Terminator

Mods

The Turner/Votto DH platoon will combine for 80 years, 35 homers and incalculable levels of vetrin presents.

Vogelbach is gone. There is zero chance in hell he makes the team over a hometown HoFer and one of the best baseball personalities in 20 years. Give Votto the month of April and see how it goes. If he sucks we can just move him to the Front Office or coaching staff and go with Horwitz.

Gotta love these internet tough guys. Professional athlete Zach Pop would throw a 90 mph haymaker at your round fat head and would damn near knock it off what I can only assume is a set of shoulders (I'm assuming you have no neck).

Smart man. Pro basketball is ass.

Going to be a battle to the end between him and Wes Parsons for the final rotation spot. Can’t forget Mitch White either. (forget Manoah)

The thing with the hitting is that it appears like we had some big downgrades from Chapman and whatever the hell got into Belt to IKF and Turner, but Chapman and Belt's Clutch scores were so god awful that just normal years from IKF and Turner (with normal Clutch scores) probably closes the gap in terms of winning games in a pretty sizable way. Then you factor in what should be big rebounds from Vlad, Kirk and Varsho and what should be a small rebound from Springer and the offense has some potential, despite the naysayers, to be very very good. The pitching could take a step back, but it's got more depth to deal with it. And let's not forget how horrible Manoah was last year. If our #5 SP this year (whether it's an improved Manoah, Francis or White) puts up even 1.5 WAR that's a 2 WAR improvement which helps mitigate any of the other 4 taking a step back. The defense and bullpen should be good again and we've also got a lot of depth there as well. So that said I'm going to vote for 90-94, though if we got a big injury in the Spring or something I'd obviously revise that number down.

Those grades on his stuff look great. Excellent fastball, two good secondaries and a serviceable show-me pitch to complete the arsenal will play even if his control isn't great. Poor Alek Manoah going to gain all that weight back eating chicken wings in Buffalo.

I don't think he's going to be ready in time at this rate. Throw that fat bastard on the 60-man and use one of Bowden Francis or Mitch White as the #5.

Do we have overhead renderings of what the new field looks like compared to the old one?

Yeah the 2 mil for Vogelbach isn't a huge deal, but when he's on the fence as is it can play a factor in his release. Not sure why everyone hates on Espinal so much while Biggio is getting slotted into the 5th spot in the lineup. Espinal put up more WAR in 2022 than Biggio has in the last three seasons combined. Keeping him on the bench isn't the end of the world. There's a chance he's our best 3B or 2B right now. Just keep the 3 infielders on the bench and then when someone gets hurt, Horwitz can get the call up. Also, BNS isn't gospel. He's a beat writer for the corporate owners so he plays everything really safe and rarely makes any bold claims. I like him but most of his takes merely put forward the same conventional wisdom and he carries it over year to year. So if the team hasn't gone beyond the 2nd payroll threshold yet, he'll write that they are unlikely to do so. He probably thought the team would never be a Top 5 payroll in MLB either but here we are. Schneider didn't get full reign last year, so he thinks he's on a leash again this year. The truth is (1) he doesn't know for sure and (2) things can change, we are only a week and a half into ST so far. Take his offseason plans for the team, for example. He was pushing the team to sign Rosario all offseason and the team apparently wasn't even slightly interested.

I'd say that the team has pretty good depth this year. Every position but for corner OF has pretty simple backup options but Barger is an option there too. Lukes isn't exactly replacement level either.

Yeah he could have a nice year. He got off to a slow start after taking a ball to the face last year in ST and then he finished the season horribly after he got a bone bruise on his heel. He slashed .300/.365/.522 from 4/11 (ball to face) to 8/27 (heel injury). <---- yes, I'm cherry picking Seems to be seeing the ball ok this spring with 5 BBs to 2 Ks so far. Add in that the Jays got over 2 WAR out of the corpse of Brandon Belt last year and Terminator is officially BUYING Justin Turner stock for this coming season.

You love to see it

Yeah he's just so limited. He brings a different skillset than keeping around ANOTHER slap hitting infielder on the bench, but when you factor in Jansen and Kirk needing more ABs than just sharing the Catching duties 50/50 I think cutting Danny Burgers makes a lot of sense.

I don't know if this is fair or not but it seems like the Vancouver Grizzlies were seen as the worst expansion team in the history of sports and I bet that has lead to its perception about getting other expansion teams, including in different sports like baseball. It'd still be a good western option though; the minor league team does well and they pack Seattle anytime the Jays are in town. I'd rank it on par with SLC and probably San Jose (this is barely a real city but I think the corporate opportunities could help it overcome that).

Alright alright my bad, let's get back to the bench talk. I'm starting to wonder if we even want Vogelbach. If Turner plays the field some then we have more room for him but even then Jansen/Kirk are good enough bats to handle the backup DH/pinch hitter role that Vogelbach is trying to win. Schneider can get some DH ABs as well. And it seems like Vogelbach might be on borrowed time anyway with Horwitz and Barger knocking down the door. If one of Vogelbach/Horwitz do make the team then we have to move an infielder. If it's optioning Espinal (or even better trading him) that would be fine. But DFA'ing Clement or optioning Schneider seem like dumb moves to me. I'd rather dump Vogelbach.

Yeah and since Nashville is the clear front runner it would make sense to pair it with a western team which needs more teams. There's not many options out west though. Portland at one point would have been the frontrunner but SLC is trending up and Portland is trending down so it seems like SLC would be a better place for a franchise to thrive. Another California team like San Jose could be an option. The Bay Area had two teams for a long time and San Jose could rely on big tech buying up corporate sponsorships? Vancouver is another option but I just don't see it for some reason, though it probably makes as much sense as SLC.

Ah my bad, Dean. Didn't know you were "pouring yourself a tall one" for regurgitating BNS articles. I thought you'd only reserve celebrations and pats on the back like that for actually coming up with the idea all on your one.

As Jays fans do we want the Expos back?

Yeah it seems like it's coming any year now. Nashville seems like it's got a ton of momentum. Not sure who should get the other team, maybe SLC.

Yeah everything I'm reading says he could be a good pick to have a breakout year. On the hitting side of things I like Jace Bohrofen to have a breakout year.

Dean, did you really just regurgitate a BNS article and then take credit like you came up with the idea yourself? lol

The star that burns twice as bright burns half as long...