Santander to Dream
Forget WAR, just sock some dingers.
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The Blue Jays have done the seemingly impossible. They’ve managed to get a free agent to take their money. Anthony Santander is bringing his talents to Toronto. And as long as you don’t look at his on-base percentage, um… or fielding… or, uh, baserunning… they are mighty talents indeed.
The switch-hitting outfielder who clubbed 44 home runs for the Baltimore Orioles in 2024 has penned a five-year, $92.5 million deal to come to the Blue Jays. The contract includes deferred money, and also an opt-out after year four that can be voided if the Jays add a sixth year.1
Five years is a lot for a player who turned 30 in October, but clearly the team felt like they had to stick their necks out to get a deal over the line. By doing so they’ve ended up with a slugger who, once Juan Soto was off the market, may have been as good a fit as anyone out there for their particular group. Santander will make a lot of outs, but they will easily be offset by all of the good things that will happen when he’s smashing dingers with Vlad on base ahead of him.
Or, well, mostly that one very particular good thing that will happen, I suppose. Give me the runs, baby!
He’s a throwback to the days when the Jays actually coveted players with pull-side power.
He’s certainly not the sort of one-dimensional hitter I’m painting him as.
And his ability to hit from either side of the plate will make him a difficult matchup for opposing managers late in games, too.
For a Jays team that has failed for two years with only one true power threat in their lineup, trying too often scratch out runs with walks and hits slapped to the opposite field in a sport where pitching is so good that it’s harder than ever to string hits together, this is a huge win.
I mean… Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (.396 OBP) took 77% of his plate appearances in 2024 while batting third in the lineup. Meanwhile, the Jays’ cleanup hitters as a group slashed .247/.329/.359 with a league-worst 12 home runs. It’s genuinely hard to overstate how badly needed a slugger hitting behind Vlad has been.
GAH!!
And I’m not a lineup protection guy at all—Vladdy did just fine in 2024 with so little behind him—nor am I an RBI guy. But just think of the number of games over the last two seasons that would have been meaningfully changed by having someone who hits the ball over the fence so often in that spot. Last year Vlad played 159 games, had over 270 walks and hits, yet only crossed the plate 98 times—and 30 of those were because he’d gone yard himself.
Also a huge win? The Blue Jays getting a player to take their money, and recognizing that despite this not being the most efficient way to spend it, it’s absolutely what the team needed.
Will the deal age well? Probably not, and few of them ever do. His flaws will probably grate on us at times. It is undoubtedly not going to be a perfect experience. But it’s a perfect fit for this moment and, more importantly, this roster. Playing in an outfield with Daulton Varsho won’t hurt in that regard either.
Financially, we seem to be into uncharted territory here. Ben Nicholson-Smith tweets that “the Santander deal pushes the Blue Jays’ 2025 payroll above the second CBT threshold of $261 million.” The club has also lost “their second-highest draft pick this year and $500K in international bonus pool room for 2026” as a penalty for signing a player who had rejected a Qualifying Offer, per Shi Davidi.
Amazingly, neither of those things necessarily means they’re done.
Nor should they be…
YES.
I hate to get greedy here, but… actually, after this bloody winter, and last season, and the season before that, I absolutely do fucking not hate to get greedy. Go get Bregman. Go get Alonso. Get at least one, then go get Max Scherzer or Jack Flaherty. Offseason’s not over, boys! Spend that dang unicorn budget! Great start but it’s not enough yet!
Let’s gooooooooo.
(Hey, and don’t forget to read the giant mail bag that I posted seconds before news of this transaction broke. I think you’ll find it aged rather nicely.)
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News of the deal was first reported by Jon Morosi. Ari Alexander appears to have been first on the length of the deal, the structure, and the deferred money. Ken Rosenthal was first to put the dollar figure at over $90 million. Ben Nicholson-Smith was first to report that the physical was complete and the deal was complete. Scott Mitchell reported that adding the fifth year was what got the deal done.
holy shitballs they did it, this offseason might be salvaged after all
if the blue jays are like kind of like jimmy mcgill dragging a duffel bag of cash through the desert then anthony santander is kinda like a warm jar of piss...
which is to say, thank god!