Blue Jays Discussion: Vlad Jr wait/watch II: Watch Harder

Status
Not open for further replies.

Leafsfan74

Registered User
Jul 2, 2018
4,781
4,914
N


1) Your opinion...not shared by the majority of baseball...and you know it.
2) Not for a long time has he been even close to that.
3) He whined that if he didn't get his way (regardless of how he may have played) he'd sulk until he got what he wanted.
4) I'm gonna guess those 3...ok, maybe 4...people will get over it and will be easily replaced by real fans who come to see a talented, emerging superstar like Vlad. Not an old, overpaid broken down whiner who can't see the end of the road.
5) It wasn't going to matter if he wasn't good enough...if he wasn't handed the job, he was not going to be happy.
6) I like AA as well, but his big splashes were a) a disaster (Florida trade) and b) a last desperate attempt that did get us to the playoffs, but cost us a lot of farm capital. It was short term roll of the dice that ultimately worked...sort of. We didn't get back to the Series (the ultimate goal) and the 2016 team only got there through guts, not talent. And he was gone by that point anyway, leaving a tear down and rebuild as someone else's problems.
7) Again...your opinion and not even close to the truth.

Sorry.


Ask Donaldson or Adam Lind about how their injuries were dealt with. The Blue Jays simply don't have a great reputation, we never seem to have a player for their entire career and we've had some great players, we refuse to maximize their value beyond just their stats.

Where is our Derek Jeter or Cal Ripken? Once they hit an age, or we view them as not as valuable an asset, they are traded. There is some value to loyalty and in building a star. The Leafs are similar to a lesser degree and I would really like to see this change. Who will buy a Blue Jays jersey? Might as well switch to renting them. I have 5 of them hanging in my closet and none of the names on the back play here anymore. I understand you have to move players, but just two years ago we all thought Donaldson should retire a Blue Jay.

Consider, we didn't even offer Price a contract, this makes no sense to me. Maybe people forget, but Price just won a WS Ring and he really liked Toronto. He was a key part of that team and they really could have had another year or two if ownership were serious. I think the decision to grossly overpay for hockey rights, put alot of fear on the baseball side of operations.

For whatever reason, the Blue Jays don't have a clue about how to deal with players in 2018. Gibbons was great because he let players do their thing, he wasn't a micro manager, they are adults ffs, treat them as such. I just think they have a really bad reputation now, far different from the 1980's early 90's.
 
  • Like
Reactions: supermann_98

The Nemesis

Semper Tyrannus
Apr 11, 2005
87,979
31,214
Langley, BC
I have to say, I don't understand this situation. Blue Jays management is known to be some of the worst in baseball, their training staff even worse.

The industry has generally had a fair amount of praise for team management (excepting Scott Boras, but who cares, Boras would run down his own mother if it got his clients a few extra million or initiated some franchise making a knee-jerk reaction to spend). It's the fans that believe that they suck. The training staff issue is more questionable since it's hard to assess how much of injury problems comes from the trainers and how much comes from the players just getting hurt.

Also there has been training staff turnover in the last couple years and guys still got hurt. So that would seem to indicate that maybe it's not all the staff's fault?

He's an All-Star shortstop, you paid him big money, he should at least get a chance to earn his position as he went down with an injury. If after a couple of months, release him. It's the same outcome but at least you get to see if he would be able to produce or not. Asking him to move is premature when he lost so much time due to the injury. If he was not going to play, sit him out the year. It's a tougher situation if he absolutely wasn't going to come back, but he wasn't, let the insurance pay his contract then.

1) He's not an all-star shortstop. He wasn't for several years before the Jays acquired him. He's a broken shell of what he once was and is currently basically borderline unemployable at the MLB level if his defence slips even a little bit

2) The Jays didn't pay him big money. The Rockies did. The Jays simply decided that they'd rather pick up the Rockies' tab more than they wanted to hang onto Jose Reyes

3) He sucked well before the injuries. He hasn't been what people picture when you mention Troy Tulowitzki since 2014. 2013 if you want to consider that he played barely half a season in '14.

4) The team has more than enough 2B/SS/3B types on the 40-man, never mind the wave of guys coming up who can fill those roles. The younger players need a chance to prove themselves more than Tulo needs a chance to get back out there. Gurriel needs a full season of MLB development more than Tulo does. Travis needs one last chance to prove himself worthy of a starting gig more than Tulo does. Drury needs to find a place to play before and after Guerrero arrives more than Tulo does. These and playes who can come up from the system are more important to the team moving forward into its next competitive window than a degraded husk of once-upon-a-time All-Star Troy Tulowitzki.

5) They can't let insurance pay him out becuase he's probably healthy enough to play eventually, just not necessarily healthy enough to play well. He's going to be 35 by the end of next season, hasn't played an MLB game since July 2017, and hasn't played a reasonably full season since 2011. the best case scenario for him is probably a small but noticeable step backwards in his overall play on both sides of the ball. The more likely case is that he's going to show a noticeable lost step defensively (thereby tanking most of his remaining value) and his bat is going to continue its downward trend (as it was already mediocre-to-poor for his entire Blue Jays run)

What do the Jays get in return for letting him go?

They get:

1) a spot on the 40-man roster
2) no distraction from the issue of having the most expensive player on the roster probably riding the pine for stretches this season or being trotted out to start even if someone else deserves the job more because of some sunk cost BS.
3) Potentially some yearly monetary relief because while we know they're paying out the whole salary left on his deal, we don't know how. Maybe they pay it all out this year and are off the hook for 2020/21 seasons. Maybe they spread it out longer and don't have to fork out so much every season. Maybe they Bobby Bonilla'd him and we'll get something to laugh and joke about from now on.
4) The goodwill from giving Tulo a chance to find a team that wants him instead of sitting him at home and not playing because there's no room for him.

Do fans who bought his Jersey and who might like him want to come to the ballpark?

If there are hypothetical fans whose decision to watch/not watch the Jays is entirely based on whether Troy Tulowitzki is present, I would argue that perhaps they aren't fans worth caring about in the grand scheme of things. Not that what the fanbase wants is worth caring about in a management decision-making process anyway (becuase the goal of management is to achieve as much sustained winning as possible. Fans want wins. You don't make personnel decisions based on fanbase favoritism to players or the like unless it also aligns with "is this going to help my ballclub win now and/or in the future?" Fans make favorite players out of guys who do well and help them win games. You can have all the star players you want, but if the team has no hope and no future and sucks, players will turn on those fans. Fans were already turning on Jose Bautista before the bat flip heard round MLB. Fans turn on great players all the time because they can't singularly drive a team to success. And then they pick up the "not a winner" stigma and it gets held against them even though it's not even close to being entirely their fault.

Surely his replacement could DH or play another position and let Tulo succeed or fail at shortstop being this decision.

First, if there's one position more than 2B/SS/3B that the team has some issues with in terms of finding adequate playing time, it's DH. Morales is stuck at DH. Hernandez should possibly be a DH. Smoak will need some time at DH. Martin would probably get some DH work if he's still around. Lots of players need to be able to use the DH spot for a variety of reasons, so shoving Gurriel there to placate Tulowitzki doesn't seem tenable.

Second, shoving a 25-year-old, promising middle infielder who is likely to be a part of this team now and into the foreseeable future just so that they can give Tulo one last ride as a starter seems like poor management.

I like Anthopolous, I don't understand why they couldn't let him finish the job, he had the balls to make the big splash when it was needed and had back to back Final Fours. The players liked him and succeeded under him.

They were going to let him finish the job. He was offered a new contract as GM when his old one expired. He walked because he didn't like the idea that Shapiro as president wouldn't necessarily just let him do whatever he wanted. Like do the things that got us into this mess right now (becuase this is the price paid for those 2015 and 2016 playoff runs. Let's not pretend this would be any different if Anthopoulos was still here. Except that maybe we wouldn't have Guerrero/Bichette and others in the system to reinvigorate things over the next couple years because they would've been sold off to sustain a 2017 playoff run with a worse roster than what the team had in 15/16.)

We don't know if current management "has the balls to make the big splash" because the roster is not in a position where a big splash would do anything worthwhile.

But we do know they have the balls to cut a guy who has no place on the roster even if it means eating $38m in dead salary. So... they seem pretty ballsy?

Jays have poor ownership and the league knows it. Sorry.

Your whole thing was about management before, and now it's ownership? The ownership situation does suck. It sucks they're owned by a corporation that has to operate differently than a billionaire hobbyist owner. It sucks that they're owned by a media corporation that makes them take a bath on the biggest potential revenue stream (TV deal) in the name of corporate synergy. But nothing your really talked about was even about ownership. Well, except that apparently ownership was cool with lighting a giant pile of money on fire to make Tulo go away. So I guess Rogers isn't really as cheap as they tend to get made out as much of the time.
 

deletethis

Registered User
Mar 17, 2015
7,910
2,486
Toronto
I don't get why you'd ever release a player under these circumstances. There doesn't seem to be any monetary benefit to the team. The only thing this accomplishes is giving the guy an opportunity to play elsewhere this season. If I'm eating $38M from a petulant entitled jerk (it's actually $58M considering the 2018 no-show), I also want to make sure the career is dead too.
 

trellaine201

Registered User
Feb 10, 2010
19,678
2,698
Left coast
I don't get why you'd ever release a player under these circumstances. There doesn't seem to be any monetary benefit to the team. The only thing this accomplishes is giving the guy an opportunity to play elsewhere this season. If I'm eating $38M from a petulant entitled jerk (it's actually $58M considering the 2018 no-show), I also want to make sure the career is dead too.

Couldn’t agree more. Crazy to eat 38M and have him play on another team lol
 

deletethis

Registered User
Mar 17, 2015
7,910
2,486
Toronto
This is starting to feel like the Interbrew days of the late 1990's.

I just need to remember how grim things seemed in the spring of 2015 in Leafs' land.
 
  • Like
Reactions: supermann_98

Leafsfan74

Registered User
Jul 2, 2018
4,781
4,914
I don't get why you'd ever release a player under these circumstances. There doesn't seem to be any monetary benefit to the team. The only thing this accomplishes is giving the guy an opportunity to play elsewhere this season. If I'm eating $38M from a petulant entitled jerk (it's actually $58M considering the 2018 no-show), I also want to make sure the career is dead too.


I agree with your comment except for the last sentence. Being vengeful doesn't help anyone.

Trade him and eat MOST of the salary. I don't care if you have to eat 18 of the 20 million, get something back. If you can get back 5-6M for the length of his contract, do it. Someone should take a flier on him you would think if they don't have to pay much at all.
 

The Nemesis

Semper Tyrannus
Apr 11, 2005
87,979
31,214
Langley, BC
Ask Donaldson or Adam Lind about how their injuries were dealt with. The Blue Jays simply don't have a great reputation, we never seem to have a player for their entire career and we've had some great players, we refuse to maximize their value beyond just their stats.

Where is our Derek Jeter or Cal Ripken? Once they hit an age, or we view them as not as valuable an asset, they are traded. There is some value to loyalty and in building a star. The Leafs are similar to a lesser degree and I would really like to see this change. Who will buy a Blue Jays jersey? Might as well switch to renting them. I have 5 of them hanging in my closet and none of the names on the back play here anymore. I understand you have to move players, but just two years ago we all thought Donaldson should retire a Blue Jay.

Consider, we didn't even offer Price a contract, this makes no sense to me. Maybe people forget, but Price just won a WS Ring and he really liked Toronto. He was a key part of that team and they really could have had another year or two if ownership were serious. I think the decision to grossly overpay for hockey rights, put alot of fear on the baseball side of operations.

For whatever reason, the Blue Jays don't have a clue about how to deal with players in 2018. Gibbons was great because he let players do their thing, he wasn't a micro manager, they are adults ffs, treat them as such. I just think they have a really bad reputation now, far different from the 1980's early 90's.

A lot of this still relates to the post I just made replying to your earlier one but:

Adam Lind wasn't even treated by nearly the same trainers and medical staff that the team has now. You might as well hold Gord Ash responsible for how bad the team was last year if we're going to pretend Adam Lind is relevant to any current medical staff talk.

Again, you don't make decisions based on fanbase sentimentality. If a player can't continue to contribute to the success of the team to a meaningful degree and commensurate with their salary and other requirements, there's no point in keeping them around.

Price wasn't offered a contract because he wanted (and got) a stupid crazy amount of money that it made no sense for the Jays to pay. Had the Jays offered what they believed was a fair deal, they probably would've been mocked anyway for a "if you're not going to bother trying, why bother at all?" approach. David Price was the 4th highest paid player in all of MLB last year. If we're being generous, he was maybe a top 30 starting pitcher in MLB based on his performance. And no, I don't count "but the Red Sox won the world series" as value-added. Among qualified starters he was 25th in ERA, 16th in WHIP, 21st in opponents' batting average, and generally worse when it came to fielding-independent measures (in other words, he was probably propped up a bit by the Red Sox D). The team admitted that they decided that the cost of David Price didn't fit into what the team needed moving forward, so they went in another direction. And history would seem to show that to be correct becuase David Price was not getting this squad back to the playoffs in 2017 or 2018. Partially because one player doens't make that big of a difference, and partially because the image of what David Price based on his history doesn't jive with what David Price is now on the baseball diamond. World Series win or not.

And how are the Blue Jays not treating players like adults? Coddling Tulo and letting him continue to work when he doesn't deserve it is what you do with kids. In the real world if you can't do your job, you get replaced. Also we have no idea what Charlie Montoyo will do in terms of "micromanagement" so trying to hold up an idea that the loss of Gibby is going to screw the players over is hasty and baseless.

A lot of your points are full of assumptions and speculations that you can't possibly prove enough to rely on. It makes it hard to really have a firm case for any of them being correct.

Also the team got "respect" in the 80s and ealry 90s because they won. The team isn't getting "respect" now because they aren't winning. It has less to do with public perceptions of management/ownership/players being on point than it does with teh fact that a sucecssful club breeds a shift in views. A loudmouthed malcontent who wins becomes a "spirited competitor who pushes his teammates to be their best". A sullen loner who wins becomes a "focused, intense professional who tunes out distractions". Whatever moves a manager makes become the right ones when you win. Whatever trades the front office makes are the right ones when you win. And whatever support ownership provides is valuable and in good faith when you win. The view of the organization is almost entirely context-driven because winning absolves everyone of their sins just like losing dismisses all smaller-scale successes.
 

The Nemesis

Semper Tyrannus
Apr 11, 2005
87,979
31,214
Langley, BC
I agree with your comment except for the last sentence. Being vengeful doesn't help anyone.

Trade him and eat MOST of the salary. I don't care if you have to eat 18 of the 20 million, get something back. If you can get back 5-6M for the length of his contract, do it. Someone should take a flier on him you would think if they don't have to pay much at all.

If teams know the Jays have no recourse but to either trade him for free or cut him, they have no impetus to offer anything of substance to the Jays in trade talks. Why offer to pay some of the salary or send back any player of consequence if they can just sit on their hands until there's an opporutnity to pick him up off the FA wire for a minimum salary? No team is going to pay $2m and a prospect or $5m and no other prospects AND be on the hook for his 2020/2021 salaries (in whole or in part) if they can wait out the Jays and get him for (for instance) 1 year at $1m with no strings attached.
 

zeke

The Dube Abides
Mar 14, 2005
66,937
36,957
This is starting to feel like the Interbrew days of the late 1990's.

I just need to remember how grim things seemed in the spring of 2015 in Leafs' land.

interbrew days were fantastic compared to these interminable rogers decades.

interbrew spent money and tried to win. Those teams were fun as hell. we signed Roger Clemens for chrissakes.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Leafsfan74

rojac

HFBoards Sponsor
Sponsor
Apr 5, 2007
12,952
2,808
Waterloo, ON
I agree with your comment except for the last sentence. Being vengeful doesn't help anyone.

Trade him and eat MOST of the salary. I don't care if you have to eat 18 of the 20 million, get something back. If you can get back 5-6M for the length of his contract, do it. Someone should take a flier on him you would think if they don't have to pay much at all.

I suspect they tried to trade him and nobody wanted him.
 

Anthrax442

Registered User
Aug 4, 2008
15,309
7,524
Toronto
www.russianroulette.ca
This was the right move to make, Tulowitzki and his .250/.313/.414 batting line as a Blue Jay was not cutting it. Combine that with the drama that would ensue in Spring Training when Gurriel (or someone else) wins the starting shortstop position over Tulowitzki. The release works for both sides - Toronto gets the roster flexibility mentioned by Atkins and avoids the potential headache that would be Spring Training and then Tulowitzki gets the opportunity to prove he can still be an impact player on a new team that will likely have more of an opportunity for him. Combined with the fact that he will only require a league-minimum salary, I am sure that Tulowitzki will have multiple opportunities available to him.

I wanted nothing more than for Tulowitzki to get healthy and be an impact player again, but as Atkins said, I do not think it is likely. It is unfortunate to see a player of his caliber have his body break down, I wish him nothing but the best going forward. On another note, given that Diaz and now Tulowitzki have been moved out, combined with the human question mark that is Devon Travis, it could be a good time to take advantage of the crowded free agent infield market - especially at second base.

As for the Tulowitzki jersey that is currently hanging in my closet, I think it is an appropriate time to take a long look into the mirror and question my purchasing decisions.

EDIT:



So much for going home if he isn't a shortstop.




What a rat. Thanks Antitorontopus
 

zeke

The Dube Abides
Mar 14, 2005
66,937
36,957
You mean Clemens picked the Jays to spite the Sox, then conveniently got sent to the Yankees to win a couple of chips.

Interbrew suckedddddd

interbrew inherited a worse team and had a better record than rogers, and they actually signed big free agents on the reg.

way, way better than this 2 decades of rogers small market BS.
 

Eyedea

The Legend Continues
Jan 29, 2012
27,407
3,234
Toronto, Ontario
interbrew inherited a worse team and had a better record than rogers, and they actually signed big free agents on the reg.

way, way better than this 2 decades of rogers small market BS.

Say what now lol? Interbrew spent, shed, spent, shed, because they treated the Jays as a business just like Rogers does. They wanted to make money, they didn't, so they sold extremely low and Rogers bought in. The way the Jays were trending was very bad and we could've been in the same state as the Expos.
 

Discoverer

Registered User
Apr 11, 2012
10,760
5,910
interbrew inherited a worse team and had a better record than rogers, and they actually signed big free agents on the reg.

way, way better than this 2 decades of rogers small market BS.

1998 - 19th
1999 - 14th
2000 - 24th

I can't find payroll data for 1996-97, but those are your "big market" payroll rankings for the last three Interbrew years.
 
  • Like
Reactions: JustAShadow

TheMadHatTrick

Registered User
Nov 2, 2008
6,631
2,676
Since we're largely not competing this year I hope we target some post hype players or prospects that we can afford to give an opportunity to develop or bounce back.

Grichuk and Smoak have fit that category in the past. I think Drury might qualify as one this year.

I wonder if they'll give Pompey an opportunity. I still think he has major league talent and potential if he could ever stay healthy.

Any post hype prospects you guys see out there? Maybe Buxton? Michael Taylor? Any pitchers?

I kind of wanted to sign Gabriel Guerrero but not sure he's really better than Hernandez.
 

canucksfan

Registered User
Mar 16, 2002
43,788
9,433
British Columbia
Visit site
I am surprised they released him. Smart move. He obviously didn't lie being in Toronto and could be a locker problem. In 2017 he had 0.1 WAR. I can't see him doing much better than that coming back from a big injury and two years older.
 

Dr.Funk

Registered User
Jul 2, 2004
19,667
2,372
MLB.com's Mark Feinsand reports that the White Sox, Astros, Yankees, Reds, Rangers, and Blue Jays have shown interest in free agent starter Lance Lynn.
 

thehockeysong

Registered User
Nov 1, 2009
1,373
369
I have to say, I don't understand this situation. Blue Jays management is known to be some of the worst in baseball, their training staff even worse.

He's an All-Star shortstop, you paid him big money, he should at least get a chance to earn his position as he went down with an injury. If after a couple of months, release him. It's the same outcome but at least you get to see if he would be able to produce or not. Asking him to move is premature when he lost so much time due to the injury. If he was not going to play, sit him out the year. It's a tougher situation if he absolutely wasn't going to come back, but he wasn't, let the insurance pay his contract then.

What do the Jays get in return for letting him go? Do fans who bought his Jersey and who might like him want to come to the ballpark? Surely his replacement could DH or play another position and let Tulo succeed or fail at shortstop being this decision.

I like Anthopolous, I don't understand why they couldn't let him finish the job, he had the balls to make the big splash when it was needed and had back to back Final Fours. The players liked him and succeeded under him.

Jays have poor ownership and the league knows it. Sorry.

Nem had a really well thought out (and actually defended with fact) post in reply to this. I hope you invest some time in responding to him, least you can do in response.
 

dredeye

BJ Elitist/Hipster
Mar 3, 2008
27,063
2,760
I believe any team can now sign Tulo for league minimum which comes out of what the jays owe Tulo. I believe Tulo just keeps receiving the same salary for the next two seasons. It’s not a buyout.
 

trellaine201

Registered User
Feb 10, 2010
19,678
2,698
Left coast
Can u buyout in MLB? If so, why wouldn’t they ave worked a deal to pay him less and then let him go? Otherwise let him rot on the bench.
 

dredeye

BJ Elitist/Hipster
Mar 3, 2008
27,063
2,760
The dodgers are actively trying to trade Puig. If it didn’t cost much I’d be happy to grab him as a moveable asset later.
 

dredeye

BJ Elitist/Hipster
Mar 3, 2008
27,063
2,760
Can u buyout in MLB? If so, why wouldn’t they ave worked a deal to pay him less and then let him go? Otherwise let him rot on the bench.
I don’t think you can. I think you just release them and maybe save the league minimum. You don’t “let him rot” because you create an unneccessary distraction. It also opens up a spot on the 40 to either add or protect another player
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad

Ad

-->