Olerud363

They also lost 2 baserunners (Bo and Vlad) over the series. It also looks like they lose at least 30 baserunners compared to teams like the Orioles and Twins with 10 or 15 extra double plays and 15 or 20 extra caught stealing. I wonder how many that would be including pick offs and baserunning outs? Like maybe they are down 50+ runners compared to good teams.

Jays lost power in exchange for perhaps some average right? No. Jays hit .256 in 2023 down from .264.

Twins walked 11 times hit 2 homers. Blue Jays walked 5 times hit 0 homers. That is all you need to know. (if you want to know what it was in the regular season it was Twins 590 walks, 233 homers, Jays 550 walks, 188 homers)

The funny thing is, the truth is Jays are not using enough analytics or not using them right. Sid thinks Cito Gaston was the best manager in Jays history. He thinks John Gibbons would not have done that, when he did it with Dicky, and it blew up the exact same way in game 4 2015 ALDS. If Jays scored 1 run instead of 7 that day, that decision would have looked exactly the same. Why bring in a tired Price when Dickey was cruising? In fact at the time it was still blasted in some circles because it made Price unavailable for game 5. If Stroman had blown up, or the Texas Rangers didn't make 3 errors we'd still be hearing about that. I'm not saying I liked the move. I cringed when it happened, but the overall game plan kept the Twins to 2 runs. Offense scored nothing because team is way behind on advanced hitting science in terms of both analytics and coaching. Risky time for the organization, need to go more advanced with the bleeding edge baseball science, not backwards... but guys like Sid could push the organization in the opposite direction it needs to go. Two camps that both think Schneider/Atkins should be fired but for different reasons.

The underperformance is with comparison to multiple years and thousands of at bats of stats, not just compared to these players at their 'best'. Like Kirk for example. He was good in 2019, 2020 (low sample size), 2021 and 2022. Yes for 3 months of 2022 he hit like prime Edgar Martinez, which may have been over his head, but maybe not considering how good a minor league hitter he was. In 2021 he hit 8 homers in 120 at bats or something. Then loses all his power in 2023? Varsho was a great minor league hitter and even if he has holes in his swing should be able to at the least repeat his 2022. Vlad was like top 5 all time in the history of baseball as an 18, 19 and 22 year old. Even his age 20 season was probably one of the top 20 age 20 seasons of all time (as a hitter) since so few player play 120 games at 20... now at 24 he's battling Ryan Noda? At an age when they should be having their best seasons, multiple players are performing way below what they have in the past.

Underperformance. The great mystery. Why do the Braves score 900 runs and 300 homers with a lineup that wasn't projected to hit much better than Toronto's? Why do the Twins hit 233 homeruns with guys I never heard of ? Why are number of 380 foot fly balls Vlad hits reduced by 50% since 2 years ago? Underperformance. Anyone working at Rogers upper levels, counting the money and stuff, needs to get Shapiro to get everyone under him to write a 5 page book report on why players under perform and what to do about it. Then same bean counters at Rogers (I don't even know who these guys would be, like Ted Rogers kids and their friends or something?) need to go outside the organizaiton and get some people in baseball to write the same 5 page report. Then they all need to sit at a long table and decide who (if anyone) to fire for next year, and who (if anyone) to hire. Why do player do bad? I don't know. Figure it out Rogers. You love money. You love profit. This will help your money and profit. Do you really want to spend 240 million on s*** like this again?

Isn't the "hate" for Bo just coming from one guy (LTBF) because he is pissed that everyone hates Vlad, so has some gig going where he performs the 'Vlad hate' on Bo. Like maniacs on the board (like me) - It really sucks that Vlad 80 hit tool Guerrero is getting beat by Ryan Noda in WAR, release Vlad! LTBF - Well it really sucks that Bo Bichette is getting beat by Cory Seager in WAR, release Bo! It's not literally quite that bad, but close. Like legit Vlad hate comments are parroted by LTBF as not legit Bo hate versions.

He got 5 playoff wins in 2016. Though those are mostly because of AA. You can say 0 playoff wins with "his" version of the contending Blue Jays 0 days in first place after May 1st (I believe this is true) 0 days within 5 games of first place in second half of season (I also believe this is true Rays/Yankees/ than Rays/Orioles got 5+ games ahead of Jays and stayed there throughout 21-23)

Analytics as an ingame tool is ... I don't know. Over-rated? Useless maybe? You replace guy a, with guy b in the 4th and decide not to bunt in the 5th inning and get a .04% better chance of winning but a 92.5% chance of pissing everyone off if you don't? Analytics should be used as like a long term thing. Like if we get these guys, who look good with the analytics and get them the best hitting mechanics coach, and get a nerd to use the AI to find tells, then we can score 850 runs and give up only 650 and hit 254 homers.. that's how analytics should be used. Like a long term thing to choose the right hitting approach and amphetamine doses.

The hilarious thing about McGriff/Fenandez Alomar/Carter is that it was 11 fWAR for 1. But then Carter/Alomar rebounded to about 8 WAR and beat McGriff Fernandez in 1991. Bo/Vlad are like 5 WAR combined in 2023. Tough to make a big trade with the all the analytics, like what front office is going to give you value for them that is a better bet to be elite in 2024 than a Vlad/Bo rebound is?

Agree. I am more frustrated with him than any player I can remember. At age 18, 19 and 22 he was literally like a top 5 hitter ever for that age. He is now at 24 just like an average guy. Like Ryan Noda, and Boston's first basemen, Tristan Casas, and the Twin's first basemen can all just do what Vlad do at about the same age. Like he went from multiple years top 5 as a hitter out of thousands of players ever, to not even top 20 among 24-26 year olds this year with minor journeyman every where beating him. But the top 5 ever potential may still be there because he did multiple times.

I've heard this from multiple other posters. No idea if they have a real source, but claim it is not the coaching that is responsible for Vlad's situation.

It depends what you project him for. Is it 10 million per WAR now? Your favourite player, Cody Bellinger was sort of in a similar situation in terms of fWAR. Going from a 6+ fWAR superstar to a 1 WAR dude but having the high arbitration start baked in and there is a rule that they can only decrease so much in Arb. Difference is Bellinger colllapsed completely as a hitter into unknown realms, where Vlad has merely degraded to a slightly above average hitter, but with such terrible defense and baserunning that his fWAR is still at 1 like Bellingers. So on one hand you may want to take a chance on Vlad because his hitting skills are still mostly intact and just some weird 2 degree angle tweak or something from being elite... on the other his arb number might be like 25 million next year (based on Soto's not sure if the arb dudes consider walks and WARs... if it's old school Vlad is getting 25 million). So do you pay 25 million next year? I guess you have to, especially after Bellinger made a similar decision look real bad.

hard for me to believe a player with Varsho's minor league stats can hit as badly as he does. Good bet for any player is that they hit to their career average which would make Varsho better than he was this year. Just shocked at how bad he was. His 2022 looked like Teo's 2019 and I thought for sure he would take a step forward like Teo did.

He literally took Dickey out in a similar situation where Dickey was pitching a shut out, coming off a 2015 season that was somewhat similar to Berrios's 2023, and replaced him with David Price. One difference was it was a 5-0 game I believe. Price pitched bad and made it 5-3 but Jays won I believe 7-3. Second difference was no one trusts an old dumpy knuckle baller, but everyone trusts a guy throwing 95 with sharp looking breaking stuff. I think that decision may have been looked on historically very different if the offense only scores a run or 2 that game... Or maybe not. It was different. It was Price who was the top pitcher in baseball that year.

It's a flyball by Belt. A fly ball to center. A 380 foot flyball. It's a popup by Vlad. Very typical 2023 game.

You can't just keep waitin' around for the 3 run homerun that may never come. Gotta do the small ball. But you know what? Who ever hits a 3 run homerun will win this game. Or maybe even whoever hits a 2 run double.

It was small, it was ball, an old George Springer couldn't taken advantage though. Old George, not as good as Young George! f*** you small ball. A single homerun with these guys on it's 3-0. Small ball is retarded.

Who helped Moreno with the tweak? Hitting Coach? Team coaching effort? One of these 'high performance lab' crews? As a fan in 2023 I constantly hear about all these high performance approaches to making pitchers throw harder and hitters hit better. So what happened that Moreno found a tweak and Varsho didn't? Varsho is just not fixable? Jays coaching staff is behind the curve?

Totally agree. Just saying they bought it Nerd style which teams have done since the mid 90s Yankees, the Boston Red Sox even tried to buy Billie Beane. You can still hire Nerds and give them lots of money to play with. I think that is how Wall Street works. But yeah. Not 'money ball' (like finding hidden stuff) but just plain nerd ball still.

Yeah. Not sure about that trade. Don't know enough about Norby. The guy I'd really want from the Orioles is Samuel Basallo. If Tiedermann is healthy all year he is probably up with the Jays right now and never getting traded. However it would have been great if he established himself enough to get Basallo, which I don't think he has. Note, Basallo isn't rising on the lists as much as an 18 year old hitting like he is should... I don't know if there is some red flag, or it is just the prospect ranking system has like a pecking order, and Basallo has to wait until more prospects graduate to get his turn. I think Vlad and Delgado were both top 10 at this stage, then went 1 or close the next year. (after which Delgado spent 2 years going back and forth to Syracuse instead of playing MLB ball, but that is another story).

Team that led the league in 1985 Bill James nerd stats is winning. Not sure it is anything against Nerds. It's like what they said in that movie "the money ball' or whatever. Get on base. Texas gets on base and hits the long ball. They spent for it I guess.

The only Blue Team I remember getting off the mat in a tough playoff or pennant race situation is the 2015 ALDS. Even when the Jays won in 92 and 93 they took 3-1 leads in the series and won in 6. The 85-90 team was notorious for choking leads (85, 87, 90). The 2015 thing happened because Tulo, Colabello, Donaldson, Pillar, EE and Bautista decided to hit homers ** (also Ranger made 3 errors). I will Guarantee if either a) Jays hit 3 homers or Twins make 3 errors and Jays hit 2 homers they will win today.

Just looking at some statscast stuff looks like a good power hitter having a great year hits around 50-60 fly balls over 380 feet, like Vlad 2021 or Acuna 2023. Until a few weeks ago I was 100% convinced that Vlad and Chapman were not pulling enough, and too many long outs to center. That may be part of it, but they aren't making that many long outs to center (Vlad 6, Chapman 9)... it's that they aren't hitting as many 380 foot flyballs as power hitters having good seasons.

Royce Lewis hit 18 balls over 380 feet this year. Projects to about 55 in a full year. Vlad and Chapman each hit only 30 balls over 380 feet.