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I thought they did a tremendous job at the deadline last season.

I think the biggest benefit for a Grandal signing would be adding depth to cover for Kirk if he were to miss any time due to injury. It's maybe passable to run a guy like Heinemann as backup catcher, but if he's forced into starting and the team is forced to use the depth guys in any capacity the catching situation gets pretty ugly in a hurry.

That doesn't feel very realistic as he's maxed out at 92 starts in a single year in the last 5 seasons.

The team was still a good team during their 4 year run whatever the playoff format happened to be. They were still playing in a division where it took a winning percentage equivalent to 99 wins to take the division over these 4 years, so making the playoffs while having to compete and play the bulk of your games against teams of this quality should still count for something. The payroll thing is overstated as well. The team didn't even pay luxury tax until the 2024 season.

It wasn't anywhere close to as long winded as the Cathal Kelly'esque hatchet job piece you linked to. I'm not going to waste my time going piece by piece to refute that crap, but I'll grab a small snippet to showcase the types of half truths contained throughout. The Blue Jays were not the only other team that was bidding for Ohtani's services until the end. If Ohtani hadn't outright told the team that he wasn't going to sign with him I don't know why any serious fan of the team would actually want the team to voluntarily take themselves out of the running. That's dumb as hell. I'd love to know who these other big name free agents were that the Blue Jays missed out on while waiting for Ohtani to sign. Oh that's right, there was literally nobody of note that signed before Ohtani made his final decision. Most of the better remaining free agents were Boras clients, and due to his ridiculous asking prices and refusal to drop to more reasonable levels the bulk of these guys were forced to take short term deals as spring training approached.

Yeah I don't get why anyone would be in shambles. I don't even recall any major criticism sent his way either so this is just a puzzling post. I'm a big Roden supporter personally and I think he's the player with the best shot of providing any level of impact in the upper levels of the minors based on his toolset.

I don't see the point of efforts like this. If the team has another season similar to 2024 change is going to occur organically. The team had a single bad season in the last 5, but based on the fan fiction piece you linked to one would think the team just endured 10 consecutive losing seasons. It was intentionally ignored that the period from 2017-2019 were poor because the team that the previous GM built was old, expensive and increasingly injury prone. The writer acts like the previous GM walked on water despite only having his team be successful for half a season while he was in charge, and a single season after he left. He left behind a weak farm system which was ranked similarly to what it is now, except the current system actually has a lot of ready/nearly ready position players in the upper minors that have a good shot to contribute to the team as soon as this season. The people who write partially accurate pieces like the one you presented utilize a lot of half truths and intentionally withhold a lot of crucial information as well with zero effort expended towards presenting fair and balanced information. I seriously doubt Rogers would particularly care about a petition, if the stadium is half empty because the team sucks and the tv ratings slip accordingly the bottom line will be affected and change will occur as a result.

I believe the stated plan for Kirk was to have him start in the range of 120 games this season.

I'm trying to be civil. I would say much worse but I've been on my best behavior since new management took over.

Somebody is still a mouth breather.

It drives me semi bonkers that the Blue Jays have hitting labs in their spring training complex and Rogers Center but Bo Bichette chooses to spend his practice time hitting off of a tee.

He still has a long ways to go to match a dude that caught a routine popup with his face.

Can you offer a breakdown for those who don't listen to podcasts?

Meh, Roden wasn't on the 40 man roster yet and he was still getting his feet wet in AAA. He took a seismic leap forward in AAA later in the season as well and that may have been delayed if he were called up to MLB too soon. It's really not a situation to continue being upset about after so much time as I recall you griping about this back in September as well.

This is Vlad negotiating tactics 101. Lets suppose that the Ortiz comment represents something that approaches Vlad's actual asking price. Vlad insists he'll keep "negotiating" (I use that term very lightly) if the front office makes him a reasonable offer, despite this reasonable offer amount almost certainly being so high that there's no team in MLB that would be willing to pay it. More Vlad negotiating tactics: state repeatedly that he wants to be a Blue Jay long term, but liking social media posts with him photoshopped in other team's uniforms. This came along with a generous serving of negotiating through the media as he directly stated the team's initial offering price in an interview. stating that he set a spring training deadline to avoid becoming a distraction but failing to realize this would set off an inevitable shitstorm of media attention and speculation as soon as the deadline came and went. Despite not wanting to be a distraction he continued liking posts showing him in other team's uniforms. That sort of feels like maybe it would be a tiny bit distracting, but then I've been told I need to stop looking through "Shatkins blinders" so what do I even know.

Jeff Passan is likely the most respected insider in the sport of baseball. He made the original statement that he thought Vlad wouldn't touch $300 million, took a bunch of flak from other baseball people and walked the statement back entirely. I respect the guy even more for being willing to take his lumps and change his viewpoint when necessary, and the only reason I can see for you to use a retracted statement in your argument is that you have very little else to offer in this discussion to back up your viewpoints. Your entire argument is based on a bunch of assumptions. The fact of the matter is that none of us have any kind of idea what Vlad is actually asking for or what the final offer was from the team. We have a report from before the Soto signing that the team was offering somewhere around $350 million or thereabouts. There was an oddly specific opinion posted by David Ortiz that he views Vlad as being worth a 13 year $585 million contract. It's possible that this is what Vlad is asking for from the Blue Jays, but I'm not going to start making definitive statements here because I don't know what Vlad is asking for or what the front office was willing to offer. Go ahead and make a bunch of assumptions and assume that you are correct as that in your typical tact. Try using some basic logic and reasoning in your posts and your opinions might even be taken seriously.

The supercars that set the market were known for more reliable performance and require a reasonable amount of effort to maintain. Those cars possessed a much higher top end and didn't have periods of time where they were misfiring and offering mediocre performance relative to the financial requirements. The supercar the Blue Jays possess is very heavy in nature and has poor handling and acceleration. It has a miscalibrated electronics system that occasionally leads to itself driving off of the road. It's been known to require more and more maintenance over time that increases the required effort to even keep it on the road let alone maintaining it's performance. As this particular supercar is so unique in it's characteristics it's impossible to know at this point how it would perform in the market due to it's outlying characteristics and uneven performance.

Passan himself admitted that he's changed his mind on what Vlad's future earning may entail and that he very well could eclipse the $300 million mark. I'm sure you are well aware that he completely walked back the statement and that it's completely irrelevant at this point. If the entire premise of your argument is based on a past statement that's been corrected by the person who originally made it then perhaps your argument isn't particularly sound to begin with.

The seller of the used car is trying to sell us on a 13 year payment plan but similar models of cars have broken down after another 6-7 years of use.

Bo Bo ran hard plenty of times throughout the game. What's the upside of going 100% in every single play in the first game of spring training before he's even fully conditioned and ready for the season? Spring training exists for a reason, there's no reason to pretend this is the 7th game of the world series. The downside risk of Bo overdoing it in a warm up game is far greater than any kind of upside. This would do nothing more than increasing his risk of injury in a completely meaningless game. If he blows out his calf in spring training by pushing too hard too soon that could easily set him up for another wasted season.

I have the same 3 people that constantly downvote me. They have a really sweet thing going on and they are like the boards edgy boys.

I had no issues with the plan in general, but I didn't agree with bringing in Kikuchi in the middle of the inning vs waiting until he could start an inning without runners on base as he's more accustomed to as a starter. With a little better luck on batted balls the plan could have worked to perfection as well as Kikuchi surrendered a few ground balls that snuck through the infield.

That's it, I challenge you to a duel!

Why on earth is everyone so quick to assume that Ross Atkins is some sort of evil domineering mastermind? He strikes me as more of a Ned Flanders type than someone that has his fingers in every single decision the organization makes. The team has a horde of dudes in Khakis to come up with schemes like this. My only real complaint is that it appears as though nobody informed the players of this plan. Take your pick of whether this is something that Atkins should have done, or if an in game decision like this should be relayed by the manager as he's supposed to be the on field leader of the troops.