The Case for the Blue Jays
At the beginning of the season, the Blue Jays were a clear playoff contender. In the American League, only Boston, Cleveland, and Houston had higher playoff odds than Toronto’s 52.1%. On June 1, those odds had dropped considerably, down to 36.3%, but were still near the top of the heap. The only other AL team that had passed them in those first two months of the season were the New York Yankees. Things improved briefly afterward, but then they took a turn south again. Let’s take a look:
That dark blue line on top represents the Blue Jays. Well, it’s on top for a portion of the graph on the left — the equivalent of a few weeks — before descending to roughly 25%, where it meets up with the rest of the pack. Now, Toronto’s no longer the top dog in the race for the second Wild Card, they’re just… dog.
All told, Toronto’s probability of qualifying for the postseason in any form has declined from 36.3% to 18.0%, including their loss yesterday in Detroit. In other words: not great.
But as Craig Edwards noted just over a month ago, there are quite a few American League clubs with a reasonable chance of claiming a Wild Card spot. Today, I’d like to focus on Toronto, specifically — and, in particular, why the odds might be in their favor.
No Strong Reason To Sell
Toronto doesn’t have a player who’s due to hit free agency after the season who’s also likely to bring back a sizable return. Some of their free agents to be — Darwin Barney, Chris Coghlan, Marco Estrada, J.P. Howell, Francisco Liriano, Miguel Montero, and Joe Smith — would fetch something of marginal value, but not the sort of package that’s going to kickstart a major rebuild.
Two of the club’s players, meanwhile — Russell Martin and Troy Tulowitzki — are well into their 30s and are signed to long-term contracts that will prevent a return of great substance. Tulowitzki might not even be tradeable at this point. As for Josh Donaldson, he would absolutely receive interest from many clubs. Given that he missed time this year and didn’t make the All-Star team, though, the Blue Jays wouldn’t exactly be selling high on him. The better strategy may be to let him remind everyone of his true MVP form and move him in the offseason.
Offense Can’t Be Any Worse
If you look at the team leaderboards, you’ll see that the Blue Jays appear near the bottom in terms of Offense. Specifically, they place 24th, when you take out pitchers’ hitting. But much of that stems from their horrid April. In April, the team’s wRC+ was just 71. It hasn’t been as bad since — 114 in May, 91 in June, and 85 in July. Obviously there’s a downward trend there since May, but April is still dragging down their season numbers. Also, some of the players who haven’t been hitting are either not playing now (Coghlan, Luke Maile) or are localized to one position (like Barney and Ryan Goins at second base).
More importantly, the projections haven’t given up on them. Our depth charts still see Toronto as possessing the seventh-best offense the rest of the way. Looking at season-to-date wOBA vs. projected rest-of-season wOBA, all of the team’s regulars save Justin Smoak and Russell Martin are expected to post wOBAs 10 points or more higher the rest of the way.
Second Base Can Be Upgraded
The depth-chart projections also reveal that the Blue Jays are projected to derive 0.0 WAR from their second-base situation the rest of the way. Literally replacement level. Devon Travis is an impressive talent, but he is frequently hurt. In his place, Barney and Goins have been a terrifyingly terrible platoon. Enter Dee Gordon rumors. It’s hard to know what the cost would be for the Marlins’ second baseman, given the possibility that the Marlins will take less if the team to which they deal him agrees to eat a bunch/all of his contract. Toronto has shown a willingness to do just that in the past, and may do so again. It would create a headache for the team when Travis is healthy enough to return, but the bet is that Travis could work his way into the outfield mix to stay in the lineup.
Gordon makes sense because he would not only be an upgrade for the rest of this season (0.6 WAR), but he’s signed to a cheap, long-term contract. But there could be other keystone players on the market. It’s not hard to see the Padres trading Yangervis Solarte or the Phillies dealing Howie Kendrick. Perhaps if Neil Walker can get back on the field the Mets will deal him. There will be options. When your current players are literally replacement-level players, then most anyone represents an upgrade. The Blue Jays can upgrade, in other words, without breaking into the vault.
The Bullpen Is Fine
One of the reasons the Blue Jays can avoid the fire sale for another year is that they really don’t need to upgrade their bullpen. As Jeff wrote last week, Roberto Osuna has been just about perfect, and with Aaron Sanchez back in the rotation, Joe Biagini is transitioning back to the bullpen. He’s working low-leverage situations for now, but it probably won’t be long before he’s back in a setup role. This is good news for Toronto. Biagini’s season splits for start vs. relief look similar now because he was rocked in his second relief stint back just before the break, but from the beginning of the season until May 3rd (before he was put in the rotation), he posted a 3.38 ERA / 2.82 FIP / 3.18 xFIP, with a 58.3% ground-ball rate and 19.7-point strikeout- and walk-rate differential (K-BB%).
Biagin will join Osuna, Danny Barnes, Joe Smith (who is set to return this week), seasoned-lefty killer Aaron Loup and less-seasoned lefty killer Jeff Beliveau. It’s not a group filled with household names, but they’ve been getting the job done. All told, they’ve been the eighth-best unit in the game by WAR.
Teams that need to spend big at the trade deadline to improve their bullpen are often in a precarious spot. Why make a big push to add players who may not make a huge difference in the grand scheme of things to aid a playoff push that may only result in one extra game? This may be the case for teams like the Mariners and Rays, but it won’t be the case for Toronto.
Aaron Sanchez
Last season, the California native posted a 3.00 ERA, and his 3.9 WAR was the 17th best among all pitchers and eighth best in the AL. This season, he’s made just seven starts and tossed just 32 innings while dealing with right-middle-finger issues. But he’s back now, and in his second start back from the disabled list on Friday, he threw six innings of one-run ball against Detroit. By Game Score v 2.0, it was his second-best start of the season, with his best coming in his season debut back in April. A healthy Sanchez will make a big difference for a starting rotation that has held its own without him.
Not much has gone right for Toronto this season. They started out as one of the favorites and have slunk further and further back to the pack as the season has progressed. But they should start hitting better, they have one of their best starting pitchers back, and they have a good bullpen. Second base is a major black hole, but it can be upgraded without costing them their future. Things have looked better for the Blue Jays, but don’t count them out just yet.
Paul Swydan used to be the managing editor of The Hardball Times, a writer and editor for FanGraphs and a writer for Boston.com and The Boston Globe. Now, he owns The Silver Unicorn Bookstore, an independent bookstore in Acton, Mass. Follow him on Twitter @Swydan. Follow the store @SilUnicornActon.
Further, all the valuable pieces are here next year and most of the under performing guys are coming off the books. Bautista, estrada, carrera, Howell and liriano are making 50m$+. Better health and/or better luck next year and they can be a wild card contender.
Sure, but then there’s arb raises for Donaldson and Stroman, and Osuna, Sanchez, Pillar, and Travis all hit it for the first time and will make considerably more than the league minimum level salaries they currently have.
That will eat up a lot of that 50 mil, and then there’s still a lot of wins you have to buy to catch up with Boston, New York, and TB. And that’s just within the division.
Tear it down.
Building around “could be a wildcard contender” is the worst idea ever. Pretty much every team in baseball save a couple is in that position. So, maybe they could sneak in next year and the year after that? They’d lose Donaldson and Happ for nothing. You should not put off a rebuild for an outside shot at a wildcard.
Dee Gordon seems an interesting possibility, given that LF is also a bit of a hole. A platoon of Travis, Gordon, Pearce in 2B/LF could be serviceable.
I could be persuaded that a full teardown is the right move. If you trade all the non-Sanchez pitchers and Smoak now, and Donaldson in the offsesason, you might get a good jump start on a rebuild.
I could also be persuaded to go all in, either this year or next year. Put together an incredible team with lots of upgrades for next year and go for it in 2018. This team probably isn’t a serious contender without more talent, but there’s enough of a base here that you could add a couple of free agents and have a real contender.
I would not be persuaded to just sit tight and do nothing. This team is old and lots of key players are free agents in 2018. It’s time to either break up the band or go for it.
Getting Dee Gordon IS going all in. As the article pointed out, they don’t need starting rotation upgrades or bullpen fixes.
And Gordon is a long-term solution that the Jays can get for money alone, rumor has it. The cost of a rebuild is ticket sales plummet back down into the 20,000 range, whereas getting Gordon will keep those fans coming back, esp. if it works, and the team starts winning. So taking on Dee Gordon’s contract plus surrendering a C or D level prospect is basically free (provided Gordon can stay away from the PEDs… well, that might save the club some money, actually, but they need the dude on the field…)
Getting Tulo & Revere a few years ago triggered a massive winning streak, so maybe Gordon could do the same.
Getting a smart base-stealer, who distracts the pitcher and the defence, and not the hitter, would add incalculably to this team. Just look at how Betts drove Chapman nuts this weekend.
No, going for it means finding someone for second base (if Dee Gordon is free, great), another starting pitcher controlled through 2018 to go with Sanchez and Stroman at the front of the rotation, and getting someone who can actually move in left. If you can somehow steal guys on lousy contracts to fix those, great. If you are just getting Dee Gordon, you’re too far back to make up ground this year and you don’t have enough firepower for next year when everyone is a year older. That’s the sort of move you make to placate your fan base while you put off the hard decisions for later.
I would not say that getting rid of Steve Pearce in LF is a solution. It’s silly to talk about a tear down when there is very little talent to be had by doing so even if the Jays eat a lot of contract.
There is too little talent in the upper minors to trade if you want to ‘go for it’. We aren’t exactly going to get Syndergard for a Dalton Pompey and Rowdy Telez.
You plug in with players who can be had for money and hope the existing talent starts playing better.
Folks, the friggin Royals snuck into the playoffs with the last wild card and won the World Series. There were no HoF players on that team, to say the least. A partial starting rotation, great bullpen, some timely hitting.
The Royals actually won the division and had the second best record in baseball when they won the World Series. You are thinking of 2014 when they lost to the Giants in the WS as a wild card team.
(2014 was also a very unlikely run that I would not really bet on happening all that often but that is another conversation)
Forot to mention that the Royals didn’t really “sneak in” in 2014 either. They had the 3rd best record in the AL and were the first wild card. People forget that the Royals actually had a better record than the A’ s that year.
I would say getting rid of below-replacement players is what you absolutely should be doing.
The point is that if this team got Dee Gordon, they would barely be improving their chance of getting to the playoffs, much less improving their chance of winning in the playoffs. Right now the Blue Jays are “stuck in the middle” and an extra win or two doesn’t move the needle much. They have no shot this year, and things don’t look much better next year when the old guys are a year older and the Yankees and Red Sox’s core (and the Rays too, probably) are still in their primes. You either have to go for it or sell everyone who won’t be around in 2021 anyway. This “being in the middle” thing is for suckers.
Apparently you forget David Price who had a 9-1 through 11 starts with them.
Yeah, I agree with the not sitting tight thing, but I have a hard time thinking that they should push all in at this point, either. It’s hard to look at most of the guys on the roster and think they’ll be any better next year than they are this year (assuming also that they stay healthy), and I don’t see a lot of payroll room for the club to just take on lousy contracts.
I think that the team looks more like the Tigers from 2015 than the Yankees last year. The Tigers had a ~20% shot at making the playoffs, just like the Jays did, but they opted to punt, trading away David Price, Joakim Soria, and Yoenis Cespedes to re-tool and rebuild. At the time they had basically no useful prospects to trade away, and a few albatross contracts on the books that, for better or for worse, they’d be stuck with for a while. Trading those guys freed them up to make moves in the offseason and compete again in 2016.
To me this is what the Jays look like today, and it makes more sense to try to build up some prospect capital than it does to trade it away, or to just stand pat, either.
Makes good points. Jays would get very little for their crop of impending FAs and they can probably get solid returns for Donaldson and Happ over the winter if they chose. Therefore, despite their low playoff odds, the opportunity cost of plugging 2B and going for it this year, rather than selling, is almost non-existent.
Yo that graph needs labels badly
or other colors haha
I’m more concerned about the starting pitching. Stroman is the only consistent starter. Hitters have learned to sit on Estrada’s change-up, Liriano has not been effective, and Happ is inconsistent. Getting a healthy Sanchez back would be great, but I think they might need to acquire another starter along with a second baseman in order to make a run.