Atkins Speaks!: It's hard to fix the problem when you're it

Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins met with the media for their annual end-of-another-dogshit-season press conferences on Wednesday. Shapiro went first, and you can find my transcription of his words here (along with a preamble that puts this one to shame). Number two in your program, and in your heart, was Atkins. His words, in full (minus a question at the end asked and answered in español) are below, along with my own set of pithy comments and half-concocted thoughts.

You know the drill. It’s time for Atkins Speaks!…

You can watch both pressers here via Sportsnet.

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Cut-off opening remarks

From the very beginning, we had goals to bring championships back to Canada. That certainly remains. I know that I need to take a step, in order for us to do that, and I'm committed to that.

What you’re reading there is just the end of what I assume were more expansive opening comments from Ross. The first bit was not only cut off from Sportsnet's live feed, but evidently not captured on video either. I guess whoever was supposed to click the button to re-start things after the half hour break between Shapiro's presser and the start of Atkins' one screwed up. I warned them!

Anyway! Sure, man. We get it. You need to take a step. Fine. Let's pretend that's what that is. Let's pretend you're not just saying that because it's as close as you can get to giving fans what they want without pulling a full-on Budd Dwyer. But if it's any step other than one toward having an offence that isn't infuriating and doesn't consistently waste good starting pitching efforts, I don't want to hear about it—and I don't think there are many Jays fans who would.

Like, yeah, the bullpen was a problem. But there's a reason that wasn't fixed via mid-season trade the way the team has done every other year in the past half-decade. Once again the team failed to turn wRC+ into runs because they didn't hit enough home runs. You could say that's an oversimplification, I suppose. I'd say it's just a simplification. The Red Sox had a 104 wRC+ for the season, which was just ahead of the Jays' 101. The Red Sox scored 80 more runs than the Jays did—751 to 671. The Red Sox hit 194 home runs to the Jays' 156. How much nuance do we really need here? The Jays were one of the hardest teams to strike out this season, ranking sixth by K% at 20.3%. Who gives a fuck? Fix it.

You had a team that in 2023 turned MLB's eighth-best wRC+ into the 14th-most runs scored and then brought back Kevin Keirmaier and added IKF and Justin Turner. Step into figuring it the fuck out.

What do you need to do better for this team to be better?

I really think it comes down to balance in our roster construction. And that doesn't mean the obvious things like left-handed versus right-handed. Could be those things too, but I think it's how each player complements one another in that clubhouse and how they're supported. That's the staff, that's me, that's the players, and the roster-construction piece is something that we've learned a great deal about in the last in the last year.

Like… man, the very obvious imbalance is that you have too many guys who can’t hit for shit but are OK enough at fielding their position. You need to sacrifice some defence for offence. It may not be ideal. It may not be as good as having a bunch of guys who can do both. But that’s really it. And you can say this! We saw you attempt to do this during the season! We saw Davis Schneider forcing his way into the outfield picture early on. We saw Spencer Horwitz playing second base. We know, dude. We know.

Can you walk us through the changes to your coaching staff?

Yeah, so, I think you're aware of a couple of them, with us having made the decision to move on from Guillermo Martinez. Gil Kim will not be returning to the staff as our field coordinator, Jeff Ware will not be returning to our staff as the assistant pitching coach in the bullpen. We've also made an adjustment to Donnie's role. Donnie is no longer going to be overseeing the offence, he will go back to a more traditional role of a bench coach. He's excited about that opportunity to impact us and John in a different way, and a bigger way. Think the world of Donnie, he's been incredible and open-minded to change as well.

I mean, I can't say that these are necessarily the wrong moves. But I can definitely say that it's amusing to me to think of the contrast between Shaprio—who stuck to his guns and made the unpopular decision to bring Ross back—and Atkins, who seems here to be painting by numbers. “We need to fire a hitting guy and a bullpen guy and let's change Mattingly's title.” I called that last one, even. 

Thing is, I do believe that, given what he said last winter about not wanting to step on anyone's toes on the hitting side when that wasn't within his purview, Mattingly genuinely will have a different role going forward. But if the idea here is to quiet the utter stupidity of fans too lazy to actually want to understand the thing they're outraged about, I don't see how this is going to work. People were dumbly convinced Mattingly was breaking the offence before he had anything to do with it, and they'll be convinced of it after as well, I am sure.

Moving on from Martinez will maybe help those same dullards feel better about the situation for a minute, but to people actually worth taking seriously—people who've actually observed the changes in personnel that have gone hand-in-hand with Martinez suddenly getting stupid—this all feels pretty pretty cynical. 

I'm not going to pretend that sort of thing doesn't happen all the time in sports, and I can understand wanting new voices—or not believing it matters very much who is helping players interpret the analysts’ reports or starting up the pitching machines every morning. The changes are just a little too on-the-nose for me to be able to see it any other way. 

A year ago you talked about needing a big internal review of the offence. Why do you think we are now doing it again?

Well, one, I don't. And that lies with me. That run-scoring component, I've touched on that in the roster-construction aspect. And then, secondly, we're demonstrating that we're open to change. So, I think those adjustments will make things different than a year ago. I think last year we were trying to use similar voices and similar resources in a different way, and this year we're going to—obviously need to do that too, but we're also open to the change of personnel.

Woof. It's like he was given a bunch of talking points to hit on across the entirety of the presser and then just vomited them all up at once into a jumbled mess. He knows he's supposed to take personal accountability, or look like it. He knows he doesn't want to come off too rigid after a year when doubling down clearly didn't work. He knows people are mad about run scoring and that the non-insane ones recognize that the problem is mostly down to roster construction. But he fired the hitting coach and reassigned the “offensive coordinator” and really doesn't have a great answer for why. It shows they’re open-minded though, at least!

Not exactly dissuading me from thinking those were just cosmetic changes here—convenient scapegoats to distract from deeper problems. But also... that's fine! I don't think it matters that much. I do think on-field personnel is the bulk of the issue. I just don't think Ross is threading the rhetorical needle very well on this. Quelle surprise!

Are you making changes to the staff a year too late, or why didn't you make them last year?

We've been committed to growing and learning, and being open-minded, and we felt that we could do it with the people that were here. Again, that is on me. These individuals did nothing wrong. Guillermo Martinez has been very successful, a big part of some individual success, and he's been with teams that have scored a ton of runs. But, as John and I worked through it, we felt that asking people to do things differently again was not going to be quite enough, so we wanted to get new voices in.

Fair enough, I guess. My issue with any of this, if I even have one, is the gravity we seem to be treating it with. It's a hitting coach, for gods sake. A coach for players who are themselves already experts in the craft. I think it only adds to the the misunderstanding fans have about the value of these types of roles by not acknowledging that everyone in them is pretty much the same. Like, obviously not completely, but there's no salary cap for coaches and yet they're never the subject of bidding wars. The industry doesn't really see one as especially better than another. Nobody gets valued as though they possess some kind of secret sauce that can turn shit into gold. They mostly only go as far as the hitters they work with—as we're seeing here, and as we see again and again. But fans often don't see it that way. Like… booing the hitting coach on Opening Day? Really dumb stuff!

Who do you plan to oversee your hitting?

We'll open up a search for that. It will be external and internal candidates for that.

I mean, if we’re giving the people what they want, Hague is the obvious candidate, no? Fans seem to have already decided that everything good was him and everything bad was everyone else. If it really doesn’t matter, why not lean into it?

Are there going to be front office changes in addition to the ones on the staff?

Well, we've added to it externally. Some of the names bigger than others. Constantly we've grown at a very rapid rate over the years, as many offices have. We'll continue to that. We're open to external adds, as well. We have individuals that we're already talking to. Then we always are thinking about the structure, and thinking about ways to be more innovative and efficient.

What are going to be your offseason priorities?

We've got a lot of work to do, and we've got some time to do it. We've obviously already started that work. There are some obvious areas—like adding run-scoring, and adding to our bullpen—that are easy to point to as opportunities, but we want to be really comprehensive and creative to make sure that we're doing it in a way that ensures we take a step. As I've talked about, I need to be better. I have got to do a better job of building that team around a very good core that has been successful. And I'm committed to doing so.

Run-scoring and the bullpen is indeed the correct answer. And yet Ross here somehow manages to find a way to almost fumble it anyway. “Opportunities” is such a painfully trying-too-hard-to-be-neutral way of saying “shit that we've fucked up.”

Will the improvements to the bullpen need to be external, or are pieces already in place that can bring it back to where it needs to be?

Yeah, last year, coming off such a successful year, and returning that group, seemed like a very solid play. None of us expected the level of injuries that we had. I mean, you have to account for those, but in addition to the performance setbacks. Then we also had injuries to players that would have been depth for us. So, we have to have more depth, we have to do a better job of avoiding injury, and this year we have to be probably more aggressive on the external adds. But last year Chad Green—obviously he was here the year prior for some portion of that—but Chad Green coming into the fold was the most significant add, and we'll probably be looking a little bit more aggressively than that.

Good!

What's the implication for Demarlo Hale with Don Mattingly moving back to bench coach?

It's a great question and John and Donnie and D have already talked about that a great deal, and they're going to talk about that balance. The scope of the managerial role every year is greater, in my opinion. It never gets easier with the amount of resources, with the amount of stakeholders, obviously with the magnitude of winning and being where we are in our cycle. There's plenty of work to be done and distributed amongst those two.

These guys really, really like Mattingly. Clearly. Otherwise why bother? Which is fine enough, even if it's maybe the reason fans have so dumbly cast him as a pariah for literally no tangible reason whatsoever.

What does the offence need most?

I mean, power is low-hanging fruit to add. I think in today's game you also have to be cognizant of strikeouts when you do do that. And I think it's also something that we have been working very hard to understand, is what that means in the playoffs as well. It's clear that contact is exceptionally important in the playoffs. That's proven. So, balancing that with power additions is obviously very important. But I don't think it's as simple as just plug in a power bat. If a power bat is also a very complete hitter—right-handed, left-handed pitching doesn't matter, their on-base, their contact rate is high, doesn't matter which pitcher, whether it's velo and spin and carry at the top of the zone versus sink and slide—then, sure, one hitter can do that. But there's just so many variables, and it's such complex equation of scoring runs. Then, taking another step to talking about the complexity of just hitting and offence, I think there's more to it than power bats, but we're certainly open to adding a power bat.

This too-clever-by-half motherfucker is out here trying to talk himself out of the most painfully obvious fix for his offence imaginable. Good lord. Go ahead and fire him for this shit, for all I care. Like, you're worried about the playoffs when over the last two years combined you're 18th in runs scored? You got there by having the sixth-best strikeout rate and ranking 21st in ISO, hits are harder to string together than ever, and yet you're still pumping the brakes on instant offence in the form of home runs? I know he's not entirely doing that, but man alive. This is why people getting worked up about coaches is stupid. This is the problem.

Also home runs are even more important in the playoffs holy shit.

What do you need to change about the way you evaluate players?

Yeah, it's interesting, because the talent acquisition, in our view, has been strong. As you look at the players who have come, if you think either projections, or if you're just looking at contributions in a very basic way—like, OK, did they do what they normally do? How are they as defenders and base-runners?—the identification of talent has been strong for our group. Our pro scouting and research and development group has been strong in that area. It's on me to complement it better, and then it's on us to deploy it in a way that is maximizing the group.

You had as good a defensive centre fielder as there is, whose 2023 performance only made the questions about whether his bat would play in a corner spot louder, and then you went out and handed $10.5 million to Kevin Keirmaier when there was no market for him otherwise. I mean... I do think there have been some fine acquisitions over the years here—Robbie Ray, Kevin Gausman, Chris Bassitt, etc., Brandon Belt, I suppose, and even IKF last winter was a good-if-wholly-unnecessary one—but Turner, Keirmaier, Varsho, banking on Kirk, banking on Springer, and even on Matt Chapman's offensive ability... these are not wins or strong evaluations. And they're pretty much all the most recent ones. Hard to fix a problem you can't admit is there, Ross.

How much do you need to address the problems your lineup has had with fastballs/power pitchers?

It's really, this year we just didn't drive the ball. You know, Vladdy did, obviously, certainly in the second half. But we just didn't drive the ball as much. We made good contact. If we faced good pitching, we had no problem putting the ball in play. We weren't driving the ball. We weren't getting into advantage counts as well as we—actually, we were getting into advantage counts at a fine level, but then doing damage is where we saw guys take some steps back. And I feel like, again, that's something I've got to figure out, in how we're supporting them.

How about you figure out how to support some better players? How about that?

How confident are you in your ability to recruit top free agents given this year's record and the fact that Bo and Vlad only have a year to go before free agency?

It's high. Obviously every team has challenges. There are certain players who are just not going to want to cross a border, there are certain players who are not going to want to go to the west coast, there are certain players that want to be with an east coast team for spring training reasons. So, there's so many variables to that, and we've had very good success in attracting players here, and have not come up against hurdles other than the obvious ones that are going to be something that you really can't change. I think the free agency market has been attracted to this one because of the city, because of the team, because of the winning—the same reason that Vladdy and Bo have stated their desire to be here.

I mean, OK. Sure. The house of cards hasn't yet fallen in on itself. I can grant him that. But this was a fair question and while, as with Shapiro, I understand not wanting to make clear how vitally important it is for this organization to get Vlad signed to an extension... um... it sure is vitally important for this organization to get Vlad signed to an extension. Because I don't believe at all that players aren't looking at a team’s on-field situation before pledging years of their future to that organization. Not the ones good enough to have their pick of where to go play, at least.

Do you have the prospect capital to improve the team to the required level through trade, or will the focus necessarily have to be on free agency?

We've demonstrated the ability to get talent to the major leagues. I think we've been in the top third—I know we've been in the top third—in doing so in the time that I've been here. And we just went through a trade deadline that we did not want to be in, where we were selling, but we acquired 13 players that we are excited about, and have learned a lot about them. They've transitioned, had good exposure, and some of them have learned that things are going to work, and some of them have learned things they need to adjust.

Bit of a short circuit from the ol' ROSSBOT there. Feels like some ChatGPT garbage. But sure, the system has been in better shape before, and new guys have been added via those deadline trades you really didn't want to do. So... uh… once again, if I'm not mistaken, this can contained tomato paste.

OK, but are you excited about those prospects as trade pieces, or...?

I think it's both, right. There's a lot of players internally that made strides as well. There's players that are going to be coming back from injury that will be great pieces for us moving forward. But you need depth in order to do either of those things.

Sure. Whatever.

What impact do you see Juan Soto's next deal having on Vlad's potential extension?

Well, one, Vlad's here next year. It's too hard to project what's going to happen with Juan Soto, the structure of his deal, the magnitude of his deal. We'll see. It could have some impact, but we'll see how that goes.

Please for the love of god just get Vlad signed. Please. I'm serious. At the very least give the next GM that. PAY IT FORWARD.

How many offensive players do you think you need to add?

If you look at the versatility that we have, we're going to need—as I've said—this is the same for every team—you know, I think you have to have internal solutions and progress, and you have to have external adds for a market like ours, and a team like ours, for us to get—to take another step. We are committed to making that happen, we will be obsessive about making that happen, and believe it.

So is that one to two players? Is that more?

Yeah, I think... we'll see, right? We need to do the work on that. I don't want to commit to a number of players that we have to add via trade or free agency, is what I'm assuming that you're targeted at. But we understand that we have to take a step, and I'm just saying there's multiple ways to do that.

I think this is a completely reasonable answer here, and we all basically understood that this was where he was going to go from the outset. He'll get killed for it now if the number he gives seems too low, or he'll get killed for it all winter if they don't add as many players as he said. No need to be too definitive. That's fine! We get it. But why did it have to be like pulling teeth to get here?

If you can't get a long-term deal done with Vlad or Bo this winter, are you prepared to go into next year with the risk that they may leave for almost nothing a year from now?

We're prepared for anything that can happen to us.

Let me stop you right there. You weren’t really prepared for your bullpen falling apart this year, were you? WERE YOU?

OK, continue…

And I think if you're asking what does that mean for our organization, is we have to continue to have to think about what's best for us to win. To win now—there's a lot of urgency around next year. Having said that, you cannot lose sight of what that means long term. So, being prepared for having a solid, strong organization that can sustain winning, you always have to think about the short- and the long-term.

Right, and so what do you think about the short and the long term???

Would you have to trade one of the two if you didn't get them signed this offseason?

No, I would never say that we have to do something, or don't have to do something. We're fortunate to have incredible support that we aren't ever backed into a corner that way. Now, should you, and will you, and would you are different questions that I'd rather have more information to answer. 

WHY DO YOU KEEP ASKING ME, THE GM OF THE TORONTO BLUE JAYS, THESE TORONTO BLUE JAYS QUESTIONS AT MY TORONTO BLUE JAYS PRESS CONFERENCE???

Have any players changed your offseason to-do list by solidifying spots for themselves over the last two months?

I think it's just depth. So, if you look across our infield we have a lot of alternatives. And then we have strong alternatives in our outfield as well. I think what we've proven is we're going to have versatility and depth in both areas. Catching could be a potential need where we have a little bit less of it. But it's a matter of impacting them, and then me doing the best job of complementing them from a support, and just run-production. How each at-bat complements the next, and what that means in the AL East against really good pitching.

Say it's on you. Acknowledge run scoring is a problem. Complement. Support. Repeat.

Did Bowden Francis and Yariel Rodríguez show enough this year to strike starting pitching from your offseason checklist?

I would say we'll be in both of those markets (impact starting pitching and depth starting pitching) for sure. We are afforded the ability to do so, where we don't have to be in the impact market, but we will stay in it.

Bring Kikuchi back!

What did you see from Bowden and Yariel that has you feeling good about their rotation spots next year?

I'll separate them, but a lot of similarities. From Bowden, the thing that was so impressive to me was the strike-throwing. I mean, obviously the split gets a lot of attention, but his ability to be aggressive in the zone just separated him. Really, really impressed with his poise. To have dealt with that stretch of historic performance, and a couple of runs at no-hitters, that takes a special level of poise. And from Yariel, from a guy who didn't pitch for an entire year, and comes to a new country entirely, not speaking another culture—language, yes, but such a different culture and professional environment—and to just have no fear and not back down. It's really interesting talking to him about his experience and his growth. To now think about how much his routine is going to change in making sure that we help him manage that in an effective way, because of the cultural differences in professional baseball in Cuba and here in North America.

I mean... Yariel spent three seasons in Japan. But sure, sure, this is good. Talking about Bowden Francis is good. Whenever Bowden’s not on screen all the other characters should be asking, “Where's Bowden?”

Seriously though. Talk up your best stories, man! Lean into it! Take credit for it!

Is your approach to next year about trying to win and getting back to the postseason, or is there a scenario where you could consider taking a step back?

So, yes to the first question, no to the second question. We are definitively committed to this core. I've said this to Bo and Vladdy—they have done very powerful things already. And they've done them as a team. They've done exceptional things, to win in the AL East—not enough. Not enough to their standards, nor mine, and certainly not the fans'—but what they've accomplished already is exceptional and there's a lot of good baseball ahead of them, and I hope it's together.

Ol' Rossty don't have enough time to take a step back for a year, I tell you what.

Can you build around two very significant contracts for both of those players, and still have room to add top players next year and into the future?

Yes. We can. We've had incredible support here and that is certainly a possibility. Now, that doesn't make it just happen, because it's a possibility. It's extremely difficult to sign one player to an extension (like that). Signing two is difficult. Building around them also still requires making sure that our farm system continues to contribute.

So we can expect either one thing or another thing. Got ya. Great talk.

You and Mark both talked about a lack of depth in the bullpen, but the bullpen coach has lost his job. How do you square that?

That's a very—it lies with me. I'm the one—Jeff Ware did not do anything wrong. He's done some good things in this game, some great things. He will continue to. We are looking to make incremental improvements, and we made—John and I—the very tough decision to have another voice come into the fold, another skillset come into the fold. Pete is obviously very involved in that. And, as opposed to asking Jeff to do things differently, even though the year before we had success, but the game moves fast. It moves fast. And I think the world of Jeff, and we had to make a very, very difficult decision.

Did you though? Did you have to? I mean, I genuinely don't care either way, and I don't expect to find out specifics anyway. It's just... you know... since you're here and you're speaking about it, a little more clarity might be nice.

Last year we heard how excited you were and Don Mattingly was for him to have a bigger role in the offence. What gives?

We just need to change the structure, and he's open to it. So, it's a combination of urgency, a trend over the last couple of years, and ensuring that we are doing everything to make incremental progress in a very complex problem.

OK, I think we’re done here. And I don’t want to see you come out of your room until you’ve got Vlad signed, young man!

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