Monday, December 5, 2016

News and views in Blue Jay Land


Editor's note: RADAR wrote this for Friday but I deferred it to today. Any dated info is my fault.


It seems that there was a meeting, between the brain trust of the Blue Jays and the local media. Which provided some insights into the direction the Jays may be taking in the future. Scheduled ahead of the winter meetings and shortened by an MLB conference call to update Shapiro and Atkins on the new CBA.



Highlights are.
  • It seems to more than one writer at the meetings that Edwin isn't in the plans going forward. quotes from Atkins about Morales and EE
    "Yeah, two guys that do similar things is less than ideal for a team and money has been spent. So it doesn’t make it impossible, but it certainly made it less likely. We realized that the day we made the move. We talked to Edwin about that as well.” 
                  and
“We feel with Morales here we’re in a good position to stay aggressive on the players that we feel are closer to ideal fits,” Atkins said. “Because Morales is here, we also feel we will be in a position to be more opportunistic later in the off-season.”
               Chisholm thinks there may be a certain amount of gamesmanship involved with the Atkins quote,but with other players available and the concern about how long EE will be able to play in the field.
  • I asked at PitchTalks if Donaldson was going to require surgery in the off season. I was told that he wouldn't and Griffin confirms this in his article. In fact he is already working with the high performance department mending his ailing body.
  • Chisholm asked Atkins about the move to sign Morales so quickly when the Edwin situation was unresolved?
"Character, contributions, excited about what [Morales] could mean for our clubhouse," Atkins said when asked that type of question. "Excited about what he could mean in this ballpark. We feel like there's upside to him. He has been in a larger ballpark the last two teams he was with and then, we like the deal."
  • Shapiro and Atkins have been impressed with Gibby and his handling of this group of players.   
  • Davidi thinks that EE's market value may not emerge until Beltran signs.

With an outfield of  Pillar, Upton and Carrera still under control, it seems that Blue Jays management is waiting to see how the market will play, with the new CBA in effect. Stoeten talks about Fowler and his demands but I do wonder if Grffin was on to something when he said, that Gurriel will be playing left field for the Jays by June.

One guy not mentioned anywhere is Bautista. There are some that think he might consider taking a one year deal, both to re-stablish his value and to take advantage of the changes in the qualifying offer compensation next year. To me, it'd be a risky proposition. First, he could have a worse year. Second, he'd be a year older and get less term. Third, more than a few teams that are waiting for the following years FA pool and be saving their cake for it.

It's all leading up to what should be a robust winter meetings session.