Blue Jays Discussion: Winter Discontent II: Discontent Harder

[Discoverer]

Hosmer may have just lost San Diego as a suitor with Dave Cameron going there.

That would make Dave Cameron they best signing of the offseason so far.

 

[Woodman19]

Weren't we continually on Bruce's no trade list? Chances are anything but a major over pay wasn't going to do it.

 

[Silver91]

Don't understand why some are falling so hard for Bruce. I'm guessing it's just a shit on Shapiro and Atkins thing more than actually thinking he'd be a good bet, considering his terrible age 27-29 seasons. I'm not going to bet on his age-30 season holding up as the new norm. And I also don't buy that he'd have come here for that cost anyway, so you're probably looking at at least $45/3, possibly even more to have the privilege to over pay him. If we're looking at the type of money, give it to Cain.

 

[GoonieFace]

With Bruce only being signed for 3 years and 39 million I think the Jays missed the boat. He is only getting paid 10 million this season. Sorry as much as everyone is set on Cain, I too would love to have the Jays sign him. But I think the Jays missed the boat on this. They should have offered him 10, 15, 15 with club option for 1o on a fourth. He definitely would have come.

They better end up signing Cain or acquiring Yelich or McClutchen. If not this was a very bad not signing regardless of what people like or dislike about Bruce.

Who's to say they didn't offer that. Maybe Bruce did not want to come here regardless. Either way, they better add at least 1 quality OF this offseason, plus another decent starting pitcher, or it will be a bit of a bummer

 

[BlueForever75]

Or they just didn't want him that badly, which would be a perfectly reasonable stance.

Only reasonable if they have something better in the works. If they lost out on a deal like this only to come up 2nd in any other FA or trades for OFer. They look very stupid. They only were after this guy for the past to calender years via trade. Now they have an opportunity to sign him to a below average cost especially for this upcoming season and they balk????

If they couldn't sign Bruce on the cheap I find it hard to believe any of the others are coming.

 

[BlueForever75]

Don't understand why some are falling so hard for Bruce. I'm guessing it's just a **** on Shapiro and Atkins thing more than actually thinking he'd be a good bet, considering his terrible age 27-29 seasons. I'm not going to bet on his age-30 season holding up as the new norm. And I also don't buy that he'd have come here for that cost anyway, so you're probably looking at at least $45/3, possibly even more to have the privilege to over pay him. If we're looking at the type of money, give it to Cain.

So 2 bad seasons in a 9 year career is not a good player??? His age 30 season as you put it were done consecutively at 29 and 30. And prior to his two down seasons you speak of, he had a run of 4 years at the same numbers as his 29/30 seasons that you aren't willing to bank on!!!!

I guess we should have given up on Bautista when he had that down year only to come back and produce two consecutive seasons at an elite level at age 34 and 35.

Sorry at that cost the Jays were absurd to not be in the running. Because as far as I can see, the Jays don't have an OF on their roster this season or this past season that can have the numbers Bruce has over the past 10 years.

 

[Discoverer]

Only reasonable if they have something better in the works. If they lost out on a deal like this only to come up 2nd in any other FA or trades for OFer. They look very stupid. They only were after this guy for the past to calender years via trade. Now they have an opportunity to sign him to a below average cost especially for this upcoming season and they balk????

If they couldn't sign Bruce on the cheap I find it hard to believe any of the others are coming.

Bruce just signed for exactly what MLBTR and Fangraphs predicted he would get. It's not a bargain.

 

[Nineteen67]

Or they just didn't want him that badly, which would be a perfectly reasonable stance.

I would hope they would have their sites on one or two targets and will only spend resources on those targets.

Adding Bruce would be counter productive to their goals.

 

[BlueForever75]

Bruce just signed for exactly what MLBTR and Fangraphs predicted he would get. It's not a bargain.

But we all stated that if that was the going rate we should have been in on him for that cost!!! Even if we had to overpay a little we should have done this. Cain isn't coming here, bank on that. So who do we get as an impact OF??? Cause the team desperately needs one.

 

[BlueForever75]

I would hope they would have their sites on one or two targets and will only spend resources on those targets.

Adding Bruce would be counter productive to their goals.

I hope everyone is right about this and I am wrong. But I see a Dyson type signing and that's it. And that isn't an impact move that they have been speaking about.

 

[zeke]

Cheap deal for power.

just like Kendrys.

 

[Discoverer]

But we all stated that if that was the going rate we should have been in on him for that cost!!! Even if we had to overpay a little we should have done this. Cain isn't coming here, bank on that. So who do we get as an impact OF??? Cause the team desperately needs one.

I mean... you posted this literally a week ago:

Lots will start happening and the Jays may be right in the middle of things. Its frustrating don't get me wrong, but when the rest of the league is really doing nothing as well!!! We just need to be patient. It will happen.

A week later, Jay Bruce signs, and that all goes out the window?

A lot people aren't high on Bruce. Apparently a lot of teams aren't all that high on him either.

 

[Nineteen67]

I hope everyone is right about this and I am wrong. But I see a Dyson type signing and that's it. And that isn't an impact move that they have been speaking about.

If they can’t sign a FA OF because of the the “Toronto factors”, then trade Donaldson for guys they can control and can contribute in a couple of years.

 

[Diamond Joe Quimby]

If the "Toronto Factors" are still a thing for a free agent in 2018, then the Blue Jays are probably best to avoid said free agent.

- "Turf hurts my legs; you guys have turf." You're a brittle outfielder that I should not be signing for multiple years
- "I have to go through customs, and stuff." You have to go through customs roughly once a week, to then sit on a private jet for a short flight. You're an idiot, and I don't feel comfortable investing money in you.
- "It's cold in Canada." The season is from April to September, and we play in a dome, jackass. Someone who is unaware of how the seasons work can not be trusted.
- "I won't get the same kind of endorsements I could in a large American city." The 90's called; they want their cliché back. Its 2018.

 

[Silver91]

So 2 bad seasons in a 9 year career is not a good player??? His age 30 season as you put it were done consecutively at 29 and 30. And prior to his two down seasons you speak of, he had a run of 4 years at the same numbers as his 29/30 seasons that you aren't willing to bank on!!!!

Huh? His age 27-29 seasons were all bad. And what does the bold even mean? Yeah, he had a 4 season run of being a great player, followed by a 3 season run of being a pretty bad one. If you want to place emphasis on his age 23-26 seasons and bet on him, good for you I guess? It's possible he keeps up his now outlier of a season, but I'm not willing to bet on it.

I guess we should have given up on Bautista when he had that down year only to come back and produce two consecutive seasons at an elite level at age 34 and 35.

Bautista Age 29: 6.4 fWAR
Bautista Age 30: 8.1 fWAR
Bautista Age 31: 2.9 fWAR (92 Games - 4.6 fWAR over a full season)
Bautista Age 32: 4.3 fWAR
Bautista Age 33: 6.3 fWAR
Bautista Age 34: 4.5 fWAR
Bautista Age 35: 1.4 fWAR
Bautista Age 36: -0.5 fWAR

From the time Bautista broke out, the first time he was worth less than Bruce's age-30 season came in his age-35 season. The only time he was worth less than Bruce's peak during his 27-29 seasons was during his age-36 season. You want to compare Apples to Cars, again, go ahead. Bautista and Bruce were nothing alike, and there's no indication Bruce is going to have a 4 win season this year.

Hell, I'd be quicker to compare Bruce to Andruw Jones, who came up at 18 and had >3WAR in his 19-year old season, and through his age-29 season was a consistent all-star. Once he hit 30, his play fell off the map, and yet I'd still bet his age 31-33 seasons were more productive than what Bruce's will be.

Sorry at that cost the Jays were absurd to not be in the running. Because as far as I can see, the Jays don't have an OF on their roster this season or this past season that can have the numbers Bruce has over the past 10 years.

Again, you can't look at his career on the whole. If you want to believe a 3 year period was an aberration, when that's almost half his career, then sure. But then we have Tulo and Russel on our roster, who have been superstars during their careers too, we shouldn't need to add anyone!

But we all stated that if that was the going rate we should have been in on him for that cost!!! Even if we had to overpay a little we should have done this. Cain isn't coming here, bank on that. So who do we get as an impact OF??? Cause the team desperately needs one.

I have seen far more posters saying no to Bruce than yes. If you think we need to overpay to bring in an OF, why settle for him and not overpay for Cain? If Cain isn't coming here, what makes you think Bruce wanted to? Why are there clouds? Get them out of my sky!

 

[hockeywiz542]

Heyman | Red Sox And JD Martinez Remain In Stalemate

In any case, word coming out of Miami is that Martinez, 30, believes it appropriate that he get a six-year deal. It isn’t known what kind of total dollars the Red Sox, Diamondbacks and maybe others are offering (the Jays also have been showing interest and met with Martinez at the Winter Meetings), but sources suggest that Martinez is seeking $30 million-plus annually — $200 million if he can get it but at least $180 million, following his boffo season, first in Detroit and then Arizona.

The interested teams are believed offering somewhere in the $120 million to $150 million range (yes, that’s a big range, but the offers to this point are unknown). So it’s believed he’s in the neighborhood of around $50 million short of the asking price at present. That sounds like a lot.

But Martinez’s willingness to wait is bolstered by the reality that there are multiple teams involved (Arizona’s involvement may have been underplayed to this point) at somewhat similar levels, and also the fact that there is no one comparable – at least when it comes to 2017 performance. Jay Bruce and Carlos Gonzalez have been productive offensive performers, but Martinez’s 2017 season was extraordinary while Bruce’s was just very good and CarGo’s uncharacteristically unproductive (at least until the final several weeks).

While Boston has been seen as the favorite, word is Martinez prefers to play the outfield rather than DH, which is one edge the D-backs may have, and they’ve hired his personal hitting coach, Robert Van Scoyoc, as the team’s hitting strategist.

 

[zeke]

Much was made of Morales' exit velocities when we signed him - that they showed he "deserved" to be a much better hitter and thus was likely to be even better for us than he was before. That didn't work out.

Interestingly, both of our current new adds have the opposite issue - both saw precipitous declines in exit velocity last year. (Blue Jays' recent infield deals don't come without risk) By the same logic, that would lead some to predict that their downturns were earned, and so we shouldn't expect any bounceback.

Me, I don't know what to think of the predictivity of exit velocity, but offhand i'm not sure it's been great so far. Should be interesting to see what happens in these cases this year.

 

[Discoverer]

Much was made of Morales' exit velocities when we signed him - that they showed he "deserved" to be a much better hitter and thus was likely to be even better for us than he was before. That didn't work out.

Interestingly, both of our current new adds have the opposite issue - both saw precipitous declines in exit velocity last year. (Blue Jays' recent infield deals don't come without risk) By the same logic, that would lead some to predict that their downturns were earned, and so we shouldn't expect any bounceback.

Me, I don't know what to think of the predictivity of exit velocity, but offhand i'm not sure it's been great so far. Should be interesting to see what happens in these cases this year.

How predictable batted ball information is vs. actual results will probably be a really interesting area of study over the next few years. Statcast data is still so new that it's hard to draw many conclusions beyond "hitting a ball harder is better".

 

[Diamond Joe Quimby]

The interesting thing about Morales is that his 2017 wasn't profoundly different than his 2016 in terms of the slash line, the exit velo, hard contact, the babip, etc.

The main issue was the ground balls (1.46 GB\FB ratio), which speaks more to launch angle than it does avg exit velo. Since you're essentially stuck with him, and the ability to make hard contact is still clearly there, it would be worth while for him to work with the same guy who worked with Byrd\Bruce\Murphy or JD Martinez's guy to shift the launch angle.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that it wouldn't surprise me if he produced a ~115 wRC+ this year. I can't imagine I can notice these things and the Blue Jays, or Morales himself, have not, and have not already taken action in the offseason to rectify it.

 

[TF97]

Miguel Gonzalez back to the White Sox on a 1/4.75M deal. Decent arm for the back end of a rotation.

 

[Discoverer]

The interesting thing about Morales is that his 2017 wasn't profoundly different than his 2016 in terms of the slash line, the exit velo, hard contact, the babip, etc.

The main issue was the ground balls (1.46 GB\FB ratio), which speaks more to launch angle than it does avg exit velo. Since you're essentially stuck with him, and the ability to make hard contact is still clearly there, it would be worth while for him to work with the same guy who worked with Byrd\Bruce\Murphy or JD Martinez's guy to shift the launch angle.

Or get Donaldson to teach him. It might make the extension more expensive, but it's a nice way of consolidating assets.

 

[theaub]

I'll say the same thing I said last year - one year and even two year exit velocity stats are useless to me (assuming there's a bigger sample size to be looked at). Very rare is the player who magically learns to hit the ball harder in the middle of his career.

In regards to Solarte specifically, I find it tough to believe that after 1500 PA's from 2014-2016 where he had a relatively consistent contact profile, he all of the sudden forgot how to hit the ball in 2017. Per the rolling exit velocity graphs it seems like he had a rough go of it in April/May last year (two lowest hard contact monthly % of his career), when he also had a surprising dip in pull % (37% and 29% respectively, which were the 2nd and 4th lowest totals for a month in his career). Then from June onwards the pull rate returned, and his hard hit % stayed up (still a bit higher soft contact % than normal but the overall velocities were near his career norm).

And the cause (at least in my opinion)? Solarte was on the Venezuelan WBC roster last year but hardly played, which meant that he went basically two weeks during spring training without any at-bats, and just as when someone gets hurt during the spring, its awful hard to catch up to everyone else who is getting consistent reps.

 

[Nineteen67]

If the "Toronto Factors" are still a thing for a free agent in 2018, then the Blue Jays are probably best to avoid said free agent.

- "Turf hurts my legs; you guys have turf." You're a brittle outfielder that I should not be signing for multiple years
- "I have to go through customs, and stuff." You have to go through customs roughly once a week, to then sit on a private jet for a short flight. You're an idiot, and I don't feel comfortable investing money in you.
- "It's cold in Canada." The season is from April to September, and we play in a dome, jackass. Someone who is unaware of how the seasons work can not be trusted.
- "I won't get the same kind of endorsements I could in a large American city." The 90's called; they want their cliché back. Its 2018.

You forgot:
Education - do you want your child to be educated in Canada or the US?
Health Care - I don’t know if they families have access to the Jays Primary care providers- if they don’t that’s a major concern ( it my number one reason for not moving back to Canada)
Taxes
Over crowded city.
TV
Languages

Then you get to the horrific stadium and the baseball stuff.

 

[BlueForever75]

The White Sox are signing players!!!! Wow this is getting nerve racking. The Jays have done well on trade front filling holes, but I don't get what is taking them this long to sign some FA? It doesn't make sense, unless they are in on the big boys (Martinez, Arrieta, Darvish, Cain, Lynn, Cobb) and are waiting the process out??? Its the only thing that can make any sense. Or else we would have signed some of the 2nd tier guys already.

 

[Diamond Joe Quimby]

You forgot:
Education - do you want your child to be educated in Canada or the US?
Health Care - I don’t know if they families have access to the Jays Primary care providers- if they don’t that’s a major concern ( it my number one reason for not moving back to Canada)
Taxes
Over crowded city.
TV
Languages

Then you get to the horrific stadium and the baseball stuff.

Education: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/education-full-list

Health Care: The World Health Organization's ranking of the world's health systems. FYI, Players are provided the same health care insurance provided to high level Rogers employees.

Taxes: MLB Opening Day: Tax Planning for Ballplayers

Overcrowded City: MLB metro areas with a higher population than Toronto: New York (x2), LA (x2), Chicago (x2), Dallas-FW (Arlington), Houston. MLB metro areas with similar population of Toronto: Washington, Philadelphia, Miami, Atlanta

TV: Its 2018.

Languages: ....

Again, if a given free agent is obtuse enough to allow any of those things to effect his decision making, I do not feel comfortable investing multi-million dollars into him. That would make him an imbecile, and would make me a fool for committing to him.