Orgfiller

In Fairbanks' defense, he's made up for it by improving his BB/9 and Location+.

Ross Atkins is just waiting for him to become old enough to be considered a non prospect and that's when his trap card activates. +15 contact from grit and grind, +20 clutch from feel good stories, +10 defense from being a team player, -5 baserunning from being in Jays org for too long. Schreck turns 26 in mid July, look for him to be getting steam around then.

Said it before, but if you can sign him to the Yimi Garcia deal - who should hopefully also be a little healthier in 2026 - then we've effectively replaced Seranthony in the bullpen at a very palatable price.

Yamamoto was in his own class coming out of Japan. Imai isn't quite there, he's probably closer to a Kikuchi type, since the command is a grade or two below some of these top Japanese guys we've seen previously like Yamamoto and Tanaka, but the stuff is good. Less of an ace and more of a solid #3 guy is the upside here, with a decent floor.

I think you're kidding yourself if you don't have Tucker as the best FA available. The defense isn't special but he's an excellent hitter and baserunner. Since 2021 (his first proper full season) he's 10th in the MLB in wRC+ and WAR. Left handed of course which allows us to slot him neatly either at second or fourth in the lineup while breaking up our righties. Doesn't strike out and walks a ton which fits our team philosophy to a tee, and yeah he also has a career .234 ISO. Only real concern with him is he's not the most durable guy out there. If that limits his ceiling to only 4.5-5 WAR every year you can live with it, but you're of course paying a premium for that value if he doesn't have odd years where he's pushing 5.5-6+ wins. With that said, you're likely not getting both Bo and Tucker, so you gotta make the decision that if you must have one, which one is easier for you to find internal options to make up for the value, while giving you financial flexibility of making other additions. Tucker increases our position on the win curve and balances our lineup, with Ernie likely then doing his best to replace Bo, but it might come at the cost of not allowing us to shop at the top of the pitching FA market. Keeping Bo, seeing if Barger develops further, and signing a top pitcher could be more viable potentially. It's a fun thought exercise, and as long as they can get one of those guys without hampering them from further additions then we'll be in a good spot regardless.

With Suarez I'm definitely most concerned with the durability and declining velo than I am his velo in a vacuum. I think the stuff is good enough and the command is excellent, but he's never broken the 30 GS mark, and the velo just keeps tanking even though he's getting better as a pitcher overall. If the velo stays where it currently is, I still think he's a very good pitcher who will start playoff games. But there's the injury history, now on the wrong side of 30, and notable declining velo three seasons in a row. Those are the kind of things that certainly don't get better with age. If I had a crystal ball that told me he's guaranteed to give you 150+ IP, always be available for the playoffs, and his velo didn't decline any further, I wouldn't hesitate to bank on him as a middle-low tier TOR arm.

First of all, heavy disagree on Dave Roberts out managing Schneider in that series. This to me is heavy revisionist logic based on the outcome of the games. He didn't use his bench properly at all, but ultimately it didn't really matter. Mookie Betts was a black hole and hit second for most of the series. Starting Miguel Rojas in a game 7 should have been a stupid reactionary move, but of course it worked out for him. His pitching usage was nothing special, he just had the luxury of Yamamoto being a robot and bailing him out for 3 wins single handedly. Ohtani staying to pitch 3 innings in Game 7 was objectively a bad call and almost lost them the series. If you look at the numbers, for whatever reason Vlad hits significantly better in the 3 spot, in his entire career over thousands of PAs. There's gonna be a lot of noise to that, but if the reason is psychological then you simply have to put your best hitter and player in the most comfortable position, since that's what's best for the team to win.

Honestly, Little just always has that look on the mound where he looks like he's s***ing his pants. I really can't blame JS for avoiding using him with the body language and general mental fortitude that he visibly shows out there. Don't forget he also gave up the game-winning HR in the 18 inning marathon! So much for the guy being able to keep the ball in the park lol, gave up two of the biggest homers the pitching staff allowed in the entire postseason run, in only 4 IP! I think while the SSS criticism is fair, there's something to kind of trust the hot hand a bit in the playoffs, when for some guys the moment is too big. He arguably left Varsho up too high in the lineup for a bit too long when Barger was crushing it and it hurt us a bit, not that I'm blaming that on Schneider. Fluharty didn't quite maintain the magic in the Dodgers series, Fisher's command regressed a bit, Seranthony was gas canning heavily. Meanwhile Hoffman was having the best stretch of the season at the perfect time, and of course it would come back to bite us to rely on him when we needed it the absolute most. Not to mention JS single handedly building Varland's innings count up so he could be ready for a full season starter's workload.

I'm pretty sure the fastball thing is one of the biggest reasons why his contact rates are bad. I've seen a lot of people saying he can't hit 95+, and if you're a guy already not making contact in the NPB where contact reigns supreme and the pitching quality isn't quite as good as the MLB, I have extreme hesitancy at giving him a big contract to hope to fix him. Anyone remember Yoshi Tsutsugo? Obviously Murakami is a tier above in contact quality, but the K rate trending up from his early 20s to now is a big red flag.

No way Jonah Hill is coming back to baseball to immediately sign the most anti analytics guy available lol.

I'd say Varsho but he also ticked every other box that Atkins loves - defense++ and baserunning

He's a pretty good arm so he'll likely beat this, but getting him on the Yimi Garcia contract would be great. Would be the Seranthony replacement in the bullpen, with better command but worse stuff - his fastball Stuff+ has really declined.

At 55 seconds the radar gun shows 155 km/h which translates to 96 mph, on his 100th pitch of the game.

Alcantara's contract + club option has him paid like what Chris Bassitt is projected to get in free agency. It's not just that you can get Cease for money, the money he's likely to command in FA would potentially prevent the team from making further additions. Alcantara would still give us payroll flexibility. Not that I'm anti signing Cease or anything, but you gotta consider the pros and cons to both guys.

Unless they just think his shoulder is cooked.

s***** re: Burr. Seemed like something had potentially clicked for him and then he couldn't stay healthy. Projections still like him, would be interesting to see if he would sign a minor league deal with a chance to break the team. At least an agreement like the team has to make a decision by Opening Day or he can become a FA after that.

Ever heard of trades? Or having depth? Bo projects for 4 WAR in 2026, and given where the Jays are on the win curve, 4 wins from one player vs a collection of guys who might put up 2-2.5 if you platoon them well enough is a big deal.

He's under contract until end of 2028 because Preller gave him a 6 year deal entering his age 36 season. I'm sure he would consider retiring from the MLB otherwise.

You don't say lol. Without Schwarber's eye which Varsho clearly doesn't have, a more realistic peak expectation is some version of prime Javy Baez/2025 first half PCA, without as much chase.

I honestly think if Varsho was forced to only throw left handed for the rest of his career that he'd still be one of the premier defenders in the sport. His range is otherworldly, in large part because he gets elite jumps consistently and often takes the best possible routes. We've seen his elite defensive instincts provide benefit even with a noodle arm e.g. in the playoffs in that long Leo Rivas single off the wall. As long as the shoulder doesn't affect his hitting, he remains relatively healthy, and his legs don't dramatically decline, he'll be one of the best outfield defenders in the sport for a few more years to come, and a valuable 3+ WAR piece. He's shown this season that the power is indeed legit, but I don't know how much I can buy that he's better than a ~105-110 wRC+ bat over a full season, in a good year. There's a lot of swing and miss and not great plate discipline tendencies. I hope he continues his all or nothing approach though. He's shown that the power can really play at this level even with a less than ideal general approach at the plate, and when he locks in on a pitch location he can do damage.

That's a crazy factoid, wonder if there's a big difference between daytime Dodger Stadium vs nighttime. All 3 games will be starting at 5 pm PST, so the weather effects will be somewhere in between for the early portion of the games and then regular nighttime effect (if any) for the later innings.

Muñoz was on the ropes. The boys earned the s*** out of it tonight. Even the Mariners with a horseshoe up their ass the whole game couldn’t beat the team of destiny.

As far as I'm concerned, they need to treat Miller as the ace of the staff. Jays hitting has demolished elite starting pitching these playoffs. Miller was pretty good as recently as last season, so it's not like this injury plagued year is a fully accurate assessment of his quality. They gotta treat him as if they're facing Gilbert, Kirby, Fried, Rodon, etc.

The funny part is this wasn’t even him at his best. The slider command was nonexistent, but to his credit he threw a good splitter to Raleigh. Otherwise he was really spotting his fastball.

What an inning for Hoffman.