Mail Bag: Bless This Mess
Have you tried unplugging the offence and then plugging it back in again?
The Toronto Blue Jays are not exactly, uh, inspiring confidence among their fans at the moment. And not even just this very moment, frankly. I put out a call for mail bag questions over a week ago, wrote a massive reply to one, posted that on its own, have now returned to the ol’ digital burlap to finish it up, and guess what? Other than a couple of statistics that have changed, and games I now have a fuzzy memory of, they all still make complete sense. They all still track. And I can very much sense a theme.
No sir, there most definitely is not a lot of “Why didn’t John Schneider call for a lefty in the seventh inning against the Royals?” in this one. But there sure is a lot of “Why do I hate my life and why is the answer the Blue Jays?”
Ho ho ho, we do have fun here on DJF Mountain sometimes, don’t we, folks?
Jokes aside, I want to thank everyone who submitted a question this time. There was a little bit of overlap among some of them, which meant that a few ended up getting cut, so my apologies to those who don’t see theirs here. But I appreciate everyone who reached out, everyone who reads what I write, and especially everyone who supports what I do with a paid subscription. I know times are tough and not everyone can do that, which is why it means so much to me that there are those of you who do. This is the only way I make a living and that I can do so—to an extent; please subscribe!—while still keeping the site free for all to read absolutely rocks.
Ah, look at me. I’m ramblin’ again.
So let’s get to what we’re all here for, shall we? Let’s forget that, in my Opening Day Mail Bag, I wrote that I had a feeling it’s going to be a surprisingly fun season! Let’s eat Arby’s! Let’s talk about the goddamn Toronto goddamn Blue Jays.
As always, I have not read read any of Griff’s answers…
It’s becoming pretty clear that, if nothing else, the Blue Jays could use a fresh set of eyes in the GM’s chair. But while I’d welcome never having to see or hear from, or hear about, Ross Atkins as much as the next guy, it seems foolhardy to hold one’s breath waiting for a Modern Major League Franchise™ to appoint a replacement who would operate all that differently—or, crucially, do all that much better. Even after quite likely the most deflating offseason of Atkins’ tenure, Justin Turner clearly still has The Goods, and if the season ended today (May 7)—as many would welcome, no doubt—IKF would have a career-high wRC+ (of, uhhh, 93).
Or, consider his signature too-clever-by-half move that everyone loves to hate, trading away the potential franchise catcher who the disgraced sesquipedalian screed merchant we’ll call for privacy’s sake Rosie D. (no, that’s too obvious; let’s say R. DiManno) calls “Gabe Marino”. Daulton Varsho has as much fWAR so far in 2024 as his two next best position player teammates combined, and his defense is one of the increasingly few things keeping this team from becoming straight-up unwatchable in its current state.
Things are likelier to get better in the short-term than they are to get worse, so the following is a pretty big “if”, but:
1. If the team stays stuck in the mud and is forced into an early rebuild—or, uh, “pivot”—this summer (instead of the one many have suggested is looming in one or both of the next two offseasons anyway), how likely do you think it is that Ross Atkins is the GM to lead it?
2. For as many depreciating assets as the team does have, or as many guys (Vladdy, Bo, Kirk, etc.) as they’d be trading at an ebb in (if not the nadir of) their value, do you think it’s more likely that they make somewhat more lateral moves that might better fill out the active roster/upper minors or net them More Years Of Control, as opposed to a full teardown/fire sale?
I don’t love the team’s long-term outlook but there’s certainly still enough meat on the bones here that it’d seem far more logical to take a step back, while prolonging their window of at least being good, than to blow it up on the off chance they could be the next Orioles in 2030 or whenever. Keep shooting for 54% like the other Modern Major League Franchises™, I guess.
3. Stoeten, without knowing precisely what the Blue Jays’ future holds, would you say it’s time for their fans to crack each other’s heads open and feast on the goo inside? — fraser
Great question, fraser. A whole lot to chew on there, speaking of meat on bones. Thanks so much for it, and for the support!
I think you’re right that a fresh set of eyes feels like it could only help at this point. I could obviously go off on a huge tangent here, because there’s a lot to mine from the question of whether Atkins should continue as GM, but on the most basic level I keep thinking about something I wrote last week about George Springer’s lineup spot and the idea of cluster luck. As I said then, you can’t choose when you get your hits, which is why, in a single game, a player’s spot in the lineup doesn’t really matter as much as people feel. What I should have added there is that the one thing that breaks cluster luck is a home run. That’s instant run scoring that can come at any time, with no need to string hits and walks together among teammates. The organization seemed to understand this in 2021, but as they’ve moved away from lineups that were criticized as “too similar,” they’ve ended up with guys who are strong all-around hitters with maybe fewer “weaknesses” but that are far less of a threat to go deep. You put yourself at such a disadvantage when you don’t get a bloop and a blast every once in a while and have to scratch and claw for literally everything. It’s becoming clearer and clearer that this has become a huge organizational blind spot, I think. Or at least one at the big league level.
That said, speaking of those strong all-around hitters, back when you wrote this question it would have certainly felt as though Justin Turner still has “The Goods,” as you said. Don’t look now but he has just three hits in his last nine games and is down to a 109 wRC+. Some of that is maybe due to the illness that’s been going around the Jays’ clubhouse, but we’ll be talking about him a lot more very soon if this doesn’t improve. (Hey, but at least if he no longer has to play every day it should give someone from Buffalo a chance to get some run and maybe make an impact. Yes, we’re approaching that level of concern for this offence.)
IKF is up to 96 since you submitted the question though!
Anyway, you’re bang on that the Varsho trade, so far, isn’t looking nearly as bad as the fans who only noticed Gabe “Marino” in last year’s playoffs think. Gurriel was a one-year thing, so we can’t even consider what he’s doing at this point—he was a free agent this winter and the Jays could have signed him just like anyone else. Daulton is far from the problem. And though it still looks like a misstep banking on Alejandro Kirk’s bat as much as it seems the Jays did, neither is their tandem behind the plate.
I also think you’re right that fixing a Modern Major League Franchise™ can be like turning a battleship in a bathtub, especially if the people running it stay the same, are not very interested in wildly changing course, and/or think more like the Dipotos of the world, who you reference later.
OK, so, to your actual questions...
1. Honestly, apart from Mark Shapiro getting canned and the Rogers boardroom giving whoever comes next no choice, I’m not honestly sure what would need to happen to force the team into an early rebuild. More accurately—because I think this is what you’re driving at—I don’t know what would have to happen to cause a full-on mid-season fire sale. I think it would be a terrible, perhaps untenable, look for the team to let Atkins lead that process. And there’s still a lot of talent here, even if it isn’t organized optimally among the different phases of the game. Plus, staying on the fringes of contention is easier than ever these days because of The Rob Manfred Expanded Playoff Experience™.
So, while I don’t think “stay the course” would be the right word for it, I could absolutely see them continue to churn the roster trying to find the right mix and hoping that the waves of reinforcements from the farm actually materialize at some point.
2. Because, yeah, this is sort of the thing. Do you thinkg you get enough back for Vlad to justify not even taking one more chance with him in 2025? Or, more to the point, does this front office think that?
The worst-case-Ontario for the Jays and Vlad—losing him for nothing, which is really means losing him for a draft pick and $25 million off the books, while getting an extra year of Vlad-based hope and whatever production you might be able to coax out of him—doesn’t necessarily look all that bad at this point. If you choose to move him you’d not just be giving up a player, you’d be sending an awful message about 2025, asking for even more unearned trust from your fans, and losing what might be a de facto “pillow” contract with a really exciting hitter. The return would have to be pretty significant, I think. And considering his salary and production since the start of last season, why would it be?
This, of course, is basically the Dipoto thing. For those who missed it back in October, after Seattle failed to make the playoffs, their GM, Jerry Dipoto, explained that the team was “actually doing the fan base a favour in asking for their patience to win the World Series, while we continue to build a sustainably good roster.”
Pressed on this he continued:
“If you go back and you look, in a decade those teams that win 54 percent of the time always wind up in the postseason. And they more often than not wind up in the World Series. So, there’s your bigger-picture process. Nobody wants to hear the goal this year is, ‘We’re going to win 54 percent of the time.’ Because sometimes 54 percent is — one year, you’re going to win 60 percent, another year you’re going to win 50 percent. It’s whatever it is. But over time, that type of mindset gets you there.”
It’s an ugly, blunt way to put it, and Dipoto had to walk it back. It’s also no way to treat your fans or your “entertainment product” to think about it that way. But neither is blowing the thing up completely and being irrelevant for the next half-decade or so, I suppose. And while a lot of fans are desperate to think this isn’t true, and to believe the romanticized narratives we’ve been fed about it our whole lives, he’s right that the reality is that the playoffs are functionally a lottery. That fact has brought us to precisely this kind of thinking, and it would shock me if the Mariners’ front office was the only one that sees it this way. Thanks, Rob!
3. Yes, I would, Kent.
Hi Stoet, I agree with your thoughts on the lineup. How do they not make more significant changes? Sure lineup construction is not a huge factor, but don’t these guys subscribe to the theory of incremental gains compounding? I am sure that is painted on a wall somewhere lol.
Anyways my question: A wise man once said “this market is a behemoth and there will be waves of talent flowing.” Now me, personally, I don’t believe in rebuilds. I look at big market teams like the Yanks and LA for example, and these guys find a way to always be in the conversation through spending or prospects or trades. Why can’t we figure this out here? We have unlimited money and a giant market. How can we have a farm system with not enough prospects to pull off deals or restock the big club? It’s been 10 years since AA supposedly emptied the system. Any thoughts? — Derek S.
Thanks so much for the question and the support, man. Let’s maybe not get me too wrong here. I do think changes should be made at the top of the lineup—they’ve certainly been more active moving hitters around lower down—but my greater point was that keeping Springer up top a while longer yet isn’t such a big deal, and that the vitriol directed at John Schneider as though it’s some massive obvious error that he’s simply missing is misplaced. Yes, it’s an abdication of good, sabermetric principles that we can definitely see them use elsewhere, but it’s a really minor one as long as it doesn’t drag on and on, and one of many examples where teams need to strike a balance between doing the optimal thing and player preferences and needs. (Another of these is the fact that guys are going to get days off sometimes—even if, and maybe even intentionally because, the team just had an off-day—which also drives fans absolutely nuts.)
Let’s not forget that Vlad has, at times, made it be known where he prefers to hit. For example, in spring 2020, Charlie Montoyo told reporters that Vlad preferred to hit behind Lourdes Gurriel Jr., because he knew teams were going to pitch similarly to both. And this year, writing about the club’s decision in spring to move Vlad to third in the order, and Bo to second, Rob Longley of the Toronto Sun explained that John Schneider had said that “he’d like to keep the top of the order as consistent as possible, something the players prefer.”
Also worth considering here: A 2021 FanGraphs Community Research post described an experiment in which the author did 100,000 simulations of three different lineups: an optimized “modern“ one with the best player hitting second, a more traditional one, and a third one deliberately designed to be as bad as possible. The bad-as-possible lineup scored 26 fewer runs on average per 162-game season, or 4 1/3 fewer runs per month. Meaningful! Definitely meaningful, especially for a team struggling to score like this one. But that’s with the worst lineup possible, not just one struggling guy at the top. The impact of having a slightly suboptimal lineup order just isn’t very big—and certainly less than, say, dumb old batted ball luck.
Anyway! As for your question, I don’t think the fact that it hasn’t happed yet means it can’t or won’t happen. I also, as I’ve said above, have a hard time believing that a full-on rebuild is on its way. And though they may not have the types of top prospects that teams salivate over in trade talks—perennial All-Star types or, outside of Ricky Tiedemann, potential frontline starters—I do think the Jays have some interesting guys down on the farm, some of whom could turn into very productive major leaguers. Especially if there ever comes a year where expectations are dialled back a touch and they actually get a chance at some real run.
I’m not trying to say that the drafting and developing here has been great, but I will say that I don’t think fans necessarily do a good job of evaluating it either. We often forget how many guys are gone from the system via trades—which have usually worked out pretty well for the team—and just how long it can take for good stories to bubble up. Davis Schneider and Addison Barger were taken in 2017 and 2018 respectively, for example.
Just for my own edification, if nothing else, let’s do a quick review:
2016
T.J. Zeuch was a miss, but Bo Bichette and Cavan Biggio came out of this draft. J.B. Woodman was flipped early for a win in Áledmys Díaz. Josh Winckowski helped get Steven Matz.
2017
A miss in Logan Warmoth, and Nate Pearson has disappointed, but, as mentioned, Schneider came from this draft. Riley Adams was also in this one, and he’s carving out a nice career in D.C. after being traded for Brad Hand (oops). Oakland might have something in Ryan Noda, who was dealt for Ross Stripling. Kevin Smith and Zach Logue were both in the Matt Chapman deal.
2018
Jordan Groshans disappointed but brought back Anthony Bass and Zach Pop. As mentioned, Barger was from this draft. Griffin Conine went for Jonathan Villar. Adam Kloffenstein was part of the Jordan Hicks deal.
2019
Alek Manoah was a win from this draft, at least for a while. Spencer Horwitz was in this one too.
2020
Austin Martin was, of course, in the Berríos trade. Nick Frasso is still a prospect, albeit for the the Dodgers via the Mitch White deal.
2021
Gunnar Hoglund headlined the Chapman trade. Ricky Tiedemann came from this draft. Damiano Palmegiani as well.
I don’t think it’s particularly useful to go beyond there, so I’ll give it a rest. But it’s not like it’s a horrific record. They just flipped a lot of guys for win-now players, as was the right strategy at the time. Obviously you’d like to have seen them have a few more guys come up and establish themselves, because that would have freed up resources for them to take some really big swings in free agency, rather than trying to spread their money around as much as they have. But that takes time, and opportunities at the big league level that they really haven’t had to give. I don’t think that should be held against them. (But yes, the pitching depth in the upper minors, especially after the Hicks deal, is quite thin.)
The Player Development Complex in Dunedin didn’t come online in full until 2021. That’s not that long ago, and that’s really what was supposed to up the Jays’ player development game. Teams like the Dodgers and the Yankees have had a long head start on this stuff, and have even more money to invest in it. Those two, as well as the Rays and Cardinals, have certainly been the best in baseball at keeping the floor high, in terms where their systems rank according to Baseball America—something we can see in graph form thanks to a J.J. Cooper piece from back in March.
The Jays’ graph, by contrast, looks more fully cyclical, like you’d expect.
It feels like we’re entering a period where they’re probably not going to be spinning off a lot of prospects anytime soon, which means that their system ranking will likely be rising again. Realistically, we probably can’t really judge how well this project has gone until we see where the floor ends up the next time things cycle down.
Obviously that’s not the whole story. They need their best players to be better, and their abandonment of power—partly due to regression from Vlad and Springer—is really hurting them. And I’m certainly not saying that a lot of their current wounds aren’t self-inflicted. But I think there’s a chance that this year, if it continues on its current trajectory, will end up being more a setback than it is the concept-disproving disaster many fans seem to want to take it as.
Over some drinks at the pub, some friends and I were mulling over who from the Jays will be on the chopping block if things don’t improve. Schneider’s got to be in some degree of peril, but many GM’s who part ways with their third manager in five-ish years would draw a lot of heat too. This led us to a discussion of how insulated Ross is from being fired by Mark Shapiro, as the two obviously have a long history of working together. The opinions around the table ranged from “They are a package deal and Mark won’t fire Ross” to “We’d need to be completely drained of talent for Ross to get canned.” I tend to lean a bit towards “Mark would fire Ross if he thought he Atkins’ meddling with the coaching was holding back the talent” but I can honestly imagine any of those scenarios (and maybe others!) being true. Do you have a sense of how strong of a package deal those two are, or what it would take for Mark to cut Ross loose? — jimboknows
Great question, jimbo. Thanks for it and the support!
I mean, I don’t think I know any more than anybody else. Writing an obviously they’re not going to fire Charlie piece like a day before Montoyo was sent packing will do a lot to humble a person on these kinds of questions, it turns out. But what I would guess is that—as I wrote in part one of the mail bag—Shapiro and Atkins aren’t as tied at the hip as a lot of people think.
Mark values stability a lot, but I think he spent a lot of capital with fans and his bosses by bringing Ross back after last season. If he wants to keep his own job the question of whether to continue on with Ross as his head of baseball ops after this season has to be asked.
Now, as I was writing that I wondered for a second if Shapiro would necessarily even care that much, considering he can basically write his own ticket anywhere in the sports world. But I have a hard time believing he could be the kind of guy who ends up in the role that he’s in while also being someone who could comfortably walk away without the unfinished business he has here gnawing at him.
Maybe he could. And maybe he doesn’t feel that Ross is holding him back, or that he owes it to himself to try it another way before moving on. But Shapiro moved up to club president in Cleveland at the end of 2010, which was a year after he’d fired Eric Wedge after seven seasons as manager—and five years managing in the club’s minor league system before that. He’s not above letting someone he’s had a long relationship with go if he feels the team needs to go another way. Stability only takes you so far.
I’d be surprised if a move happened mid-season here but, again, what do I know?
As always, love your level assessments of our beloved team. The coalition of reason remains strong w you <3.
Folks working themselves into a lather about the manager/coaches (admittedly bizarro) choices is energy misspent—I think we have to point directly at the underwhelming off season as the biggest slice of the blame pie.
Hashtags of firing Atkins aside (he’s done an awesome job if you had asked me every prior offseason), it was known to almost everyone they had to improve the team in the offseason. It was equally realized by almost everyone that they did not do so: they downgraded at 3B—I actually like IKF but he is a downgrade—and merely kept level at DH. (Turner’s real good but not such an upgrade over Belt to be considered game-changing.) (Yariel’s acquisition is a nice add but does he replace a Hicks?)
So I’ve come around to needing that changing of the guard—ahem #FireAtkins. My question (finally) is, do we know if Atkins and Shapiro are as attached at the hip as their portmanteau would suggest? I know they were with the Guardians together but beyond that connection? And who is out there or in the org who might be a good successor? — Christ on a Bike
Thanks so much for the question, the support, and the kind words, man. I tackled the tied-at-the-hip thing above, but as for who is out there? I’d be lying if I said I had any kind of a wish list, because—these days especially—it’s difficult to know who in a front office really does what. Eno Sarris wrote about this topic for the Athletic back in November, calling it a “full-time job” to identify the best minds in the game, and produced a pretty good list of future GMs by “texting people inside baseball with a simple question: Who’s good at what they do and will continue moving up within the industry?”
Also worth a read (and not paywalled) is a piece from R.J. Anderson of CBS Sports last August, looking at even more names.
I’d just be cribbing from those guys if I tried to give you an answer. Like… uh… Kim Ng? I don’t know!
As for in the organization, obviously James Click was formerly—albeit somewhat briefly (2020-2022)—the GM of the Astros. Before that he’d spent 15 years in the Rays organization after coming up at Baseball Prospectus with former Red Sox Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom. He’d be the easy answer. Though I must say I’m made slightly concerned by his current title with the Jays: Vice President, Baseball Strategy.
So while there’s lots of stuff you can say about how all teams have rough patches in their season and it just looks worse when it’s at the beginning, it’s getting harder to believe that this year’s Jays are Actually Fine. Especially when they come off a tough stretch of games and go and lose a series in Washington.
So: Is there a realistic move the Jays could make to change their fortunes this season, or are they basically locked in to riding out the year and making decisions in the offseason? — Evan M.
Thanks for the question and the support, Evan. I find it really difficult to see a path forward for this team that isn’t simply holding for now. It makes little sense to send prospects away to attempt some kind of a quick fix, and we’re still a long way from selling off—partly because there really isn’t going to be much of a market out there at this point anyway.
Unlike many fans I don’t subscribe to notion of laying the blame at the feet of Atkins. Atkins can’t make Springer, Bo, Vlad, Kirk etc., produce at the plate. These are all supposed to be elite players and they have to figure it out for themselves. Vlad has been regressing for three years. I don’t think the Jays will want to sign him for $400 million for 10 years. I’ve been wondering since the end of last season about trading him to a team that still sees a lot of value. He’s under team control for another full year. What do you think of a couple of high ceiling recent draft picks (to help rebuild the farm system) and a couple of proven veterans maybe in their 30’s? Would there be any takers? What’s the downside for the Jays? — Robert S.
Thanks so much for the question and the support, Robert! Unfortunately, I don’t think anywhere near that kind of value is going to be out there for a player with so many question marks, and who is making $19 million this year and will probably make $25 million next. Maybe if his salary was lower? Maybe in the offseason? Except then you’d be selling off just one year instead of two.
Not a lot of teams, even if they think they can fix Vlad, are going to be willing to take on that kind of expensive project mid-season, if at all. Especially while also giving up veteran players and high-end prospects for the privilege. Playoff-bound teams don’t need to take that chance. Rebuilding teams are better off with the prospects.
I really think the Jays are best off grinding away, trying to get him right. Even if it means going all the way to free agency. Unless you’re especially worried about Edward Rogers’ bank account, I don’t think the return will ever match the potential that something with him could still click and pay off for this team.
Heard a pundit (Rosenthal?) mention that the Jays could be serious sellers at the trade deadline. He also suggested that Vlad could be one of the players on the block, and that there could be teams out there confident they could “fix this guy”. If that were to happen and 2021 Vladdy emerges on another team, wouldn’t that be justification for Rogers to fire everybody and start over? — Tim H.
Thanks for the question and the support, Tim! Thing is, I get that everybody would really like to find a way to make what’s going on with this team the fault of the coaches, or anybody else who isn’t a player, but no, I don’t think that alone would be reason to fire everybody.
That’s not to say that firing everybody and starting over would necessarily be a bad idea. But, for example, Cody Bellinger was a 161 wRC+ NL MVP in 2019, then fell off a cliff until he landed with the Cubs and now looks like a nicely productive hitter once again, even if he’s probably not going to get back to the level he was at in that MVP year. Not quite the same, but nevertheless, I, uh, don’t think anybody would say that the Dodgers should fire everybody and start over.
It is early Stoeten, but I can’t get the Orioles out of my head. They are young, talented, and have seemingly waves of talent percolating in the minors. They have become what we thought this Jays team was set up to be in the 2022-25 years. Sure the Jays could play to their career norms and sneak into the playoffs, but they don’t appear to be a real contender. Thus, should the selloff-and-restock-the-system begin?
I honestly don’t believe it’s the GM or the President or the Manager’s fault. We can replace them all, and we’ll still in the future have trades we win and lose, draft picks that work out and don’t, and lineups and decisions that we like and second guess. Ultimately, the talent on the field has to perform. The projections haven’t turned into reality for this core unfortunately. The team is running a record payroll, thus it seems we’ve got to shed dollars, get what we can, and try and pivot so it doesn’t become a future lost decade. What says you wise one? — Seth
Thanks so much for the question and the support, Seth. There have been a few submissions with a similar theme, so I won’t repeat myself by answering your actual question—though I’ll say that I don’t think the situation is as simple as a choice between a hard pivot or a lost decade. But I will offer some thoughts on your first paragraph...
• You’re right that the Orioles are in a great place right now, but as we’ve all learned over these last few years, it’s easy to be optimistic about a team that’s at that point in its championship window. Don’t forget that those can close much more quickly than you expect, and that even the best prospects can ultimately disappoint or have their careers fizzle out. I say this a lot, but nothing in this sport is ever as good or as bad as it seems. That really does cut both ways.
• A thing to note about the O’s success is that, while they look incredibly well built, we can’t forget how long it took them to get here. The Jays and Orioles played each other in the 2016 playoffs, and both tried (modestly) and failed to repeat that success in 2017. The Jays then had two really rough years before making the playoffs again in 2020, and have been one of the better teams in baseball basically since. Baltimore didn’t return to the playoffs until last year. They had four seasons between that failure in 2017 and when they broke through the .500 mark again in 2022. For the Jays it was really just a two-year turnaround. It would be easy to look at where Baltimore is right now with envy, but we’ve banked so much enviable baseball since 2016 that they’re still a long way from catching up.
• This is closer to Jerry Dipoto’s 54% comment than I’d like it to sound, and I know that fans don’t want to believe it, or can’t wrap their heads around it, but a playoff team is a real contender. Any playoff team. Look at the Diamondbacks last year, who made that run to the World Series after going 32-39 in the second half. Or the Rangers, who won it despite winning just one more game in the regular season than the 2023 Blue Jays. Or the Phillies in ’22, who took the Astros to six games despite winning just 87 that year. Or Atlanta the year before, who won it all despite finishing 88-73.
Since the Blue Jays are pretty tough to watch right now (and really what else is there to say about them?) I wanted to get your take on something more frivolous.
When I look around baseball, I see teams everywhere having fun with home run celebrations. Personally, I enjoy this; it is nice to see teams having fun in a long baseball season, and some of them are quite funny. I know it isn’t for everyone, but I’m all for it. I mean, come on, the trident in Seattle is good stuff.
Now, I realize that the Blue Jays are a serious team full of Rex Banners who would never allow themselves to have fun at all (you all know what laughter sounds like!), but have you seen any around the league that you enjoy? Maybe a top three? — FaketownNS
Thanks so much for the question and the support, Faketown! I’ll be perfectly honest, I try not to pay too much attention to the celebrations other teams are doing, because I’m still mad at the crusty losers who got such sticks up their asses about the home run jacket—and that the Jays stupidly let those people win.
That said, I will repeat something that I wrote in part one of this mail bag, which I actually stole from @joyeful (aka Robin) from Twitter: part of the reason it felt like the Jays suddenly got incredibly serious last year is that the pitch clock has sped up the action and left a lot less time for the TV broadcast to show what’s going on in the dugout.
Don’t get me wrong, a bigger part of it is that they traded away their most fun-loving players, but I think the ticking clock has limited our views into the dugout and maybe skewed our sense of how much has changed a little bit.
Since fans generally overestimate the return from a sell-off, what are realistic trades for our impending free agents and how much would it really improve the farm?
On the flip side, which impending free agents would be most targeted by other teams? I think Kikuchi and Yimi are the biggest (only?) trade chips that could help any contender. — will
Thanks so much for the question and the support, will. I think you’re absolutely right that fans overestimate the return from a sell-off.
The Jays certainly could have focused less on higher minors talent when they pivoted the last time, and maybe ended up with a few more lottery tickets that might have paid off, but they did what they did and the only thing of value they really had to show for that process was Teoscar Hernández and an excuse to pull $50 million out of the payroll budget.
As I mentioned above, Baltimore took a different path coming out of the 2015-16 era, but did they do much better? Their owners certainly did, with payroll going down by more like $100 million from its 2017 peak, and staying down much longer. But as for actual parts of the current, good version of the O’s that were acquired in trade during those down years, all I really see is Kyle Bradish, who came via the Dylan Bundy trade, and Dean Kremer, who was part of the package they received for Manny Machado.
Yennier Cano and their numbers nine (Cade Povich) and 26 (Juan Nuñez) prospects, per MLB Pipeline, came from Minnesota via the Jorge López deal, but that was in late 2022 and I’m not sure it should even really count.
So, yeah, I think it’s a bit misguided to think that a sell-off would be a panacea and not just a way for Rogers to pocket a bunch of money.
As for potential deal suggestions, that’s honestly just something that I really don’t ever do. There are people that have the mind for it—Ben Nicholson-Smith is great, for example—but I find I have to do a full-on research project just to even get close to putting together something that makes sense, and then when I do it’s got like a 99.999999999% likelihood of absolutely never happening real life. Is this just an elaborate way to say that I can’t be arsed to do it? Maybe. But my brain tends to shut down with this kind of stuff because I just don’t know other teams’ needs, payroll situations, farm systems, how strongly they’re going for it, or what other options might be out there for them well enough. You really need to get into the weeds of all that. I mean, if a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right. And I don’t think I’m the person to do that stuff right.
Anyway, you’re definitely correct about the trade chips the Jays have. Kikuchi and García could bring back something pretty meaningful, I think. Honestly, I would be quite happy if the Jays simply extended Kikuchi anyway—if they’re going into a more mediocre phase, can we at least do it with a pitcher we like and suffered for!—but I’m realistic enough to know that that’s not really how these things work.
If they do decide to sell, all their impending free agents would be on the table—Kikuchi and García, Jansen, Turner, Kiermaier, Richards and Vogelbach. And while those guys wouldn’t bring back enough to completely transform the farm system, it would certainly help.
Guys with more team control than that probably—maybe?—wouldn’t be going anywhere.
I guess I’ve been saying it a bunch, since this is the topic in this mail bag, but I just don’t think they fully punt on 2025 until the coming offseason at the earliest, or probably never. On the off chance that they did, I think they’d be inviting mountains of scorn and brand-destroying anger if they let Ross Atkins be the guy in charge of a sell-off bigger in scope than just moving those free-agents-to-be. I’m a terrible gambler, but my best guess at this point is that Ross, Bo, and Vlad are all still here after the trade deadline passes. Beyond that all bets are off—especially when it comes to the GM.
There’s a narrative out there that because they’ve invested so much money in the renovations and luxury seats, lounges, etc., the Jays can’t “afford” to field mediocre teams the next few years. How valid do you think that is? Does that narrative preclude us making some trades at the deadline if we find ourselves 10 games under (or worse)? — OzRob
Thanks so much for the question and the support, Rob. I don’t really buy that narrative, to be perfectly honest. The Jays can afford to do anything they want, for one. But for two, they don’t necessarily get to choose whether their teams the next few years are mediocre or not, you know? They might be mediocre whether they like it or not.
More to the point, I don’t think it would be smart business to try to be bad, and that might preclude them from trading away guys with term left on their contracts beyond the end of this season. But obviously there are still plenty of guys they’ll be able to move at the deadline if they’re out of it, and I expect that they will.
As I’ve been saying throughout this piece, I think just continuing stay at least on the fringes of contention for a while might be good enough for them. That way they can still sell hope while holding their prospects, adding to the collection by focusing on one-year deals and flipping pending FAs at the deadline, giving some of the guys at Buffalo a chance to establish themselves, etc.
Unappealing as that sounds, I have to say, I suppose I find it preferable to the alternative as well.
Having been a fan of the Jays from 1989 onwards, this may be the toughest season to watch so far. From 1995 to 2014 was painful at times, don’t get me wrong, but those teams didn’t have much sustained talent outside of Halladay and Delgado, so expectations were low. This team is simply frustrating to watch. That being said, I’m still a fan, I’m still going to watch every damn game. — JP
Thanks so much for the question and the support, JP. I sort of hear you on this, but memory is a funny thing. I think there was a lot more frustration in those years than you might recall, and certainly a whole lot more talent that came through than just Doc and Carlos. That said, I think you’re right that there is something particularly frustrating about these last couple of seasons, and especially this one. A lot of fans will tell you it’s stylistic—I’m not sure it’s better to have a great hitting team and a tire fire bullpen, but people seem to be very convinced that’s the case, and in terms of pure entertainment and we-can-overcome-any-deficit swagger, I can’t really argue—but I think the issue is, as you say, more to do with expectations. And, crucially, with the relationship between expectations and hope—two things that, right now, are as far apart as I can ever remember.
In the abstract, last year’s team was a lot like 2013. Huge expectations, a high level of talent, plenty of guys doing their thing at an elite level—Edwin Encarnación slashed .272/.370/.534 that year MY GOD—but plenty of others who fell bafflingly flat, and so the whole thing just didn’t work. The hope was there at the start but eroded in fairly quick order. This year the expectations were just as high—they told us internal improvements were coming, and there was some reason to believe it was possible—but whatever little hope fans had has been very easily to let go of, because it just didn’t ever feel like they’d done enough in the winter. And game-to-game, for a second straight year, we barely even have the hope of a comeback if the team ever falls behind.
It can definitely still be fun. It’s still baseball. There are still great stories, great plays, great performances, and fun players to cheer for. But what makes the frustration so palpable, and the anger so legitimate, is that we expected so much better of this team and this era, and yet there doesn’t seem to be much hope left in it. (I know I’m saying that far too early, because they genuinely (theoretically) could still turn this season around, but that’s the mood.)
On one hand, baseball and watching baseball is supposed to be fun! On the other hand… you know where this is going.
I consider myself a fairly even handed and rational fan who tries to take everything over the course of a long season with a grain of salt. Basically I’m at loss right now as to how to maintain my rational fun loving fandom in the face of… this. (Don’t worry I will never actually stop watching the Blue Jays).
I like traveling to go see the boys play and I typically have to since I live in Arizona. Few things get me more excited to spend money and make plans than an annual Blue Jays pilgrimage to some American baseball outpost. I have yet to make plans this season and I can only say it’s because of the way this team makes me feel. I don’t even know what my question is—I reaallly want my enjoyment of baseball to outweigh my negative feelings for this iteration of my favorite team—but how? Help me Andrew. — Ari
Well, the Jays are playing at Wrigley in August, if that helps.
But yeah, thanks for the question and the support, Ari. I don’t know if I can help you with this one though. And, honestly, I don’t think I’d really want to. You don’t have to keep on doing a thing like this if you’re not having fun. And there are plenty of exciting teams and players out there to follow if you still need your baseball fix.
Like, it is obviously bad for business for me to say this, but I get it. This team is a drag to watch much, much too often. I’d be lying if I said there hasn’t been the odd night where I’ve flipped the game off after the Jays fell behind and simply waited for a lead change notification on the Gameday app before turning it back on. That’s not really OK for me to do, because this is my job, but it’s certainly OK for anybody else.
And hopefully, for those in charge, this all sounds as alarming as it should.
Hello Andrew,
I’m writing this after Friday’s loss to the Twins, 3-2, and I usually do not find losses egregious, but this one really irked me. IKF steps up to the plate with 2 men on base and 2 outs. Why not have Daniel Vogelbach, with a career 129 wRC+ against righties, pinch hit here? What’s the point of having so many players capable of playing a lot of defensive positions if the bench isn’t in play every game? The Blue Jays rank 22nd on PAs by a pinch hitter, and even though they sport a 127 wRC+, that translates in 4 hits (3 singles and a home run) and 3 walks on 22 PA. Defensively they could shift Schneider to 2nd and slot Kiermaier into CF, sliding Varsho to LF. The roster is constructed exactly for being this type of aggressive, however the Blue Jays haven’t been exactly that this season.
These kind of decisions are making me question the effectiveness of the data they have, the analysis of such data, and the decisions they make with that. I do not claim I know better than the team, they have access to better data and they do that for a living. However, lately I feel as if the Blue Jays are behind other teams with respect to their analytics department. So, my question is, do the Blue Jays have a good analytics team?
Thanks for reading, and best regards,
Gabriel G., from Mexico
This will be the last one, and thanks for making it a great question, Gabriel. And for your kind words! It’s always to hear from Jays fans from around the world, and I truly appreciate it and that you’ve found my work and are choosing to help keep it free to read for everyone else by supporting what I do.
As for your question, some of the specific weirdness you’re referring to may have to do with swing path stuff, or guys being sick, or Rocco Baldelli having a lefty ready to counter Vogelbach (I honestly don’t remember the details of the specific moment). But there have definitely been some head-scratchers with how this team uses its bench, among a whole lot of other head-scratching things about them.
Zooming way out from just the substation stuff, you’ve hit on something here that doesn’t get talked about nearly as much as it probably could—not just whether the analysts are any good, but how they might fit in with everything that seems to be going wrong with this team right now, especially on offence.
When I write about understanding the impact that coaches have I usually lean to the idea that the answer is inscrutable, but that’s not quite true. Coaches at least speak to the media, whereas the analysts and what they do are entirely a black box. For example, Don Mattingly is quoted pretty extensively in a recent piece from Travis Sawchik of theScore (never heard of it), which addresses the Jays’ issues with pulling the ball in the air.
Mattingly, it turns out, is far from a non-believer when it comes to the value of pulling the ball in the air, but he believes that it’s something that develops over time.
Bo Bichette’s “foundation has been right-center, right field, and center field,” Mattingly says. He “is a good hitter first, and the power comes from hitting balls cleanly and getting more balls in the air. … As he gets older, and continues to mature as a hitter, you’re going to see a 30-home-run guy.”
Sawchik notes here that Bichette was nearly a 30-homer guy in 2021, “when his pulled air-ball rate was at a career high.” But I think it’s also worth noting that his 22.5% rate that year, while meaningfully higher considering how valuable those types of hits are, isn’t crazily higher than last year’s 19.5%.
It’s also worth noting that “the challenge in asking a player like Bichette to change,” Sawchik describes Mattingly’s telling of it, “is that he owes a lot of his past success to hitting the ball the other way.”
“He’s such a good hitter, you hate to take things away or push too fast,” Mattingly adds.
Fans may say that the time has clearly arrived to do something different, and Sawchik points to a mid-season change made in 2013 by Justin Turner—“known for being an additional hitting coach with the Dodgers,” and a huge advocate of pulling the ball in the air—as reason to think that this could be done fairly quickly, yet Mattingly seems to genuinely believe in taking a longer view.
“It kind of starts (with contact ability), and then progressing to learn how to pull the ball more, and understanding pitchers,” he explained. “In general, we are looking for guys to know themselves, and understand where they are best, and working to get balls in that area (of the strike zone). What the pitcher’s mix is, what his movement is and, ‘How do I get him to do what I want him to do.’”
Anyway! The piece is good and everyone should read it. But I bring it up, in addition to this simply being a good place to address it, because I think it shows better than my explaining ever could how the Jays’ coaches are hardly single-voiced or single-minded, and gives a good glimpse under the hood at the balancing act they’re asked to perform, and how the players are ultimately in charge.
I also bring it up because I think it leads right back to your question. Mattingly says he wants hitters to understand themselves and their strengths, to work to get pitches in the part of the zone where they can do damage, and to know their opponents’ pitch mix and the movement they generate.
Obviously those are areas where data can help a lot, and where whatever they’re doing doesn’t seem to be working.
I can’t claim that any of the following represents comprehensive statistical research, so I’m probably going to fall into some of the same biases that I bristle about when fans do it with coaches, but it definitely does feel like these hitters are not as prepared for how pitchers are going to attack them as they should be.
For example, last year the Jays scored the second-fewest first-inning runs in baseball, ranked 24th in first-inning OPS, and had a tOPS+ of 91, meaning that relative to their own performance overall the batters that went up in the first inning were 9% worse. Similarly, this year they’re the 10th-worst by runs scored in the first, 21st in OPS, and they sport a tOPS+ of 87.
But while their first innings have been awful (.624 OPS), they do much better in the second (.818) and third (.830)—and I wonder if that’s, in part, because they've had more of a chance to make in-game adjustments. Part of it is obviously personnel, too. But an indictment of what they’ve been told to expect out of the chute? Perhaps.
Interestingly, the Jays’ numbers drop off in the innings after that. I would assume that’s largely because the bullpen starts to come into play at that point, and the Jays have also been bad when seeing relievers for the first time (.610 OPS). (It may also have something to do with starters figuring them out and simply rolling, because somehow the team’s OPS actually drops to from .704 the second time to .649 when a starter is facing their order a third time—the very opposite of what you’d expect.)
They also seem to be doing a bad job of being aggressive, and choosing when and how to be aggressive—more things that you would think the analytics department would be able to help them refine.
Right now the Jays rank just 25th by OPS in at-bats that end with the batter ahead in the count. Their slugging percentage when ahead in the count ranks 27th. They rank just 28th by OPS in plate appearances in which they swing at the first pitch, too.
And yet, in pitcher’s counts they rank 5th by OPS, and they’re 14th-ranked in at-bats when they take the first pitch.
I obviously don’t want to overlook that the biggest factor here is the guy with the bat in his hand. Preparation can only overcome so much. But that certainly looks to me like they’re wrong a lot more than they should be when they have the opportunity to be aggressive. This notion, I feel, also passes the eye test.
Are they getting crossed up by bad information about what pitchers’ tendencies are in certain counts? I can’t say I haven’t wondered. Are they too afraid to swing-and-miss? As a team their swinging strike rate is the lowest in the majors, and it sure seems to me like it would be a good idea to see that go up in exchange for some extra pop.
Do they have the wrong on-field personnel? The wrong coaches? Are they getting the wrong data? Or is the data being interpreted incorrectly?
It’s impossible to say for sure, but considering that these weren’t problems two or three seasons ago, and little has really changed except the guys holding the bats, I tend to believe it’s largely on them—and the people who chose to put them in place. But it’s certainly possible other teams are doing a better job of knowing how to attack than they are, and that may indeed come down to some kind of an informational advantage.
Either way, it really does feel like this entire dynamic—from the players to the coaches to the analysts to the GM—needs a complete makeover.
The 2021 Jays were the best in baseball at putting the first pitch of an at-bat in play, and did so more often than any other team. That kind of controlled aggression is part of what made them special.
And sure, you can’t be that aggressive forever, because teams are going to adjust. Plus, some players aren’t built that way as hitters. But while I don’t know if this stat is a good proxy for how well-prepared players are for an at-bat, and for how pitchers are going to attack them, it feels like it might not be too bad.
Well, in 2021 the Jays slashed .391/.397/.710 in 798 plate appearances when putting the first pitch in play. This year their line in that split is .255/.266/.390.
Find out how on earth this happened and you’ll find out where the problem lies, I suspect.
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Solid write up. Jays should employ you to speak for Atkins, he just can't stop spewing the same non-sense.