Terminator

Good comments by Shapiro. Didn't say anything to fan the flames.

It's called a take it or leave it offer.

Well it's even worse, Bautista said he wouldn't even allow them to counter or negotiate. Although that might have been posturing as I'm sure he would have allowed some wiggle room if they Jays got close to matching, right?

Now Rosenthal is seconding it. Ken Rosenthal ‏@Ken_Rosenthal 9m9 minutes ago Hearing same as @jonheyman: Bautista asked #BlueJays for more than 5 yrs and more than $150M. But average annual value was below $30M per.

Yeah good point.

I wonder how many of those minor league guys can leave if they don't make the big league team?

Yeah that Hendricks trade wasn't the best. That's also interesting about Happ getting more than Gallardo; I didn't think of that before. I honestly might prefer Happ but you would think Happ's market would be smaller than Gallardo's.

The rotation was in shambles to start the offseason. And not only the big league rotation but the AAA rotation as well. I like the FO's approach to add several options on shorter term deals in order to build depth. We will need 8+ starting pitchers this season and I think the FO did the best they could in getting that 8.

The only time he got close to 200 strikeouts was in 2013, the last time he was any good.

My guess is that Blair said that because they have similar salaries? It's hard to tell what the mind of an alcohol-related dementia sufferer is thinking.

Fangraphs' profile on him kind of mirrors your thoughts and explains it pretty well.

It's not they they think Saunders is worthless, they were prepared to pay him 2.9 mil. The perplexing part is that they think Bruce is an improvement. That said, I don't know Saunders medicals, idk what about Bruce they think is fixable, and I don't know how much money the Jays will get in this deal if it happens. To many moving parts to be upset about it right now.

I mean if we add an insignificant net amount to the payroll and don't give up any prospects I think I'll chalk it up to "well maybe they know something". But if we are talking 3-4-5 or more million added it's going to be a real head-scratcher for sure.

Yeah he definitely is. A lot of his quotes directed at Rogers haven't been making the rounds as much. Gregor Chisholm ‏@gregorMLB 21m21 minutes ago Bautista put all of the focus on Rogers: "It's not necessarily Ross and Mark. I can't say that, I don't know... (1of2) #BlueJays Gregor Chisholm ‏@gregorMLB 21m21 minutes ago ... Some of that decision making, of a contract of this size that I presented, has to come from ownership." #BlueJays

It was tough talk from Bautista but he's right, Rogers can pony up the money for a guy like him. He's in the Stieb-Halladay-Delgado class of player that the Jays rarely get. That said, Shapiro doesn't need to substantially overpay either so I wonder what Bautista's number was. If his number wasn't sacrificing years or money in exchange for the certainty of signing it now then it may be best to just let this year play out and try in the offseason.

Bautista in a Red Sox uni would suck ass.

Pretty good article. His conclusion is that there is no way the Jays should sign both guys to extensions as they will be DH's (or at least should be) in 2017. He ultimately settles on resigning Bautista over EE.

http://espn.go.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/14823719/the-perils-locking-edwin-encarnacion-jose-bautista-mlb Tony Blengino Special to ESPN.com The juggernaut that was the Toronto Blue Jays' offense was one of the best stories of the 2015 season. In fact, it was one I wrote about in this very space, saying a case can be made for it being the best offense of this century. Anytime a club reaches such historic offensive heights, there usually are surprise contributors, Chris Colabello and Devon Travis (when healthy) in the Jays' case. There are also go-to heavyweights in place, such as Toronto's three-headed monster of MVP Josh Donaldson, Edwin Encarnacion and Jose Bautista. Encarnacion and Bautista have been Toronto bellwethers for quite a while now, and the club's investment in both has paid off handsomely. Both will play the final year of six-year contracts in 2016, with Encarnacion being paid $10 million and Bautista $14 million in deals that guaranteed them totals of $43 million and $78 million, respectively. The Jays have been handsomely repaid with 18.8 WAR from Encarnacion and 32.6 WAR from Bautista, bargain rates of $2.3 million and $2.4 million per WAR. Not too shabby. Both of these stalwarts are slated to hit the free-agent market together at the end of the 2016 season, and the Jays have indicated an early willingness to keep both players around for the long term. There are enough underlying subplots here that will make this courtship one of the more intriguing off-field storylines to follow this season. Today we look at those. First, there is the turnover that has taken place at the top of the baseball operations department. The bulk of the two players' tenure in Toronto has occurred with president Paul Beeston and general manager Alex Anthopoulos in place. Most clubs coming off 93-69 seasons are models of stability in the prime decision-making roles, but not this one. Former Indians' GM and president Mark Shapiro was brought in to replace the retiring Beeston, and after a brief period of uneasy coexistence, Anthopoulos stepped down and was replaced by another former Indians exec, Ross Atkins. The men who will be making the call on these important contract decisions are not the ones who have established long and productive relationships with these two players. The second key point is one that is applicable to every pending free-agent situation throughout the game. The golden rule is to pay free agents to be not for what they have already done, but for what they are likely to do moving forward. It's a very tough call when the player is on the near side of age 30, and arguably still in his prime. In theory, it's a much easier one when players are ages 33 and 35, as Encarnacion and Bautista are. It's not that simple, however. We need to examine each player's specific situation to determine whether the Jays should place big bets on them moving forward. The comps For both players, I identified a group of comparables based on their respective production, age and years as a regular. I weeded out a few comps with similar overall production, but dramatically different OBP and SLG profiles. First, let's look at Encarnacion's comps: Edwin Encarnacion Comparables PLAYER OPS+ TO AGE 32 CONT. SCORE TO 32 REM. YEARS REM. OPS+ REM. C. SCORE Scott Rolen 128.8 139.4 4 111.5 107.8 Roger Maris 128.7 130.6 1 105.0 103.0 Willie Horton 128.3 156.2 5 100.2 117.8 Mark Teixeira 128.3 133.5 2 123.5 114.5 Ernie Lombardi 128.1 131.4 5 122.8 127.2 Edwin Encarnacion 128.1 120.2 N/A N/A N/A Roy Sievers 127.8 137.5 4 129.5 137.2 John Mayberry 127.5 122.5 0 N/A N/A Steve Garvey 127.2 140.0 5 103.2 111.0 Average 128.1 134.6 3.25 113.3 118.9 Encarnacion played 2015 at age 32, and it was his ninth year as a regular. The comps were all 32 years old, and had between eight and 10 years as regulars at that time. The left-most column lists their career OPS+ after their age-32 season. The next column lists their Contact Score -- their production on all balls in play, compared to the league average of 100 -- through age 32. Next up is the number of additional years each player lasted as a regular after age 32, and the final two columns list each player's OPS+ and Contact Score for those post age-32 seasons. (One note: Sal Bando, Tony Gwynn, Mike Hargrove and Roy White also made the initial comp list, but were dropped because of very different OBP/SLG profiles compared with Encarnacion.) The results aren't very pretty. The players as a group averaged only 3.25 seasons as regulars after age 32, though that figure may increase a bit as Teixeira's career continues. Encarnacion still has a season under team control, so these players averaged 2.25 additional years of service after age 33, the point at which Encarnacion can enter the free-agent market. The two players arguably most comparable to Encarnacion in terms of Contact Score and K/BB profile, Roger Maris and John Mayberry, lasted a single combined season after age 32 between them. Perhaps more importantly, the production of these players dropped off quite a bit after age 32; the group's cumulative OPS+ and Contact Score both decline by 12 percent. Encarnacion is basically a pure DH at this point, and a 113 OPS+ moving forward makes him a very marginal asset. Only one of the group of comps improved after age 32 in Roy Sievers, though by a very small amount. Let's perform the same analysis with Bautista: Jose Bautista Comparables PLAYER OPS+ TO AGE 34 CONT. SCORE TO 34 REM. YEARS REM. OPS+ REM. CONT. SCORE Al Simmons 138.6 171.6 3 105.6 116.0 Will Clark 137.8 145.8 0 N/A N/A Billy Williams 137.4 145.1 4 115.5 108.0 Tony Oliva 136.9 150.4 2 106.0 100.5 Minnie Minoso 136.4 135.6 2 95.0 85.5 Matt Holliday 136.0 148.2 N/A N/A N/A Jose Bautista 135.8 127.1 N/A N/A N/A David Ortiz 134.8 148.9 5 153.8 144.0 Dave Winfield 134.8 137.4 7 121.4 127.6 Bobby Abreu 134.7 146.8 3 111.7 108.0 Bill Nicholson 134.5 151.6 0 N/A N/A Mo Vaughn 134.4 173.6 0 N/A N/A Average 136.0 148.5 2.6 120.6 118.8 When I first identified the group of comps, using age 34 and between nine and 11 years as a regular (Bautista has 10), the group was very thin, including Oliva, Minoso, Holliday, Abreu and Vaughn. That group played only seven total seasons as regulars after age 34. Given Bautista's current excellence, and his unusual late breakthrough, I expanded the group to include players with between eight and 12 years as regulars, giving us the group above. (In this case, Joe Morgan, Rod Carew and Sammy Sosa were dropped from the group because of large OBP/SLG profile disparities.) The group lasted an average 2.6 seasons as regulars after age 34, 1.6 after age 35, the age Bautista will be when he would hit the market, not including Ortiz's 2016 farewell season. There are two comforting cases of Ortiz and Dave Winfield, however, who were productive in the vicinity of age 40. But again, there's a significant drop-off in production, with the group OPS+ declining by 11 percent and Contact Score declining by 20 percent after age 34. The players who relied on thump alone, without a strong K/BB foundation, plunged after age 34; Vaughn, Simmons, Nicholson and Oliva front that group. Bautista has a better current K/BB foundation than any of his comps did at age 34, enhancing his chances to remain productive moving forward. Once an average-ish right fielder whose arm strength was his best defensive asset, Bautista is now a DH-in-waiting, with a very limited shelf life as a serviceable outfielder. The comps enable us to make some big-picture generalizations, but let's briefly drill down into specifics regarding Encarnacion's and Bautista's specific offensive games. Both players stand out because of their ability to hit for power while maintaining low strikeout rates. That said, Encarnacion's K rate, while still strong, has increased from 10 to 16 percent in just two seasons. In addition, his average BIP authority, which had been over a full standard deviation higher than league average from 2011-14, was just over one-half standard deviation above average in 2015. The hitting profiles Encarnacion is an extreme pull hitter with an extreme popup tendency, whose liner rate has been below league average in six of the past seven seasons. Encarnacion is also routinely over-shifted in the infield, and can be counted upon to bat in the .100s on ground balls, putting a hard cap on his batting average. It's all about BIP authority moving forward, and I'd expect Encarnacion to age typically in relation to his comps. As for Bautista, many of the things I've just said about his teammate also apply to him. Extreme pull? Check. Extreme popup? Check. Miniscule liner rates? Check. In fact, Bautista's liner rate was the lowest among AL regulars in 2015, and since 2008, his liner rate percentile rank has never been higher than 17. Thus, he too has a hard cap on his batting average. There's one big difference between the two players, however, and it's in the biggest performance driver category for this type of player: BIP authority. Bautista's average velocity off the bat was over two full standard deviations above league average last season, his best single-season mark ever. That's up in Miguel Cabrera territory. In addition, his walk rate was over two full standard deviations higher than league average. He has very far to fall in those two categories, which should allow him to thrive for a while. So what should the Jays do? Under no circumstances should the Blue Jays sign both Encarnacion and Bautista. There is room for only one DH in an AL lineup, and by the time the 2017 season rolls around, both of these players will be pure DHs. If both players perform in the 120-125 OPS+ range in 2016, a fair yet conservative estimate, they likely will be seeking three-plus-year deals at $20 million-plus per season. Going forward, it's very unlikely that Encarnacion will be worth $20 million, even on a one-year deal, in 2017. He is not a standout among his comp group, he's already a pure DH, and has already begun to show some decline in BIP authority, the driver of his upside. His K/BB foundation gives him a high floor, while hit authority controls his ceiling. And the winner is ... Jose Bautista, who is more likely to maintain his production than Encarnacion. David Manning/USA TODAY Sports I'd be more inclined to explore an extension with Bautista. He still has at least a few strands of defensive utility remaining, and his BIP authority remains at the top of the scale. He's arguably the best age-34 performer among his comp group, killing the baseball with an elite BB rate, more than offsetting his weaknesses, chief among them his extreme pull tendency and subpar performance on grounders it brings. Like his comp Ortiz, Bautista has shown the ability to at least partially address his shortcomings; his K rate was once a weakness, and his popup rate was once much worse than it is today. I'd let the 2016 season begin to play out, then explore a three-year deal with a vesting option for Year 4 with Bautista.

I don't mean to pile on but I wouldn't trade any of those three main players you mentioned straight up for Jay Bruce; never mind combining all 3 together.

It doesn't really matter whether he said he gained 20 lbs of muscle or just 20 lbs because it's just ST drivel equivalent to "best shape of his life and ready for a breakout season."

Geezus, I really hope they just go with Tulo.

1. Cubs OVER 2. Mets OVER 3. Oakland OVER 4. Rays OVER 5. Orioles UNDER 6. Indians UNDER 7. Rockies UNDER 8. Marlins UNDER 9. White Sox UNDER 10. Seattle UNDER 11. Braves OVER 12. Toronto OVER

I wonder if they would want to play together. One team could end up with both of them.

I understand the desire to stack the MLB team as much as possible to start the season but you have to think about depth. 2 weeks in to the season changes to the Major League roster are going to happen due to injury and ineffectiveness. But let's go with that you have said. Chavez moves from longman to starter when we need another starter. But then what? Who would your first callup starter from AAA be when you inevitably need one? Scott Diamond? Then what about when we inevitably need our second one? I can't even think of a name unless one of Penny/LeBlanc/Hernandez actually stick around in Buffalo after spring training. Scott Copeland I guess? With your strategy of stacking the bullpen with capable starters we are probably looking at a minimum of 20+ starts from the likes of Diamond/Copeland/etc. Yuck.

We need a minimum of 9 starters, probably more. We used 12 last season and we were relatively healthy. Taking 3 potential starters and burning them all up in the bullpen kills our depth. With what you have proposed who would be or 6th starter? Diamond?