The Shapiro & Rogers Megathread

[polo007]

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It’s good to see that the Jays’ shrilly promoted “high-performance department” is paying early dividends.

For now, the Jays are calling Happ’s injury “left elbow soreness.” He’ll get an MRI on Monday.

It’s the sort of thing that often starts off “a little concerning,” and then ends in a surprise e-mail from the club’s PR department telling you so-and-so has just had successful reconstructive surgery.

Last year’s grind into the playoffs was down to several factors, but the most important of them was healthy pitching. Put aside the Jays’ current record and statistical wretchedness. If Sanchez and Happ are laid up for any length of time, you can forget about 2017.

When you lose 10 of 12 in June, you can take comfort in the law of averages and tunnel your way out of it. But when it starts out this miserably, a tone is set for an entire year.

So far, this is the year the Blue Jays begin coming apart.

It was obvious that team president Mark Shapiro and GM Ross Atkins wanted to start that process this off-season. They talked up getting younger, bulking up the farm system, and very clearly wanted rid of Edwin Encarnacion and Jose Bautista.

When the fans revolted, they got cold feet, made up with Bautista and reaffirmed their faith in the current core. This ‘no changes required’ approach made fans happy, while allowing Shapiro and Atkins to invest nothing extra in the team. They can still blow it up any time.

This result of this neither/nor-ism was a wafer-thin roster, one or two injuries from disaster. On Sunday, disaster walked through the door and hung up its coat. It may be staying a while.

We don’t know how long Sanchez, Happ or Donaldson will be gone, but it’s already too long if the goal is the division. The Jays can’t grind their way out of this. To make the playoffs, Toronto will probably need to play something like .580 baseball the rest of the way. The last time the Jays did that was 25 years ago.

Mathematically, I suppose it’s possible. Certainly, stranger things have happened.

But is it likely any more? No.

[JaysRule15]

I bet a vulture like Kelly is just loving this. Gives him plenty to write about.

[Fairview4Life]

I'm a little confused as to what the difference is between letting Bautista walk and trying to trade guys in the summer, if we're going to tear down. A single pick, maybe, but Jose came back on a discount anyway. I can't see why we'd get more for guys 3 months ago as opposed to 3 months from now. It's not like we're currently on some kind of evil treadmill. We're losing a whole bunch of games.

[polo007]

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On Jose Bautista’s 2017 upside

“Believe it or not, our analytics had Jose as the player with the largest upside on our team this year of all our players, which means we don’t have a lot of young players on the team, but it also means analytically that at his age, 36, 37, they felt he was going to be a lot better than last year based on the history of his career.”

On the possibility of early-career extensions for Blue Jays players

“Those deals have to be wanted as badly by the player as they are by the club. They’re all about sharing risk. It’s understanding that, as a team, you’re committing guaranteed dollars regardless of injury or dip in performance and you’re committing to the person and the player for a very long period of time.

“Not every player wants to do that and sometimes you can’t find that sweet spot where what you both give up is comfortable. It should be a little bit painful for both sides, you’re both on the verge of being uncomfortable.

“Those deals are worth exploring. Much more challenging with a pitcher than a position player.”

“We’ve got enough resources here that if going year-to-year is something that’s more comfortable for a player, then so be it. We can still root for that player to perform. Like we said about Aaron Sanchez and all of our guys, we want to pay them a ton. I’d love for these guys to go off and for us to be committed to paying the absolute highest dollar amount in arbitration. That would be a great thing.”

[polo007]

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So the Toronto Blue Jays are in an offensive rut. It happens.

No need to panic – I’m looking at you, Pedro Martinez. Heck, there’s no need even to suggest that Jays fans think about panicking when the team has struggled for all of five per cent of their games. All you’re doing when you spout stuff like “Panic!” is giving fair-weather fans a reason to toxify the web with their sky-is-falling whining. It ruins the game for everyone, darn it!

Oh, wait. The Jays are in an offensive rut, and Josh Donaldson (their best hitter) is hurt, Aaron Sanchez (their would-be Cy Young contender) is on the 10-day disabled list, and J.A. Happ (their 20-win lefty) might have injured his elbow on Sunday.

But wait, there’s more!

Jose Bautista is still hitting well below the Mendoza Line and has all of one RBI to his name, with no home runs. In fact, Russell Martin, Devon Travis and Bautista share three RBIs and zero home runs between them. That’s three RBIs in 113 at-bats, and two of them belong to Travis. To put that in perspective, San Francisco’s Madison Bumgarner has two RBIs and two homers in seven at-bats, and he’s a pitcher!

Overall, the Jays currently have the worst batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage, and runs-scored total in baseball.

Basically, what I’m saying is: NOW you can panic.

[vaff87]

I bet a vulture like Kelly is just loving this. Gives him plenty to write about.

When's Steve Simmons going to chime in? Need a good hot dog vendor/casino story.

[polo007]

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It won't be Shapiro's first "re-envisioning." During his time as the Cleveland Indians' president, he led the retrofit of Progressive Field.

That renovation included a reduction in seating capacity, more bars and restaurants and a pedestrian bridge that allows people outside the ballpark to catch a glimpse inside.

Shapiro acknowledges the Rogers Centre presents unique challenges.

"[It's] a multi-purpose stadium designed in a different era for a variety of alternatives and at a time when people consumed both media and sports differently," he said.

A renovated Rogers Centre would better meet the demands of the modern fan, Shapiro said.

"It would be a ballpark, and by a ballpark I mean it would have character, it would provide different experience for different types of fans that come for very different reasons to the ballpark."

Just a bit outside

Last year, the Blue Jays and Rogers Communications, which owns the team, put a call out for architectural and design firms to submit their best ideas for revamping the stadium. The team has selected a firm, but it hasn't been made public and no early renderings revealing how this project might take shape have been made available.

The Blue Jays also haven't confirmed how much they'll spend on the project, but initial figures suggest something in the $250-400 million range.

Toronto architect Mark Berest — a principal at B+H Architects who has worked on several stadium projects, including Regina's Mosaic Stadium — knows what he would do with the Rogers Centre.

Berest would start by "invigorating" the space outside the stadium, "bringing more retail, more parkland, more development… making connections to other public spaces, maybe even to [nearby Lake Ontario]."

[Schad]

At the risk of sounding like I'm saying something nice about Rogers: can I just say how **** novel it is to see an article in professional sports about a nine-figure renovation that doesn't include the words "public money", "referendum" or "bond issue"?

[Raider917]

how long did it take Shapiro to turn things around in Cleveland?

[Schad]

how long did it take Shapiro to turn things around in Cleveland?

Hard question to answer. He took over after the 2001 season, which was the last in their long span of dominating the AL Central. That team was even older than ours...at 28, Einar Diaz was the only guy in their top 9 in PAs under 30. Within two years, they had the second-youngest position player grouping in baseball, and the third-youngest pitching staff, in compliance with the owner's demand that they reduce payroll. By 2005 they were good...they just happened to make the mistake of being good in a season where four teams in the AL won 95+, and they missed the playoffs. In 2007 they were division winners despite a low payroll, knocked off the Yankees, and then were within a game of the Series before completely collapsing. So, for the first iteration it took four seasons to transform them from a team of old, expensive sluggers into a younger grouping that could compete at a high level, and six to reach the point where they could contend.

The second iteration came when they blew that playoff team up in 2008. They proceeded to suck for four years, and haven't been below .500 since.

What should be heartening is that they weren't strictly a draft-and-development team (which is good, because their drafting was pretty damned bad in the aughts, which may have been exacerbated by a lack of resources)...they did extremely well when they had to trade off their vets. The trades they made in 2008 shaped a good part of their core now...they got Carlos Santana, Michael Brantley and Carlos Carrasco in deals around the deadline. Got Corey Kluber at the deadline in 2010. Acquired Bauer for Shin-Soo Choo, who was due to be a free agent after the following season. If you assume that our scouting staff is better than what Cleveland had, that combination bodes pretty well for a rebuild that will start with a wave of trades.

[Raider917]

has he said anything about a plan for the future? when they didnt re-sign or replace encarnacion, it looks like he isnt happy with this team. Hopefully it wasnt because of Rogers unwillingness to spend but maybe he is waiting for next winter to spend big money on a big crop of available players.

[Fairview4Life]

At the risk of sounding like I'm saying something nice about Rogers: can I just say how **** novel it is to see an article in professional sports about a nine-figure renovation that doesn't include the words "public money", "referendum" or "bond issue"?

The good people of Dunedin weep.

[-MetA4-]

Hopefully it wasnt because of Rogers unwillingness to spend but maybe he is waiting for next winter to spend big money on a big crop of available players.

A) It was his own decision. Shapiro basically wrote the playbook on why it is a bad idea to sign aging players to big deals.

B) Does this team look like its in a position wherein "spending big money" on free agents is a worthwhile endeavor? Free agency should only ever be used to add finishing touches to a competing roster, because you are almost always paying market value on the past performance of players who are usually already around ~30 or over, ie: the contract almost always ends up looking bad. You should never ever attempt to use free agency to build your team. What does this have to do with us? We're a team that obviously needs to rebuild and replace way too many pieces for free agency to even mean anything. Cool, you're going to spend big money on a few players and probably still miss the playoffs. Not smart.

[Schad]

Hopefully it wasnt because of Rogers unwillingness to spend but maybe he is waiting for next winter to spend big money on a big crop of available players.

A) It was his own decision. Shapiro basically wrote the playbook on why it is a bad idea to sign aging players to big deals.

B) Does this team look like its in a position wherein "spending big money" on free agents is a worthwhile endeavor? Free agency should only ever be used to add finishing touches to a competing roster, because you are almost always paying market value on the past performance of players who are usually already around ~30 or over, ie: the contract almost always ends up looking bad. You should never ever attempt to use free agency to build your team. What does this have to do with us? We're a team that obviously needs to rebuild and replace way too many pieces for free agency to even mean anything. Cool, you're going to spend big money on a few players and probably still miss the playoffs. Not smart.

Put another way: we're 5-13 with a $163m opening day payroll. Even our expected win-loss, which is a little kinder, pegs us for a .348 winning percentage. If we replaced our two worst players thus far (Pearce and Travis) with two 5 fWAR players at $25m apiece (a bargain!) we would be...still well below .500. With a payroll north of $200m. Not worth it.

[C Court]

The Jays crappy record doesn't really bother me, because it likely accelerates a rebuild or proper build. Shapiro now knows that this team won't be in the playoff chase by adding another piece here or there.

While I didn't like AA's 'all-in' deals at the time, there is no denying that Alex completely reinvigorated the Jays fan base and gave Toronto/Canada two great playoff runs.

That said, our aging expensive roster is never going to compete with the new Red Sox or Yankees or even the Indians, who all have a solid young homegrown nucleus to build on.

So let's take a step back and start re-stocking the farm. Adding more old free agents and trading prospects isn't sustainable.

Major thanks to Alex for the past two seasons, but its time to move into rebuild mode. Shapiro did it well in Cleveland and he can do it again in Toronto.

[Schad]

Yeah, looking forward, the biggest bonus from the past two seasons is the knowledge that, whether it takes us a year or five to build the team back up, the fans will come back out and viewership will skyrocket. We can afford to be patient and do it right, but we can also afford to jack payroll up into the second tier of spenders when the time comes.

[So_Fresh]

Get ready for a price hike on your cable and other services from Rogers, after fans don't go to the games and viewership plummets for the next 3-5 years.

[polo007]

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[Payroll416]

I know its an old thread but letting solid people like AA, Josh Thole and B.J. Upton walk were clear signs that they didn't have a clue. It threw the whole team chemistry off. You need guys who want to win no matter the numbers.

[Fairview4Life]

I know its an old thread but letting solid people like AA, Josh Thole and B.J. Upton walk were clear signs that they didn't have a clue. It threw the whole team chemistry off. You need guys who want to win no matter the numbers.