AMS528

I read that he spent a lot of time working on it for this season but even then I agree he could have stolen more there. It's not just that he's gonna nearly steal 60 bases which is crazy. It's that he's going to also have stolen those bases while basically never being caught. He has the highest success rate for a fifty plus stolen base season except for one guy in 1922.

Vlad now has a very good chance of reaching 200 hits which is another plus for an arb case.

Overall there's definitely more SBs and as high as any year in the 80's or 90's so it's a little less impressive to have 50. But maybe it's more evenly distributed in terms of the increase and the top end is still hard to hit. Even ten years ago when SB numbers were significantly lower there were two guys with 50 SB, and this year it's likely to also see 2 guys with over 50 SBs.

6.2 bWAR and 5.3 fWAR. If his baserunning was less horrific those two numbers would be closer, but he may finish the year as between a 5.5-6.5 WAR guy. Not what anyone thought would happen after the first two months. His defense stopped bleeding his value as much these last two months which helped.

I appreciate his need to go for history in style. He's not gonna slum it to 50/50. No that wouldn't be adequate, he's gotta have one of the best hitting games of all time as well while doing it. Only player to steal a base when getting that many bases in a game as well. And apparently also the record for most RBIs by a Japanese player in a single season passing Hideki Matsui. He's also left himself some runway to pad that 51/51 season further. Maybe 55/55 for fun.

Even ten years ago we could have traded Berrios for a very good return. Now I'm not sure if anyone is looking at his peripherals without significant concern.

Genuinely feel like not giving Horwitz a shot a 2B is shortsighted. He should at least continue getting a number of starts there and to see if he can improve. His bat could really just play so much better there as a full-timer, I think he's got a decent floor for his bat, and that really means his value at 2B could be very solid. At least run him as a 2B/1B/DH. Vlad plays every single game and it's best to keep that DH slot more rotatable.

171 wRC+ after tonight. Could definitely end as a better hitting season than his 2021 year now. Also of some interest, even with his underperforming last season, his overall wRC+ for the last four years combined is 145. Good for 9th in the league. 12th in the league for fWAR among position players as well. 10th by rWAR. Even when he had started hitting well the refrain was that he would end up with 3-4 WAR for the year. Gotta say though, one depressing fact about this year is that an absolutely elite hitting season by Vlad has us six games under .500. We have last years pitching staff with this Vlad and we're ok. Not having an ace, the worlds worst bullpen, nothing from Bo, bad seasons from Springer, KK being bad and then Schneider also turning into a pumpkin. Just a lot of areas failing. Really speaks to the mountain the Jays have to climb for next year. You have to hope you get literally this exact season from Vlad again, plus either Bo or replacement Bo has to perform, you have to hope you completely successfully revamp the pen (although it very literally could not be worse), either sign an ace or hope that Gausman can pitch like one again, hope that Berrios continues to outperform his frightening peripherals, that Bassitt doesn't decline, and that we can sign someone who lifts the floor of this team. It's a lot.

I notice as well that Roden is overall hitting lefties pretty solidly for the season. He wasn't as much last year, and definitely earlier in the season this year. That gives him some more potential runway to be a regular.

SP/OF - One season, potentially career destroying for his arm. Goes 50/50, GG defense, 15-5 - 2.4 ERA/FIP, 200ks - 16 WAR season. C'mon Dodgers let us see if he can do it. I think he played OF while pitching in Japan?

Just decided over the winter that if he couldn't pitch he may as well become the leagues most effective base stealer.

Doh! Yeah that's gotta be it. 28 in 98 games was ridiculous for a 19 year old.

Ohtani has 3 stolen bases today. Up to 46 along with his 44 HR's. Has also only been caught four times. 50/50 is well within sight now. Really just a question of the HRs I think.

Bowden Francis was a prospect when we got him. Dillon Tate is a 30 year old reliever. Not really the same thing. If we can get him to get him to perform like he did in 2022 as a reliever, that's a good win.

Travis Snider hit 16 in 118 games as a 19 year old. Richard Urena hit 15 in 91 games as a 19 year old. Lots of top prospects didn't hit that many, but I clicked around randomly for the A ball 90s Jays (Hagerstown Suns) and I found Mike Whitlock who never made the majors hit 20 as a 19 year old in A ball. That's the highest I've found.

Yeah a discussion in not really necessary when you're talking about a guy who's produced wRC+ OF 89, 62, and 41 over the first three seasons of his massive deal haha. No you point and laugh at that deal from a distance and then consider whether Bo has a risk profile that is in that ballpark as well (not that it matters, he's not resigning and we're probably trading him).

I had only been counting the ones from 2021 winter, but he makes sense to include as well. Out of those 6 big contracts, I think four of those teams would be anywhere between fine with to thrilled with the deals. That's honestly not bad given the amount of money being paid to those guys.

Story and Baez were disasters, Lindor is on a HOF path, Seager has a world series and has been great, and Correa was great one season, poor in his second and amazing this year pre injury (which is his long term concern). So feels like it's a fairly mixed bag. Baez was definitely by far the riskiest profile, everyone knew it, and it blew up in the exact way you would expect. Story could have been ok. Am I missing anyone?

That's not really accurate, cause he did start hitting better in May. His wRC+ was 166, 172, 201 in May, June and July. He performed when he needed to, and he absolutely had some bad luck in that first month as well. He wasn't matching his expected numbers but obviously that did eventually happen.

I really think last year probably needs to be tossed in terms of Vlad's performance. His xwOBO has in every other season basically matched what he's actually done and it looks like a very clear outlier now. If he hit like his expected numbers indicated he would have probably been at around like a 130-140 wRC+. He's projected to hit around 5.5 fWAR this year (which is amazing given he was tracking for 3-4 two months ago). 6.3, 3.4, 3ish, 5.5 as the last four years would be viewed differently for sure. I think I'm increasingly comfortable with a large extension (especially if it has like an out in his age 31 season).

For the life of me I could not remember who the hell we traded him for. Jonathan Villar, who I completely forgot we even had for a brief stretch in 2020 and who really sucked for us.

I feel like it would be a good idea to send Davis Schneider down to the minors to regroup a bit. He's slashing .157/.236/.236 good for a .472 OPS and 37 wRC+ since June in 199 PA. He's gone beyond struggling now, he's been one of the worst hitters in the league for three months now.

It's hard to hit 50 when you walk 232 times (120 intentional).

I mean I didn't comment at the time but I read those posts, and the response to people saying that the team probably had a talk with him and that's why he clarified what he meant was kind of ridiculous. Complete and utter denial of the possibility even though that is not an abnormal thing to happen in sports. I get why people who argued that would be annoyed and pointing this out now. It's not as if the responses were nuanced.