glory

Yeah I expect Leon to get a serious look in Spring Training as a reliever. He's not a good SP, but maybe they see something in him out of the pen. If not, they lose him on waivers or he slips through and adds depth to AAA. Ultimately, nothing of value was lost if he doesn't make the team. Not a move to be excited about, but you throw enough of these failed starters into relievers, and maybe one or two of them pan out. That's really the best way to go if you have no money to get established relief help.

It took him six years on the job to start making moves even resembling saber-friendly. If he values it, then it was a recent thing. Certainly not something he showed from 2010-2014.

Make him a reliever and see if he turns into anything. If not, minor league depth. We are starving for news, that's why this nothing move is even a topic.

"Andrew, I'm telling you, trading DeLeon, Urias, and Seager for Hanley and Panda makes a lot of sense. Just a suggestion. Think about it. Sincerely, Alex".

Smoak had a .243 ISO last season. The power potential is there. Combine that with a 9-10% BB%, and he still has enough potential that I'd be willing to give him a real shot, especially in the 2016 lineup where he won't have to carry a huge responsibility on offense. The issue is if he is playing 2-3 days a week like last year, it will be hard to get any sort of consistency going. They either need to tell Gibbons to do a strict platoon, or trade/demote Colabello, because having a $4m back-up 1B that can't play anywhere else is a pretty bad use of resources. Either give him a real shot, or don't and use that money for another need (probably too late for that now).

The story is that Gibbons didn't want to platoon Ben Revere, so they had to make a decision on Colabello or Valencia, and apparently AA said that he left the decision up to Gibbons. Colabello had options left so he could have been demoted and called up again in September, but they decided to lose an asset for nothing instead.

I don't think Gibbons will be given as much rope to make his own decisions like he had with AA (the idiotic DFA of Valencia because Gibby didn't like him, for example). If the FO wants Smoak to start at 1B, then he will. I don't think Smoak was brought back at $4m to be a defensive replacement. I think we'll end up seeing a platoon for most of the season.

You said he sucks. I'm saying there's a good chance he won't next season. That doesn't mean anyone is saying he is a central part of the pen.

Cecil, Osuna, and Loup should be good. I hated seeing Loup in games last season but the track record and peripherals suggest he was unlucky last season. A bounce back is possible. Sanchez is what he is (assuming he doesn't come to camp with a new swing and miss pitch). As long as Gibbons doesn't use him as if he were Betances, and maybe a bit more situationally (fewer LHB, more GB situations) then he should be fine as well. I agree the team could use another arm (Blanton!!) but the pen is the easiest of all positions to find a surprise contributor. I'm not too worried about it.

They don't want to trade prospects, and with presumably little wiggle room in the payroll it is going to be difficult to acquire relief help in the current market. They likely did not anticipate the FA market for relievers to be this crazy. Im fine with how this off season has played out. A little boring but it is what it is. If they can gather enough room for a Blanton type it would make me feel a little better about the pen, though.

The Jays accurately predicting the market for SP's in November saved them a whole bunch of money, short and long term. No way they could have gotten into bidding wars with teams like the Dodgers, Giants, Cardinals, etc, for the 2nd/3rd tier free agent SP's (Kazmir, Shark, Leake types).

It's pretty clear that Osuna and Sanchez will both be in the bullpen. Shapiro knows what this team is in 2016 and those two present far greater value in the pen than they would in a rotation with many starters likely projected to be better than them in 2016. In 2017, that could change, but for 2016, given where the payroll is projected to be and the internal options available, I can't see any scenario where those two are not in the back end of the bullpen. Blame Alex for making them relievers before they developed into SP's. This is their reality now, at least for the time being.

The Yankees bullpen is ridiculous. I guess don't go into the 7th inning trailing. Wish the Dodgers just completed that trade when it happened.

Chapman, Betances, and Miller to close out a game. Damn. Better not be trailing after 6 against the Yankees next season.

They definitely view Chavez as the more valuable piece, otherwise they don't make that trade. I think they clearly view Chavez as a SP and the "swing man" talk is just window dressing in case someone like Hutchison dominates in spring training. However they still have to add a reliever to replace Hendriks (even though Gibby didn't use him properly). They likely envisioned a reliever being easier to acquire as opposed to a SP, so they took that gamble. But the relief market went crazy and now they have to adjust. As GD mentioned above, I'd rather they have been right about the SP market, so I'm fine with how things played out. If the Jays still had Hendriks in the pen and needed to find a 2 win starter in free agency, then they would have been in a worse position. Leake getting the type of contract he got makes Estrada/Happ/Chavez look a hell of a lot better. Hoping one of their RP options busts out in the spring is a risk I'd be willing to take.

It sounded like Estrada was going to accept the QO but signed the two year deal instead. He's probably fine with how things played out. If there was no QO, then he probably would have explored his options a bit more.

Yeah, it looks like they envisioned being able to sign a Hendriks replacement for a reasonable price but then the middle relief market exploded. They seemed to predict the SP market, but misjudged the relief market.

AA: "Alright guys, you see the top 10 prospects in your system? Five of them should be traded immediately."

Yes, get May.

Re-signing both Bautista and Encarnacion is simply not financially feasible given where the team's budget is, unless they move someone making $20m annually (either Martin or Tulo). Let's be realistic, the payroll will probably be around $140-150m in a best case. Re-signing both of them would mean paying five players $100m combined in 2017 (and more than that in 2018 depending on where Donaldson's final year of arb falls). Unless Shapiro also inherited the Indians starting rotation, that's not a lot of wiggle room to improve the rotation and pen. Happ and Estrada make $27.5m in 2017. Dickey and Chavez will need to be replaced in the rotation. Cecil will need to be replaced in the pen. Etc. It's a one year window with this current group. That doesn't mean Shapiro won't be able to acquire other players to extend the existing core post-2016 (Donaldson, Tulo, Stroman, Martin, etc), but it will be difficult to do. Either you lose Bautista/Edwin, or bring them back on free agent contracts while they are likely going to hit their declining years and forgo any financial flexibility to improve elsewhere. Shapiro wasn't brought in to make the team older and more expensive. It was likely the opposite. That's why it's a tough spot. It's easy to focus on 2016 while losing sight of 2017-beyond.

He inherited what should be an elite offense with a one year window, but with no pitching depth and a farm system that will probably rank in the bottom 10 in baseball this winter. A likely contender in 2016 followed by a lot of uncertainty in 2017. If the team contends and makes the playoffs in 2016, he'll get very little if any credit for it, and if the team has to take a step back in 2017 due to the losses of Bautista and/or Encarnacion, then he'll get all the blame. Hell, he's getting blamed for two things that had absolutely no chance of happening even if AA and Beeston stayed another five years (Price re-signing and grass). I think it's fair to say that it's not the easiest situation to inherit. I thought he did a great job of replenishing the pitching depth without trading a prospect, losing a draft pick, or signing an unreasonable contract. What he does after 2016 in an effort to keep this team a contender will be interesting.

I'd trust a bum on the street before I trust McCown's "sources".

Dick Pole is correct. You can consistently make the playoffs and build a strong farm system without sacrificing one for the other. It will take some creativity with this team since post-2016 looks a little shaky, but that should be the goal. It will involve dipping into free agency, but I see no reason why this regime won't do that if the money is there.

Well, he only inherited 3 starters in MLB and AAA combined. He had to do something. The offense he inherited projects to be great, but even that has a one year window attached to it. Then he'll either have to let Bautista and Encarnacion go or pay them free agent money into their mid-late 30's. It's not as rosey as many people seem to think it is. To his credit, all of his moves so far have been aimed towards winning in 2016 without sacrificing flexibility and prospects. That's exactly what the Jays needed to do.

Even if Osuna was only going to throw 100 IP in 2015 had he stayed in the minors, it would have been fine as long as he was an SP for those innings. He was only 20. There was no rush to bring him up and he could have worked on his secondary stuff during that time. Give him 100 IP in 2015, bump that up in 2016, and then maybe by 2017 he would have been a legit rotation option at age 22 if all went well. Worst case, they could have always turned him into a reliever anyway down the road. Now they have no choice. They won't demote him as he's a cheap bullpen piece which they lack, an option of his has already been burned, and his service clock has started. There was no reason to put Osuna in this position. Very short-sighted of AA. Sanchez is a reliever based on his current skill set, and I think he's a reliever long-term if he doesn't develop a plus 2nd pitch and improve his control, but I'm not that impressed with him as a reliever ATM. Granted, some of that could be because of the way he was used as others have mentioned. Bringing him into games with runners on base and less than 2 outs is basically handing the other team a run since the ball has a high percentage of being put in play. Gibbons being a moron should not be held against Sanchez. However, we're still looking at a guy with a decent/not spectacular K rate and so far a heavy platoon split. Even as a reliever he needs to improve. The potential is there. I just wish he would have spent 2014 and possibly 2015 in the minors as a starter so he maybe could have developed something down there. He has a great fastball and his GB rates are excellent, but he's not a finished product, and unfortunately he may not have time to develop into one given the team's current needs.