Today in MLBTR: We have a (minor) transaction!
The latest rumours, rumblings, and thoughts on the Thornton deal, Buffalo's infield, Génesis, Teoscar, payroll parameters, Lance Lynn, Rob Manfred, Wednesday's win, Kikuchi, Ohtani, Anderson, & more!
One Wednesday afternoon the Blue Jays mercifully made a trade, completing Trent Thornton’s DFA process by sending him to the Seattle Mariners in exchange for minor league infielder Mason McCoy, and giving us something to talk about that isn’t Tuesday night’s godawful loss or the fact that the bullpen is currently running on fumes.
Then they bounced back on Wednesday afternoon with an excellent win. And that’s not the only thing going on around the world of baseball, the Blue Jays, transactions, etc.
The league’s annual trade deadline will pass in less than a week: Tuesday, August 1st, at 6 PM ET. There have already been a lot of rumours floating around out there, and they only will come faster and thicker (heh) from here on out. So let’s take our first trip of the trade season through the always invaluable — it’s so valuable it’s in valuable — MLB Trade Rumours, for the latest on the Jays, and anything related to their pursuits. It’s time for Today (and, to be honest, probably a few other days) in MLBTR!
(Also invaluable: the work of Ben Turner, who does an outstanding job of aggregating Jays-related rumours on Twit… er… X.com. Give him a follow!)
Now, on to the good stuff…
I’ll be honest here, friends. This site keeps the lights on for me, but it isn’t a cash cow. And I could live a lot more comfortably than I do right now if I was willing to put some of my work behind a paywall and push a bunch readers who are on the fence into becoming paid subscribers. But, the thing is, I know that times are tough for a lot of people and I really don’t want to become inaccessible to anyone. So, if you can afford it, and you value what I do and aren’t already a paid subscriber, I’d ask that you consider upgrading your free membership to a paid one. Thanks. — Stoeten
The Real McCoy
Trent Thornton was not going to be helpful to the Blue Jays down the stretch after his walk rate this year in Buffalo ballooned to 5.8 per nine innings, and the Jays needed to free up a roster spot late last week in order to bring on Génesis Cabrera (which has provided some nice early returns — more on that later). Mason McCoy likely isn't even the second coming of Mike McCoy, but he won't need a 40-man spot unless the Jays are inclined to protect him in the Rule 5 draft this coming December, and he provides a warm body for the Buffalo Bisons to use in case their infield depth gets shredded by trades or promotions.
I could quote some stats here for you, but why bother? The only interesting aspect to this deal is the way it sets the table for some moves involving the Buffalo infield — exactly the place where the Jays' deadline deals may be focussed.
RHB Davis Schneider, who isn't on the 40-man but will have to be added in order to avoid being selected in the Rule 5, has continued be a "he hits everywhere he goes" guy this season, heading into Wednesday slashing .266/.409/.532 (134 wRC+) in Buffalo thanks to an 18% walk rate and 19 home runs. (He then hit his 20th bomb, going 3-for-4 in a 14-2 win over Scranton.)
LHB Addison Barger, the darling of spring training, struggled early in the season and then got hurt, but has been in the process of turning his season around for a while now. He sports a 138 wRC+ (.306/.398/.569) over his last 83 PA, and is also on the 40-man.
Either of these players could be in line for a call-up, particularly if Cavan Biggio or Santiago Espinal gets moved in the next week or so. Or they could be attractive trade pieces in their own right.
Buffalo's infield also has a theoretical trade candidate in shortstop Otto Lopez, who is currently out injured, but is running out of time in the organization because he's only got one minor league option year after this one remaining. Barger and Schneider are nobody's idea of shortstops, but Leo Jimenez is, and is also on the 40-man (and at .292/.370/.459 in Double-A is probably ready for the next level). Orelvis Martinez, newly back on the top prospect map, is also technically a shortstop, though that's not likely where his big league future lies. With his recent promotion to Buffalo he’s also part of this picture. And he is, if they're going to really get silly here (which there's a decent argument to be made that they should!), a trade candidate as well.
The addition of McCoy doesn't guarantee that there will be some movement from out of this group in the coming days, but his arrival means one less thing to think about for Atkins and company as potential deals come together.
(Insert your Genesis joke of choice)
Since we've already mentioned Génesis Cabrera, this seems like a good point to check in on the Jays' new reliever. It's a little too early in the process to draw conclusions about how his new club appears to be trying to fix him, but we can note right now that Cabrera has yet to throw a changeup since joining the Jays and, in a continuation of a trend that started late last month, has yet to throw a curve to a lefty. It seemed almost certain that the Jays would immediately try to simplify his five-pitch arsenal, so none of this is surprising. But what’s interesting about it is that he’s done a better job in these last two outings of finding the edge of the strike zone, and this season the curve has been his worst pitch in terms of Edge% versus lefties, and the changeup has been his worst pitch in terms of Edge% versus right-handed hitters.
I’m not going to pretend I’m incredibly enthused or anything, but so far so good, and he’s got some pretty filthy looking stuff. It’s better than the reverse, at least!
So the Jays and Mariners have been talking, you say?
Seriously, though. The Jays could use a right-handed hitter who mashes lefties but is good enough against same-sided pitching to play a lot, and even though he's having a tough year against RHP (84 wRC+), Teoscar is certainly that. This week MLBTR looked at the possibility of Seattle trading their free-agent-to-be, and polled their readership on whether they should. Two-thirds of respondents said yes.
Would Jerry Dipoto really swallow his pride and trade Teo back to the Jays? If they made the best offer, why not? It’s not quite the same as Tony Fernández coming back a few years after The Trade and winning the World Series back where it all started, but I sure as hell would still like to see it, wouldn’t you?
Passan stirs the pot
For my money, ESPN’s Jeff Passan is the most reliable of the trade-breaking guys on Twitter, not necessarily because he’s first more often than anybody else, but because he doesn’t have time for bullshit. He generally go for that “talks are heating up” or “it’s almost over the line” kind of stuff. When a deal’s done, he announces it. No teasing.
But the lack of teasing apparently doesn’t extend to the written word, because in a Tuesday morning piece he dropped this bomb on us:
Despite currently holding the final wild-card spot, Toronto hasn't done enough to convince ownership to open up the coffers, leaving the Blue Jays precisely where they've been all season: the muddled middle. That said, when asked where Ohtani could wind up if he's moved, three of the most popular answers from executives are Baltimore, Tampa Bay and Toronto (the Blue Jays are a longer shot due to a thinner farm system).
Now, the Ohtani thing obviously isn’t coming from Jeff. It’s coming from executives who can’t possibly be serious — at least about the Blue Jays part, but probably also the other part. Smarter people than I are surely out there trying to put a value on two months of Ohtani. I’m not going to say that it can’t be done. But to figure that out, have the pieces to do it, and then get Angels owner Arte Moreno to sign off? It’ll be very impressive when Alex Anthopoulos pulls it out of his back pocket. Heyo! (Though, actually, the Angels have supposedly now taken Ohtani off the market, if he was ever even on it. So there’s that.)
UPDATE: No, I think they really did take him off the market, as Passan reported late Wednesday evening that the Angels have acquired RHPs Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo López from the White Sox. Nice to see them not land with an actual contender at least!).
The thing about Jays ownership being unconvinced to open up the coffers, on the other hand, is from Passan. And it ought to be be pretty infuriating if you’re one of the fans who have been ponying up a ton of extra money for new suites and club seats that will be added over the winter when the club renovates the infield portion of the Rogers Centre, or just paying an enormous premium to keep your current seats.
For everyone else, maybe disheartening is closer to the right word. But infuriating also works!
You know, if it’s accurate.
Rogers has been pretty good here in the Mark Shapiro era, presumably due more to Shapiro’s work than to Edward Rogers’ whims. But who knows! I do know that, after looking at a ton of stuff from back in 2009 while writing that Scott Rolen piece over the weekend, things could be a whole lot worse. I also know that the fact that the Jays’ payroll is actually above the luxury tax threshold for the first time ever means that we’re maybe getting a bit greedy here thinking that it’s unacceptable for them to decline to spend more — though certainly not as greedy as, you know, literal billionaires (or whoever is setting the prices for next year’s crop of season tickets).
Be that as it may, it sure seems odd that, in the astronomically small chance that the Jays could win a bidding war for him, the $10 million Ohtani would be owed for the rest of the season might actually be reason enough for ownership to kibosh the deal. Generally Shapiro and Atkins seem to have known enough to make sure they have some extra dollars to play with at the deadline without having to go to Rogers with their hats in hand, so this nugget feels suspicious.
On the other hand, if this means that the Jays might not be able to afford the $6 million or so remaining on Lance Lynn’s deal with the White Sox, perhaps it’s not so bad.
Speaking of Lance Lynn…
While the White Sox' 6.18-ERA-starter-with-an-$18-million-club-option-for-next-year is potentially on the block, according to Bob Nightengale (which maybe means this is wrong!) their mildly fraudulent ace, Dylan Cease, is not. Cease has two years of club control remaining after this one, and apparently the White Sox are telling teams that are checking in on him that he won't be dealt. "The White Sox are not interested in a massive rebuild and still hope to contend next year," Nightengale says.
Makes sense given their division. Though looking around and seeing how few high-end impact players actually seem available right now isn't doing much for my excitement about the trade deadline — or about my excitement for having to deal with everyone who's going to whine that Ross Atkins had an underwhelming one when that may simply end up being the case for all GMs this go-'round.
Thanks, Manfred!
Speaking of Rob Manfred…
It turns out that MLB owners really like short-sighted financial decisions and, presumably, the possibility of being buried in a vault with more money than the world could have ever spent. It also turns out that they don’t like baseball very much, except as an instrument of wealth-extraction from various tiers of governments and classes of people alike.
We knew that, of course, but here on Wednesday they confirmed it, voting to extend the contract of ol' union-buster Bob through the 2028 season and into early 2029.
The pitch clock has been great. I suppose it's in some ways good that the they didn't actually cancel the season last year. And I think I finally am starting to understand this Nancy comic. But otherwise: boooooooooo!!!!
Please don’t make me talk about Randal Grichuk
Seriously. No.
On the field…
With the rumour mill not yet spinning with the incomprehensible ferocity of Ross Atkins answering a question about player performance, it’s probably worth saying a little more about the Jays’ Wednesday victory in Los Angeles. “They won!,” for example. Also: “Holy balls, they actually won!”
Yusei Kikuchi dealt with some traffic all night, allowing seven hits over six innings, but... six innings! As we can see in the chart below from Props.cash, heading into this one Kikuchi had only gone that deep into a game five times in 20 tries this season.
He worked himself out of jams in ways that would have seemed impossible to anyone who watched him pitch last season, and ended up with eight strikeouts for his afternoon, with just two walks, and a single run allowed.
I'm not saying that the Jays don't need a little more help against left-handed batters — as Eno Sarris pointed out in a piece on potential minor deals for the Athletic on Wednesday, the Jays rank 21st by wOBA when throwing to left-handed hitters this year (and 22nd by ERA) — but Kikuchi is somehow down to a 3.79 ERA. And, don’t look now, but he’s kept the ball in the ballpark in each of his last three starts, after doing so in just three of his previous 18!
Hey, and Whit Merrifield hit a huge home run. Always liked these acquisitions!
Elsewhere on the field…
The Jays are in a pretty good spot at the moment, provided you ignore your pre-season expectations. At 57-46 they're just four games back of the sinking Rays, and 5.5 behind the AL East-leading Orioles. They hold the third AL wild card spot, and (as I write this) are about to be just one game behind the Astros, who are being blown out at home by Texas. The Red Sox sit 1.5 games back, the Yankees are 2.5 behind, and the Angels, who are 7-3 over their last 10, are now four back.
Those Angels will be visiting the Rogers Centre over the weekend, and it was expected that they'd be sending Ohtani to the hill in the first game of that series on Friday. However, Wednesday's game between the Angels and Tigers in Detrot was postponed by rain, and Ohtani has been bumped up to game one of a Thursday doubleheader.
That's the good news.
Less good news: Jose Altuve, who has been out since the start of this month after also missing the first six weeks of the season, and Yordan Alvarez, who has been out since June 6th, both made their return to the Astros' lineup in that game against Texas. Meanwhile, on Friday the Yankees will finally get Aaron Judge back from the toe injury he suffered on June 2nd.
The status quo ain't gonna cut it, Ross!
Quickly…
• I don’t want to say this is also “good” news, but it’s worth noting that Rays starter Zach Eflin, who was a surprisingly large free agent acquisition this winter and has pitched very well for the club this year, exited Wednesday’s game with a knee issue and has been sent for an MRI. Knee issues have been a problem for him in the past, as MLBTR notes. Could be a huge loss.
• Jon Morosi is evidently looking for radio hits in Toronto, Seattle, San Francisco, Milwaukee, Chicago, St. Louis, and Tampa this week, as he tweets that the Jays, Mariners, Giants, and Brewers are looking at middle infielders such as Tim Anderson (White Sox), Paul DeJong (Cardinals), and Vidal Bruján (Rays). Anderson has had his best weeks of the season in the past two, and has obviously been a very good player in the past. He also has a $14 million club option for next year. That maybe makes him fit the kind of profile that Ross Atkins has chased in the past, but everything else about his season is pretty scary. (Davy Andrews of FanGraphs tried to figure out what’s been up with him earlier this week.)
• Jayson Stark of the Athletic writes that it’s Ohtani who has been holding up the market, as teams have been reluctant to offer their best prospects in other deals because they’ve been holding them in case they were needed in a potential Ohtani trade. I’m sure it’s definitely that and not the fact that guys like Lance Lynn, Randal Grichuk, and Vidal Bruján are the kinds of names we’re hearing are available!
• Speaking, again, of Lynn, Ken Rosenthal reported earlier in the week that the Jays are on his no-trade list. Oh no.
• Can't believe there was a right-handed hitting infielder available and the Jays didn't get him! Amed Rosario (86 wRC+, horrific marks by OAA and DRS) has been sent to the Dodgers from Cleveland in exchange for Noah Syndergaard (washed). Uh, OK?
• In a deal that's nearly as weird, the Twins and Marlins made a "change of scenery" trade of right-handed relievers. Dylan Floro and Jorge López will each join a new team in the coming days. Which one is going from Miami to Minnesota and vice versa? Who cares!
• Lastly, a brief comment on the state of things. (Thanks, Galen!)
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With 116,000 millioners in Toronto, it's hard to keep hearing about the price of new luxury boxes.