springer and Kirk would all have OPS's in the .500's and like 5 home runs combined right?

 

Dumbasses lol

I don't think anybody is complaining about not signing Chapman, Soler, etc.

Shapiro and Atkins are dumbasses because...

a) they have several minor league players who look great yet they block Howritz and Barger with Turner and Biggio. Schneider looks great up here, so you wonder how Barger and Howritz will translate.

they have several collapses which as you keep mentioning can't be 'predicted'. Exactly. Jays are behind the times somehow in game prep and hitting approach which has led in part to these collapses.

 

I lived through the 1992-1993 World Series wins. I can honestly say that it is absolutely worth living through some terrible seasons in order to feel that kind of joy. Others' opinions might vary.

I actually don't advocate tanking for 4 years of time despite that the Chicago Cubs/Houston Astros/Orioles seem to have done it successfully.

What I am for, is identifying where you are in the cycle, and not worrying about the 70th win. Don't try to tank for 4 years, but if it happens because you added an extra bad year onto the beginning and end of the cycle, but got good players out of it that is fine.

What the Orioles did was absolutely intentional and brilliant. They played the pandemic perfectly. Who the f*** needs 70 wins instead of 50 when there no fans anyway. Who needs 32 wins and a sweep by Tampa Bay in a 60 game fanless season when 20 will get you a nice draft pick.

It has a lot to do with how you weight playoff appearances and World Series wins against never being bad.

 

Like the Yankees right now are constantly a decent team, but haven't won anything recently. Same with the Jays.

 

On the other hand, teams like the Astros, Red Sox and more recently the Orioles have gone through stretches where they were absolutely terrible, but have also had some major postseason success.

 

I lived through the 1992-1993 World Series wins. I can honestly say that it is absolutely worth living through some terrible seasons in order to feel that kind of joy. Others' opinions might vary.

Since Jays were good in 83 Red Sox have been good in 86, 88, 90, 95, 98, 2002, 2003, 2004-2011, 2013, 2016, 2018, 2021. They are like always giving the fans something to cheer about every 3 years.

Orioles have not had any big time playoff success in my lifetime. I predict they will set the single season and 10 year record for wins (121 and 1050) in the next decade and win at least 1 world series, but that has not happened yet.

I'm responding to what he said. I think 23% is highly improbable and I'm prepared to back up my view view a bet. He is dancing all over like a drunk ballerina. If he truly believes 1/4 is not highly improbable, it should be a decent bet for the Sheriff.

 

Couple good weeks of play is all cash for him.

It's funny that he's one of the first to complain when other posters post walls of unreadable vomit (I'll fully admit I'm guilty of that and he has a legit point about that sometimes)

Yet now today the Sherriff, usually concise, is himself polluting this fine message board with massive walls of text and obtuse argument, that will take phone users a few minutes to scroll by....

Another positive and kind of hilarious thing that is happening to the 2024 Blue Jays is that Vlad is challenging for second place in Blue Jays WAR with a unique season.

He is now on track for 3 WAR hitting .270 .370 .370 with 14 homers.

I hope he heats up average wise, his defense rocks, he walks alot and his power continues to be absence and he ends up something like .295 .390 .380, with true gold glove deserving 1st base defense, 9 homeruns, and 4.5 WAR.

What the hell do they do with him then? Nobody will know what to do. His agent won't know what to do. The Jays won't know what to do. The arbitrator won't know what to do. The stupid gold glove voters won't know what to do (probably give the gold glove to some ******* with worse defense but more homers).

Schwarber hit .197 with 47 HRs and a .333 OBP. His D was so bad his WAR was 0.9 in 2023. He is the Silverbach who actually hits home runs.

Joey Gallo 2021 hit .199 with 4.3 fWAR based on defense, walks and homeruns. That's the highest fWAR with batting average below .200 since 1975 as far as I can see. I did not go back farther than that.

Varsho has a chance to break that record but needs to keep his current walk rate and power going. His walks and power aren't at Gallo level, but with his better defense he could do this.

It would be an hilarious record and somewhat appropriate.

It's not even over the top, you can look it up.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5325414/2024/03/14/mlb-franchise-rankings-wild-card-era/

 

See, the Wild-Card Era (1995 to present) franchise rankings are not a creation of my fallible mind. They are borne from a tested, trusted, completely objective, never-been-questioned, all-math, no-bias formula borrowed from football writer Bob Sturm and tweaked to fit baseball’s postseason structure.

 

Winning the World Series (WS): 9 points

Losing in the World Series (WSL): 6 points

Losing in the Championship Series (CS): 3 points

Losing in Division Series (DS): 2 points

Losing in Wild Card (WC): 1 point

 

As of last year, the scoring system also incentivizes division titles (+1 point) and penalizes prolonged losing cycles, docking teams (-1 point) each time they lose at least 90 games in consecutive seasons.

 

Tally the point totals for the past 29 seasons, from 1995 to 2023, and the result is the franchise rankings as listed below — along with each team’s point totals from the past decade, and average points per season. Tiebreakers are World Series wins, then World Series losses, then Championship Series appearances, then Division Series appearances, then division titles.

 

Pirates - -4 points

Royals - 7 points

Reds - 9 points

Orioles - 9 points

Jays - 10 points

Rockies - 10 points

Brewers - 14 points

Ms - 14 points

Washington - 14 points

Marlins - 16 points

 

This is the analysis!!!!

 

And anybody would take the Orioles or Brewers right now for their development systems, so the how-do-you-look-today tips way in their favour. And the Royals and Nats have the WS titles which earn a lot of fan satisfaction.

 

So there is a strong argument that Toronto is bottom 5 in the last 30 years. Bottom five org!

Royals should have more points right? 1 big hit away from back to back.

Add in lack of franchise players, normalize for payroll and market size. Add negative points for the historic Vlad/Bo/Kirk collapse.

It is arguable this franchise is the worst in baseball. The illusion of being "OK" is only provided by existing in the 3rd great market after LA and NY. No other market has access to an entire country of fans. Literally this is the 3rd best market.

The Blue Jays are definitely in the discussion for saddest franchise in MLB

 

That may seem over the top but it makes sense when you measure actual accomplishments in the last 30 years. The Jays have almost nothing other than the 2015/2016 runs and some individual accomplishments. Most other franchise in baseball can match that other than perhaps the Pirates and Rockies but even Colorado had a WS appearance lol.

 

Jays probably bottom 5, maybe bottom 7, unless you give them a handicap for being in the AL East lol. Like yeah some of the teams that finished 3rd might have won a different division but losses are still losses.

Jays also haven't kept and developed franchise players. Colorado has 4 players with higher lifetime WAR than Jays greatest (Fernandez/Bautista/Delgado) depending how you measure it. Jays just have never had the generational player who showed up as a rookie than retired at 40 with opposing teams giving him presents. Pirates had McCutchhen, Colorado had Helton.

The Bo/Vlad/Kirk collapse is just so f***ing insane and nut breaking. May be generations until you even see Blue Jay minor numbers at a young age like that again.

The Blue Jays are definitely in the discussion for saddest franchise in MLB

 

That may seem over the top but it makes sense when you measure actual accomplishments in the last 30 years. The Jays have almost nothing other than the 2015/2016 runs and some individual accomplishments. Most other franchise in baseball can match that other than perhaps the Pirates and Rockies but even Colorado had a WS appearance lol.

 

Jays probably bottom 5, maybe bottom 7, unless you give them a handicap for being in the AL East lol. Like yeah some of the teams that finished 3rd might have won a different division but losses are still losses.

Baseball is a game of Joy, a game of generations, the job of the baseball management team is to provide joy and hope to the fans. Playoff wins bring Joy.

If you give say 2 points for a division title being = to the 2 wild card playoff wins, here are the total playoff wins in the supposed Vlad/Bo prime (2021-2025) so far. (with the other teams all still having hope to add to their totals, and Bo/Vlad having collapsed to nothing at age 25.5).

NY Yankees - 7

Boston - 6

TBR - 3

Baltimore - 2

Toronto - 0

Still the Yankees and Boston on top of playoff success in the 2021-2025 Bo/Vlad era.

I saw on one thread a discussion about the 2005 Jays and I wanted to respond but couldn't find exactly where it was.

2005 Jays are very interesting. 775 runs on 136 homers and a bit of luck. 775 runs would be an outstanding total for 2024. And I think this is the type of offense Jays brains thought they could create. I think what we see is a result of the great Jays minds thinking about this problem a lot and figuring out what they thought was a good way to score 775 runs.

Get the team to hit .260 or so, with a .335 on base, .400 slugging, great baserunning and you get 750 runs or so even with only 140 homeruns.

They are indeed on track for 140 homers, but only hitting .229. So the plan didn't work.

Why not? It would seem super reasonable if you sacrificed a bit of power, you could get guys to hit .250 .320 .400, the better guys like Vlad to hit .290 .390 .450. Bo to hit .300 .350 .450. Old Springer to hit .250 .320 .420.

Kirkie to hit .280 .380 .420. Varsho to hit .240 .320 .450.

So they probably crunched the numbers, got the egg-heads to run some analysis, assumed that under a higher average, less power hitting philosaphy, they get hit .260 as a team and reach a good run total.

Something about the modern game of baseball made this not happen... even though it sounded pretty reasonable.

I know you're joking but you don't want a lazy headcase anywhere near a core of young players during a hard reset. He would be the first to go.

Not entirely joking. Springer is playing at a level where he should be released, though realistically they give him another year to work out of it.

Guerrero? Not really sure he is that bad of a guy. I don't know though. Seems like the type who would have fun with young players and in a non-pressure situation.

Like if the goal is to develop these young guys, who cares if they have a little fun and where a homerun jacket when they are losing 9-3. Maybe relaxed for a year Vlad would rebuild some value for Trade Deadline 2025.

Josh 'no power bro' Kasevich up to .328 .383 .406 and .290 .363 ..369 lifetime.

1. May have the D and position to survive without power.

2. Steven Kwan translated from .300 .380 .438 minors to .289 .361 .385

3. That would put Kasevich at .280 .340 .340 or so with similar translation.

Maybe still not enough to survive. However I guess Kasevich still has a year or so to develop a bit more power so he can put up a 2024 VGJR like .270 .370 .370 line.

Varsho has 150 PAs. His chase and BB rates percentiles way better than '23. Sitting on a 113 wRC+ and on pace for 28 HRs.

 

27% better than last yr. Big time valuable player if he can maintain the approach and outcomes.

What is the all time record for WAR hitting under .200? Varsho I imagine hitting .208 and on pace for 5WAR could challenge that if he slips to .198

He also got two good pitchers for Big Rowdy

Rowdy has power bro. 35 homers one year. Hit one 530 feet over the Ted William seat in Fenway once. Though they later said that actually didn't happen and it was only 430 feet and didn't get near Ted William's seat... still dudes got power.

So Atkins traded the two bad prototypes 'no power bro' and 'no contact bro' for useful things.

Atkins, perhaps the worst GM in baseball according to some, got a setup man and a platoon OF from Kim Ng for Joe Panik and he got her to throw in some money on top of it.

Come to think of it Atkins also got two (at times) useful relievers for Jordan 'no power bro' Groshans.

It would be an insult to the hard working members of this message board to hire a lady that traded for one of the most notorious members of the 'no power bro' club.

Maybe Bonilla is that guy, although still only in the FCL

He is seemingly hitting very well but has a 0 to 8 bb/k rate in the FCL. That is not good.

Fcuk this entire franchise.

Daulton Varsh (best player) - hitting .208

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (260 pound dude with elite exit vs) - somehow just raking the 115 mph singles and a .370 slugging, his ISO is like .100 and it used to be .300

George Springer - at an age where Bautista was still prime Bautista he is like half of 2017 Bautista... like his OPS is below where is slugging used to be.

Bo Bichetee - OK. Hitting .220?

Kirkie - a .190 hitter with no power

f*** off. Someone said. How could you predict any of this? It's not Shapiro's fault?

NO. That's not how it works. If it is something that has a low chance of being predictable or happening by chance there is a cause...

If all your 5 kids have an IQ of 60 and you and your wife are reasonably smart, it's unlikely it is an unpredictable random thing, but more likely it has a cause like lead in the pipes, or you both are cousins to each other!

Realizing now I was wrong, and the 'no power bros' were right. They identified one of the Shaprio failure modes of which there is two for hitters.

Mode 1 - 'no power bro' - Roden, Horwitz, Kirk, now Vlad, Biggio, the Jace B. guy. THese guys might look good with their occasional .400 on base percentages but their ceiling is .250 hitter .350 on base and .350 slugging. No power bro. Vladdy is now a no power bro with hit .270 .370 .370. On base percentage = slugging but most 'no power bros' have a .320 on base, when facing good pitching, so .640 OPS does not cut it.

Mode 2 - 'no contact bro' Orelvis most years, Nimalla, Derek Fisher if you remember him, Grichuk mostly, Biggio. These guys all hit like J.P. Arencibia. ALl of them. Even if like Orelvis they look OK in their 7th year of minor league baseball (J.P. looked OK at age 23 or 24 in aaa) they eventually hit .190 with a .230 on base and .380 slugging despite 30 homners.

The Mark Shapiro 2 modes of prospect failure 'no power bro' and 'no contact bro'. I am betting with new bat speed stats they misuse it and we get many more 'no contact bros' and lose all our precious no power bros.

Biggio. He is both LOOOOOLLL

 

This team has become the exact inverse of what Shapiro promoted. The Emperor has no clothes. ItÂ’s an old, very expensive team jacked up on Free Agents predominantly. They won 92,91,89 games 21-23. They benefitted from expanded wildcard. Pretty dam solid, but itÂ’s a sustainability mirage without more drafting & development success. The 9 year sample size objectively is not good. A lot of their top picks and prospects were traded to create the past and current roster construction.

 

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1. The only good thing is payroll is in decent shape, so if they could find someone willing to take the money, maybe that is good. On the other hand who wants to come to Toronto except the A- class free agents once LA and NY chooses who they want. (And if there are no A- free agents the offseason sucks like last year).

2. Nimalla. If you want waves you need some guys like that to do exciting things at 18 (still 3 years away even if doing exciting things in low A). The Nimalla dissapointment just f***ing is representative of this front offices in ability to get exciting talent. The next Paul Dejong is not exicting.

f*** Shaprio. And you 'no power bro' boys who hate Spencer, and Roden and maybe now Bohofren or whatever... demand that Shapiro resign tonight for not providing you dudes with the power you deserve.

I know large chunks of the league have a lot of respect for her ability - and Miami is a tough gig.

 

I think the issue always is - who do you hire - if it is anyone with experience chances are they were booted out of their prior organization and usually the fans were irate that it took so long to get fired. So experienced GM mostly always means they were canned.

 

If you hire someone from within the organization - it's probably going to be more of the same.

 

The only reason I mention Ng is because she left over the situation she was in - she already turned down the Red Sox I believe - so it seems like she wants to be in charge and not have to answer to a bunch of dumbasses.

 

Thus, Ng in Toronto - she'd probably have to be President and GM.

 

Women always do the work of two for half the salary - We're saving Rogers money already

Very simple list of qualifications.

1. Progressive thinking and understand game theory. This means they are willing to eat up whatever is public knowledge but also understand that what is not public knowledge is the most important.

2. Willing to dive into problems at multiple scales. High scale important. Kirk fat. Kirk weak. Kirk hit .200 with 1 homerun. Kirk used to be good. Kirk now bad. We all know this, but sometimes it is useful for the GM to acknowledge this, and make sure resources are allocated into finding out why did this bad thing happen to Kirk. Then you get to the finer scale of Kirks genetic and mental makeup, biochemistry, batting mechanics, psychology... but need the high scale to first acknowledge the problems, look for simple solutions, then low scale.

3. Acknowledge the great front offices that are doing good - need to suck Baltimore dick with modesty and respect. Tell the fans the truth. Baltimore is shaping to have a generational-dynasty, LA and NY Yankees have a generational dynasty with no apparent end. To compete drastic steps may need to be taken. All resources feasible will be allocated to understanding the processes that have led to these generational dynasty with the hope that in a few years the Blue Jays can at least modestly compete with them.

4. Care. You may have to look into a Canadian. Need someone who cares as much as this message board does. Will stay up all night, every night, while a Nanny takes care of his children while his wife isn't (she's sleeping around). But the GM of the Blue Jays doesn't care of this. MUST FIND OUT WHY VLAD SUCKS. MUST MAKE SURE JACE BOHOFREN doesn't become MR. "NO POWER BRO". Must solve these problems. Must defeat failure. Must develop pitching prospects. Do not care about wife and what she is up to, or kids (that is Nanny's job).

5. Good at bullshitting and acting normal - Needs to care as much or more than the maniacs and disunctional weirdos on this board, but can't act like it in public and with other GMs. Even though wife is having affairs needs to act like it is all great, and he is well adjusted, and knows how to schmooze, and send "trust signals", and negotiate, and convince others he/she is an alpha...