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It should be relatively straightforward to tune the strike zone over time once an automatic system is utilized for awhile. I recall in independent league games where automatic umpires were utilized there was a definite adjustment period for the hitters with the system in place. One of the biggest adjustments seemed to be with breaking pitches that dove down into the upper regions of the strike zone, pitches like those are almost never called strikes by human umpires but technically fall into the textbook definition of the strike zone.

I'm totally done with the s***** umpires that have the single handed ability to ruin games. Giving less rein for asshats like Vic Carapazza and Angel Hernandez to directly affect the outcome of games is an absolute necessity.

I can't help but think there's a very good chance of this happening. This offseason seems to mirror that of last year in a lot of ways. Last year the front office made a take it or leave it offer to Odorizzi, walked away from the Wheeler negotiations when offers surpassed 9 figures, and went all in for Ryu. If reports are to be believed they also made a $300 million offer to Cole as well before he ended up signing with the Yankees. This year the front office has made take it or leave it offers to Gausman and Sugano, and went all in to reel in Springer. I wouldn't be at all surprised if Bauer is another top target such as Ryu and Springer that they will push very hard to bring on board.

This seems like an issue that could go either way honestly. I too think that more teams making the playoffs could potentially entice more teams to actually make an attempt to compete. With the limited playoffs under the current MLB financial structure the majority of the league is making no attempt whatsoever to compete and is presently attempting some form of rebuild. We've only had expanded playoffs for one shortened season and covid has baseball financials f***ed up around the league as is, so at this point there's no way to really know what effect expanded playoffs would have on player salaries.

I did a little digging around and he was suffering from some upper back discomfort that led to starting the season on the injured list. He had a freak injury getting hit by a comebacker, and suffered from blister issues as well. He should probably be fine going forward but it seems like he's suffered from back issues earlier in his career, so it's tough to say if this could be a recurrence of previous problems.

It's win win for players and fans, but of course MLB has to be miserable pricks on such a no brainer move. Do teams even want to see pitchers batting anymore at this juncture? It places pitchers at more injury risk than simply allowing them to perform their primary job, so who does not adopting the universal DH benefit other than owners maybe saving a few million bucks in payroll?

3 or more years for Turner is a hard pass for sure, perhaps if the Jays beat the Dodgers handily in total dollars it could possibly lure Turner away from the Dodgers. I doubt this front office would go above their valuations for this particular player though given the variety of options available in free agency.

On a 2 year deal he's just a perfect fit. He can split time at third with Vladdy (provided he shows he can play the position better than a beached whale), and is a plug and play insertion into the roster. Brantley would have required making some room on the roster as suddenly there would be more outfielders than spots available.

That's a nice deal for the Red Sox. Boston bought a prospect with money, and if Ottavino has a good year they have a chance to flip him at the deadline for another prospect as well.

No concern there for me. I would be far more skeptical of Bauer's chance at continued elite production if he had only produced elite seasons after the crazy spin rate increases.

Yeah I would too without hesitation. I've had a hard time gauging what Bauer's market actually looks like. Who is competing for his services right now? Most of the typical big spenders look to be missing in action this year, and it appears as though San Diego and New York Mets may be close to finished adding to their clubs at this point. Would the Jays be willing to add two big contracts in one offseason? Mark Shapiro himself insinuated they could add two elite players this offseason, so it's not entirely out of the realm of possibility. When they set somebody as a true target they look to do what it takes to bring them aboard. They've added extra years for both Ryu and Springer when other teams looked to be hesitant to do so. With an obvious hole in the starting rotation and the club having added nobody of note other than resigning Ray so far, I do find myself wondering if the front office is leaving budget space open for a possible Bauer addition. Once he's off the market I suspect the rest of the remaining free agent starters are going to sign rather quickly.

Bag lady.

I look Bauer as having produced elite seasons 2 of the last 3 years. I suspect 2019 was the outlier compared to his new true talent level. If he was hurt as he claims then he can have a pass for that season. I couldn't give half a f*** about what he did prior, that's not particularly important when players unlock new levels of performance in their career. Look at guys like Josh Donaldson, Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion etc. as very good Blue Jays examples of players who reached new heights after many seasons of mediocre performance, and sustained that performance for many years afterward as well. There may be a bit of a chance for somebody to acquire an ace level pitcher on a relative bargain contract compared to years past. Look at Stephen Strasburg for example, he received a crazy 7 year $245 million contract from the Nationals despite being older at the time than Bauer is presently. If somebody can snag Bauer with the MLBTR predicted 4 year $128 million deal that's a steal in comparison (admittedly looks very unlikely at this point). Bauer's best seasons are comparable to the best that Strasburg has managed to produce, and Strasburg has historically missed a ton of time due to injury. Projection systems actually appear to like Bauer more in 2021.

Jinx!

And on top of that he gets to pick the team he plays for as well. Good deal for him all around.

Jesus man are you dense? Bauer provided almost the exact type of value in 2018 BEFORE the obvious increase in spin rates.

Lol that's f***ed up.

There's no point in even comparing who has had a better career up to this point in discussing which pitcher is a better target. Bauer has recently found another level of performance which is more indicative of his potential going forward. I'm on the fence as well about handing out a mega contract to Bauer as well, but provided ownership is willing to provide the necessary funds to continue building the roster around the addition of Bauer then I say get it done. Similar to what was done with Springer, the Jays could front load Bauer's contract as well so as not to interfere with a ability to extend the young core. Adding an elite starter to a weak starting rotation is the biggest single upgrade that's available to the club right now, with where they fall on the win curve every potential added win is massive. The Jays have several very high quality potential reinforcements in the minor leagues as well, so it's no given that all of the players on the current roster are going to be kept long term. With prospects like Martin, Groshans, Martinez, Moreno etc. there are cheap potential core players in the system which may be able to provide cheap production to the club in the future.

Trevor Bauer has no performance related red flags. Pretty much every pitcher in baseball is using something to enhance their grip, so unless MLB decides to fully crack down on everybody Bauer is going to be perfectly fine to continue doing what he's doing. Besides the alleged cheating (we have no proof, only suspicions at this point) he's produced elite results with spin rates within his typical career norms before 2020. He typically stays healthy, limits walks, provides plenty of innings, induces weak contact and racks up strikeouts. This is an elite pitcher by any measure that you want to look at. James Paxton is a broken down oft injured starter who you can bank on missing several starts every season. He is coming off of back surgery and a forearm injury in 2020, and his results on the field were terrible. There is a good chance with a full off season to strengthen up that he will bounce back, but he is several tiers behind Trevor Bauer in the ranks of starting pitchers. There is no denying that Bauer is a prick off of the field (sometimes on the field too, thinking of the ball tossed into the center field stands episode) but he's one of baseballs best starters. Signing this guy instantly elevates the Jays into true contender status. Paxton would be a nice fallback option banking on a bounceback season, but he's far from a sure thing to provide value on whatever contract he obtains. Bauer has a potential ceiling of 7 WAR with a good season by his standards, and a poor season by his recent standards would be 3 WAR. A good season for Paxton places him in the 3-3.5 WAR range, which is the lower range you could reasonably expect for Bauer.

Kloffenstein and Martinez are firmly in the second tier right now for me, but each guy with a solid minor league season under their belts could quickly reach untouchable status as well. Potential for each guy is massive, Kloffenstein in particular has me very excited as I think he has a good shot to be a top of the rotation monster. He's very motivated to make that happen as well. https://www.sportsnet.ca/mlb/article/blue-jays-kloffenstein-salvaged-2020-development-covid-league/

At this point of their respective careers they are nowhere close in value, regardless of how you view their careers up until now. Bauer is more than a one hit wonder, he had an elite season in 2018 with the Indians. He produced 5.8 FWAR/BWAR in only 27 starts. Let's surmise that he was able to make the full 32 starts that season , that extrapolates to 6.9 WAR. That is a pretty similar pace to his results in 2020, which would extrapolate to 7.3 WAR over a full season. The elite results in 2018 were attained without the suspicious spin rate increases as well, so it's not like he needs to use whatever grip enhancing substance(s) he was likely utilizing in 2020 for elite production. For what it's worth his spin rates look to have been improving every year since the Statcast era began. Bauer looks to have broken out in 2018 and hit new levels of performance. In 2019 he has gone on record saying that he was dealing with injuries for much of the year, as he was negatively affected by partially torn ankle ligaments and back spasms which affected his mechanics. Despite that he battled through the season and still managed a very respectable 3.3 FWAR in 213 innings. Looking at the fangraphs pitching leaderboard for the last three seasons he ranks 6th among starting pitchers. This is a pitcher that induces soft contact, piles up strikeouts and has typically been pretty healthy throughout his career. The man is in the upper echelon of MLB starters, and he is going to be paid accordingly. https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2020&month=0&season1=2018&ind=0&team=&rost=&age=&filter=&players=&startdate=&enddate=

Simeon Woods Richardson would be close to untouchable for me as well. The players I would consider moving him for would be viewed as untouchable by the organization they belong to as well, rendering the whole thing moot. The only other guy in the Jays minor league system I'd consider on the same level would be Martin, everybody else would be eminently available for the right return.

Grichuk is one of the more active Jays players on Twitter, but he's probably busy gorging himself on ice cream seeing as how he lost his starting center field job.

Rumors have it that the Jays refused to include Gurriel in a potential Lindor trade, so it seems unlikely they'd include him in a trade to the Cubs.

I would imagine there's a good chance Severino should be back at some point in 2021, but perhaps the Yankees are super cautious with him and really limit his innings upon return.