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What does a Jays firesale look like?

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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#321 » by Tanner » Tue Jul 25, 2017 12:00 pm

Schad wrote:And I don't think that we're so much planning to win in 2018 as we're planning to make a show of winning in 2018 to keep our revenues up. No one would actually look at this team, which has been the third-worst by expected record in the majors (below several teams that are making no effort to be good at baseball) and think there's 90 wins here. But Rogers doesn't care; they just want our money, and they -- perhaps correctly -- believe that a pantomime contender will still sell tickets.


It could also be that Shapiro realizes his assets have no value, making a mass selling spree completely pointless, and there is a reasonable chance some of his roster will improve next season, possibly making the 2018 team better and making existing assets more valuable to trade a year from now. If he was able to make a killing off Donaldson right now, I think he may have traded him.


Cano would be very hard to trade on account of being a Mariner, heh. As for most of their other vets, the reason is pretty simple: they had little to no trade value. Tanaka had a partial UCL tear and was going nowhere. Pineda, with his extensive injury history, had an ERA in the 5s when the deadline rolled around. There was talk that Sabathia might be on the market, but with $25m owed in 2017 and the fact that he was in the midst of a two-month implosion when the deadline hit, he wasn't exactly Grade-A beef. Gardner and Ellsbury are boat anchors, and they tried and failed to move Headley, who also has more contract than production.

But what they did, primarily, was recognize that they needed to get younger and resisted the temptation to do anything stupid. They were above .500 when the deadline rolled around, and in late July went on a lengthy winning streak that might have led another team to go in the opposite direction. Instead, they sold off what they could, and planned to wait for the kids to arrive and the vets to age out. Instead, they beat the schedule.


In 2013 the Yankees were 8 games out of first in the East and 3 games out of the 2nd Wild Card with three teams to pass on July 31 of that year. They kept Cano instead of trading him. I am sure they could have traded Tanaka and Pineda without any issue prior to this season if they felt they were a few years away. Gardner as well. They did not trade those guys for any combination of these three reasons : 1) wouldn’t get (enough) value back, 2) wanted to keep the big league team competitive, 3) did not have internal replacements. They traded McCann because they wanted to open CA up for Sanchez. Beltran was traded last deadline because he was a free agent and they wanted to open up right field for Judge. They let Jeter, Tex, and A-Rod retire on their team instead of dropping them earlier (all three were untradeable for various reasons). They had every opportunity to do what you want the Jays to do now but never did.

When they traded Chapman last deadline to signify that they were giving up, they were 51-48. They were 7.5 games out of 1st in the East, and 4.5 behind the 2nd wild card with three teams to pass.

Today, the Royals are 51-47, a half game better than the Yankees were when they gave up last year, but lead the 2nd wild card. The record doesn’t matter. It is where you are in the standings. If the Yankees were 51-48 in 2016 and holding down a playoff spot instead of five games out, you think they would have sold off Chapman, Miller, and Beltran?

Let’s be real here. Cashman was doing the exact same thing as Shapiro is doing now. What prospect has Toronto traded since Shapiro got here? Hansel Rodriguez? They’ve added more to the farm than subtracted and that was despite trying to win the last two years (successful in 2016, not so much in 2017). They have invested internationally. They have hoarded every asset they had, including Smoak who has turned into a star inexplicably. I don’t see how trying to win the last two years has impacted their ability to improve the farm. They haven’t gotten younger on the big league level because they inherited a system that had its best players very, very low in the minors. It will still take a year or two for players to start coming up but that doesn’t mean they have to scorch earth in the mean time.

Where the Yankees were able to transition gracefully is by making great trades. They got Chapman, Hicks, Castro, and Gregorious for basically nothing. That’s the one area Shapiro and Atkins need to work on. Smoak is a good start. No one expected that when he was extended, but they need more.



And no, we are not going to compete in 2019 and 2020 just by building on to what we have. We might be able to fake it a little longer, but by 2019 we'll be paying $90m+ to nine players: Martin, Tulo and Morales, who will not be at all good, plus Smoak, Stroman, Sanchez, Osuna, Pillar and Travis. Which sounds like an awful lot of money left over, until one considers exactly what you need to pay in free agency to get quality, and the fact that we may not have any good young talent arriving then unless Bichette and Vlad are major league ready by then. Instead, we'd just be repeating the mistakes of the past...letting players run down the contracts, thus severely reducing our leverage, in the vain hope that we can catch lightning in a bottle.


Like the Yankees did except for the Andrew Miller trade. It hasn’t seemed to hurt them.

This isn't the NBA. No need to tank to get a top draft pick. The Jays will have a top 10 system this winter despite never purposely taking a step back. I don't see how holding on to JD and Smoak for another year and seeing their market expand to maximize the trade return is symbolic of trying to pantomime a contender. It's probably the most logical way to go next season. If the 2018 season goes the same way as 2017, which is certainly possible, then trade JD and Smoak then. The difference in the return will probably be insignificant if JD bounces back.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#322 » by I_Like_Dirt » Tue Jul 25, 2017 2:46 pm

It didn't hurt the Yankees, but they also find ways to load up on prospects, so yeah, if the Jays can get a haul of prospects without trades, fine.

That said, I do also appreciate that it might be the case that the trade assets here have no value and there is no point in really trading them. As an example, I have a hard time believing that Liriano really has any value at all right now, even if the Jays agree to pay what's left of his salary. But if that's the case, then the entire argument isn't that "there are other options" as Schad was arguing against, but rather that things are even worse than Schad is suggesting and the Jays are stuck riding this one out and are going to be terrible no matter what they do and if they even consider trying move prospects or picks for help to the team immediately, it would be an instant waste unless you feel the Jays are more in the business of trying to trick the gullible and are interested in discussing baseball on those terms.

The bottom line is that the Jays are bad and are going to remain bad for another year or two no matter what they do. And free agency is fools gold at this point. Anyone who brings up free agency as a magic bullet is pretty much completely blind to reality right now. That said, I don't mind more trades like the Liriano trade, but that's more an opportunity that you can't exactly plan for. I guarantee you there is no such thing as just riding this out. If the Jays don't move some of their guys, there will be strong pressure to try to trade to improve the team, and if the team already demonstrates that they cave to pressure by not trading out, they're going to cave to the pressure to trade for the immediate, because that's what the Jays do. The fans will all leave eventually, too, it's proven, and once they leave, it will just be even more reason they can't tank because the financials of tanking when the fan base isn't strong to begin with are even worse than when the fanbase is strong.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#323 » by Schad » Tue Jul 25, 2017 4:00 pm

Tanner wrote:It could also be that Shapiro realizes his assets have no value, making a mass selling spree completely pointless, and there is a reasonable chance some of his roster will improve next season, possibly making the 2018 team better and making existing assets more valuable to trade a year from now. If he was able to make a killing off Donaldson right now, I think he may have traded him.


Doubtful. Happ would have real value now, and his trade value is likely to decline from here, given that he comes paired with eighteen months of team control and the right to QO him at the end of next season. We're doing what we're doing for the stated reasons: Rogers is making a profit right now, and so they're going to keep selling hope under fans catch on and stop showing up.

In 2013 the Yankees were 8 games out of first in the East and 3 games out of the 2nd Wild Card with three teams to pass on July 31 of that year. They kept Cano instead of trading him. I am sure they could have traded Tanaka and Pineda without any issue prior to this season if they felt they were a few years away. Gardner as well. They did not trade those guys for any combination of these three reasons : 1) wouldn’t get (enough) value back, 2) wanted to keep the big league team competitive, 3) did not have internal replacements. They traded McCann because they wanted to open CA up for Sanchez. Beltran was traded last deadline because he was a free agent and they wanted to open up right field for Judge. They let Jeter, Tex, and A-Rod retire on their team instead of dropping them earlier (all three were untradeable for various reasons). They had every opportunity to do what you want the Jays to do now but never did.


In 2013, the Yankees were laboring under the belief that they could win one last title with an old, bloated roster, so they kept the gang together. Luckily for us...delaying the inevitable helped open the window for ourselves as well as the Orioles.

When they traded Chapman last deadline to signify that they were giving up, they were 51-48. They were 7.5 games out of 1st in the East, and 4.5 behind the 2nd wild card with three teams to pass.

Today, the Royals are 51-47, a half game better than the Yankees were when they gave up last year, but lead the 2nd wild card. The record doesn’t matter. It is where you are in the standings. If the Yankees were 51-48 in 2016 and holding down a playoff spot instead of five games out, you think they would have sold off Chapman, Miller, and Beltran?


Maybe not. That said, it was still a gutsy decision to trade key pieces when they were on an 8-2 run had brought them back into theoretical Wild Card contention. And one Jays ownership would be much less likely to sanction.

Let’s be real here. Cashman was doing the exact same thing as Shapiro is doing now. What prospect has Toronto traded since Shapiro got here? Hansel Rodriguez? They’ve added more to the farm than subtracted and that was despite trying to win the last two years (successful in 2016, not so much in 2017). They have invested internationally. They have hoarded every asset they had, including Smoak who has turned into a star inexplicably. I don’t see how trying to win the last two years has impacted their ability to improve the farm. They haven’t gotten younger on the big league level because they inherited a system that had its best players very, very low in the minors. It will still take a year or two for players to start coming up but that doesn’t mean they have to scorch earth in the mean time.


But it makes sense to scorch earth in the mean time, because all our damned players of any value will walk by 2020. Vlad and Bichette likely will only just be reaching the majors by 2020, and unlike the Yankees we can extract value for some of them, because they are not attached to hideous contracts running into their late 30s. As ILD said, you're effectively laying out a nightmare where nobody wants anything on our roster, so we might as well try to tread water in the interim. If that's the case, it doesn't mean we're going to be competitive in 2018...it means we really need to cross our fingers that we can put together a competitive team by the time Bo/Vlad are in their arb years.

Where the Yankees were able to transition gracefully is by making great trades. They got Chapman, Hicks, Castro, and Gregorious for basically nothing. That’s the one area Shapiro and Atkins need to work on. Smoak is a good start. No one expected that when he was extended, but they need more.


While it's possible to get something for nothing, it's rather difficult to have a plan built around trading nothing for something.

On Chapman: they got him for little because he had just been accused of choking his girlfriend and firing several gunshots, which caused the Reds' previous trade plans to break down. It was a pretty scummy situation.

Like the Yankees did except for the Andrew Miller trade. It hasn’t seemed to hurt them.

This isn't the NBA. No need to tank to get a top draft pick. The Jays will have a top 10 system this winter despite never purposely taking a step back. I don't see how holding on to JD and Smoak for another year and seeing their market expand to maximize the trade return is symbolic of trying to pantomime a contender. It's probably the most logical way to go next season. If the 2018 season goes the same way as 2017, which is certainly possible, then trade JD and Smoak then. The difference in the return will probably be insignificant if JD bounces back.


No need to tank, no, but our farm system is pretty fringy beyond our top two, particularly the part where we have no highly-rated pitching at all. If we had a stronger base, we could work more judiciously, but AA nuked that option. And we are not hanging on to JD and Smoak to maximize trade return. We will not trade them if we're anywhere near .500 in 2018, because Rogers wants your money to be their money. And ultimately, that's all that matters. Unless 2018 is as disastrous as 2017 (and here's hoping), we'll repeat this charade with diminishing returns each year, which is why they're also talking about pseudo-contending in 2019 and 2020. They'll ride our names for as long as they can, and only when it stops working will they sanction another direction.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#324 » by Tanner » Tue Jul 25, 2017 4:07 pm

I_Like_Dirt wrote:It didn't hurt the Yankees, but they also find ways to load up on prospects, so yeah, if the Jays can get a haul of prospects without trades, fine.

That said, I do also appreciate that it might be the case that the trade assets here have no value and there is no point in really trading them. As an example, I have a hard time believing that Liriano really has any value at all right now, even if the Jays agree to pay what's left of his salary. But if that's the case, then the entire argument isn't that "there are other options" as Schad was arguing against, but rather that things are even worse than Schad is suggesting and the Jays are stuck riding this one out and are going to be terrible no matter what they do and if they even consider trying move prospects or picks for help to the team immediately, it would be an instant waste unless you feel the Jays are more in the business of trying to trick the gullible and are interested in discussing baseball on those terms.

The bottom line is that the Jays are bad and are going to remain bad for another year or two no matter what they do. And free agency is fools gold at this point. Anyone who brings up free agency as a magic bullet is pretty much completely blind to reality right now. That said, I don't mind more trades like the Liriano trade, but that's more an opportunity that you can't exactly plan for. I guarantee you there is no such thing as just riding this out. If the Jays don't move some of their guys, there will be strong pressure to try to trade to improve the team, and if the team already demonstrates that they cave to pressure by not trading out, they're going to cave to the pressure to trade for the immediate, because that's what the Jays do. The fans will all leave eventually, too, it's proven, and once they leave, it will just be even more reason they can't tank because the financials of tanking when the fan base isn't strong to begin with are even worse than when the fanbase is strong.


Actually, the players that might have more trade value by waiting are players that should help the 2018 team (Donaldson, Smoak, Happ). Liriano, Estrada, and Bautista are gone after this season so trading them for anything you can get is fine. Holding out for more on the three who are signed through 2018 makes more sense.

If you look at projections versus actual results, it wouldn't surprise me if there was at least a 10 win difference between what was projected for Bautista, Tulo, JD, Pearce, Morales, and Travis, and what they will actually produce this season. Possibly more than 10, especially when you consider who has replaced Travis (way too much Goins). I really don't think it's unreasonable to expect improvement from existing players next season. The depth should be better as more prospects are closer to the bigs (Alford, Guirrel). It's not going to easy to field a contender in 2018, but to suggest 2017's decline is only going to get worse is pretty strong.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#325 » by vaff87 » Tue Jul 25, 2017 4:10 pm

I don't know whats going on in this thread, anymore. Posts are becoming too long for my attention span.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#326 » by Schad » Tue Jul 25, 2017 4:16 pm

Even if the team's goal is to be perpetually .500 to fool consumers like some of you think, as long as they do not sacrifice any of their top prospects to do it, then I don't think it will make too big of a difference. Alex's mistake was he sacrificed prospects. If the Jays focus on free agency and taking on contracts (like the Liriano dump a year ago), then it's about the least offensive way to not rebuild.


And because he sacrificed prospects, we don't have a hell of a lot by way of prospects. A handful will filter up, but adding them to the largely barren roster post-Donaldson (plus whatever cheap free agents we can find) isn't a recipe for success. It's a recipe to waste their prime years and repeat the same process year on year until we simply don't have any other avenue, which is what preceded AA being given the opportunity to build organically (before ownership made it known that they'd had enough of building organically, heh).

All this is known, because all this has been done before. For more than a decade after the 1995 strike, we followed the same playbook. It got us nowhere. In 2010, we switched gears, traded vets and rebuilt our system. It got us somewhere. Let's do the thing that worked again, rather than the thing that left us as a joke for many years.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#327 » by polo007 » Tue Jul 25, 2017 5:19 pm

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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#328 » by BramptonYute » Tue Jul 25, 2017 6:01 pm

any chance they look at trading a guy like tepera or do you think they'll hang onto him?
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#329 » by Tanner » Tue Jul 25, 2017 6:39 pm

Schad wrote:
Even if the team's goal is to be perpetually .500 to fool consumers like some of you think, as long as they do not sacrifice any of their top prospects to do it, then I don't think it will make too big of a difference. Alex's mistake was he sacrificed prospects. If the Jays focus on free agency and taking on contracts (like the Liriano dump a year ago), then it's about the least offensive way to not rebuild.


And because he sacrificed prospects, we don't have a hell of a lot by way of prospects. A handful will filter up, but adding them to the largely barren roster post-Donaldson (plus whatever cheap free agents we can find) isn't a recipe for success. It's a recipe to waste their prime years and repeat the same process year on year until we simply don't have any other avenue, which is what preceded AA being given the opportunity to build organically (before ownership made it known that they'd had enough of building organically, heh).

All this is known, because all this has been done before. For more than a decade after the 1995 strike, we followed the same playbook. It got us nowhere. In 2010, we switched gears, traded vets and rebuilt our system. It got us somewhere. Let's do the thing that worked again, rather than the thing that left us as a joke for many years.


The 2012 Jays who had three years of AA building it up looked like straight trash. A top rated farm system, but a system whose best prospects even by the end of 2012 were still years away, and a big league team whose assets were either falling apart or not at peak value. That was after three seasons of trying to get as many assets as possible (Yunel, Colby), and watching Bautista turn into a star unexpectedly. It was not a good time to do what they did (Marlins trade, Dickey), but that doesn't mean this front office will do the same thing. This front office in that situation probably would have kept all the prospects, tried to plug holes with short term free agents, and seen how far it took them. Of course, then people would complain that it was wasting Bautista and Edwin's primes. There's no magic formula. If they traded Jose and Edwin after 2012, would that have meant they would have fielded an Astros style contender in 2015? 2016? 2018? They could have traded Bautista to Texas for Profar in 2012, gotten all kinds of crazy praise for it, and been sitting on a bust for four years. Scorched earth rebuilding in baseball is not necessary. It could work definitely, but it's not like basketball.

If Shapiro decides to do the Rogers endorsed team building strategy (perpetually .500), and I'm still not convinced that they will, then I trust this front office enough to feel comfortable that they won't sacrifice the farm to do it. Just add pieces when you can, trade assets at peak value rather than low value, and let the organic growth happen that way. Chances are it will lead to bad seasons anyway, in which case you can still trade JD/Smoak next summer, draft very high, et al, and still make Rogers happy.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#330 » by I_Like_Dirt » Tue Jul 25, 2017 7:00 pm

You talk about trading assets at peak value rather than low value, but then also talk about how guys who have value can't be traded because they will clearly help the team next season. Which is it?

As for guys like Tulo, Liriano, Estrada, etc. bouncing back... ehhhh, maybe. They still have a lot farther they could fall, too, believe it or not. I mean, you don't give them away for nothing or anything, but those aren't the main guys people are talking about moving, it's actually the Donaldsons, Smoaks, and even Osunas that would have the returns here. Those are the guys who would absolutely have returns who are risks to lose value if the team doesn't trade them. Those other guys aren't really risks to gain value, but they admittedly don't really have much. The Jays basically didn't have to pay for much of any of Liriano's salary and took on a couple of reasonable prospects just to take on Liriano in the first place. The idea that waiting and waiting is suddenly going to mean his value goes up is basically like waiting for Godot.

And the Jays right now are 3rd last in the AL. I'm not sure what you think tanking actually looks like, but it really isn't outrageously different than this. Yeah, you or anyone can dream that these aren't the real Jays and the tide will turn eventually, but there is nothing particularly special about the Jays that can't also be said for every other team at this point. In fact, the Jays are so much older than most teams with a thinner top end farm system that they're actually less likely to be anything but what they're showing than most other teams. If you get rid of the name players, you can still dream of what if x player raises his batting average just .009 or whatever. At this point, it's basically like hanging on to Nortel stock because they were so good for you in the leadup that they just have to turn things around eventually.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#331 » by Schad » Tue Jul 25, 2017 7:03 pm

Tanner wrote:The 2012 Jays who had three years of AA building it up looked like straight trash. A top rated farm system, but a system whose best prospects even by the end of 2012 were still years away, and a big league team whose assets were either falling apart or not at peak value. That was after three seasons of trying to get as many assets as possible (Yunel, Colby), and watching Bautista turn into a star unexpectedly. It was not a good time to do what they did (Marlins trade, Dickey), but that doesn't mean this front office will do the same thing. This front office in that situation probably would have kept all the prospects, tried to plug holes with short term free agents, and seen how far it took them. Of course, then people would complain that it was wasting Bautista and Edwin's primes. There's no magic formula. If they traded Jose and Edwin after 2012, would that have meant they would have fielded an Astros style contender in 2015? 2016? 2018? They could have traded Bautista to Texas for Profar in 2012, gotten all kinds of crazy praise for it, and been sitting on a bust for four years. Scorched earth rebuilding in baseball is not necessary. It could work definitely, but it's not like basketball.

If Shapiro decides to do the Rogers endorsed team building strategy (perpetually .500), and I'm still not convinced that they will, then I trust this front office enough to feel comfortable that they won't sacrifice the farm to do it. Just add pieces when you can, trade assets at peak value rather than low value, and let the organic growth happen that way. Chances are it will lead to bad seasons anyway, in which case you can still trade JD/Smoak next summer, draft very high, et al, and still make Rogers happy.


"Organic growth" doesn't get you anywhere if the growth isn't clustered. Again, that's what happened in the 90s: we actually produced a number of very good young players, and rarely traded them away (ahem, Michael Young), preferring instead to make vet-for-vet trades and free agent signings. Unfortunately, because our young players were not peaking around the same time, it got us nowhere, and we were unwilling to move the ones approaching free agency. A new star would emerge just as the last one walked or demanded to be traded. We're poised to repeat the same here, where we're talking about a window that extends through the free agent season of Sanchez, Osuna, Stroman, Travis, etc despite seeing most of the roster age out in the interim.

We are not going to move players at peak value. If we were, Happ would be on the block, as likely would Osuna. Whether we sacrifice the farm or not may not matter, because the route AA had available (exploiting the old compensation system to load up on a huge number of high draft picks) has since been closed, as has our ability to simply out-spend people on IFAs, so we either have to be the best damned drafting team in baseball, or we're going to end up with a team that is perpetually full of holes with a few standouts.

Scorched earth isn't necessary in most circumstances, I agree. It's simply that, at current time, we have a really ungainly mix: a whole bunch of old players, paired with a group of younger ones who are three years from walking, paired with a farm system that is three years from bearing fruit. There is no overlap of any duration, no point at which all of those groupings will actually be productive at the same time. We need to line those things up, or it will be a series of false dawns and wasted talent. Scorched earth is thus the best option we have left available, because we pushed all of our chips in for a two-year run that is now over.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#332 » by I_Like_Dirt » Tue Jul 25, 2017 8:20 pm

The real catch here is that scorched earth really isn't so outlandishly different from what we're presently seeing and likely to see next season.

It isn't a reason to do scorched earth if there legitimately isn't any return whatsoever - trades just for the sake of trades, so to speak. But as options do present themselves, they really need to be jumped on - particularly the sell high variety. Players that are currently helping the Jays are helping them get destroyed and play ~.450 ball. A lot of players can help the Jays play ~.450 ball - that isn't some amazing feat. For every underachieving argument, there is an equally valid (or even more valid) argument that they are actually currently overachieving, too.

Optimism is actually great for being a fan, but it's every bit as dangerous as pessimism when it starts factoring in to how you build your team.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#333 » by Schad » Tue Jul 25, 2017 8:32 pm

Yeah, the difference between scorched earth and the 2017 Blue Jays is merely that we're effectively trading prospects for profits. We're getting outperformed by many of the actual scorched earth teams.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#334 » by North_of_Border » Tue Jul 25, 2017 10:07 pm

If the Jays can try to contend while still adding to the farm as opposed to subtracting, I'm all in.

Draft good. Sign the internationals. Trade the pending UFAs..... while adding veterans at a reasonable price. I mean trading away only mid level prospects, taking on salary for incentives like the Liriano trade. Some Vet for Vet trades. Promoting older prospects to the Majors as they progress. Sign vets on prove it type deals. Stay away from long term FA commitments. Lock up young assets like they did in Cleveland.

No?
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#335 » by Tanner » Wed Jul 26, 2017 11:53 am

I_Like_Dirt wrote:You talk about trading assets at peak value rather than low value, but then also talk about how guys who have value can't be traded because they will clearly help the team next season. Which is it?


Never said any player can't be traded. I said the players that can help in 2018 (Donaldson and Smoak in particular) are not at peak value, one because of a down year and the other because he doesn't have the track record, not to mention contenders not needing third and first basemen right now. If the Jays could get Devers for Donaldson at this moment, then of course they should do it. They can't, and won't, so bring him back next year, see if they can make a run, and if not, sell from hopefully a position of strength at this time next year.

My point has always been to maximize the return on the players with actual value, otherwise there's no point. You'd be selling for the sake of selling. The only exception would be the impending free agents at the moment. Smith looks like the only one with any actual value, but get what you can for the others (Estrada, Bautista, and Liriano).


As for guys like Tulo, Liriano, Estrada, etc. bouncing back... ehhhh, maybe. They still have a lot farther they could fall, too, believe it or not. I mean, you don't give them away for nothing or anything, but those aren't the main guys people are talking about moving, it's actually the Donaldsons, Smoaks, and even Osunas that would have the returns here. Those are the guys who would absolutely have returns who are risks to lose value if the team doesn't trade them. Those other guys aren't really risks to gain value, but they admittedly don't really have much. The Jays basically didn't have to pay for much of any of Liriano's salary and took on a couple of reasonable prospects just to take on Liriano in the first place. The idea that waiting and waiting is suddenly going to mean his value goes up is basically like waiting for Godot.


Liriano and Estrada are irrelevant because they are free agents. Only way them bouncing back becomes relevant is if the Jays bring them back. Like I said earlier, look at projections versus reality. The Jays have under performed expectations significantly. Even current projections for the rest of the season have them playing better than they have now. If it had gone the other way, and the Jays exceeded projections so significantly that they were running away with the East with this same roster, would you expect it to continue next season? So why expect further decline aside from "these guys are in their 30's"?

I'm not even saying that I'm optimistic about 2018. They have a lot of holes to fill and it's too early to guess what the roster will be. I'm just pointing out that expecting the team to actually decline more than they have this season is not a reasonable argument. Bautista and Tulo were projected ~6 war players combined currently around replacement level. Donaldson's likely going to end up 3 to 4 wins below projections, give or take. That's just three players. Maybe it will continue to get worse and Donaldson will be a replacement level talent and Tulo will decline to Goins levels, but do you really think that's a reasonable expectation?


And the Jays right now are 3rd last in the AL. I'm not sure what you think tanking actually looks like, but it really isn't outrageously different than this.


Then try again next year, and when it fails, trade JD when he has more value. Nothing will change except JD's value. The key is whether you think you will get more for him now than you will next summer. The time under control is less, but the performance might be drastically different. It's a risk either way.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#336 » by Skin Blues » Wed Jul 26, 2017 12:13 pm

It's always funny to hear people arguing about who is at peak value. As if a random person on a message board can better tell that a player will improve or decline than entire front offices of potential trade partners. Everybody knows Donaldson is a superstar, he's not going to be valued as if he's a true talent .342 wOBA hitter, so we don't have to wait for him to get back up to a .375 wOBA to get full value for him. Waiting it out to trade him is a 50/50 proposition, as it is for basically everybody. Maybe he gains more trade value, maybe he stays in the funk and has less trade value. The longer we wait to trade anybody, the less we will get in expected return because there are less games for which the player can contribute for the new team. Some will make real improvements and improve their trade value (Smoak 2016 vs 2017), some will decline or get injured and lose their trade value (practically the entire rest of our MLB roster). The entire notion of buy low/sell high is nonsense, since nobody knows if a player's perceived value will increase or decrease.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#337 » by Tanner » Wed Jul 26, 2017 12:15 pm

Schad wrote:
Tanner wrote:The 2012 Jays who had three years of AA building it up looked like straight trash. A top rated farm system, but a system whose best prospects even by the end of 2012 were still years away, and a big league team whose assets were either falling apart or not at peak value. That was after three seasons of trying to get as many assets as possible (Yunel, Colby), and watching Bautista turn into a star unexpectedly. It was not a good time to do what they did (Marlins trade, Dickey), but that doesn't mean this front office will do the same thing. This front office in that situation probably would have kept all the prospects, tried to plug holes with short term free agents, and seen how far it took them. Of course, then people would complain that it was wasting Bautista and Edwin's primes. There's no magic formula. If they traded Jose and Edwin after 2012, would that have meant they would have fielded an Astros style contender in 2015? 2016? 2018? They could have traded Bautista to Texas for Profar in 2012, gotten all kinds of crazy praise for it, and been sitting on a bust for four years. Scorched earth rebuilding in baseball is not necessary. It could work definitely, but it's not like basketball.

If Shapiro decides to do the Rogers endorsed team building strategy (perpetually .500), and I'm still not convinced that they will, then I trust this front office enough to feel comfortable that they won't sacrifice the farm to do it. Just add pieces when you can, trade assets at peak value rather than low value, and let the organic growth happen that way. Chances are it will lead to bad seasons anyway, in which case you can still trade JD/Smoak next summer, draft very high, et al, and still make Rogers happy.


"Organic growth" doesn't get you anywhere if the growth isn't clustered. Again, that's what happened in the 90s: we actually produced a number of very good young players, and rarely traded them away (ahem, Michael Young), preferring instead to make vet-for-vet trades and free agent signings. Unfortunately, because our young players were not peaking around the same time, it got us nowhere, and we were unwilling to move the ones approaching free agency. A new star would emerge just as the last one walked or demanded to be traded. We're poised to repeat the same here, where we're talking about a window that extends through the free agent season of Sanchez, Osuna, Stroman, Travis, etc despite seeing most of the roster age out in the interim.

We are not going to move players at peak value. If we were, Happ would be on the block, as likely would Osuna. Whether we sacrifice the farm or not may not matter, because the route AA had available (exploiting the old compensation system to load up on a huge number of high draft picks) has since been closed, as has our ability to simply out-spend people on IFAs, so we either have to be the best damned drafting team in baseball, or we're going to end up with a team that is perpetually full of holes with a few standouts.

Scorched earth isn't necessary in most circumstances, I agree. It's simply that, at current time, we have a really ungainly mix: a whole bunch of old players, paired with a group of younger ones who are three years from walking, paired with a farm system that is three years from bearing fruit. There is no overlap of any duration, no point at which all of those groupings will actually be productive at the same time. We need to line those things up, or it will be a series of false dawns and wasted talent. Scorched earth is thus the best option we have left available, because we pushed all of our chips in for a two-year run that is now over.


I agree the young talent has to peak at the same time for long term growth to happen, but I think that's possible. What is the ETA on Vlad and Bichette? 2020? By then, the trio of Stroman, Sanchez, and Osuna will either already be traded or on their last legs with the org. The thing with the Jays currently is that their top prospects are pretty much all clustered in the lower minors. Their most advanced top prospect is probably Alford, and he still looks a year away to me. If they made short term vet FA signings and trades without sacrificing the prospect base for the next two years, then they might have their prospects come up around the same time anyway. The overlap might be a year or two, which is nothing.

I think the Jays could organically 'bottom out' without actually trying to lose on purpose and still be able to create the team's next competitive window a few years from now. It won't be easy, and they can't afford another Rogers-forced "go for it" type of off-season, but Shapiro is not Beeston. If they happen to make a wild card or two during the transition to their next core group of guys, then great. If not, then they'll win 75 games again while trying to compete, and they will be forced to move players for prospects. In the mean time they will get top 10 picks and keep adding to the system. Either scenario works. They can accomplish both goals without sacrificing one for the other (build up the system and keep Rogers happy).

My point, there is more than one way to build this club, and they can avoid Rogers ruining the timeline if they do it right.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#338 » by Tanner » Wed Jul 26, 2017 12:32 pm

Skin Blues wrote:It's always funny to hear people arguing about who is at peak value. As if a random person on a message board can better tell that a player will improve or decline than entire front offices of potential trade partners. Everybody knows Donaldson is a superstar, he's not going to be valued as if he's a true talent .342 wOBA hitter, so we don't have to wait for him to get back up to a .375 wOBA to get full value for him. Waiting it out to trade him is a 50/50 proposition, as it is for basically everybody. Maybe he gains more trade value, maybe he stays in the funk and has less trade value. The longer we wait to trade anybody, the less we will get in expected return because there are less games for which the player can contribute for the new team. Some will make real improvements and improve their trade value (Smoak 2016 vs 2017), some will decline or get injured and lose their trade value (practically the entire rest of our MLB roster). The entire notion of buy low/sell high is nonsense, since nobody knows if a player's perceived value will increase or decrease.


Of course it is speculation, none of us know what teams are thinking, but we can make pretty reasonable guesses. Recency bias does exist. It can be mitigated by certain factors, like Quintana hasn't been as good this season but is young with an extremely team friendly contract that runs for up to 3 more seasons, so that combined with his track record made him extremely valuable. On the flip side, look at what Beltran was able to get last year (Tate) at age 39 while Bautista at 36 with the same months of control left probably couldn't get a sandwich in return for him. Teams will pay for recent performance, get turned off by bad recent performance, or some might ignore recent performance depending on other factors. We don't know. Just speculating. I don't think it's unreasonable to say that the Jays will get a good offer for JD right now, but not a great one based on how he's performing. They might get a good one next year too if his performance goes back up, but the offer going from good to great is what the hope should be.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#339 » by Skin Blues » Wed Jul 26, 2017 1:35 pm

Tanner wrote:I don't think it's unreasonable to say that the Jays will get a good offer for JD right now, but not a great one based on how he's performing. They might get a good one next year too if his performance goes back up, but the offer going from good to great is what the hope should be.

And if he keeps playing like this, with a sub-.350 wOBA, then we'll get less for him next year than we will now. So we don't know if his value is at a peak or a valley. If his perceived value remains unchanged going into next year and we keep him until the deadline (hits around .375 wOBA and stays healthy), his trade value will have declined pretty heavily since potential suitors would not be able to get a comp pick for him which is worth about $10M, nor will they get the 4 WAR that he produced in the first 2/3 of the season, which is worth another $40M. $50M worth of lost value, right there.

I really don't think most teams are guilty of recency bias as you make it out to be, either. There might be some, but there are also some teams who don't give enough importance to most recent data and they are liable to overpay for a player on a decline. Look what the Astros gave up for Carlos Gomez in 2015; Domingo Santana, Josh Hader, and Brett Phillips. They assumed Gomez would improve to his pre-2016 self, and he actually declined even further to the point they they released him a year later after paying him $11M for contributing 0.6 WAR. So, that door swings both ways. It's much harder than people realize, if not impossible, to know when a player's value is at it's peak. But it's easy to see how much trade value is lost as time passes. For Donaldson and Smoak, they lose trade value every day they remain on a team that doesn't intend to compete. Now, if we intend to compete in 2018 then it makes a bit more sense to keep those two. But the trade value is still lost.
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Re: What does a Jays firesale look like? 

Post#340 » by anj » Wed Jul 26, 2017 3:16 pm

Liriano to the Royals?

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