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He should spend his offseason in Florida as the Jays already have a hitting lab in their new player development complex.

It's time to make BJMB great again. Somebody should make up some hats for this. Seeing as how a new board would be a special occasion the likes of Canada Day, it only makes sense that they should be red.

I hope Bloom is serious about not trading Bogaerts as this would be a great opportunity for the Red Sox to receive some value back for a player who's very likely to opt out at the end of the season. Seeing the Red Sox send out prospect value in a midguided attempt to compete would be perfect.

I was hopeful that Kikuchi would at least be able to throw a few more strikes, but he looked great tonight. He painted a lot of nice fastballs on the edges of the plate, and garnered quite a few swings and misses with his slider and splitter as well. Hopefully he can keep it up.

There are a few guys at the MLB level who would do well to work on improving their swing decisions.

It's magical thinking to make assumptions that simply because the score was kept closer a team is guaranteed to score the necessary runs to come back and win a game in which they are trailing. Life simply doesn't work that way. I'm not arguing that it would have been far more likely for the Jays to tie or potentially win the game if Richards didn't throw gas on the fire, but the offence was kept in check all game by a great performance by Wainright. This doesn't necessarily change if the score is 3-1 vs 6-1. I don't subscribe to the theory that a particular subset of bullpen pitcher is required to get outs in the middle of a baseball game. If a bullpen has a full assortment of arms that can reliably retire batters late in games in leverage situations, then it also stands to reason that these same pitchers are going to be able to come into a game in the middle innings and retire batters as well. The team already has plenty of players who have been succesful in putting out fires in the middle innings. We've seen Phelps used in this fashion, Cimber has had success here as well. The team is only going to need to use 4 starters in the playoffs. Assuming Kikuchi can turn his season around (obviously no guarantee here) one of Kikuchi or Stripling likely finds themselves in a long relief role for the playoffs. Acquiring a playoff starter in my view is a bit of a luxury rather than a necessity, and the team can concentrate more on a back of the rotation/depth starter instead.

Once the shift is banned Tellez will likely see his numbers soar as a result. That being said he simply had no spot on this team as there was very little playing time available for him due to an MVP calibre player manning his primary position.

The Jays lost because they only scored 1 run. You can't assume that the Jays would have scored more runs if Richards was able to prevent the Cardinals from scoring in the 5th inning, that's completely devoid of logic. Acquiring leverage relievers also serves to push the existing bullpen members down the ladder as well. If you have a few more reliable late innings options that opens the door for guys like Phelps, Cimber, Mayza etc. to pitch earlier in the game in situations like last night's 5th inning. The team doesn't need to acquire more middle relief options as they already have plenty of pitchers that are perfectly capable of pitching at that point of the game.

I don't think we are going to see that version of Merryweather again. Merryweather, along with most of the Jays top bullpen members, experienced a very pronounced increase in spin rates at the start of the 2021 season. I don't think it's a coincidence that this is the same time when Tyler Chatwood was a member of the Jays pen. Merryweather hasn't been able to recreate that type of dominance at any point since the sticky stuff crackdown occurred.

Replacing Gallo with Benintendi isn't exciting but it still improves an already extremely good Yankees team. I suspect they are going to be extremely active at the trade deadline.

Bringing in Richards with multiple runners on is the first legitimate gripe I've had with Schneider since he took over. That's pretty decent all things considered.

Whether Kikuchi pitches or not he's still getting paid. The team's coaching staff expended a ton of time and effort attempting to straighten him out. If he isn't given a chance to start the money, time and effort are all a complete waste. The team doesn't have a proper depth starter to take his place either at the moment, and the last few games started by the depth options were pretty terrible and the pen was burned out anyway. There's not much to lose by giving Kikuchi a start against a weak Tigers team.

If Kikuchi can throw strikes the team could certainly piggyback him with Stripling in the playoffs when a 4th starter is required.

Barger mashed in high A as well. 155 WRC+, .248 ISO, 14 home runs, 21 doubles, etc. I'm not suggesting the AA numbers are in any way sustainable, but he certainly doesn't appear to be strictly the creation of his current home ballpark.

Blue Jays insiders such as Ben Nicholson Smith and Scott Mitchell are both quoted in the article I linked stating that Gurriel is a free agent after next season. It appears as though the contract tracking sites haven't been updated to reflect this reality.

If I recall correctly Gurriel's contract only runs through next season as there was misinformation floating around that he was eligible for salary arbitration after 2023. https://jaysjournal.com/2021/11/12/blue-jays-lourdes-gurriel-jrs-contract-changes-things/

He has the raw stuff to pitch mid rotation but even when he's on he's so inefficient that he typically hits his pitch limit after 5 innings.

Sounds an awful lot like this year's version of the Jays before they exploded towards the end of May. This year's fatal flaw was a historically low RISP, perhaps something similar was to blame with the 2006 team as well.

Bell really isn't a great fit for the Jays as his presence would only serve to cut into available DH at bats for the likes of Kirk, Vladdy, Springer etc.

And conversely he's had pretty good starts against really good offences including twice against the Yankees and once against the Red Sox.

Inability to place his pitches in or even near the strike zone has been Kikuchi's primary issue. If he's properly commanding his fastball the stuff should play just fine at the back of the rotation.

If that's the case you would think it really increases the pressure on the Angels to move Ohtani.

Moreno has shown power in the past, but it really hasn't re-emerged since the broken thumb of last year. Hopefully it's just a matter of rebuilding strength over time, but it's been over a full calendar year now and he's still primarily a singles hitter since the injury.

The article definitely throws plenty of shade at Kirk's defensive contributions. That portion of the breakdown is very poorly researched. https://blogs.fangraphs.com/2022-trade-value-21-to-30/

I've dug into the various catcher statistics and metrics and Kirk is better than average at every measurable aspect of defense behind the plate. He ranks very well in blocking, throwing, framing and pitch calling.