glory

I can't believe people thought their offense would be fine without Cespedes. Running a bunch of platoon players in the outfield to replace a 3 WAR bat with power is not the answer, especially when the lineup lacks power to begin with. Good to see Beane realizing it before it was too late.

The Jays would have a lot of trouble finding a SS as good as Reyes next season, but that doesn't mean you don't dump his salary and try to allocate the resources better if an opportunity came up. Same with Lind. If the payroll was going to increase, then fine, hold on to Lind and try to find upgrades elsewhere. However, that's probably not going to happen, so money has to be spent more wisely.

A better defensive 1B who is more split neutral and can stay healthy would be better than keeping Lind.

Why not move Reyes over to 2B? It should hopefully improve his defensive value and assuming they actually get a good defensive short-stop, should improve the MI defense considerably. I think JJ Hardy would be perfect for this team, or if there is a trade to be made with the D-Backs for Didi, that would be good too. Navarro can always been moved to back-up catcher, or traded. I just think his defense/pitch framing is terrible and his offense isn't nearly good enough to compensate for it. We don't even need to sign Martin to upgrade. Trade for someone like Rene Rivera (hitting OK and playing good defense for the Padres but stuck behind Grandal). It would be cheap, a defensive upgrade, and not much difference offensively to Navarro. These tiny upgrades will make a difference overall. I'm drawing a blank on what the Jays could do for LF. There is not much out there. Maybe trade for Craig Gentry, stick him in LF, and hope his plus defense and speed will make up for his lack of power. He was a 3 WAR player with less than 300 PA's a year for the Rangers, so maybe he's a good buy low candidate if Beane wants to move an OF, but Beane is usually smart about players like that. Regardless, if the team drastically changes its team building philosophy, they might be able to make up some ground in terms of internal improvement. Whether that's enough to make the playoffs is another story, but it's worth a shot. The all power/no defense strategy has failed miserably.

I have a hunch it won't end well, but I think you have to keep Sanchez in the rotation until he absolutely proves he is a failure. It's not like the Jays are dripping with MLB starters. With that said, yes, I'm fully expecting his career to be in the pen. And he'll probably be great in that role.

The Jays will never sign free agents with this current regime and their strict rules (five year deals, no player friendly options, etc). What the Jays might be able to do is add better defensive players and hope that helps the pitching staff. Gose/Pillar in CF should help. Shifting Reyes over to 2B and finding a real SS would help. Replacing Melky with a better defensive LF should help (his offense will be hard to replace). Replacing Navarro with a catcher who is not a fat lazy stump would be an improvement. Do all those things, and the pitching should improve without adding anyone. Teams with good defense and great bullpens are currently in AL playoff spots (O's, Royals). Might be time to follow that trend and hope Bats/Edwin/Reyes can carry the offensive load.

The thing with Lind is that he takes up two roster spots (one for him and one for his platoon buddy). I mean, as good as Lind has been against RHP, how have his platoon mates been? This season, Navarro is hitting .270/.309/.374 against lefties. Moises Sierra had 2 hits and 1 walk in 35 PA's with the Jays so I don't think searching his splits are necessary. Valencia should be an improvement there, but you have to pay him a salary to sit on the bench and only hit against lefties (plus you have to hope his splits continue despite a relatively small sample size against LHP). You get the idea. Factor in Lind's brittle body and bad defense, and I'm not sure it's a no brainer to bring him back. Would a more split neutral 1B with better defense be an improvement? I tend to think it would, but then as you said, the team would have to find a cheap solution, and I'm not sure Alex is capable of that. I'd take that chance, though.

Lind is a 1-2 win player who can't hit lefties, can't play defense, and is injury prone. Paying him $8M when the team is cash strapped would not be wise.

The next time Rogers increases payroll and decides to go for it, Gibbons better not be the manager. It happened in 2006-08 and 2012-13. Gibbons just happens to be around every time hype turns into disappointment.

McGowan's option better not be picked up. This organization has given him free money for years because they didn't want another Carpenter situation. McGowan is clearly not going to be Chris Carpenter. Move on.

Declining Morrow's option and then bringing him back on a cheaper deal wouldn't be a terrible idea as long as they put him in the pen. His days as a starter are over. Not durable enough.

As embarrassing as it would be, would you guys do Bautista to the Mets for Syndergaard and d'Arnaud? Thinking of teams that may want/need an OF and came to that sad realization. I can't believe Alex gave those two up for Dickey. Terrible.

It's too late. I'm not sure it's possible to compete next year with this group plus whatever improvements that can be mustered from the waiver wire due to payroll restrictions (I doubt payroll is going up after this season and they'll need it to). Rogers might be against a complete house cleaning due to likely attendance drops, but I can't think of anything else that makes sense short and long term. Unless Norris and Sanchez becomes stars along with continued development from Stroman and Hutchison next season. That's asking for a hell of a lot.

Taveras and Martinez for the Cardinals.

The Pirates are notoriously cheap so I don't see them trading guys like Hanson along with Glasnow for Edwin. I'd definitely ask for it though. Maybe I'm overrating Glasnow but I think he will be a top 5-10 prospect in baseball by next season, if he isn't already. But I'll agree that it's not a good trade after looking at Tabata's contract (I thought he was making way less than that).

Glasnow looks like an elite pitching prospect. The Pirates won't trade him and other top prospects with him. Definitely a risk to center a trade around a pitcher below AA ball, but I think he has a chance to be excellent if he pans out. Tabata is just a placeholder in the outfield as the team rebuilds.

Bautista to Boston for Betts, Swihart, and Escobar Encarnacion to Pittsburgh for Glasnow and Tabata Who says no first?

Taveras and Martinez from the Cardinals. A direct OF replacement for Bautista with six years of control left plus another starting option with upside to stick in the rotation. Bautista seems like a player the Cardinals would trade their top prospect for (they usually like to keep their prospects). I'm not trading with the Red Sox unless I get Betts, Swihart, and Owens. Seeing Bats win with the Red Sox would be disgusting.

If they kept all the prospects and built internally while keeping Bautista and Edwin, they would have been better off than they are now. I'm not sure where you got building around Lawrie and Morrow from. They still would have been bad over the last two years, unless Alex got some cheap productive players, but may have set themselves up to have a good young rotation by next year (Syndergaard and Alvarez mixed with the current group) with TDA at catcher and no albatross contracts.

His downfall was not sticking to the original plan. It may have been ownership's call to win right away after the 2012 season, but regardless, that was the beginning of the end in hindsight. The Jays could have been sitting on Stroman, Sanchez, Norris, Syndergaard, Nicolino, etc, in the minors or just reaching the Majors, with Hutch and Alvarez already up. d'Arnaud at C, Marisnick an option at CF, Escobar at short on a cheap contract, etc. With the AL East being as winnable as its ever been, waiting would have been the best option. Hindsight and all.

Was the 2nd year a team option? Otherwise that is way too many years. Not worth it.

Yeah Bradley has more upside but it's not worth trading talent for Bradley when the team is grooming Pompey for that spot anyway (nevermind Gose being a similar player to JBJ in the mean time). Like I said, I think he is a throw-in in a larger deal for a star player. Maybe a starter if one becomes available.

Who could the Jays give up for the Red Sox to trade him and why would the Red Sox sell low on him? He seems like the ideal guy to trade in a package for a star (maybe package him with Betts). Unless the Jays want to package Bautista for those guys, it seems like an unrealistic to get him for cheap.

The Jays have to go on another May-like run and then let the chips fall where they fall. Highly unlikely. It's a shame. On June 6, they were 38-24. If they just went .500 from that point, they'd be in a WC spot right now. Unfortunately, 27-38 is not .500. Or, when they were 60-50 on August 1, if they went .500 instead of 5-12, they'd be right in the thick of it. With this club, they either go on a run where they look elite, or a run where they look like the 2014 Rangers. No in between.

What did Sid say?