Blue Jays trade tiers — 2023 edition!: From the untouchable to the Yusei Kikuchi

A look at the likelihood every single Blue Jays player has of getting traded this winter (plus a brief diversion to look at their most notable Rule-5 eligible players for some reason)!

Image via Jays Care Foundation/@JaysCare

The Toronto Blue Jays have their work cut out for them this winter. They’ve had back-to-back seasons with win totals in the low-90s, but only two playoff games and no playoff wins to show for it, meaning the team badly needs to take the next step — especially when you consider that, barring extensions, a year from now Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette will be just two seasons away from free agency. Progress needs to be made in 2023, and that starts this winter.

The free agent market is, as ever, full of shiny baubles that fans can’t help but find enticing as they think about ways to make their team better, but financial restrictions may be more of a factor for the Blue Jays this winter than they have been in recent years— partly due to the increasing expense of guys like Guerrero, Bichette, and Teoscar Hernández as they get deeper into their arbitration years, and partly due to the many long-term deals the club is currently locked into. The best way to add to their win total may instead be to subtract from their current group. And that’s precisely what we’re here to talk about today.

I attempted a piece like this last year, and hoo boy, there were some swings and misses on my part. Jordan Groshans (traded to Miami this summer for a pair of relievers) in the “it would have to be a blockbuster” tier? Gunnar Hoglund (sent to Oakland in the Matt Chapman deal) in the “not really worth discussing tier? Hope for Thomas Hatch? Randal Grichuk (dealt to Colorado for Raimel Tapia and a prospect) as unmovable?

Not some of my best guesses!

Of course, obviously the write-ups are the more important parts of a piece like this anyway, but let’s try to do a little bit better this time, shall we? Here’s my 2023 version of the Blue Jays’ trade tiers!

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Making a trade is a whole lot easier said than done. The Blue Jays have some players that would be of obvious interest to other teams this winter, some of whom they’d be completely unwilling to trade. They also have some players they’d be much happier to send away, most of whom won’t be enough to bring back the kind of impact talent the Jays will be looking for. Here are my best guesses at the likelihood of each Blue Jays player being traded this winter…

The "Untouchable" tier

Vladimir Guerrero Jr.: We’ll start with the easiest name to place on this list. Vlad had what most are comfortable describing as a “down year” in 2022, though I think fans with a more negative bent could be forgiven for wondering if his incredible 2021 is ultimately going to be the outlier in his career. And if his dip in production relative to the league wasn’t pronounced enough (132 wRC+ in 2022 versus 166 wRC+ in 2021), the dip in raw numbers was absolutely glaring: .311/.401/.601 in 2021, .274/.339/.480 in 2022. It’s a concern.

Meanwhile, he’s turned into a very good first baseman — a Gold Glove winner, no less! — but will never get real value out of anything but his bat, and is now just three years from free agency. With an arbitration projection of $14.8 million, he is not the bargain he once was. And yet: he’s Vlad, three years is a long time, and there are very few guys who’ve been able to produce a wRC+ above 160 over a full season that don’t turn out to be excellent hitters year in, and year out. He’s showed in 2021 the ability to make the needed adjustment to stop hitting the ball into the carpet so dang much, and that should give everyone hope he can do it again. Plus, if exit velocity is still there — and it is — he’ll still be incredibly dangerous at the plate. He’s going nowhere.

Alek Manoah: Another easy choice here, Manoah turned in an incredible rookie season in 2021, then managed to shave nearly a full run off his ERA in 2022 — while simultaneously taking on the form of a true workhorse, coming up just short of the 200 inning mark, but still landing among the top 10 in baseball by innings pitched. The strikeout rate was down, but so were the walks. He pitched efficiently, going deep into games, relying less on swing-and-miss and more on his ability to limit good contact — yet was still able to routinely get Ks when needed. His strand rate was high, his home run rate was low, and if those regress to the mean a bit his ERA might not be quite as sparkling going forward, but that will still make him an incredibly important part of this team for a long, long time. You can't make the Jays better by dealing Manoah. They won't.

Kevin Gausman: Unlike some of the Jays’ other guys on long-term deals, I don’t think Gausman’s contract is prohibitive to a trade. You just wouldn’t want to trade him. 205 strikeouts to 28 walks in 174 2/3 innings with a 3.35 ERA and a 2.38 FIP? He's got four years left on his deal at an average of $22.75 million per. It's pretty much the Ryu contract, but for a younger, much more overpowering pitcher with a cleaner health history. What's not to love?

The "It would have to be a blockbuster" tier

Bo Bichette: If you think I’m being a little more stingy with the “untouchable” tag this year, you’d be right. Last winter I had seven players in that tier, and now this time we’re moving a tier down after only three. That’s mostly because of what I expect to be a tighter budget than a year ago, and how little appetite I think there will be for the Jays to move their best prospects. The core of this team isn’t on the verge of being broken up, I don’t think, but time may be running out. And there’s no better indication of that than the fact that I have Bo Bichette down here.

I’d still be very surprised if Bo was moved, but it’s an idea that at least needs to be considered in places beyond the realm of overly-frustrated fans. And maybe a change of scenery is the best way to get him to accept a move off of shortstop.

Statcast allows us to break down infield defence in a number of ways, and in looking at Bichette's data over the last two seasons, two things really stand out. One, he's actually been a pretty good fielder when left-handed batters are at the plate, with a +7 OAA that ranks fourth among 42 shortstops. And two, he's been awful (-19) against right-handed batters, and particularly against right-handed batters when he's had to move in to field the ball (-22). His -19 OAA with RHB at the plate is the worst in baseball.

I haven't thought or read a ton about how a situation like this will be affected by the coming ban on the shift, but here's how I'm interpreting it at the moment: Nearly half of Bo's plays against lefties have come with him in more of a second base role, starting from spots on the right side of the bag that shortstops will no longer be permitted to occupy in 2023. The other half includes a ton of plays where he’s started just to the left side of the bag, but where the second baseman was shifted into short right field — also about to become illegal. In other words, plays where he's been able to accumulate value to offset how bad he's been against right-handed hitters will be drying up, making a barely tenable situation worse. Combine that with the fact that his overall OAA, and his mark against RHB’s, went backwards in 2022, and it feels like this is a good time for this experiment to end — though it's worth noting that plenty of good teams can get away with defensive performances this bad from their shortstops just fine: Corey Seager, Gleyber Torres, and Xander Bogaerts were worse in 2021 by OAA than Bichette's worst season, as were Taylor Walls, Amed Rosario, and J.P. Crawford in 2022.

Anyway, a trade? I don’t know! Maybe!

Jordan Romano: I had Romano in the “untouchable” category last year, and while I think it’s far, far more likely than not that the bullpen-deficient Jays retain their best reliever, if the Brewers and Padres can swap their closers, I suppose anything can happen. A reliever should never be untouchable anyway, right? Even if it will never not be awesome to have a local kid closing out games for the Jays — something he’ll be able to do for three more years before he’s eligible for free agency, which is kind of a lifetime for a reliever. It does give him a ton of trade value though, if the Jays are actually looking to do something incredibly bold. Hard to see it.

Matt Chapman: The main difference between Chapman and Teoscar Hernández, who I have in the category below, is the fact that Teo is making it difficult to move George Springer to his optimal position, while Chapman is a huge part of the Blue Jays’ infield defence — and a guy they’d almost have to keep if they’re not going to move Bichette off of short. They both help tilt the lineup too far to the right, they both have just one year left before free agency, but while Hernández has the better bat, Chapman is the more important player to the team right now. That doesn’t mean he couldn’t be moved, but I think it would be harder for the Jays to do it. Especially when you consider that, if the defensive metrics had valued him the way they normally do — and it certainly felt more likely that the odd miscue was dragging him down in 2022, rather than any kind of physical deterioration to his skillset — or if he had hit the way he did in the second half all year long, he’d have been looking at something like a six-win year, or higher. Stranger things have happened, but this one’s hard to see.

Ricky Tiedemann: I can’t imagine the Jays are entering this winter actively shopping their top prospect, because Tiedemann’s breakout season has given him a chance to be a contributor at the big league level in 2023, and potentially a key player as soon as 2024. But they’re in a spot where they need to make good on the massive promise of their current core, which they’ve failed to do in either of the last two seasons, and drastic measures may be necessary. As the heading says, it would have to be a blockbuster.

The "Going to have to seriously listen, unfortunately" tier

Teoscar Hernández: Teoscar is a bat-first player whose wRC+ barely dipped this year, going from 132 in 2021 to 129 in 2022. On the surface that would seem to give him plenty of trade value, however, his case is as good a reminder as Vlad's of just how suppressed the offensive environment was this year. Teo's unadjusted numbers went from .296/.346/.524 in 2021 to just .267/.316/.491 this year. Not great! Add in that his strikeout rate moved in the wrong direction, his base running went from a strength to a weakness, and his defence in right field sunk from -2 OAA to -5, and I don't think flipping him is going to be the answer to the Jays' problems this winter. But it's an idea I think they'll at least have to explore, because even though they'd be selling somewhat low, the outfield is a real area of opportunity. Hernández and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. are heading into the final years of the contracts, Springer would be best moved to a corner, and a lefty bat would be ideal in at least one of the remaining outfield spots. If they can pull that off it might be worth getting out of the Teoscar business a year early, rather than letting him walk for practically nothing next winter. Then again, signing him to an extension, especially a back-loaded one that might free up some payroll this year, doesn't seem like a bad way to play this either. Teoscar is fun!

Alejandro Kirk and Gabriel Moreno: I’m not including Danny Jansen in this group, not because I particularly dislike Jano, but because I think he’s the much easier of the three catchers to let go of if you’re the Jays. Jansen has been injury prone, he’s been streaky at the plate, I think Alejandro Kirk’s defensive improvements this season have dulled the edge that Jansen once had in this competition, and he is lowkey only two years away from free agency. Yet he’s still a win-now guy who should have some value on the trade market. Kirk and Moreno have fewer questions, and many more years of club control remaining (four and six respectively). They will have a lot more value, so any deal involving them will be more transformative, but they’re the guys the Jays ought to be trying to hang on to — Kirk because of what he showed with the bat this year, and how well he worked with Manoah, Moreno because he’s a premium prospect and it’s going to be important going forward, as everyone else gets expensive, to fill in gaps with everyday players who will still be making the league minimum for a while yet. Dealing one of these two and keeping Jansen isn’t a bad consolation prize, though. And they’ll definitely be listening.

Santiago Espinal: I’m not sure that Espinal is quite good enough to be placed in this category, but as the best defensive infielder on the club, and a guy who hit well enough in the first half to make an unlikely All-Star appearance, I don’t want to overlook him too badly. He’s prodcued a 104 wRC+ over his last two seasons combined (737 PA), and was worth 2.3 fWAR in 2022 (Teoscar was worth 2.4) despite playing second base instead of short. He could be a really valuable guy, even if his struggles against right-handed pitching in 2022 raise some questions as to whether he can really handle an everyday role. And yet the Jays probably do have to listen on him as well, if only because his role is one they have some cover for in the shape of Whit Merrifield, Cavan Biggio, Addison Barger, Otto López, Vinny Capra, and eventually Leo Jimenez and Orelvis Martinez.

Nate Pearson: I know a lot of fans will probably scoff at the idea of it being in any way “unfortunate” that the Jays would have to consider listening on Pearson — people have this weird thing where they get mad at athletes who just happen to keep getting hurt! — but the truth is that, while it’s obviously a massive problem that he’s missed so many reps over the years, Pearson still throws hard, has impressive secondary pitches, has the build of a starter, was an incredibly highly rated prospect until very recently (Keith Law had him at number five overall heading into 2021), and it’s not like it’s been recurring arm injuries that have derailed his career to this point. Yeah, he spent time on the shelf with a lat strain this year, and a flexor strain in 2020, but many of the other issues don’t raise the same kinds of red flags. Mono??!?!

I wrote last year that “I don’t think you come this far with Nate Pearson and then trade him cavalierly just as he’s getting so tantalizingly close to looking like the guy you’ve believed all along that he can become.”

All of that seems less true now — he no longer seems as close to being “that guy” now, and with the limitations that will likely be placed on him because of his lack of innings these past few years, he probably won’t for at least a year, if ever. And you probably don’t worry quite as much about moving on from him at this point as you would have then. But there’s still going to be some value there, and I don’t think it’s quite yet a slam dunk to let go of this one lightly.

Any prospect not named Tiedemann: The Jays may not have the greatest collection of prospects in the league at this stage, but there are still some very interesting players in the system. MLB Pipeline currently follows Ricky Tiedemann's name with Orelvis Martinez, Brandon Barriera, Tucker Toman, Yosver Zulueta, Sem Robberse, Hayden Juenger, and Gabriel Martinez, with the likes of Spencer Horwitz and Addison Barger not much farther back. With Orelvis, Zulueta, Robberse, Junger, Horwitz, and Barger all having reached Double-A or higher, some measure of help is on the way for this roster, and I suspect the Jays don't want to deplete that depth too badly. But it's obviously all about balance, and about what other clubs will require to get deals done. You'd love to see the Jays get through the winter with most of this group still intact, but the needs of the big league roster are going to have to come first.

The "Not really worth discussing" tier

George Springer: I mean, maybe there’s a world in which the Jays move George Springer this winter, but it’s hard to envision. A great player when healthy, an important player to everything they’re trying to do, and a guy with four-years and $90 million left on his deal. That’s not a crazy amount of money, in MLB terms, if you’re looking to take back somebody else’s sunk cost. But why would the Jays want to do that? In my book this is a guy whose flaws are worth accommodating, and who still has more to give to this team. Just find some bubble wrap.

José Berríos: It was a nightmare year for a guy who had been one of the most consistent and successful pitchers in the sport from 2017 through 2021. Berríos won’t turn 29 until May, and that, along with his ability to throw as hard as ever and his continued good health, makes it beyond plausible that he’ll be able to find whatever it was that he lost this season. But, oh man, that’s a tough thing to actually believe after the year we just saw. Woof.

There’s not going to be a market for the six years and $116 million remaining on that contract, nor should the Jays be looking to move on at this stage anyway. Berríos will be able to opt out of the back-loaded final two years and $48 million of the deal after 2026, when he’ll be entering his age-33 season, so there’s plenty of time for him to get himself on track and get the Jays off the hook for that portion of it, but this thing could get ugly in a hurry if 2022 wasn’t just a one-year blip. There won’t be any takers, I don’t think.

Hyun Jin Ryu: I had Ryu here in the “not really worth discussing” tier of last year’s list, and I’ve gotta say, the Tommy John surgery isn’t exactly moving the needle for him this time around. Would love to see him make it back by the end of 2023 and pitch a few more innings before his current deal expires, but I’m not exactly holding my breath.

The "Sure, why not?" tier

Danny Jansen: Again, don’t get me wrong, I’d be happy to watch another full season of Danny Jansen — particularly if he’s actually able to stay healthy — but he’s the catcher of the three that it easily seems optimal to move. Maybe the Jays don’t quite feel the same way, as I know there’s a lot of intangible stuff that he brings to the table, but it’s always seemed to me like Gabriel Moreno was the long-term guy here, and the trajectory Alejandro Kirk has been on since 2020 or so — and, as mentioned above, his work with Alek Manoah — has simply put him in a class above.

Whit Merrifield: I’d put Merrifield in a lower tier, but at time moment I’m not sure who is going to play in centre field if George Springer gets hurt, and that’s a pretty important role to have until something changes. I’m not sure Merrifield is the right guy for that role, and his hot September hasn’t convinced me that his bat is going to bounce back after his wRC+ has gone down in four straight years from when it peaked at age-29 in 2018, so I can’t put him in a higher tier either. But if some team comes in with a strong offer? Go nuts.

Mitch White: The Jays’ deadline day acquisition of White clearly didn’t work out the way they had hoped, but there was method to what ended up seeming like madness. White pitched to an impressive 1.69 ERA over 32 innings in Triple-A in 2021, and managed a wholly respectable 3.66 ERA over 46 2/3 big league innings with the Dodgers that season. This year he didn't allow a single run over two Triple-A starts in the Dodgers organization, and managed a 3.70 ERA over 56 innings in the big leagues there. He was showing himself to be too good for the minors, and was good enough to get some real run from one of the best teams in the business. Then he comes to Toronto and, despite a 3.76 FIP, pitched to a 7.74 ERA. His strand rate with the Jays was also insane, as only 54.3% of the runners to reach base against him were prevented from scoring. His BABIP with the Jays jumped to .368. And while those are numbers that might indicate some kind of catastrophic bout of bad luck, they’re also the kinds of numbers you’d completely expect from someone who simply isn’t a big league calibre pitcher. I know which of those options many Jays fans believe White is, but there really is a pretty good track record to suggest he’s at least decent. And with the Jays’ lack of starting depth, they’re not going to be in a rush to be moving him. But hey, we can hope.

Any reliever not named Romano: There is obviously a range within this group — Anthony Bass or Yimi Garcia would be very surprising guys to see move, Julian Merryweather or Trevor Richards would not — but in general, even in a winter where the Jays will be looking to add to their bullpen, if one of their non-elite options is necessary to add to a trade they really want to make in order to get it done, they’re going to be fairly easy to replace. Or, if we’re just talking about smaller deals, some of the Jays’ lesser relievers could be on the move, if only to free up 40-man spots for some of the players they’ll be looking to keep out of the Rule 5 draft.

Leo Jimenez: Jimenez was added to the Jays' 40-man a year ago, after he slashed .315/.517/.381 in 54 A-ball games in 2021, but after moving up to High-A this season his walk rate shrunk by more than half, from 21.1% to 9.2%, and he hit just .230/.340/.385. Partly the struggles were due to injury, but knowing that doesn’t change the fact that the Jays are maybe in a tough spot with him with respect to the 40-man, as he's still far away and doesn't seem likely to reach the majors until 2024, when he'll have just one option year left. Based on D.M. Fox's recent interview with Jays farm director Joe Sclafani, the team does like him quite a bit, but maybe he's a guy who would be better served in an organization where the barrier to the big league roster isn't quite so high, and maybe that makes him a guy they’ll be more inclined to move.

Otto López: One of the reasons the barrier to entry for Jimenez is so high is that López is on the 40-man as well, having received cups of coffee in the big leagues in 2021 and ‘22. He’s an interesting depth player who the Jays had playing at shortstop, second base, and in centre field this year in Buffalo. He had a fine year at the plate for the Bisons, slashing .297/.378/.415 in his second year there, doing a nice job of taking walks, avoiding strikeouts, and using his speed — things that help help offset his relative lack of pop. Unless he plays in the big leagues all year he'll be out of options this time next year, so the clock is ticking somewhat. So, while he’s a nice player to have, like Jimenez, it may be better roster management to send him elsewhere, depending on how comfortable the Jays are with some of their other infielders’ ability to handle shortstop — or some of the other options out there.

The 40-man crunch guys: The Jays don’t necessarily have huge 40-man issues to contend with this winter, but there are still definitely some guys who will need to be added in order to avoid losing them in the Rule 5 draft.

Among guys who are Rule-5-eligible, it seems highly likely to me that they'll add Yosver Zulueta, Spencer Horwitz, Orelvis Martinez, and Addison Barger. Gabriel Martinez is far away but may get added as well. Adrian Hernandez, Brandon Eisert, and Jimmy Robbins would probably be smart additions. There are some other interesting names to consider, but I think those eight provide us with a good place to start. Some of those names will surely come up in trade conversations, but I'm honestly more interested in the ones who might already be going the other way — off of the 40-man.

Including players on the 60-day IL, the Jays currently have 43 names listed on their 40-man roster, but that will go down to 40 when David Phelps, Ross Stripling, and Jackie Bradley Jr. officially become free agents. Freeing up eight additional spots actually won't actually be all that difficult, I don't think. Let's highlight the non-tender/trade candidates by position, keeping in mind that most of the names here are of players who will likely be very movable — though it’s maybe not as strong a collection as the one that helped the Jays get Matt Chapman out of Oakland last winter.

• Outfielders:
Raimel Tapia and Bradley Zimmer likely won't be tendered contracts, and I'm not sure they're going to have any trade value before that point.

• Infielders:
I'm not entirely sure what to make of Vinny Capra, who ended the year on the 60-day, but I'm going to guess he's on the non-tender bubble. Maybe even Cavan Biggio, too, though with an arbitration projection of $2.6 million I would imagine the Jays don't simply cut him loose for nothing. (More on him below.)

• Catchers:
All three of the catchers on the 40-man — Jansen, Kirk, and Moreno — will obviously be tendered contracts. Though, as discussed above, it would be a bit surprising if all three remain on the roster next spring.

• Starting pitchers:
If they hang on to their roster spots, Thomas Hatch, Anthony Kay, and Trent Thornton are going to find themselves behind more names on the depth chart than ever before in the spring of 2023. It's easy to think that those guys won't have much trade value, and Kay in particular probably wasn't healthy enough this season to convince teams to give up anything for him, but let's not forget that the Jays did quite well in snagging Steven Matz for Josh Winckowski, Sean Reid-Foley, and Yennsy Díaz back in early 2021. Maybe it's time for another quantity-for-quality kind of deal involving guys like this.

Meanwhile, Casey Lawrence is on the 40-man and probably doesn't need to be. Also, though you hate to think it, players can't be added to the 60-day IL until spring training starts, which means that the Jays may have a decision to make regarding Hyun Jin Ryu's roster spot. Do they carry him all winter with the hope that he'll actually make it back and pitch meaningful innings for them late in the 2023 season? Or do they cut their losses now and have an extra spot to play with? Will doing so affect the insurance process at all? These are things I don't know!

• Relievers:
While the obvious subtractions here are guys like Merryweather and Richards, who are out of options and begging to be replaced by more trustworthy arms, there are also candidates to lose their 40-man spots in Matt Gage and Foster Griffin. Taylor Saucedo is another name for this category, but he's had impressive enough strikeout totals the last couple years in Triple-A that he might hang on as a depth lefty, depending on his health. (Like Capra and Ryu, Saucedo ended the year on the 60-day IL).

The "I mean, if anybody wants 'em" tier

Lourdes Gurriel Jr.: This one is probably harsh, and I obviously could end up way wrong here, but I really wanted to once again underline the fact that Gurriel simply doesn’t have a ton of trade value this winter. He's a fine player, incredibly likeable, but he only has one year left on his contract, is a poor defender, a liability on the bases, saw his power disappear this season, will be coming off wrist surgery, and simply has not taken the step forward it looked like he was capable of when he put up wRC+ marks of 125 and 134 in 2019 and '20. His last two seasons? Marks of 107 and 114 — and that 114 came about via a 126 in the first half and an 89 in the second. He's streaky like that. You can watch him and feel like better things are just around the corner. But he just turned 29 and has never had a WAR above 2.0. In 2022 his fWAR was 1.0. His .291/.343/.400 line honestly doesn't look awful, but I just don't think he's an everyday player on a team with real championship aspirations. I don’t know what the market will be, but if there is one I think it’s time to move on.

Cavan Biggio: After an awful start to the season that saw him spend time on the COVID-IL and then get straight-up demoted to Buffalo, Cavan Biggio returned to the big leagues in late May, then put together an incredible June. He slashed .271/.419/.525 for the month, and fans who had grown sick of some of the questions about his bat that had rather loudly arisen over the previous year or so were crowing. This was the Biggio who went missing because of a long series of nagging injuries in 2021, and those who ever questioned him needed to give their heads a shake. Even I started to wonder if maybe there was something to the theory! Then Biggio slashed .183/.283/.333 (79 wRC+) in the second half.

I don’t know what happens with Biggio this winter, but with his salary projected to be about $2.6 million, and the Jays maybe lacking some of the financial flexibility of previous winters, I don’t think it’s a slam dunk that he’s tendered a contract. He’s got versatility, he’s hits from the left side, he’s not a burner but is generally a smart baserunner — there are things to like. But the bat is the big thing, and his 2022 numbers ended up looking awfully similar to the ones from his “lost” 2021 season. Maybe this is just what he is.

The Jays won’t be rushing to get rid of a lefty bat, I don’t think. Especially with the shift ban being a great unknown. But if there’s a team out there that, for some reason, thinks Biggio can get back to what he was as a prospect or in the earlier phase of his career, a deal could certainly happen. Or at least should.

The "Yusei Kikuchi" tier

Yusei Kikuchi: Lastly we have Yusei Kikuchi, who assumes the spot occupied on last year’s list by Randal Grichuk. I fantasized in my latest mail bag about the Jays eating half of the $20 million remaining on Kikuchi’s deal and maybe finding a taker for him that way, but his situation just isn’t quite the same as Kendrys Morales, who produced a 107 wRC+ in the year before the Jays were able to trade him to Oakland, or Randal Grichuk, who was passable enough in centre field and hits the ball hard enough that a team as clueless as the Rockies managed to be enticed last spring.

Kikuchi's season was unbelievably painful to watch. And it's not even all that easy to sell it to some other club as an outlier, either. His four big league seasons, starting with 2019, have produced ERAs of 5.46, 5.17, 4.41, and 5.19. His xERA marks have been 5.41, 3.33, 5.23, and 5.63. He didn't reach those numbers in quite the same way each time — the Jays had him striking out batters at a better rate than before, though that was offset by a huge uptick in walks — but, outside of pandemic-shortened 2020, home runs and hard contact have been a feature. It’s a pretty awful track record. The unique stuff and velocity from the left side is obviously interesting, and maybe there’s a fit with a club that has a Tapia-esque bad player to offer back, but it feels pretty unlikely that anyone’s going to take this problem off the Jays’ hands. Why on earth would they?

Now let’s hope I’m wrong again!

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