The comparison is no trade assets or prospects.
2025 Blue Jays
- Thread starter Arn
- Start date
Andy007
Active member
I'm personally very meh, if not somewhat ignorant about this deal, but here's a long writeup from Ben Clemens on fangraphs (he loves this trade for Toronto)
blogs.fangraphs.com
Author: Ben Clemens
Ben is a writer at FanGraphs. He can be found on Twitter @_Ben_Clemens.
Peter D.
Moderator
Don't care who they acquire and sign. If they don't sign Vladdy to a long-term contract this off-season, then it was a complete failure.
Shapiro and Atkins should be fired on the spot if they head into spring training with Vladdy entering his last year of his contract and almost assuredly at that point walking into free agency.
IJustLurkHere
Member
What would you have been happy to sign Vlad to this time last year? If at anytime before June they'd handed Vladdy anything north of $25/30M/yr, the Jays would have worn a lot of criticism, and that was the old superstar price. Once Vladdy was convincingly back in superstar mode, waiting for Soto to reset the market seems pretty standard.
I don't think it's a surprise that we've landed here.
IJustLurkHere
Member
Horwitz numbers against righties are terrific (.864 OPS in a reasonable number of AB), but he didn't hit lefties at all. It's a funny one, feels like a video game trade where we got the guy with a better overall, but didn't bother to look at the details. I'm happy to accept that Gimenez is a guy whose - genuinely elite - glove will genuinely add value even if his bat doesn't come around (and he does have a history to give some hope. We're buying low o a guy with a career OPS+ >100, and 2 years removed from a > .800 OPS season), but you can't win games if you don't score runs, and the AL East isn't typically where you come to rehabilitate your hitting problems.
Part of me is surprised we were able to get Gimenez for Horwitz (salary comes into it too...). If Giminez bat does recover, he's a bona fide star, and younger than Horwitz too. The price isn't the problem, and I really like Horwitz. As an incremental move, with low risk and decent chance of a really high reward, it's solid work.
But a defence first 2nd baseman is so far from what the Jays need that it's hard to get excited about.
Andy007
Active member
I would hazard a guess that Gimenez was partly (and maybe mostly) acquired to take over at SS after Bo walks/is traded. I guess the question is, what moves follow this one? Hopefully the added salary with this move doesn't prevent them from adding some legitimate offense.
I don’t give a shit what they sign him for, it’s not my money and there’s no salary cap. He’s the best drafted player they’ve had in a long time and he’s not even 26 yet. Waiting until his pre UFA season to sign him is just stupid.
bustaheims
Well-known member
Andy007
Active member
The point was Vlad was reeling for quite awhile, was woefully out of shape, and playing like a replacement level player (at best) so they had reservations handing him a lucrative long term deal. That's why he wasn't signed prior to June. I have no idea what numbers would have made a deal possible later in the season/earlier in the offseason but it's quite possible Vlad's camp wanted to wait until Soto signed. And so here we are.
herman
Well-known member
bustaheims
Well-known member
Let’s not get too hyperbolic here. Vlad had a rough April. After that, his OPS was .917 or higher until September. It took a little longer for the homers to come, but he was well above replacement level for all but the first few weeks of the season - and performed at a roughly league average level when he was struggling.
Andy007
Active member
His first half OPS (nearly 400 at bats) last season was .818. His entire season (600 at bats) in 2023 was .788. Season before that (2022)? .818. For someone who is a negative base runner, is a barely average defender at the least valuable non-DH position, those aren't numbers that teams should be spending lucrative long term dollars on.
bustaheims
Well-known member
Those are still well above replacement level numbers, even if they’re not superstar level. He’s been 4+ bWAR player in 3 of the last 4 seasons - and the one he wasn’t, he only fell to 2.0. Like I said, let’s not be too hyperbolic here.
Andy007
Active member
Well sure, if you're including this last year, where he absolutely dominated in the second half. The conversation referred to before that, when it was looking extremely risky to sign Vlad on a lucrative, long term deal. Before last season he had that one HUGE year which was covid, playing in a AAA ballpark in Buffalo. Both years before THAT, he was at or slightly below a 2WAR pace (basically Spencer Horwitz). And, granted, I will concede that I was being a bit hyperbolic
Look I’m not going to say that he’s anything special defensively, but he did win a gold glove. I would think that makes him slightly better than barely average.
Andy007
Active member
In the same vein that Santiago Espinal is an all star, Vladdy has a gold glove. But seriously, that award sometimes goes to "name" players with cache. Vladdy's Defensive Runs Saved Above Average in his time with Toronto is -9. (His gold glove year it was +3). So for one year he was barely above average, based on that lone metric (and for the record, his d-WAR that gold glove year was -0.7)
Highlander
Active member
I don't think we can replace his bat and is a fan favorite (unlike Rogers), Pay the guy some decent money, drop Bo and lets move on.
L K
Well-known member
Seems like he wants to play on the West Coast. Hopefully money can persuade him. I'm not holding my breath though as the team is definitely paying a lot of money for inefficient players as it is.
As much as the rotation was a strength in the past, Gausman's strikeout numbers are dropping off and Bassitt is probably not a top half of rotation starter any more.