2021-22 Offseason Thread

[s e n s i]

UFA's

Semien
Ray
Matz
Dickerson
Dyson
Yates
Phelps
Soria

arb eligible

jansen
hernandez
guerrero jr.
berrios
stripling
cole
barnes
mayza
richards

getting info from: https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/toronto-blue-jays/yearly/payroll/

[The_Hater]

We better re-sign Dyson first. Priorities.

[Ado05]

I'm going to guess Hernandez gets extended. I think there were rumours they tried to get it done last offseason.

I wonder if they'd try to get Berrios done this offseason too.

[polo007]

[bluerap23]

Missing Grichuk

[polo007]

Watch on YouTube

EP 243 - SHI DAVIDI on the Toronto Blue Jays & the end of the baseball season.

October 8, 2021

With baseball over in Toronto, the guys bring in SHI DAVIDI to answer the question - What do the Toronto Blue Jays do now?

The three speculate on what off season moves the Jays need to make to close the gap between them and the division winning Tampa Bay Rays and ensure a playoff spot next year, not just compete for the Wild Card.

What positions need to be improved first? Who should the Blue Jays trade and can they bring back both Semien and Ray? Bob, John and Shi look for answers on todays episode of the Bob McCown Podcast

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[dagger]

MLB Trade Rumors posted this list of arb estimates which would take committed payroll to about $108m. Then add pre-arb salaries. I doubt they tender Barnes and Thornton. So maybe $106m plus pre-arbs.

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[JTT]

Spotrac has market value assessments for Ray and Semien. They seem a little low to me, but there are a lot of free agents at their positions this year

Ray 5/90

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/toronto-blue-jays/robbie-ray-14151/market-value/

Semien

4/78

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/toronto-blue-jays/marcus-semien-14066/market-value/

[Ado05]

Spotrac has market value assessments for Ray and Semien. They seem a little low to me, but there are a lot of free agents at their positions this year

Ray 5/90

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/toronto-blue-jays/robbie-ray-14151/market-value/

Semien

4/78

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/toronto-blue-jays/marcus-semien-14066/market-value/

Those are really low lol.

Both of them are getting well over 100 mill.

[Schad]

5/$90 doesn't seem impossible for Ray, given that he's a year removed from being sub-replacement-level. 4/$78 is low on Semien, though...I'd be surprised if he doesn't get 4/$90 or more.

[polo007]

Blue Jays offseason overview: Key dates, qualifying offers, club options and other decisions for the future - The Athletic

Free agents, club options and more

The World Series is scheduled from Oct. 26 to Nov. 3. The soonest it could end is Oct. 30. That’s important to know because the day after the final game of the World Series kicks off the start of the offseason. It goes as follows:

• The day after the World Series ends, trading can resume and free agency opens. But for the first five days, teams are restricted to negotiating only with their own free agents. This time frame is known as the quiet period.

• Also within five days of the World Series ending, teams and/or players decide on exercising contract options; teams will also need to decide whether they’re extending qualifying offers to any of their free agents.

• After that five-day window, players have 10 days to accept or decline QOs.

The Blue Jays don’t have any players with options for next season, so they don’t face any impending decisions there. But eight of their players will qualify for free agency, including Marcus Semien, Robbie Ray, Steven Matz, Corey Dickerson, Jarrod Dyson, Joakim Soria, David Phelps and Kirby Yates.

Of that group, Ray and Semien seem likely to receive QOs. A QO is a one-year deal valued at the average salary of MLB’s 125 highest-paid players. Ray and Semien are almost certainly going to decline those offers, since they’ll likely be seeking longer-term deals, but by extending those offers, the Blue Jays will receive a compensation draft pick(s) if Ray or Semien signs with another team.

Matz is also a candidate for a QO, but his situation is worth further discussion. Based on FanGraphs’ calculation, Matz’s 2.8 fWAR translates to $22.1 million, more than four times what he made in 2021 ($5.2 million). So, if Matz can repeat what he did in 2021 next year, he’s potentially worth more than what the QO amount is. (It hasn’t been determined yet, but it’s been about $17 million to $19 million the past three seasons.) The left-hander might also want more long-term security since next year will be his age-31 season. If the Blue Jays offered it and Matz accepted, they’d get good value on him if he did repeat his success. If he declined, the team protects itself by earning a draft pick if he signs elsewhere.

Atkins expressed interest in re-signing Ray, Semien and Matz, but after their excellent seasons, they’re expected to receive broad interest from several clubs. Money will talk, of course, and location plays a role too. But coming off their 91-win season, with guys like Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette and José Berríos on the roster, the Blue Jays can try to sell those players on returning to a club that looks poised to be a contender.

The other interesting name to watch is Dickerson. The outfielder was acquired midseason in a deal with the Miami Marlins and hit .282/.329/.450 in 46 games with the Blue Jays. As a left-handed hitter, he was a good complement to the team’s predominantly right-handed lineup. His defence in the outfield isn’t as strong as it used to be, with his throwing arm a noticeable weakness, but he can be a useful platoon partner for Randal Grichuk in the outfield and will be a name to watch for the Blue Jays, who are looking to diversify their offence with some left-handed bats ahead of next season.

[JaysRule15]

Midway through the season, I would've thought there was a 0% chance we'd extend a QO to Matz. Now I'm not so sure. He had a strong finish and might actually get some multi-year offers in FA. Which could make it tempting for our front office to extend a QO and get a pick out of it.

[Schad]

Midway through the season, I would've thought there was a 0% chance we'd extend a QO to Matz. Now I'm not so sure. He had a strong finish and might actually get some multi-year offers in FA. Which could make it tempting for our front office to extend a QO and get a pick out of it.

I don't think you QO Matz. He had a solid season, but nothing spectacular, and I'd expect that he'd take a 1 year, $18m-ish deal without a moment's hesitation. I'd be really surprised if he got more than 2 years/25m in FA in light of his past struggles, though admittedly free agency in general and FA pitching in particular has surprised me before.

[wamco]

No way on QO for matz. He’d take it in a second. Wouldn’t he have to sign a contract over like 50m for us to get a draft pick anyhow?

[JTT]

To my knowledge, all he would have to do is sign another offer after rejecting our qualifying offer and we would get a comp B pick, between the second and third rounds. However, the chance of another team losing a draft pick to sign Matz seems remote to me. I agree, he'd take the offer in a heartbeat. It would also remove him from ever having to worry about it again as you can only get qualified once.

[wamco]

I’d offer like 2/24 and see if he bites on that

[dagger]

Something to watch. The Pirates cut Gregory Palanco late in the season, the Jays picked him up on a minor league deal. Palanco had a fantastic end of season run with Buffalo. He's a fringe LH bat at this point, but a cheap option for Toronto. Not so cheap for Pittsburgh. I wonder if there is a play here that works for both teams... Jays eat some more of the money, get something for it from Cherrington.

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[Schad]

Fringe LH bat...you mean consistent starter against RHP?

[polo007]

Blue Jays president Mark Shapiro on building ‘championship-calibre team,’ future payroll, Rogers Centre renovation, more – The Athletic

On what the outlook for the payroll is in 2022 and beyond:

In each of the last two offseason debriefs with the media, Shapiro has discussed his expectation for the team’s payroll to increase, as they work to supplement the team’s young core with experienced players. While his meeting with Rogers ownership to discuss the offseason budget won’t occur for another month, Shapiro said he expects the club’s payroll to again increase in anticipation of next season.

“Every indication I’ve received, and I think every indication that we’ve been shown, which is a demonstration of consistent and strong support, along with us fulfilling our end of that bargain, which is demonstrating that the team continues to improve, and we continue to perform on the field, as well as front office and run the business side, leads me to believe that we will stay on plan and the payroll will continue to rise, despite the fact that we’re still lagging behind it a little bit in revenues due to uncontrollable circumstances,” Shapiro said.

During the 2021 season, the Blue Jays ran a payroll of about $136 million, per Roster Resource. Heading into next season, the Blue Jays have about $65 million committed to guaranteed contracts and another $50 million or so will be dedicated to arbitration and non-arbitration players, for an estimated total of $114 million as it stands now, leaving significant room to spend.

On the prospect of re-signing free agents Ray, Semien and Steven Matz:

All three players had excellent, bounce-back seasons after the 2020 season was unkind to them and have set themselves up well for free agency this year. Both Ray and Semien, in particular, look poised to be two of the most coveted free agents this offseason. And none of the three will come cheap.

Atkins has previously said the Blue Jays would be interested in bringing all three players back next season, and Shapiro commented on that possibility, too.

“We would love to sign all three of those guys back,” he said. “I can talk about each of them and how strongly we feel about them as teammates, as performers, as players and as people, and they’re guys that we’re going to go into the market and compete for, but I’m not a believer that you have to sign anyone back; I’m a believer that you have to get better."

“And as I sit down with Ross and sit in on our meetings of preparation, there are multiple ways for that to happen,” Shapiro continued. “We’ll have the resources to do it, both in young talent that we could trade, and in payroll, so I guess what I’d say is I’m confident, it may not be in the exact same shape and form, but we’re going to get better. We’ll find a way to do it.”

On balancing improving in the near-term with the need to sign internal players over the long-term

While the Blue Jays are determined to go out and spend this offseason to continue to improve, any deals they sign in the short term will have to be balanced against some of the moves the Blue Jays need to make in the long term, namely signing potential extensions for some of the current players, including Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, Teoscar Hernández and José Berríos.

Shapiro said that roster management is “a core part of the job that Ross and his entire group are going to be thinking about.”

“We’re never thinking about any move we make other than a one-year deal in isolation, we’re always thinking about, OK what will this mean for our younger players as they progress through the economic system? What will it mean for players coming off the books in the years ahead? And as we consider additions to the roster, that’s…exactly what we’ll be thinking about when we think about managing a roster, so that we don’t reach any inflection point where things are dictated to us or we still have the ability to make some decisions and have some flexibility and adjust to the things that we’re not certain of yet, that will certainly occur in the future.”

On the ways the team can improve the on-field product in 2022 and beyond

The Blue Jays will need to rebuild their rotation for 2022, replacing Ray and Matz, either by re-signing each or bringing in other equivalent starting pitchers who can fill those roles.

On the bullpen, Shapiro mentioned needing to add “experience and reliability” to that area of the roster. As for the lineup, the Blue Jays president echoed Atkins’ thoughts when he said the offence could benefit from some variety in both handedness — they were short on lefties in 2021 — and approach, namely, bringing in guys who are more patient to contrast with their many aggressive hitters.

“I would caution that just solving those problems will usually result in another set of problems coming up that we’re unaware of right now,” Shapiro added. “And there will be things that when you sit and talk to Ross in six months or eight months, there will be things that come up that we are not considering right now. So, some ability to adjust on the fly is really important, through either players in your system through trades, through some financial flexibility. There will be things that we have to do that we’re not expecting right now. But what we will do is continue to take the information that we have, the information that we can project, and continue to look to find ways to get better and that some of that will be through those things I mentioned.”

[polo007]

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Toronto Blue Jays President Mark Shapiro Full End Of Year Press Conference

October 18, 2021

SPORTSNET

Toronto Blue Jays President Mark Shapiro takes questions from the media after the team failed to make the playoffs.