If the Jays trade for a starter, and give up 2 or more of their top prospects (Stro/Sanchez/Norris/Tirado/Nay...) I'd like to see them go back to the mentality of acquiring young major league, yet controllable guys, not 30ish, verge of free agency or rental types. If you go back and listen to AA interviews, and Rogers talking heads pre Nov 2012, that was the script before The Trade and The Dickey Deal. We had stockpiled all these prospects, and if we traded them, it would be for guys who were young stars, yet still in their early arb years, so even if we werent in WIN NOW Mode, these guys would be in their primes when we were.
The perfect guy for that script wouldve been Latos, when SD was shopping him after 2011. Legend has it that AA wouldnt include Syndergaard OR D'Arnaud, so the deal didnt get done. Then 1 year later, he includes Syndergaard AND D'Arnaud for Dickey. Totally flipped the script.
I'd prefer we target guys like Dallas Keuchel, Tyson Ross, Tom Koehler, Johnathan Niese, etc. who are under control for at least 2-3 more years after this one, are either very cheap, or relatively cheap (Niese has an extension, but still tops out at like 9 mil in 2016). Sure guys like this will be hard to acquire, as they are young and controllable, and fit with a rebuilding team mentality...but Samardjiza will also be hard to acquire. When we're talking high end prospects, I'd like to get a guy who can be controllable for the next few seasons, not just the rest of this year and next.