Mail Bag: Free Agent Frenzy

The Jays are having an offseason for the ages, but not in the good way like you want.

Your paid support makes independent, thoughtful, grass-fed, naturally raised, free range coverage of Toronto Blue Jays baseball possible. Thank you.

UPDATE: I published this mail bag seconds before news broke that the Jays have signed Anthony Santander. So… see???

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The Toronto Blue Jays, everybody! [Pause for laughter]

It’s been a headline-making winter so far for Ross Atkins and company, as they try to retool on the edge of the abyss after a 74-88 finish that left them in last place in the ultra-competitive AL East. The headlines? They’ve been ugly. The results? TBD. But the few wins they’ve managed to pick up thus far have been overshadowed by what has felt like a nonstop cycle of negative press.

What do we make of it? What do I make of it?

Well that’s exactly what we’re here to find out in my latest mail bag. Thank you so much to everybody who submitted questions, my apologies for not being able to get to them all, and, most importantly, thank you once again to all of those who subscribe.

You know the drill. It’s mail bag time!

As always, I have not read read any of Griff’s answers…

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Hi Stoeten, what do you think happened in this year’s free agency. Are Jays too limited in their targets? Does “sticking with their valuations” make them noncompetitive money wise? Do FAs see the uncertainty with the front office and want to stay away? Or is there something else that is making FAs not want to come to Toronto? — Sarah

Hey Sarah, thanks so much for your question, and your support! I think this is a great place for us to start, as this really has been the central question of the last two winters so far.

First of all, I don’t think the Jays lack for targets, seeing as we hear all the time that they’re “in on everybody.” I do think their interest in certain players can be overblown sometimes, because we definitely can’t take the rumour mill at face value. Witness, for example, last Wednesday’s story about the Mets checking in on Vladimir Guerrero Jr., which lit up the especially credulous corners of Blue Jays Twitter for a few hours before it “coincidentally” materialized from elsewhere that the Mets were putting pressure on Pete Alonso to make a decision on their offer, instantly making the Vlad story look like a particularly silly bit of gamesmanship to that end. But there’s enough smoke when it comes to the many, many free agents the Jays get linked to—and enough reportage about “casting a wide net”—for me to believe that they’re certainly not limited in that regard.

If anything, I might theorize that the Jays have interest in too many different players. That they see so many paths in front of them they are unbothered about losing out on guys when the price goes past those valuations you mention—which I think you’re right to identify as a big part of this.

I get the sense that there are a certain few players they’re willing to be aggressive with—typically the same ones other big-money clubs are willing to be aggressive on—but only to a point. At least when other options are still available. And that beyond those players the goal is more about spending their money as efficiently as possible than it is identifying a specific target and then going out and doing everything possible to get a deal done.

The Jeff Hoffman situation is instructive here, I think. The Jays stuck to their valuation—three years and $33 million, plus incentives that could take it up to $39 million—and watched the player accept a deal with Atlanta, then with Baltimore, before he eventually landed in their laps.

The Orioles did their own version of this, continuing to negotiate with Hoffman after the flagged physical—as the Braves had also done, according to Fansided’s Robert Murray¹—but obviously were not willing to budge on their new, lower number. Instead, they pivoted and signed Andrew Kittredge for one year and $10 million. Perhaps the Jays would have done this themselves if Baltimore and Hoffman had agreed.

The other thing about Hoffman here is that clearly his motivation was primarily financial. Once the Jays had the biggest offer on the table, that was the offer he was going to take. Which is fine! Just as it was fine when Yusei Kikuchi chose the Angels, or Luis Severino the A’s—two players who, as many others do, did not let any concerns about those wayward organizations stop them from taking what they felt was their best deal.

And that’s the thing: Some guys may care about that, some may not. Some may care about every last dollar, others not. Some may care about geography, others not.

We saw with Corbin Burnes that, despite the Jays thinking they’d done enough to get the deal over the line, ultimately the ability to play near his family home in Arizona was of the utmost importance of him.

We also saw with Roki Sasaki that players can and do take this organization very seriously. So, it’s not necessarily that players don’t want to come here, it’s that some don’t, some don’t unless the money is right, and some won’t unless the Jays’ offer goes beyond anyone else’s—like the way they stuck out their necks for George Springer and Hyun Jin Ryu by offering additional years that were the separators that sealed things.

The Jays careers of those two players probably give you an idea of why teams try so hard to stick to their valuations. But sometimes getting a player at an uncomfortable price is better than not getting the player at all, and we may yet see that happen with Anthony Santander, Alex Bregman, or Pete Alonso. And I hope to hell it happens with Vlad and his extension too.

Above all, though, I think it can happen. It may not. There are no guarantees in any of this, and that’s why fans tend to get so queasy as names start coming off the board—especially after the last couple of winters, which both ended with the Jays adding mid-tier, shorter-term guys rather than anyone actually exciting. But it’s definitely not a matter of players not wanting to come here in the sort of way that the folks who have gone completely off the deep end about this front office like to tell themselves. It’s complicated and each situation is unique.

But, like, yeah, obviously they’re not the Dodgers. And not having a galaxy of stars signed up long-term hurts them when they don’t or can’t differentiate themselves financially from the other big-money clubs.

Maybe too late for this edition but I don't think I've heard anyone float this idea about the unicorn budgets versus a Vlad extension.

The unicorn budgets have been reported as being based on more than just on field value. The Jays have had Vlad since he was a teenager so presumably they know exactly what his marketing value is.

Is there a chance that maybe it’s not a huge as we think and that’s why to date it seems like they’ve approached this negotiation as an on field value proposition, at least from a cost perspective? — Ryan F

Thanks so much for the question and the support, Ryan! I’ve got to say though, I’m not sure I fully agree with the premise here. I don’t think there was a ton of marketing value when it came to Juan Soto. Really, that was just Ohtani. And I think some of the things we’ve heard about additional “unicorn budget” perhaps being available for combinations of players—or even the failed pursuit of Corbin Burnes—speaks to that as well.

I’d also like to point out here—though I know this isn’t at all what your question is about, but since you mentioned that this front office has known Vlad since he was a teenager—that there’s a perception out there in some corners that Vlad is “not their guy” and that’s why extension talks haven’t progressed. This, I think, is astonishingly ludicrous.

As you point out, Vlad’s been here almost as long as Shapiro and Atkins. His ascendancy, along with Bo’s, is what spurred the team to exit their rebuild a lot sooner than most teams are able to. They’ve basically handpicked two managers with his success in mind. They’ve reportedly offered him a $340 million contract extension, and did so before Soto signed with the Mets.

That’s a very serious offer that a team absolutely would not make to someone who wasn’t “their guy,” and reportedly the sides continue to negotiate. Frankly, I think the notion—which again, Seth, I know isn’t yours!—is more about fans projecting their own petty weirdness onto others.

No, I think the reason Vlad hasn’t signed yet is pretty simple. It’s a matter of time.

The Jays wanted to see more and couldn’t agree to terms after his huge 2021. In 2022 he dipped to a 133 wRC+, making him a top-30 hitter in the league rather than placing in the top five, so the time wasn’t right to pay him like the MVP-type he’d been the year before. After he plummeted to a 118 wRC+ in 2023, it was out of the question to give him the kind of contract it would require to get him locked down long-term.

He put himself back in line for a massive payday with his 2024, but really that was mostly about his final four months of his season. By the time it made sense to genuinely consider giving him what he wants it was clear that Soto was going to test free agency, and obviously that deal was going to impact Vlad’s.

Now we’re in a key window, which began with the deadline to file arbitration numbers and ends, at least temporarily, when pitchers and catchers report. Ideally that’s the point where both sides get uncomfortable enough about a deal not being done that they finally come to an agreement.

Or… well, ideally that happens today. But, realistically, I think that deadline is going to be the best motivator, and probably always was.

Talk me off the ledge, sensei. Here’s my read of the tea leaves. The front office has tried to extend Vlad and Bo. They know the cost to do so is too much for what they believe the market will ultimately reward them in free agency. That leaves four options: 1) roll with them and trade them at the deadline if out of contention, 2) trade them now, 3) keep them all year and try to sign them in free agency when they learn their true value or lose them to draft pick compensation, or 4) pay them what they want now even if it means you are hamstrung to build around them in the future because of it.

How would you handle it as GM if these were the options you were looking at? GM hat, please, not what you would do as a fan. Of course, all the other facts that exist today are true. Their farm system is weak, with seemingly no blue chipper in the org. They just renovated their stadium. They appear behind all other teams in the AL East on the major league and minor league sides. They are up against luxury tax penalties now. They have a lot of money coming off books in the next couple of years. I would love to see how you would move the chess pieces as you try to best position them for the present, short-term, and mid-term realities. — Seth

Thanks so much for the great question and the support, Seth!

First of all, I basically take Bo out of the equation. He seems intent on reaching free agency anyway, and there’s likely no way to give him close to what he wants at the moment, considering the season he’s just had. He’s going to go into next winter wanting to get paid like a shortstop, so that’s probably what he wants right now, and I can’t blame him. Even including his disastrous 2024, Bo finds himself just 1.9 fWAR behind Corey Seager through their age-26 seasons, with only 300-odd more plate appearances to his credit. Seager hit free agency heading into his age-28 year, as Bo is set to do, and landed a 10-year, $325 million deal from the Rangers.

Seager has produced more than 15 win in the three seasons since inking that contract, so it would be easy to say here that he and Bo are not in the same category, but there are parallels to his earlier body of work that I’m sure Bichette’s agent would be quick to point out. And if Bo has a strong walk year, maybe he’ll even get that kind of money. I don’t want to pay him that—I’d rather pay him like a Matt Chapman—and I certainly don’t want to do it before we see what 2025 brings.

I also want to see his 2025 play out because I probably think it’s more likely that he doesn’t get what he’s looking for in free agency. Questions about his defence, the way his swing will age, and the qualifying offer that he will potentially be tied to could suppress his market, depending on the season that he has. He’s so young that I couldn’t imaging him accepting the QO, even if he were to have a repeat of 2024’s performance, but there’s a chance that things play out in such a way that he could be had for quite a bit less than what it would take now. Vlad I don’t feel the same way about, and Vlad is already at peace—mostly, that is—with where the industry sees him on the defensive spectrum.

So, now that we’re only talking about Vlad, I don’t think there’s a worry about being hamstrung. Plenty of money is coming off the books in the years ahead. Not a concern for me.

That’s not to say that I go and pay him everything he wants this second. If there are tens of millions that could still be saved on this, it would be good to have those. But I place an incredibly high value on getting this extension done, and though I’d have to be prepared to walk away and try again in the window after the season—and I feel confident that I have the dollars to win a bidding war for him if it should come to that—I don’t need to see another year of performance from Vlad to feel absolutely sure that I want to sign him long-term.

That said, while the idea of letting both players walk at the end of their contracts is not good, I think fans would do well to remember that these aren’t the versions of Vlad and Bo making the league minimum like they were a couple years ago. Between the two of them, Chris Bassitt, Chad Green, and Erik Swanson, the Jays would have $81.5 million coming off the books next winter if they all walked—with few major arb raises due to the players that remain. They couldn’t expect to add back all the value that would be walking out the door through free agency, but it’s not exactly the worst backup plan in the world. Particularly with Alek Manoah and Ricky Tiedemann likely back at full health for 2026. That is, if they can get players to take that money. *COUGH*

Oh, also I’m absolutely fine with keeping them all the way to the bitter end and wouldn’t entertain the idea of moving them until the trade deadline at the earliest.

“Waves and waves of talent....”

“list of the top 101 prospects in baseball...there are no Blue Jays on it.”

:(

If you ever wanted to know what it was like to be a late 90's Jays fan, give it a few years. — JP

Hey, thanks so much for the question and the support, JP! I realize that this wasn’t an actual question—this was left as a comment on my recent Sasaki/Hoffman piece, and refers specifically to the latest top 101 from Baseball Prospectus—so I hope you’re OK with me including it in the mail bag, because I do want to comment on it.

First, I’ll admit that the “waves” thing always kind of irks me, mostly because I think there is enough to criticize about the Jays’ development pipeline without resorting to acting like this isn’t merely a failure to meet a goal that every single team shares but a very specific broken promise—a sacred bond left in tatters on the backfields of the Player Development Complex. Like, are we mad they’re not the Rays? Because even the Dodgers—who were down in 20th as recently as FanGraphs’ mid-2020 rankings, and 16th in their pre-2022 rankings—aren’t the Rays.

But I recognize that the Jays only have themselves to blame for this. Mark Shapiro has talked about wanting to build a “sustainable championship team” and needing “waves of talent,”² and Ross Atkins used to be very keen to suggest that waves were coming.³ However, if you look at what they’ve actually said—and there isn’t much online beyond what I’ve included in those footnotes—you’ll see that Shapiro mostly used the phrase early on as a way to deflect from the club’s choice not to accelerate their rebuild with free agent spending, while Atkins used it as a catch-all for draft classes, basically.

I completely understand why people don’t want to be quite that charitable in their reading of this stuff, because no matter how you slice it their development through the years hasn’t been good enough. But I hardly think it’s some clear and obvious catastrophe.

Honestly, it’s a stronger system than a lot of people realize—or choose to realize.

Again, that is not to say that it’s good enough, especially relative to the rest of the division. It lacks the kind of top-end, star-level-upside talent that often drives these kinds of rankings—especially if an evaluator is going to exclude Ricky Tiedemann because of his surgery, or isn’t quite bought-in yet on Arjun Nimmala. Even so, there’s some quantity there, particularly since the trade deadline, and some of it could even be more impactful than Jays fans think.

For example, Geoff Pontes of Baseball America said in a chat last month that he’d have Tiedeman, Nimmala, Trey Yesavage, and Orelvis Martinez in his own top 100, with Jake Bloss, John Kasevich, Landon Maroudis, Alan Roden and Kendry Rojas all in the 125-200 range.

That’s just one person’s opinion, but I really don’t think it’s all that hard to see better days ahead as some of the hurt pitchers get back to health, some of the personnel changes implemented this winter take effect, Nimmala gets more run, Yesavage debuts, the number eight pick gets added to the system in the summer, etc.

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OK, I’m going to break with the format for this next one, because it was submitted as a comment on my Sasaki fallout piece, yet I’d like to address it since a lot of people are probably thinking this way, and think it will be easiest to tackle by going through it a sentence at a time. Thanks for the thoughtful comment and the support, Marshall. Apologies for the disagreement to come.

The penny finally drops for Stoeten.

Yeah, no. I’ve written negatively about this front office many times before, and if they deserve it I’ll happily write positively about them again soon too. This was an ugly unforced error that will further cement the perception that Ross Atkins is too often out of his depth. It was exasperating because it was so predictably goofy and because it would have been so easy for them to miss on Sasaki quietly without again making themselves the butt of the league’s new favourite joke. But I have no problem with the people in charge continuing to run the baseball team, though for the moment they’ve somehow made it even harder for themselves to credibly continue doing so and I certainly wouldn’t object to a change.

Those "exhausting" unrelentingly negative fans who can't stand this front office have had their concerns/fears fully validated by this incredible act of stupidity.

Lol. No, they absolutely have not.

Taking on $11 million over two years for Myles Straw was indisputably a bad move, and doing so for an asset they couldn’t use on the player they wanted it for was dumb, but everyone is always saying they want these guys to be less risk-averse, no? HEYO!

Seriously though, ultimately it’s just an overpay on a relatively small scale deal for a player you can understand the Jays believing they have a use for. They’ll need a centre fielder for as long as Daulton Varsho is out. And if it’s going to be a more extensive absence than the team has let on—back when Ross Atkins met reporters from the local BBWAA chapter in early December, he suggested the Varsho being ready for Opening Day “could be unrealistic”—then I can entirely see them not being fully comfortable giving Jonatan Clase such a big role so soon, and probably not comfortable asking Joey Loperfido, Nathan Lukes, George Springer, or whoever else to cover at a position where they are suboptimal defensively.

Don’t get me wrong, I hate the move. You should be able to find a guy like this on a minor league deal. And if Straw’s dollars actually impact the team’s ability to do anything else then your point of view will eventually have a whole lot more merit. But looking outside the organization for a backup centre fielder was always a possibility. And if they’re as much of a big money club as they seem to want to think, the move should be relatively inconsequential. Time will tell. (And yes, the rush to shout “well surely this confirms my priors!” about literally every single thing is indeed exhausting. Especially when those priors deliberately ignore anything good the regime has ever done, and refuse to acknowledge any semblance of nuance about it.)

Shapiro/Atkins still think that they are the smartest guys in the room.

They’re guilty of getting too cute at times—this being a good example—and could sure as hell use understanding better when they’re about to get fucked. But the “smartest guys in the room” line is such hollow criticism. Do they really? How would we know? I tend to think it’s a way to say that somebody makes your blood boil while attempting to have it appear as though there’s some kind of rational basis for that.

They are now veering into Harold Ballard territory.

Lol. No.

The Blue Jays have become a national joke…

The perception of the team is not good right now. That is undeniable.

..and Edward Rogers (who spent hundreds of millions of dollars on stadium and minor league complex renovations) will now find himself with the ultimate stranded asset,…

You mean the team his company bought for $110 million USD in 2000 that Forbes’ most recent valuation listed as worth $2.1 billion? Yeah, I think he’ll be fine.

…as the team, as currently constituted, will find themselves struggling to draw 1m fans this season.

The A’s, abandoned by ownership and on their way to 93 losses in their final season in Oakland, were the only team to sell fewer than 1,000,000 tickets this season. And they still managed to get 922,000 fans through the turnstiles. I’m not saying that the Jays won’t take a hit at the box office, but let’s be serious.

Of course, as you note, this could all be rescued if Edward Rogers were to say, “Sign Vlad. I don't care what it costs,” and they also inked Santander/Bregman and Alonso to contracts. Maybe throw in Nick Pivetta as a decent 4th or trade for Ryan Helsley.

I’m not sure how I’m supposed to square this idea that the winter could still be saved by extending Vlad and signing a couple of the quite good free agents still very much available with what you were saying earlier about fans being fully validated in their negativity.

But yes, if the team heads to camp with only Straw, Andrés Giménez, and a couple of relievers to show for their offseason then, yeah, we’d be at that point. We are not there yet.

But does anybody seriously these idiots are capable of anything remotely sensible like that?

Yes? Like… what about their offseason and the players they’ve targeted makes you think they don’t understand that the team needs to get better?

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This is not an endorsement of the idea, more of a stray thought/worry, but: if the team fails to add a big bat or two via free agency, is the path to adding much-needed power to this roster involve trading Bo before the season starts?

(I do not want this to happen—extend him, you dopes!—I'm just beginning to wonder if this is where we're headed. Talk me off the ledge!) — steve-o

Thanks so much for the question and the support, steve-o! While I suppose I couldn’t entirely rule out some kind of a surprise trade happening with Bo, it just doesn’t make sense. Especially if the goal is to add offence.

There are only about 60-odd players who project to be better offensive performers in 2025 than Bo. The vast majority of them aren’t going anywhere at this stage. Among the ones that are, I have a very hard time imagining any will be available for one year of a guy coming off a 71 wRC+.

I’ve said from the start of the offseason that it’s best to look at Bo like a guy they added on a below-market, one-year pillow contract. Though I'll admit I’m intrigued by the fact that he was reported one of the players who made the trip to Toronto to help pitch Roki Sasaki on the club!⁴

I made an offhand joke on a recent article of yours about Brandon Belt returning to the Jays. While I do not think that is going to happen, if we don't sign Santander or Bregman or Alonso (likely in my opinion) who do you think might be out there on the fringes available via free agecny or trade that could provide us with some much needed low hanging power fruit? — OzRob

Thanks so much for the question and the support, Rob. I’m not sure why you’d think it’s so likely that they’re not going to be able to sign any of those guys, but I guess there are some names beyond that trio we could look at.

The most intriguing of those is Jurickson Profar, who had an outlier season in his walk year, posting a 139 wRC+ that ranked 15th in the sport. He slashed .280/.389/.588, the OBP ranking 7th, and hit 24 homers despite playing his home games in a pitcher-friendly environment. It would be hard to expect a repeat, but MLBTR notes that his exit velocity and hard hit rate were both up significantly. And either way, he's projected to a respectable 18 homers, 2.1 WAR, and a 116 wRC+ according to Steamer. He’s also a switch-hitter, and because he’ll be 32 this season its not going to require a lot of term to land him—especially if his market stays as cool as it’s seemed so far.

After that it does get pretty grim. Want J.D. Martinez coming off a 16 HR year at age 37? An even older Justin Turner, who showed even less power last year? Buying in on the ridiculous September that powered Randal Grichuk to a 12 HR/139 wRC+ season in just 254 PA? Think Brandon Drury, Rowdy Tellez, Ty France, or Anthony Rizzo can be the players they were back in 2022? Jorge Polanco? J.D. Davis? Yoán Moncada? Mark Canha? Tommy Pham?

There are plenty of names, a few of which might even be due a bounce-back. There’s the trade market too, don’t forget.

But, yes, they should sign at least one of the remaining difference-makers.

Hey Stoeten, trying to retain some perspective on the Jays’ offseason but hard to avoid the conclusion that the number of free agent options to fill the gaps in the roster has almost gone. Seems like they need to sign Santander or are going to have to trade for a good bat—obviously hard to do, especially as fleecing the A’s for Rooker is off the table.

Is there a credible scenario where they don’t do one of those things and are still successful without hoping everyone is healthy and hits / exceeds their projections?

Also a useful reminder (as if one were needed) that you need to extend the guys already in the building as free agents won’t always take your money. — Simon F

Thanks for the question and the support, Simon! As we were talking about in the question above, it’s really more than just Santander left. And with a lot of teams seemingly done spending, or not great fits in the first place, we might be getting to a stage where a Jays team willing to spend could do very well for themselves.

Obviously nobody’s going to go praising them for anything like that just yet. They have to actually do something with it. But I don’t think the market is quite as dire as you suggesting.

I also—as we also discussed above—think it’s more complicated than simply snapping your fingers and signing the guys who are already here, and that it’s more complicated to get homegrown players to take your money, too.

That’s not to make excuses—mostly because we haven’t reached the point where excuses are necessary. People weirdly hate being told “it’s early,” and right now it’s not early, but this offseason isn’t over either. There’s no sense sweating it too much when a whole bunch of processes have yet to play out. Slow-playing the market was always going to be a possibility—and the last time the Jays did that it worked out very well for them. George Springer was signed on January 20th, 2021. Marcus Semien on January 30th.

That all said, no, there’s really no realistic way for this team to have a successful season as constituted without great health, some projection-busting, and/or a ton of luck. That doesn’t mean it’s impossible, but currently FanGraphs Depth Charts has the Jays projected to the ninth-highest team WAR in the American League, though they’re only a tenth of a win ahead of the Tigers and Rays. Six projected wins would vault them into second place behind the Yankees, but right now they’re not good enough.

When you ask people in Tampa “Why don't you go out and support your wonderful baseball team by attending a game in person?” they reply that the stadium is really in St. Petersburg and the commute is bad. So how big is Steinbrenner Field, and if it fills up can we conclude that the Trop is a really bad location? The Lightning and the Buccaneers seem much better attended. — Laura C

Thanks so much for the question and the support, Laura! I can tell you from experience that if you’re already in downtown St. Pete, the Trop seems to be in great spot. Go to the Dali museum. But, like you say, it can be challenging for a lot of people. It’s at the south end of the peninsula that separates Tampa Bay from the Gulf of Mexico, so it’s basically surrounded by water on three sides, save for a causeway to the south. I’m not expert enough on the subject to really explain it, but because of bottlenecks and population distribution and whatnot, more people in the region can get to Tampa more easily than can get to downtown St. Pete.

People seem to like the stadium better in person than you’d expect from the way it comes off on TV but, you’re right, that could be a factor, too.

Unfortunately for your theory, Steinbrenner Field—which is across the road from Raymond James Stadium, where the Bucs play—only holds 11,026 people. Of course, that means that if it doesn’t fill up, the Rays won’t be looking very good.

Hey Stoet!! Hope you’re having a restful offseason!

Can you speak at all to how negotiations for free agents work? Do teams know what other teams are bidding? And if the agents share what other teams are bidding, how do GMs know if that’s not just a negotiation tactic? Do they call up rival GMs and ask if that is actually their bid? I’m curious because I recently read that teams that were in on Soto were blind bidding (at least at the beginning of the process—according to at least one article). It got me thinking how these negotiations actually work. — Steve D

Thanks so much for the question and the support, Steve! I can’t!

OK, OK, while part of me thinks it would be kinda funny to just leave my answer at that, I don’t want to be rude. Thing is, I don’t really know a ton about this subject, and obviously a lot of what actually goes on in the communications back and forth between teams and agencies is pretty opaque. I assume the process can be different depending on the player, agency, and the number of interested teams, too.

I can at least tell you that information is definitely held asymmetrically, and that everybody involved is trying to get the best deal for themselves—and so, like you say, rather untrustworthy. Presumably there are relationships sometimes that transcend the gamesmanship, but I honestly couldn’t speak to that.

Someone who can offer some insight, however, is David Samson, who was president of the Marlins from 2002 to 2017. He gave an overview of what dealing with Scott Boras is like in a segment on his podcast, Nothing Personal with David Samson, back in 2019, and while it’s somewhat surface level, it’s very much worth a watch. (It’s also very much related to some of what we were talking about way back in the first question of this mail bag.)

Other interesting stuff related to the subject to check out are this 2011 ESPN piece by Jim Bowman about negotiating draft pick signing bonuses with Boras, and this 2021 FanGraphs piece by Kevin Goldstein about negotiating minor league deals.

How are the plans to move on from substack progressing? — will

Thanks for the support and the question, will! We’ll finish up with this one, though unfortunately I don’t have much of an update on it. I’ll be honest. Because I started this site in early January back in 2021, the bulk of my income from yearly subscriptions arrives in the early months of the year, as the folks who were most enthusiastic early on have theirs renew—and I cannot possibly thank everybody enough for that. But what it means is that I have to be a bit careful with that money, inevitably I am not as good as that as I should be, and so thing get a bit tighter for me at the end of the year. Which is to say: There’s a bit of an upfront cost of making the jump, and so it’s been on the backburner for the last little while. I appreciate the reminder and will be looking into my options again in the coming weeks.

OK, that’s it everyone! If you made it this far, my sincerest thank you. Now let’s pray for a dang Jays transaction of significance, shall we?

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1. I wrote about the Hoffman stuff in my most recent Stray Thoughts piece, but I think it’s worth pointing out that Murray, who was the reporter who broke the story of Baltimore backing out of the deal, added some important, clarifying details on Wednesday.

I've spent the last few days reporting on this, and talking to a lot of different people involved in the Jeff Hoffman sweepstakes here. And this is the timeline of events, and I hope I can calm down Blue Jays fans' nerves, because I've seen a lot of different tweets being worried after I reported about the Orioles physical being flagged.

It started with Atlanta. He originally had a five-year deal for about $48 million in place with Atlanta. He took the physical and they ended up flagging it. They did not fail it, but they flagged it. Atlanta continued to try to sign Hoffman—they originally signed him as a starting pitcher—but they wanted to sign him for a lesser dollar value. Ultimately they did not end up coming to terms, and he ended up agreeing to a three-year, $40 million deal with the Baltimore Orioles. Baltimore flagged his physical as well. They attempted to sign him to a lesser dollar value. It ultimately did not work. After that he ended up agreeing to a deal with Toronto. Obviously ended up signing there, and he is going to be in Toronto for the next three seasons.

But what I can confidently say is that, even after Atlanta flagged his physical, even after Baltimore flagged his physical, they attempted to sign him. There was other teams involved on Hoffman, even after he ended up getting flagged for his physical with Baltimore, who were aware of what was going on behind the scenes. They continued to try to sign him.

So it's not just a case of—he does not have a chronic shoulder issue, there is nothing to my knowledge. To my knowledge, Jeff Hoffman believes he's fine. There's people around Jeff Hoffman who believe he's fine. Toronto clearly believes he's fine, because they did not flag his physical. But even after these teams had concerns about his shoulder, they attempted to sign him. Which, to me, signals that this is not a chronic thing, it's not something to worry about long-term, or even short-term. And we should put these to bed, because I've seen the Blue Jays get a lot of flack for this on Twitter, from a lot of different people around baseball—at least in terms of on Twitter. It was not deserved and I want to put those to bed.

2. For example, in August of 2017:

“You don’t just need two guys, you need waves of guys,” said Shapiro. “And behind them, you need another wave of guys. I feel like that’s coming. It’s probably two to four years away that it’s going to get here, but when it comes, what we’ve continued to execute on whether it’s [assistant GM] Andrew Tinnish leading us in international, we’ve got waves of guys coming.

“I’m encouraged by that.”

Or November of 2018:

“Ultimately, what you need to do is have a depth of talent. You want to get waves of talent coming where you’ve got fifteen to twenty guys you’re excited about and feel good about. So, I think, ya know, we’re far better today both by our own standards and by the external subjective standards. We’re far better today than we were a year ago, but we still have a long way to go before we get to the point that we feel really good about our farm system.”

Or March of 2018:

“We’ve made progress, but we need to have waves of talent,” Shapiro said Wednesday during a guest appearance on The Jeff Blair Show. “Not just good talent, but impact talent. We need to not just talk about [Vladimir Guerrero Jr.] and Bo Bichette, but we need to be able to reel off [several] names. [It’s] a really risky proposition [to] pin your hopes on two guys.”

3. In October 2018:

"There are waves of talent that are coming," Atkins said at a wide-ranging season-ending media availability. "It's not just the guys that we saw in September. There's a wave below that and a wave below that."

Or in September 2019:

“Ultimately we feel we’re at a point now where our young position players have transitioned, and we have several waves of very, very talented pitchers coming through our system that we couldn’t be more excited about,” Atkins said in an appearance on TSN 1050.

Or in January 2020:

“When we see that young pitching transitioning and that core coming together, we’ll have waves of talent coming behind it, and more financial flexibility than anyone.”

4. No, the fact that Vlad wasn’t among them doesn’t mean anything.