Was Friday's non-tender deadline another Blue Jays dud?
On a quiet deadline, Vinny Capra, Trevor Richards, the CBA, bullpen discourse, payroll, Boboa bombs, Eno Sarris, Brandon Nimmo, George Springer, Cody Bellinger, Justin Verlander, and more!
The Blue Jays made surprisingly few moves on Friday evening, as the league’s deadline to tender contracts to arbitration-eligible players passed. Meanwhile, rumours continue to swirl about how the team will approach the offseason from here, with more money to spend on the free agent market, but a Teoscar Hernández sized hole to fill in their lineup and outfield.
Below we’ll take a look at all that, as well as review some especially insightful comments from the Athletic’s Eno Sarris, who appeared on the Fan 590 this week to talk about Teoscar, Brandon Nimmo, Erik Swanson, George Springer, Yusei Kikuchi and more!
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Tender mercies
While other teams were out there swinging small deals and making tough decisions, the Blue Jays did just about as little as they possibly could have at Friday's deadline. They non-tendered two players who had already been designated for assignment (Raimel Tapia and Bradley Zimmer), and one player who wasn't even eligible for arbitration (Vinny Capra).
The Capra decision is actually an interesting one, because — unless I'm missing something here — if they had wanted him off the 40-man they could have designated him for assignment and kept him in the organization provided he cleared waivers. Yet they have instead chosen to make him a full-on free agent. I'd wonder here if maybe a deal with club overseas is the answer to this riddle, but when the Jays removed reliever Foster Griffin from the 40-man ahead of the Rule 5 protection deadline earlier in the week, they made it clear that's where he will be ending up. So... I have no idea. Not that it's, you know, in any way consequential. Just an interesting detail.
(UPDATE: We have our answer on this, as Robert Murray of Fansided is reporting that Capra has re-signed with the Jays on a minor league deal. “While he received strong interest elsewhere, (he) felt most comfortable in Toronto,” Murray tells us. So, Capra avoids waivers, stays where he wants, and the Jays don’t lose him from the system but gain a 40-man roster spot.)
What is potentially consequential? The decision to tender contracts to some of the guys who seemed to plausibly be on the bubble. And the amount of salary commitments for 2023 that the Jays are now one step closer to having locked in.
Here are the arb-eligible players the Jays have tendered contracts to, along with their salary projections per MLB Trade Rumors:
• Vladimir Guerrero Jr. ($14.8M)
• Bo Bichette ($6.1M)
• Jordan Romano ($4.4M)
• Danny Jansen ($3.7M)
• Adam Cimber ($3.2M)
• Cavan Biggio ($2.6M)
• Santiago Espinal ($2.1M)
• Tim Mayza ($1.9M)
• Trevor Richards ($1.5M)
• Erik Swanson ($1.4M)
• Trent Thornton ($1.1M)
For understandable reasons, the name that probably sticks out the most there is Trevor Richards. The right-hander once again racked up an impressive number of strikeouts in 2022, sitting down 82 batters in 64 innings, but he had a career worst year in terms of walks, always gives up too many home runs, and pitched to a 5.34 ERA out of the Jays' bullpen. Woof.
The thing is, though, FIP and xFIP liked him, those strikeout numbers don’t grow on trees, and at $1.5 million he's actually a pretty cheap insurance policy. Could the Jays do better? Yeah. Could they do better at $1.5 million? Maybe. But there’s a risk that they won’t — that they’ll have to either overpay for a similar guy, taking resources away from more important objectives, or that they’ll simply lose a layer of depth.
Part of the calculation here may also be that they don’t have to even think about these things and can focus elsewhere.
I certainly don’t think it means that they have big plans for Richards as part of the bullpen next year. Or, at least, it’s hard to see that from here. Currently Richards sits behind Romano, Swanson, Mayza, Cimber, Anthony Bass, and Yimi Garcia on the depth chart at best. Zach Pop, Nate Pearson, and the loser of the 5th starter battle all seem like stronger bets to find themselves in the bullpen at the outset of the year as well, provided everyone is healthy — though obviously that's a big if.
My guess, then, is that the Jays think Richards’ small salary will be movable if it comes to that, or they're comfortable with the idea of at some point eating his salary and letting him go.
There's another way the Jays could part ways with Richards sooner rather than later, though the mechanism by which it works has actually changed in the latest CBA. It used to be that teams could release an arbitration-eligible player during spring training and only be on the hook for a fraction of his contract. Jays fans of a certain vintage will remember when J.P. Ricciardi did this to Reed Johnson in the spring of 2008, because for some reason the team had decided to give his at-bats to a 34-year-old Shannon Stewart. Apparently, though, this is now only an option if the team and player go to a hearing to settle their arbitration case. If the two sides settle before the hearing, the contract becomes guaranteed.
This is from MLB.com's official glossary entry for "Non-guaranteed Contract":
Per the 2022-26 collective bargaining agreement, arbitration-eligible players who settle with their teams on a salary for the subsequent season without going to a hearing will be eligible to receive full season termination pay, even if they are released prior to the start of the season (this rule will go into effect after the 2022 season). Previously, the salary for such players only became guaranteed if the player was on the Major League roster or injured list when the regular season began. Arbitration players who were cut before then would be owed either 30 or 45 days' worth of termination pay, depending on the point in Spring Training the player was released.
I don’t know if there are betting markets on whether guys go to arb hearings or not, but if there are, Richards sure seems like a pretty good file-and-trial option given all that. If not, I suppose it will tell us that the Jays think a whole lot more highly of him than most fans seem to.
Or maybe they just appreciate better than fans do how difficult finding decent relief help actually is!
Speaking of which…
Some relief for the bullpen discourse
I’ll miss threads like this. No notes.
Payroll matters
The other consequential thing about the Jays’ decision to tender contracts to all of their remaining arb-eligible players is that it gives us some clarity as far as where their payroll is at. There could still be some subtraction, of course. But we all definitely expect there to be addition.
How much can be added? Not knowing where the ceiling is makes that difficult to divine, but club president and CEO Mark Shapiro certainly gave us some hints last October, when he was asked in his end-of-season media conference whether it would be possible to push payroll toward the Competitive Balance Tax threshold at some point down the line.
“That's not something I've thought a lot about. I'm not sure, with how we're currently constructed, we've got the revenues to support a team that goes over the CBT. That's not to say that ownership doesn't make the strategic decision at some point to go over. But I feel like we can continue to raise the payroll, as we already have done, to unprecedented levels. And that our team and our fans, and this city and this incredible market, which is a country, can support us continuing to raise it.
“But those are things that we'd have to determine whether there are revenue sources outside that we have not currently tapped into or mined, if we're going to get those areas. Or a level of proactively deficit spending that our ownership deemed to be a strategic decision. But it's not something that we're planning for as we sit here and look at the payrolls moving out.”
From where we sit we do not know what may or may not have changed on the Jays’ side of this question, but we do know a fundamental part of this equation did change when the new CBA was agreed to between the league and the players union last spring. The threshold at the time Shapiro made those comments was $210 million. The threshold in 2023 will be $233 million.
I have no idea whether the notion of an increased threshold was baked into Shapiro’s answer, if he meant that there wouldn’t likely be a path going forward to approach the then-current threshold, or if this was just a way to avoid getting into specifics while mostly suggesting that the threshold will function as a soft cap for the club, but it definitely doesn’t feel as though they’re going to blow past $233 million. And even with Teoscar Hernández now off the books, they still don’t have a ton to work with if that’s the case.
For years and years, when people have talked about payroll they had usually been referring to "opening day payroll," which is generally just the sum of all the contracts on a club's books as of opening day (when, as noted above, all deals with arbitration-eligible players become fully guaranteed). As the luxury tax threshold becomes more of a concern among team owners — and therefore fans — we've started seeing "luxury tax payroll" numbers thrown around as well.
FanGraphs' Roster Resource does a great job of estimating each team's luxury tax number, using a blend of guaranteed contracts (by average annual value, which is how the league does it), MLBTR's arbitration projections, and projections of other line items that go into the calculation. Right now they break down the Jays' luxury tax payroll like so:
• AAV of guaranteed contracts ($124,607,143)
• Projected salaries for arb-eligibles ($42,800,000)
• Other contract payments ($4,333,333 to Colorado for Randal Grichuk)
• Estimated pre-arb player salaries ($8,640,000)
• Estimated salaries for 40-man roster players in the minors ($2,500,000)
• Estimated player benefits (health insurance, transportation, meal money, etc.)($16,500,000)
• Payment into MLB's pre-arb bonus pool ($1,666,667)
Those figures add up to $201,047,143. And while some of those are just ballpark estimates, meaning that taking this as gospel right down to the dollar isn’t terribly useful, I should note here that the use of average annual values is not. MLB’s calculation uses AAV so teams can’t sneak under the threshold every year by restructuring contracts.
It’s also worth noting here that the Jays are going to have to save some space to add payroll at the trade deadline, too. In other words, it’s toight! Especially if they really are intending on staying under the threshold while still playing at the top end of the free agent market.
Boboa bomb!
Lmao. Lewis for the win!
Eno speaks!
Lastly, another day, another pretty dang interested Jays segment on Toronto radio. This time it was Eno Sarris of the Athletic, who joined Ben Ennis and my pal Blake Murphy for a great chat on Friday’s edition of The Fan Drive Time.
Here’s the exchange, starting with one about Eno’s most recent piece, in which he seeks out the best potential bargains on the free agent market…
How could Brandon Nimmo be a "bargain" at over $100 million?
I've heard the rumours that it's $130 million for six years, and I just recently ran the numbers — as you said — at five years and $100 million, and said he'd be one of the best dollars-per-win budget acquisitions, actually, at that. At six and $130 million, he's still in the top 10. Basically, you're spending under $7 million a win by the projections if you get him on that deal, and the normal going rate right now is $8- to $9 million. So, still a good deal, and still a really decent upgrade over Teoscar Hernández.
I know it's sometimes hard to see it, because Teoscar Hernández hit the ball super hard, and hit a bunch of homers, and those are the things we remember when we watch someone play, but Brandon Nimmo gets on base like nobody's business. The second-best projection for on-base percentage among free agents. And he also plays good centre field defence, which Teoscar — I think he's pretty much a DH at this point. So I have Nimmo as a 2.5 win upgrade over Teoscar Hernández in year one, and a better candidate for a long term deal like this.
Though I haven’t exactly been thrilled with the Jays’ decision to get out of the Teoscar business, it’s hard to disagree with any of this.
Well, except maybe the idea that paying $7 million per win-above-replacement constitutes some kind of a bargain. That seems like a lot! At least until you start to really think about it.
FanGraphs’ Depth Charts projections have Nimmo at 4.5 WAR next year. I don’t know what a more sophisticated system would say about him going forward, but the quick and dirty way to do it would be to drop him a half a win each year. Over six years that’s 19.5 WAR in total, and at $130 million that’s $6.67 million per win. If a win on the open market is worth $8 million, the difference is $26 million. If a win is closer to $9 million that deal really could be massive bargain.
The Jays have more to think about in this than just that, obviously. Adding another $130 million over six years will complicate their long-term payroll picture. But if they’re thinking about a deal with Nimmo like this — and Eno is a great person to have talk on this stuff because he’s as good as anyone out there at being a proxy for how front offices think — clearly I think the appeal is there.
At least, if you believe in Nimmo’s health…
You're somewhat optimistic on Nimmo's future health. Overall, we're not great a projecting future injuries, but given Nimmo missed a bunch of time in 2019 and 2021, aren't their concerns as he moves into his 30s?
First of all, the fact that we aren't that good at projecting is part of that optimism, you know what I mean? Because you would look at his track record and say that he's only had two real, full seasons out of the first six that he tried to have full seasons, and you'd say that this guy can't do it. But we're actually not that good at looking at the past and predicting the future when it comes to injuries. And the second part is, the models that we do have, the stuff that we do know, says that the most recent information is the most important. And last year he had 151 games, was the healthiest he's ever been, and that's the most important information that we have with regards to his future health.
So I tend to think, if the injuries are what makes him the bargain, then I like it. And I think with some of the guys on this team — I know that there's been a real effort to take George Springer out of centre field. He was maybe 30th by Outs Above Average, defensively, and I think that's what part of this interest is about. But I think putting Springer in there for a little bit, for a few weeks, if Nimmo has to go to the IL for a couple weeks, is not that big a deal. I think Whit Merrifield could spell him in centre. And, in general, finding a backup centre fielder on the market or in your own system is not that hard.
George Springer played in 51 games in 2020, his final year in Houston, which amounted to 85% of the pandemic-shortened season. He subsequently played 48% of the Jays' games in 2021, and 82% in 2022. And if we're looking at games started in centre, it was 68% for Houston in 2020, then 25% in 2021 and 52% in 2022.
One player obviously doesn't break the model, and I'm not even looking at the model — I'm just looking at Springer's FanGraphs page with Windows' calculator open! — but, uh, I can certainly understand Jays fans maybe not feeling quite as great about the team giving another truckload of money to a somewhat injury-prone centre fielder in his 30s.
Eno continued…
But yes, I do think this is a team that needs that extra couple of wins. And the Erik Swanson return is also really important. Because yes, you could say, 'Hey, why not keep Teoscar and sign Nimmo, and sign a reliever,' and I think think what we've seen on the market — that's another thing, like, that's a fans thing. Just sign all of them, right? It's just a reality that teams have a budget number that they can't go over. And on top of that, if you look at the relievers on the market right now, the market for relievers is insane. A guy as good as Swanson would cost them $35 million over three years. I think Swanson is better than Rafael Montero, who just signed a three-year, $30 million contract with the Astros. So, they got Swanson and that kept the money down that they're going to spend on the relievers, and that gives them a chance to go out there and get Nimmo.
This is in a similar vein to the stuff BK was getting into in the Twitter thread I included above and, yeah, I do get it. Though, I must say, given what Jeff Passan was saying about last year earlier in the week, and the fact that they’d probably be better served by adding a shorter-term free agent, I wonder if taking another huge run at Justin Verlander, then moving a catcher for a centre fielder, might be a better Plan A.
Hey, and maybe that’s the kind of player that could convince ownership to make the “strategic decision” to go beyond their comfort zone on payroll, too. A middle-aged man can dream, can’t he?
Is there data to back up the idea that playing centre field adds to wear and tear more than playing in a corner outfield spot?
It's only slightly. It's a slight difference. Shortstop and centre, there's a slight difference. The reason why, though, I think it doesn't show up in the data is that your centre fielder and your shortstop are usually the youngest players on your team. That's just a fact. So, you could think of, like, the type of plays they're trying to make will get them hurt — you just saw the shortstop hit the centre fielder! — those are the kinds of things that happen. When you play defensively important positions, you play all out. So, normally, that's a younger player there, and maybe they can bounce back better, or they avoid that, or — for whatever reason, younger players do get hurt less. Springer is an older centre fielder, so that's part of the equation there. Older player that's more likely to get hurt because he's older, and he's also playing a tough position. That's a double-whammy kind of.
Well, at least the Jays really took advantage of those first two years of Springer’s deal, when he was really at his best out there, amiright???
How does Nimmo's defence project over the course of a five- or six-year deal?
I don't think that Nimmo plays centre field defence in the last couple years of this deal. I mean, you're just going to repeat the process in a way. Among qualified hitters last year, George Springer was the oldest centre fielder. And just, generally, 30 to 32, I think 31-32, that's when you stop playing centre field. It's a process that you can repeat at shortstop, and you'll see the same thing. Among qualified players at shortstop over 30, you only had Miguel Rojas and Elvis Andrus that were over 30. And Brandon Crawford the year before. So, it is your early 30s when you stop being able to play shortstop defence, centre field defence.
But I think a little bit back to what Blake was saying about — this is a team that wants to win now. So it's really, for them, a lot of it is just, 'Who's going to help us in centre field best these next two years?' And then, after that, Nimmo can play left and Springer can play right, and hopefully maybe our organization has produced a centre fielder in the meantime. That's what you want. You want a young — you need Bo Bichette — you need somebody to come up through your organization to play those, because they can only play until they're 31 or 32, and free agents are age 29 to 30. It's a massive problem, actually.
Nimmo would buy them some time on that front, at least. On the other hand, someone like Cody Bellinger, who was non-tendered by the Dodgers on Friday, would likely just put the Jays in the same situation again next year.
That’s not the only reason I wonder whether the Jays will really be so interested in the former MVP, even if his pedigree, the fact that he hits from the left side, and his ability to play above average defence in centre makes him a very intriguing option — and has certainly got Jays fans talking. He will surely be looking for a full-time gig on a short-term deal in order to rebuild his value and re-enter the market next year, and I think there are going to be teams out there willing to offer that to him. For the right price, the 2019 Jays might have done a thing like that. But can a win-now Jays team really offer 650 plate appearances to a guy with a 69 wRC+ over his last 239 games?
That’s much harder to see, unless they really believe they can fix his bat. And while this organization is hardly immune to bouts of hubris, my guess is that’s too big a risk at this particular juncture.
Regarding Nimmo vs. Teoscar at the plate, does on-base skill age more gracefully than power?
One thing I do know for sure is that the ability to make contact on pitches outside the zone ages terribly. It's one of the worst things that ages, and I think there's a couple names that should come to mind. Pablo Sandoval is one. Josh Hamilton is another. These are players that made a lot of bones on their ability to make contact — bad ball hitters. They were able to make contact on anything, and then that stopped, and they just had an abrupt end to their career. Brandon Nimmo is the kind of guy who is top 20 in his chase rate — in how often he swings at pitches outside of the zone. Teoscar is more like bottom 20. So, that's the big difference there. So, I mean, yes, I prefer that Nimmo also hit the ball wicked hard, like Teoscar did, but in terms of making good of the contact that he does, he's going to continue to make contact longer than Teoscar. And Teoscar's strikeout rates are already at a place where, if they get much worse, you can see how he ends up going into a part-time role, or ending up out of baseball quicker than somebody like Nimmo.
Don’t get me wrong, Bo Bichette still has a long way to go yet before he’s mentioned in conversations like these. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think of him here.
What do you like about Erik Swanson?
He has a really good flat fastball. In terms of what you want in a fastball right now, people are always talking about vertical attack angle, and that just means that it comes in flat where the swing is coming in sort of angled, and that makes it harder to hit. But he also has a good three-pitch mix, where both his split-finger and slider are above average by "Stuff." And just, overall, he has better stuff than Montero. It might be hard to see it when you look at radar gun readings — Montero throwing harder. But the shapes that Swanson is dealing with are better, the command is better, and I think that makes him a little bit more of a stable thing year-to-year.
What you normally see with relievers, it's really hard to project year-to-year performance, but when you start talking about relievers that have both stuff and command, those are the guys that stick around a little bit longer. And, for what it's worth, in terms of stuff and command, one of the guys he profiles really well next to — somebody who's in the same neighbourhood — is Zach Pop.
So, it seems to me that the Blue Jays are saying, 'Hey, we're not necessarily going to go for —', like, Aroldis Chapman right now still has some of the stuff, but you saw what happens when you have zero command. Like, he was almost out of baseball. They left him off the playoff roster, Aroldis Chapman. Because he still had OK stuff, it's still pretty good stuff, best stuff on the market, but zero command. The Blue Jays are saying, 'Hey, we're going to make part of what we care about with relievers command, as well as stuff.' And that's what you see with the acquisitions of Pop, I think even Cimber, and with Swanson.
You had me until Zach Pop!
Though I think it’s worth noting here that Eno is a believer in Pop.
Adding Nimmo would likely make the Jays bargain shoppers on the starting pitching front. Are there any names there that would make sense?
I have the level of the guys I like that have projected contracts on FanGraphs, and then I have the level where they don't even have a projected contract. So, might be, like, a minor league deal. And I think that's actually ideal for this team. Nate Pearson has been pitching really well, but kind of more in reliever stints in winter ball. So, I think you throw him in the mix with Kikuchi and White, what you really want is to throw one or two more guys in that mix, and come out of spring training with somebody like Kikuchi in a hybrid role. Where he's your sixth starter, can give you three innings sometimes, you really want him in the 'pen. That's what I see for Kikuchi.
Hold on, weren’t we just talking about the Jays looking for command in their relievers???
I kid, I kid. Eno continued…
Somebody like Michael Lorenzen, or Matthew Boyd, are pitchers that — they don't pop with my Stuff+, but they do have decent command, and what I like about them both is they have multiple pitches. Matthew Boyd made some changes to his changeup so it was above average last year. He didn't use it very much, but what if he started using that more, and became more of a three-, four-pitch pitcher. Michael Lorenzen added a sweeper, which is a hot new pitch in baseball, sort of a sideways curve ball, and that was his best pitch last year. But he has, like, five or six pitches. So, between Lorenzen and Boyd, if you could get both, if you could get two like that, that would be a really good deal. But even just getting one of those pushes Kikuchi into kind of a sixth/hybrid role spot, and I think I would feel better about that. I, for one, am a guy that thinks that Berríos is going to bounce back.
I think I like my Verlander plan better, but sure! That could work, I suppose.
Something is definitely going to have to be done, at least. We know that much for sure.
Now, if Ross could just do me a solid and hold off on any major moves until after the World Cup, that would be swell!
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