Hey Andrew, do you think the Jays will start the season with Biggio and Vladdy playing 3rd base? Or do you think the front office is waiting to see if a potential 3rd base option will have their price drop when spring training starts and they don’t have a contract?
With the return of Francisco Liriano, it made me think: Was the trading of Drew Hutchison for (essentially) 2-years of Liriano, McGuire & subsequently Teoscar the best trade (and one of the first, mind you) of the Shapiro/Atkins era?
Good ol' Hutch pitched a grand total of 11.1 innings for the Pirates (at 0.0 WAR), where Liriano, McGuire & Teoscar have combined for 4.8 WAR in their Jays seasons (and Aoki had 0.2 WAR in his short stint with the Jays to bring it to an even 5.0!).
{WAR is from Baseball Reference - did not search fWAR}
Trying to think of a better series of trades by the current FO and can't - how about you?
My impression has been that Vlad's failings at first base were actually more costly to the team than his errors the previous year at third base, partly because there are many more plays at first and partly because it’s more consequential when he's out of position there. Shouldn’t this be a consideration in deciding how much of a chance to give him at third? If he’s going to play first, find a way to keep him from venturing so far toward second base. Thanks, and I’m delighted to be reading you again.
1. What are your early thoughts on the labour environment and the top objectives of either side; and how long is the lockout going to be?
2. If you were in charge, what would you do next to fill the team’s needs and is it now, the trade deadline or after the lockout?
3. I won’t lose any sleep over those nazi shit-weasels being called terrorists, but I’d be more comfortable if they retired the “t” word forever, as there’s no way this shit doesn’t wind up doing a whole lot more damage to indigenous people, Black people, people of colour, dissidents, protesters etc etc.
What can we expect out of Ross Stripling this year? His acquisition didn't make as much noise at the deadline last year, but obviously the team likes him.
Could the Jays use piggyback starters for two/three rotation spots, like in the playoffs? A righty and a lefty to mess with the opposition's lineup. A shorter bullpen that will not be called on as often. It would minimize the innings for two young fireballers. It would satisfy the two times through the lineup narrative. It would minimize high pitch count outings for the strikeout guys. Pitchers stats are not about wins anymore. Rosters likely expanded due to lack of pitched innings last year. Fairly set lineup with versatility would minimize size of bench needed.
Watching HNIC on saturday I was wondering, why doesn't Rogers do something similar with the Jays and air some games on CBC? I feel like the more eyeballs on the game the better, and in Canada people have access to CBC more than anything else. I see the problem with the CFL being only on one channel now and think that just isn't good for the growth of the game. This isn't really a real question cause I know why they don't do it...money obviously. But do you think it's a decent idea?
I have yet another question about finances. I love that the Jays are spending big this winter. $150 million big!! But I can't help but think it odd that a publicly traded company, coming off a year in which there was little revenue, would agree to spend that kind of money without assurances that fans will be back this year. It's not as if it is Steve Cohen who has $14 billion to spend how he wishes. Rogers, although quite rich, is a public company beholden to shareholders. It got me thinking, how much do the Jays actually affect the bottom line for Rogers? It must be fairly infanticimal compared to their media, phone, and tv/internet revenue. Maybe this requires a masters in commerce to fully understand this, however, I'm exceedingly interested and I can think of no one better than you to ask this to. Feel free to edit this question for brevity sake.
Love the content thus far. Always gets me excited when I see and email from you sitting in the ole inbox.
On the player development front - the Jays previously had 7 affiliates which is down to 5 this year (the departures being Lansing and Bluefield) - how does a system that previously housed x number of players now maintain x-80 (or whatever the number may be)? Was that change pandemic-related or just that the other affiliates weren’t deemed valuable? Or more likely I’ve missed something in the transition?
How serious of a look do you think the Blue Jays will give Vlad at third this spring? While it is true that his 2019 defense was very poor, could that potentially have been (at least partly) due to his being extremely young? If his bat hadn’t propelled him through the minors at a crazy rate, he likely would have had much more time to develop defensively. Having him as a viable option at third base would make him more valuable and add to the teams overall flexibility moving forward (which we all know is a favourite of the front office) but how do these considerations compare with the teams desire to win in 2021 and put the best team on the field.
If you were constructing a team, would you take the approach of having an ‘extra’ starting caliber player (allowing you to move players in and out of the line up) or try to use that extra player to upgrade a different starting role? I am curious, given this may be a roster construction decision the Jays may face in the near future, in particular on the infield.
This is going to be more of a Spring Training decision, I suspect, but it seems to me that the Jays are most likely to follow the Rays in having at *most* 3 starters that they trust, and for most other games follow the "an opener and some guys" approach. (Especially given that they've got rather a number of pitchers who can _probably_ go one time through the order.) The Rays did that and got to Game 6 of the World Series, so - uh, convince me it's a bad idea?
Will the Jay's pitch themselves out of the playoffs ?
Hey Andrew, do you think the Jays will start the season with Biggio and Vladdy playing 3rd base? Or do you think the front office is waiting to see if a potential 3rd base option will have their price drop when spring training starts and they don’t have a contract?
With the return of Francisco Liriano, it made me think: Was the trading of Drew Hutchison for (essentially) 2-years of Liriano, McGuire & subsequently Teoscar the best trade (and one of the first, mind you) of the Shapiro/Atkins era?
Good ol' Hutch pitched a grand total of 11.1 innings for the Pirates (at 0.0 WAR), where Liriano, McGuire & Teoscar have combined for 4.8 WAR in their Jays seasons (and Aoki had 0.2 WAR in his short stint with the Jays to bring it to an even 5.0!).
{WAR is from Baseball Reference - did not search fWAR}
Trying to think of a better series of trades by the current FO and can't - how about you?
My impression has been that Vlad's failings at first base were actually more costly to the team than his errors the previous year at third base, partly because there are many more plays at first and partly because it’s more consequential when he's out of position there. Shouldn’t this be a consideration in deciding how much of a chance to give him at third? If he’s going to play first, find a way to keep him from venturing so far toward second base. Thanks, and I’m delighted to be reading you again.
Got a few for ya:
1. What are your early thoughts on the labour environment and the top objectives of either side; and how long is the lockout going to be?
2. If you were in charge, what would you do next to fill the team’s needs and is it now, the trade deadline or after the lockout?
3. I won’t lose any sleep over those nazi shit-weasels being called terrorists, but I’d be more comfortable if they retired the “t” word forever, as there’s no way this shit doesn’t wind up doing a whole lot more damage to indigenous people, Black people, people of colour, dissidents, protesters etc etc.
Hey Andrew,
Would waiting till the trade deadline be a more efficient way to acquire a top line starter for a better price?
Thank you for the years of work, the paid subscription was the least we could do!
What can we expect out of Ross Stripling this year? His acquisition didn't make as much noise at the deadline last year, but obviously the team likes him.
What do you think the odds of games being played in the Rogers Centre is this year?
Could the Jays use piggyback starters for two/three rotation spots, like in the playoffs? A righty and a lefty to mess with the opposition's lineup. A shorter bullpen that will not be called on as often. It would minimize the innings for two young fireballers. It would satisfy the two times through the lineup narrative. It would minimize high pitch count outings for the strikeout guys. Pitchers stats are not about wins anymore. Rosters likely expanded due to lack of pitched innings last year. Fairly set lineup with versatility would minimize size of bench needed.
Rotation
Ryu
Pearson/Ray
Roark
Merryweather/Matz
Kay/Stripling
Pen
Yates
Romano
Borucki
Dolis
Chatwood
Yamaguchi
Depth
Thornton
Hatch
Cole
etc
Is there a scenario where it’s becomes apparent Semien is a better SS than Bo?
Watching HNIC on saturday I was wondering, why doesn't Rogers do something similar with the Jays and air some games on CBC? I feel like the more eyeballs on the game the better, and in Canada people have access to CBC more than anything else. I see the problem with the CFL being only on one channel now and think that just isn't good for the growth of the game. This isn't really a real question cause I know why they don't do it...money obviously. But do you think it's a decent idea?
I have yet another question about finances. I love that the Jays are spending big this winter. $150 million big!! But I can't help but think it odd that a publicly traded company, coming off a year in which there was little revenue, would agree to spend that kind of money without assurances that fans will be back this year. It's not as if it is Steve Cohen who has $14 billion to spend how he wishes. Rogers, although quite rich, is a public company beholden to shareholders. It got me thinking, how much do the Jays actually affect the bottom line for Rogers? It must be fairly infanticimal compared to their media, phone, and tv/internet revenue. Maybe this requires a masters in commerce to fully understand this, however, I'm exceedingly interested and I can think of no one better than you to ask this to. Feel free to edit this question for brevity sake.
Love the content thus far. Always gets me excited when I see and email from you sitting in the ole inbox.
On the player development front - the Jays previously had 7 affiliates which is down to 5 this year (the departures being Lansing and Bluefield) - how does a system that previously housed x number of players now maintain x-80 (or whatever the number may be)? Was that change pandemic-related or just that the other affiliates weren’t deemed valuable? Or more likely I’ve missed something in the transition?
How serious of a look do you think the Blue Jays will give Vlad at third this spring? While it is true that his 2019 defense was very poor, could that potentially have been (at least partly) due to his being extremely young? If his bat hadn’t propelled him through the minors at a crazy rate, he likely would have had much more time to develop defensively. Having him as a viable option at third base would make him more valuable and add to the teams overall flexibility moving forward (which we all know is a favourite of the front office) but how do these considerations compare with the teams desire to win in 2021 and put the best team on the field.
If you were constructing a team, would you take the approach of having an ‘extra’ starting caliber player (allowing you to move players in and out of the line up) or try to use that extra player to upgrade a different starting role? I am curious, given this may be a roster construction decision the Jays may face in the near future, in particular on the infield.
This is going to be more of a Spring Training decision, I suspect, but it seems to me that the Jays are most likely to follow the Rays in having at *most* 3 starters that they trust, and for most other games follow the "an opener and some guys" approach. (Especially given that they've got rather a number of pitchers who can _probably_ go one time through the order.) The Rays did that and got to Game 6 of the World Series, so - uh, convince me it's a bad idea?