Toronto Blue Jays

[hockeyrobot]

^^^ and even more interesting considering ownership just paid up for the ballpark upgrades. Will they clean house after doing that? If a Vlad trade is really possible...would ownership let it happen given he's their franchise "star" ?

[2014olympicgold]

Berrios decision is what it is. I don't agree with it, but it was clearly made way before. And I bet Kikuchi not being able to quickly warm up played a big influence in it. Once he's warming up, he was going in the game.

Pete Walker LEFT the dugout once they made the decision to pull Berrios. He was pissed.

0 runs though is what did them in though. Kikuchi ended up not doing poorly. The decision to go to Kikuchi took out 2 good hitters, which was the plan. I mostly don't agree with bringing Kikuchi in mid-inning with a base runner. It was the hitting. They let meatballs go past them time after time after time in this series. It was awful.

All year the hitting game plan, the hitting approach, the lack of aggressiveness like the beginning of the year... it was awful. You are a team who struggle to get to third, they didn't attempt to steal once because they were scared. You can't hit doubles, and your approach was to produce more singles, but you don't attempt to steal....You pinch run with Whitt, but not Eden...who's on the team to pinch run.

Honestly, I think you run the majority of the core back, fire Guillermo Martinez, fire Don Mattingly (he did nothing), fire John Schneider, and have Atkins/Shapiro admit they went overkill on the singles hitting approach. Vlad can get his power back. Bo can too. They have a top 5 AL pitching staff next yr still. They have a couple of trading pieces in Manoah, and Nimmala.

They'll have money to spend with Ryu ($20m), Chapman ($12.5m), Belt ($9.3m), Kiermaier ($9m), Merrifield ($6.75m), and Hicks ($1.8375m) coming off the books. Merrifield's money essentially goes to Chad Green's team option ($9m), and Bichette, Berrios, Bassitt, and Gausman's pay raises take up about Kiermaier's money.

So Jays will likely have about $25-30m in money to replace Chapman, Hicks, and Ryu. Ryu gets replaced by Tiedemann, Manoah, or a trade piece. Hicks Market Value is 2yr, ~$7m deal ($3.5aav), so his pay raise is likely not a whole lot more than we're expecting. Maybe it's like $5m a year.

All in all, the team grinddddeddd all yr, never had fun, couldn't hit balls far enough, micromanaged things all year, and base running was not there all year. Vlad just hasn't had his head in the game all year. I'm assuming it's because he wasn't getting the power this yr, and it emotionally took him out of it.

I did watch some of the interviews post game and Vlad was still in tears. He was feeling the pressure, and I think he can't truly handle it.

[2014olympicgold]

Lets see the power FA available:
Bellinger, Josh Bell, Teoscar Hernandez, Ohtani, Pederson, Conforto (player option), Max Muncy, Rhys Hoskins, Joey Gallo (LOL), Pham, Bader, Gurriel Jr.

[Axeman33]

Berrios decision is what it is. I don't agree with it, but it was clearly made way before. And I bet Kikuchi not being able to quickly warm up played a big influence in it. Once he's warming up, he was going in the game.

Pete Walker LEFT the dugout once they made the decision to pull Berrios. He was pissed.

0 runs though is what did them in though. Kikuchi ended up not doing poorly. The decision to go to Kikuchi took out 2 good hitters, which was the plan. I mostly don't agree with bringing Kikuchi in mid-inning with a base runner. It was the hitting. They let meatballs go past them time after time after time in this series. It was awful.

All year the hitting game plan, the hitting approach, the lack of aggressiveness like the beginning of the year... it was awful. You are a team who struggle to get to third, they didn't attempt to steal once because they were scared. You can't hit doubles, and your approach was to produce more singles, but you don't attempt to steal....You pinch run with Whitt, but not Eden...who's on the team to pinch run.

Honestly, I think you run the majority of the core back, fire Guillermo Martinez, fire Don Mattingly (he did nothing), fire John Schneider, and have Atkins/Shapiro admit they went overkill on the singles hitting approach. Vlad can get his power back. Bo can too. They have a top 5 AL pitching staff next yr still. They have a couple of trading pieces in Manoah, and Nimmala.

They'll have money to spend with Ryu ($20m), Chapman ($12.5m), Belt ($9.3m), Kiermaier ($9m), Merrifield ($6.75m), and Hicks ($1.8375m) coming off the books. Merrifield's money essentially goes to Chad Green's team option ($9m), and Bichette, Berrios, Bassitt, and Gausman's pay raises take up about Kiermaier's money.

So Jays will likely have about $25-30m in money to replace Chapman, Hicks, and Ryu. Ryu gets replaced by Tiedemann, Manoah, or a trade piece. Hicks Market Value is 2yr, ~$7m deal ($3.5aav), so his pay raise is likely not a whole lot more than we're expecting. Maybe it's like $5m a year.

All in all, the team grinddddeddd all yr, never had fun, couldn't hit balls far enough, micromanaged things all year, and base running was not there all year. Vlad just hasn't had his head in the game all year. I'm assuming it's because he wasn't getting the power this yr, and it emotionally took him out of it.

I did watch some of the interviews post game and Vlad was still in tears. He was feeling the pressure, and I think he can't truly handle it.

Vladdy needs a new contract too.

[hockeyrobot]

Lets see the power FA available:
Bellinger, Josh Bell, Teoscar Hernandez, Ohtani, Pederson, Conforto (player option), Max Muncy, Rhys Hoskins, Joey Gallo (LOL), Pham, Bader, Gurriel Jr.

Yikes.

[2014olympicgold]

Vladdy needs a new contract too.

His market value is listed as a 12yr, 425.5m deal (35.46m aav) and the way the last 2 yrs have gone, I bet he goes to Arb and gets like a $17-20m deal (currently at $14.5m). If he gets a new hitting coach, fixes the swing, he can turn the 12yr $425m deal into a a 12yr $450m deal easily.

The gamble of going to Arb this offseason though, is he is a UFA in 2026. So the clock is ticking.

[2014olympicgold]

First domino "falls". Luis Rivera (3rd Base coach) officially retires. He has been on the coaching staff since 2011 and with the organization since 2010. With being the 3rd base coach, he was also the infield coach. The team has discussed smaller roles like "guest coach" in spring training.

Internal possibilities include Danny Solano (minor league infield coach since 2017) and Mark Budzinksi (1st base coach).

[2014olympicgold]

Offseason Wishlist:
- Fire Atkins/Schneider/Mattingly. The focus on single hitting at the expense of power is inexcusable and out of touch. I don't fully know who pushed for this, but to even not execute it properly is bad.

- Fire Guilermo Martinez. He messed with this squads swings way too much, then couldn't even get it back. Couldn't get Chapman to hit a high fastball. Couldn't get anyone to hit anything.

- Fire the Strength and Conditioning Head. Enough is enough having players coming in overweight. I would make it public that the Jays challenge Kirk, Manoah (if he is still 'on' the team), and Guerrero to come into camp in insane shape. Have it leak through someone. I want the team to be ran into the ground like they're in the army.

- Make an impact move for a power bat, or star player that's intense. I want a Scherzer/Harper level of fire. I want someone that almost makes his team scared to talk to him when he's frustrated.

- No more fun with the other team at 1st. I stress that the team grinded to much this yr and didn't look like they had fun, I think the most I saw Vlad smile was at 1st with the other team. Stop that. I would stress joking with teammates, but that's it.

- I don't think the Jays need to alter a whole lot on the field. I think it's behind the scenes.

[stevegamer]

I really, really, hate the analytics GM suite making managerial decisions for individual games, and ESPECIALLY playoff games. The playoffs are not the regular season, and it's different enough that you need to manage differently. This trend gets us terrible decision making made in advance without enough game state information.

3 of the teams with better records went out in the Wild Card round. At least both teams I root for aren't out. Hoping next year I finally get to a game in Toronto; would like to get to a WS game there as well against the Phillies.

[Axeman33]

I know it wont happen, but when Ross Atkins hold his press conference in the coming days, I hope the media ask him the tough questions on things like analytics, and WHO actually made the call to take out Berrios when they did. Some faceless, nameless analytics person who recommended this game play out this way should not get off scott-free.

[2014olympicgold]

I know it wont happen, but when Ross Atkins hold his press conference in the coming days, I hope the media ask him the tough questions on things like analytics, and WHO actually made the call to take out Berrios when they did. Some faceless, nameless analytics person who recommended this game play out this way should not get off scott-free.

If I'm also the analytics guy, I'm going with "I want to say, it's a game plan and people get paid to implement game plans. I'm looking at a computer not on the day of the game."

The analytics guy is prolly feeling heat internally for the game plan made. But it's on Atkins. I feel like the manager roles in baseball is very close to the manager roles in businesses. Schneider is the shop foreman getting directions about something from the Director of Operations who got figures from accounting.

And if I'm Atkins, the way I would answer that question would be "it was a team decision, and we've been making that type of decision all year and it was in a whole successful for us. And it was successful for us in this game. We had 2 runs scored against us, and we got strong bats removed from the game that helped our RPs down the line later in the game."

[hockeyrobot]

What a disappointment this regime is. Just completely dysfunctional and a complete lack of leadership.

The only thing I can think of is Atkins knows that Shapiro is going to fire all of them at his press conference this week. Otherwise he comes off like a snivelling little $hit who threw everyone under the bus. It was disgusting.

[Axeman33]

Atkins said it was Schneider's decision to make the pitching change. Im not sure I completely believe him but if that IS the case, an even better reason not to bring Schneider back. Atkins has already confirmed that Schneider is returning to manage the team.

Much like the Leafs rewarding Keefe for inept results in the playoffs, the Jays appear to be willing to do the same thing here. Schneider is 0-4 in the playoffs in his short tenure as Jays manager.

[Axeman33]

Interesting numbers.

https://twitter.com/BJsFans/status/1712305985774068080

Atkins traded away...
Moreno - 7 HR, 50 RBI, 4.3 WAR, .747 OPS
Gurriel Jr. - 24 HR, 82 RBI, 3.0 WAR, .772 OPS
Hernández - 26 HR, 93 RBI, 2.1 WAR, .741 OPS

FOR

Varsho - 20 HR, 62 RBI, 3.9 WAR, .678 OPS
Swanson - 1.4 WAR
Prospect

Equals:
- 46 HR, - 163 RBI, -4.1 WAR

#BlueJays

https://twitter.com/BJsFans/status/1712306422984163406

In a season where the #BlueJays lacked so much offense, he traded away 46 HR, 163 RBI and 4.1 WAR. It turned the #BlueJays into a <90 win team, 0-2 in the playoffs... more to follow.

https://twitter.com/BJsFans/status/1712308280490336305

SO, ROUGHLY, if we're taking 163 more runs scored, the #BlueJays Expected Winning Percentage MIGHT HAVE BEEN: .626 (62.60%)
Expected Number of Wins: 101

& I'm taking Swanson's Runs > Replacement (15) and doubling it so there's an average relief pitcher in his place.

https://twitter.com/BJsFans/status/1712308695629975850

NOW, 909 runs would be the #1 in Blue Jays history, and it's not likely everyones numbers would of been exact, but it gives you a rough idea. And also Lourdes and Moreno have produced more in the playoffs than the entire #BlueJays team, so there's that. #FireRossAtkins

Obviously there's more than just those numbers involved, when you consider the defense that Varsho and Keirmeier offered by opening up those two holes in the OF, but still interesting none the less. Clearly the Jays missed their bats but not their defensive liabilities. Not to mention, both guys are FAs this summer where as Varsho is still under control.

[2014olympicgold]

From the start of last yr I rathered Kirk be the guy they moved. Moreno and Jansen would have been such a fun duo. I do like Varsho, and I expect him to be better next yr. Like 101OPS+. Plus he can be a CF replacement for KK.

But Moreno will be the best player in the trade, and it might have already happened.