Brownie19

Interesting. I also lied, he was nominated twice (2020 and 2021) but never won. GG awards are unfortunately a joke. I wish they'd restore the validity of them.

There are lots of examples of players who aren't good defensively, who have won a GG. Rafael Paleiro is the most obvious example. He won a GG in 1999 while playing 28 games at 1st base and 128 games at DH. LGJ won a GG in LF recently. It certainly happens. Vlad isn't good defensively, even though I do agree that there are glimpses of brilliance at times.

I'm not sure that's true. If that article didn't exist, we would have had the same conversation in one of the other Vlad related threads (Baerga - Vladdy Signing an Extension, Wait Will Soon Be Over, etc.). Now if moving our conversations to the 'articles' helps the board, then OK - I can get on board with that. But to date, there have been like 70 articles posted and like 48 of them have less than 5 replies. Personally (and I mean this with no disrespect to the writers), most of them seem written towards casuals. I assume that's by design and likely a requirement if you're going to be pumping out several articles a day (across many different platforms, for many different teams). That said, a few have caught my attention and at times, they have created new conversation. I had no idea how many articles would be published. It's WAYYY more than I thought, but that's probably just my ignorance. If this is what's best for the website, than carry on.

Yeah - I'd support this. I know he's trying to grow the site, but there's A LOT of articles.

Bingo. Schneider may have also hesitated because of the respect he has for Springer, but there's little to no evidence that if they approached Springer and spoke to him about moving out of the leadoff spot, that he'd refuse or create any drama.

Now use career WAR...

So the answer is no, Springer didn't refuse to be taken out of the leadoff spot. Not surprised, the guy is a class act.

Bo's OBP was .277 last year, Springer's was .303, Gimenez was .298. If you only consider last years' results, then all 3 options suck. We don't really have an obvious choice, so considering several candidates seems appropriate. Steamer OBP projections Gimenez .318 Springer .319 Bo .324 The .371 mark Gimenez posted 2 years ago is also well above anything Bo's ever done and Springer only surpassed that mark once in his career (2019). I don't see why you'd rule him out as an option in Day 1 of spring training...

George refused to be taken out of the leadoff spot last year? That's news to me.

Yeah - the Red Sox are shaping up to be a good team for the next while...

That's a pretty good comp right there. Willy Adames isn't a bad one either. He reached free agency a year older than Bo (29 v. 28), but they have had similar results to date (albeit they do it in different ways) and he can actually stick at SS. I think that's a clear sign the market has dropped and I don't think Bo gets anything close to $300M.

Don't kink shame me Term. So rude.

I think it's seen obvious to most that Bo wants to test free agency and most here share legit concerns about his ability to sustain his offensive abilities past his early 30's. He relies too much on skills that erode with age. I've really enjoyed watching and cheering for Bo over the years, but I think his time with the Jays is coming to an end.

I'm sorry Megan, but this is a bunch of nonsense. It looks like it's meant for Facebook to feed the clickbait casuals. Why give a blank cheque to Soto, but not Vlad? C'mon - that's obvious.

That number sounds believable to me. I was actually thinking Vlad's # started with a 6...

I'm just joking around with you (couldn't resist). Welcome aboard. This is a sabr heavy board and although most of us use a combination of stats and our eyes/experience as baseball fans to form opinions, there is one thing that nearly everyone on this board agrees with - and it's that Vlad's defense and base running are dog sh*t.

It would have been GREAT if the Jays and Vlad could have sat down in October 2024 and nailed down whether they could come to an agreement or not on an extension. But that comes with issues over leverage and a willingness to decide at that point. True negotiation typically doesn't happen until there's a legit deadline looming. I think it's obvious to say Vlad wasn't going to have any serious talks until Soto signed. Then once he signed (December 11, 2024), the goal posts moved and both parties needed to re-group. Even if they agreed to reconvene in early January, the issue is there's still no reason for Vlad to truly negotiate. He can just stick to his guns and ask for the moon. The only way to pull the plug on extending Vlad was to make that decision on their own - without any true negotiations with him. They'd never know what the true number for Vlad was - all they'd have to go off is his "ask for the moon" offer. The other option was to give him the moon right after the Soto signing. They've chosen to negotiate with him against his self imposed deadline - which should be taken as an act of good faith and now have chosen to head into the season without a deal. This could certainly all blow up in their faces - but we shouldn't pretend it was as easy as negotiation with him early on and then making that decision with all that good information in hand. They'd have been making those decisions blindly - without true information.

Welcome to the board. You should get your eyes checked.

I think this is a viable option as well. Like how Detroit dealt Flaherty at the deadline last year (only at a much larger scale).

There's a good possibility that Vlad already values himself as if he the repeated 2021 season for the past 3 years (man it would be great to know the truth). If he does repeat 2021/2024 again, than yes, his valuation may climb. Maybe that's what the Jays need to see to commit the extra money. They'll certainly have more competition at that point, but you really can't afford to "miss" on some 10-12 year $450M deal. More information helps Toronto (and others). If he isn't as good this year - let's say he repeats 2022, then he's humbled a bit and there's still a chance he resigns with the Jays, or perhaps he was never worth that type of mega deal and he leaves for a comp pick. If he's not a "special" hitter worth a mega deal, then he's a lot more replaceable and the only "miss" we have is what he would have fetched via trade early this offseason. Of course the Jays and the FO seemed fully committed to competing in 2025, so that was probably never a real option anyway (whether you like it or not - and I do not).

It will be fascinating to see if this passive approach to defer the major decision (while using that time to continue collecting information) is going to pay off or not. I think to date, it's been pretty effective, but that time may soon come to an end.

Could also provide us with an opportunity for a long playoff run, which would be awesome. Then once Vlad realizes MLB doesn't pay for bat only players, he can re-sign here in the offseason after being humbled that he isn't worth half of what Soto is.

I'm not convinced the value you get for Vlad today is "much" higher than what you'd get for him at the deadline - so I think they do go for it. I doubt it works though and they'll sell Vlad and Bo (amongst several others) at the deadline. It will get dicey if we're actually good this year and in a playoff spot at the deadline...