BigCecil

Coffee is for closers.

Revising my view on this. I actually think its more likely than not we sign him now. Its the best way to protect renos and other investments. It might not work out long term from a on the field perspective, but there a lot of runway to make the deal pay financially for Rogers worth the risk. For 3 years at least the buzz will be palpable and monetized. Hopefully a lot more than that.

Soto is going to the Yanks and Ohtani will to the LAD. The clocks run out, times up, over, blaow. Snap back to reality, ope there goes gravity.

Literally 50% of his remaining deal being "inevitable player decline and injury possibility outcomes" is a horribly bad signing. Point being some team (s) might still see some value, including us. At this point I don't know if our FO truly does. I do agree there is a good chance that Blair might be talking out his ass, but if they could find a fit and eat some of the $, it makes some sense. Wont be easy. Then again I thought the same about Wells and Rios deals in the past for the Jays.

I totally think they would move Springer for the right deal. All about roster mgm, risk of 3/75, Aging curve and IL history.

Getting 1 year of Soto would definitely be a "window is now" move. That bat in our order with him in LF, Varsho in CF and Springer in RF is pretty tempting. It might not cost Ricky, but whatever the price, its gonna sting.

I would think few want you to be right about Soroka more than I. He is a FA in a year and he just hasn't recovered since 2019. Tough decisions. I've heard AA interviewed about him quite a bit. He had high hopes for him in '23 and it didn't work out. Time will tell if he is another Chris Carpenter ish or not.

Bummer kind of like Ray before he got fixed. Wicked stuff - high K and BB rates. Who knows if they can "fix" him. Shame about Soroka. Works out with my son at Webber Baseball Academy in Calgary a lot this time of year. Super nice guy. He just never has recovered from Achilles yet with 2 set backs, and the body over compensated giving him some arm issues. 6.56 FIP in 2023. Braves gave up on him and with him being a FA in '25 they got what they could I guess.

Pass on $50M + AAV for Ohtani. Its the biggest sugar high ever. Unicorn and probably best player I've ever seen but for a number of reasons including being 30 and arm injury history don't want him. (I also thought Semien and Seagar signings by TEX were insane and flags fly forever. So what do I know)

The joke that never...ever gets old!

Lopez is a 73 wRC+ bat in 2000 PAs with a D based '21 outlier 6 WAR season. I don't think any team perceives his value as very high.

Been seeing some Kirk work out pictures on X. He looks better. Thats really encouraging.

Dare to dream!!!

Interesting interview on Blair & Barker pod with Big Papi today on Vlad 40 ish minute mark. Obviously he is friends with them but it was a somewhat reassuring perspective at least. Just talking about his tools and age. His desire to hit better. Saying that struggles young can be a good thing. Predicts a big year in 2024.

"Injury history was still the top predictor, along with raw number of pitches thrown, and as you might expect, having a previous injury or being older made things somewhat worse." There has been a million studies done on this and ^ holds up. Gausman 1500+ IP (33) Berrios 1200+ IP (30) Bassitt 900+ IP (35) Kikuchi 600+ IP(33) MLB but not sure how many IP in Japan Ryu held consistent to his IL history. The 2024 rotation IL history is encouraging, but miles on them. 2016 and 2023 are the most healthy SP rotation seasons I can recall. I don't think it would be wise for the FO to anticipate the same in 2024.

Now there is a blast from the past. He of the tree trunk legs and mediocre career.

He is quick but isn't as fast as I thought. Compared to Kirk his 46th percentile sprint speed makes him Ben Johnson. I think its too soon to make many judgements on the D. 20 DRS. His pop time, blocks above avg and throwing are elite. Over the next 2 years if they move to a robo appeal system on balls/strikes, which i think they will, framing (where he is currently weak) will have less value in evaluating C. Which is a good thing IMO.

yep. Not a bad thing. I think steamer is more aggressive. Has Kirk, Bo and Vlad all right around 4 and Varsho & Springer at 3. We will probably need all that.

The ZiPS projections are underwhelming FWIW. Like a lot of teams they are going to need some over performance and a great off season. 2.5 Springer; 1.9 Varsho; Vlad & Bo 3 and 3.9. Chappy projected 2nd in WAR and he is likely gone. I have this strange feeling this team could win the WS or be the White Sox lol. The narrative on fangraphs page for ZiPS says of Vlad "practically nothing between a one and six-win season would surprise me at this point." Sums it up well. Depending on how it goes they may face some huge decisions at the '24 deadline. Will be a very interesting year.

Signing Free Agents for more term & money isn't splitting the atom or inventing penicillin. Its pretty simple. Its about $, geography and winning. Ryu, Springer and Kooch came here mainly for the $/term offered. Jays have a history of signing FA's, like Russel Martin heading into 2015. We picked up big names like Cone, Morris, Winfield, Molitor and Stewart the last win window we had before that. Part of the attraction for Free Agents correlates to a chance to win, which is what KK and others have said. The reality is those windows have been few and far between (1994-2014 was dead). I think Atkins/Shapiro came out of the gate hot criticizing AA for trading prospects promising "waves" of impact MLB talent from the farm. They have had some success in development, but its been modest compared to what they billed, by any objective analysis. Our entire rotation last year, once Manoah was shelved, was Free Agents. They also traded a lot of top prospects. Without the draft & development success they hoped for, they pivoted to pillow deals and being willing to spend more signing a mix of younger and older veteran Free Agents like Ryu, Springer and Bassitt to remain "competitive". Overall they have been quite solid in these signings, but I don't think its sustainable. The back end of those deals, especially with the older player signings, can be painful and impact negatively future roster construction. Its my hope we start to get more impact talent developed internally and on our roster.

Amazing what an extra year of term and $25M AAV will do. AA had to overpay and give Martin an extra year too. Gausman has been an elite signing....to be sure. 10 WAR over 2 seasons...we are almost in house money on the entire deal.

Pretty tough on Bo and Vlad but both projections should be pretty attainable. With the caveat how in shape he is in ST, Kirk on Steamer and ZIPs at 4 WAR seems aggressive to me. I just don't think you can bank on that. He was healthy last season but he missed time in 2021 for hip flexor - not a good thing for a C.

Toronto Blue Jays president Mark Shapiro says his club’s farm system is better than it was two years ago, but still largely a work in progress. “Not where it needs to be,” Shapiro told MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand in a recent Q&A. “I think we’re really excited about what’s happening at [high Class A], at Dunedin, the Florida State League and below. Still concerned about Double-A and Triple-A, the depth of prospects there.” Shapiro said he would rank Toronto’s farm “probably in the upper half, maybe closing in on the upper third” of all MLB organizations and highlighted the success of top prospects Bo Bichette and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., who both began the season in Lansing before advancing to Dunedin. “You don’t just need two guys, you need waves of guys,” said Shapiro. “And behind them, you need another wave of guys. I feel like that’s coming. It’s probably two to four years away that it’s going to get here, but when it comes, what we’ve continued to execute on whether it’s [assistant GM] Andrew Tinnish leading us in international, we’ve got waves of guys coming. “I’m encouraged by that.” Shapiro - Aug 31, 2017

Yep. This time of the year is the worst. Even worse than Spring training. Endless meaningless rumors, empty quotes and speculation.

I'll take 91 wins. Lots of different views out there. Its all grey in baseball. Jim Bowden on JD Bunkis pod 2 days ago said: - Jays as constructed not a playoff team. - BoSox and Yanks will bounce back and make some big moves. O's are for real. - Springer another year older. Lot of risk. - Moreno trade made no sense. They wouldn't trade him for Jose Ramirez but trade him for elite D with some pop, who never hit, and he doesn't understand why anyone thinks he ever will hit. Throwing in LGJ made even less sense. - Rotation won't be as good next year. Pitching remains a strength. - Farm not deep enough to make the moves that need to be made. - Sign Bo - but if you can't, listen on both he and Vlad. - He doesn't think Vlad is going to age well - body type. - They need someone of the ilk of Soto in the order, but don't really have the farm and players to get him. - Vlad is not happy with the Jays "as he understands it". Lots of teams would look at Vlad as a solid asset. - Let Chappy go. Not worth what he will get. Not a middle of the order bat and aging. - Said he would have fired Schneids on the spot for not taking accountability for pulling Berrios. Ultimately his call. - No answers on Manoah. Everyone in baseball still scratching their head. You can't count on him. - As long as the the player gets the AAV and term they want with Boras, they will go anywhere. Winning is secondary. But does the Jays FO want to spend even more payroll?