Blue Jays Discussion: 2024 Season - Complete without a great title in keeping with the performance

[Blitzkrug]

And it’s dawned on people that it miraculously guarantees runs in the postseason too.

The straight answer is that you can legitimately throw any stats from the regular season out the window once postseason comes around. It wouldn’t even shock me if the Dodgers get swept by the Padres/Braves.

Dodgers fans punching the air right now. We all know it's coming but they think differently lmao.

(Turns out that rotation compiled of guys that are made of glass didn't survive the whole season. whodathunkit?)

 

[ryno23]

Why are we moving Springer to DH? His bat barely plays as is at RF but at the very least he brings consistently average defence there.

where are you going to put him? I want to bring in 2 middle of the order OF's. In an ideal world you dump is salary ala Jason Heyward and move on

 

[GoonieFace]

Ah yes because a 2 game sample size (in Baltimore's case against one of the best rotations in baseball) is totally enough to discredit that argument

It's not that simple, but it also kinda is when the rest of your offensive stats are actually decent.

Baltimore also pooped their pants last year. I’m just saying baseball is just so unpredictable. The Jays season sucked this year, but anything can happen next season. Granted, they have some work to do, but it’s not all doom and gloom

 

[TheMadHatTrick]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841499788459540630

They can't be serious with some of these quotes.

Shapiro is protecting his own job by keeping his fall guys alive as long as possible. He's a used car salesman.

 

[Cloned]

Baltimore is in pretty much the exact same position the Jays were in a year ago.

Regular season success after a rebuild without any playoff success. It’ll be interesting to see how they approach it compared to what Atkins “did.”

 

[Eyedea]

where are you going to put him? I want to bring in 2 middle of the order OF's. In an ideal world you dump is salary ala Jason Heyward and move on

I’m keeping him at RF, or he moves to LF where we can actually extract some leftover value out of him. Point is it’d be better to get a bat like Horwitz’s in at DH against righties than to just stick Springer there.

I think a 3B would need to come via trade (Bo ain’t moving there), and then a corner OF in FA (Soto… Santander, Teo, Conforto).

 

[metafour]

The strikeouts argument is so disingenuous it kinda pisses me off.

Aaron Judge finished 7th in the majors for strikeouts when he had his monster 2022 season. According to Ross Atkins, this is less valuable to him despite Judge hitting 62 homers and having the best all around offensive season we'd seen since Barry Bonds head turned into a thumb. Adolis Garcia finished 8th in 2023 before going on to have a postseason for the ages while you guessed it, striking out a bit under a third of the time. (18 Ks/62 ABs)

Then there's the guys like Kyle Schwarber who while they strike out a ton, still manage to get incredible value despite it.

The Jays finished 2024 with the fifth fewest strikeouts as a team. Four of the six teams who won division titles this year finished in the top 10 for home runs in New York, Philly, Los Angeles and Houston as already pointed out. To further that, 8 of the teams who made the playoffs as a whole finished in the top 12 for home runs. Detroit and Kansas City are the only outliers. Boy striking out less really helped all those not runs you scored, Ross! f***ing dork.

Dear god, take a Valium.

He did not state that home-runs (or power) aren't important. Can you try to not be hyperbolic?

Here is a fun stat for you all: the team K% ranking of each World Series winner since 2015:

2015 Kansas City - 1st
2016 Chicago - 15th
2017 Houston - 1st
2018 Boston - 3rd
2019 Washington - 5th
2020 Los Angeles - 3rd
2021 Atlanta - 22nd
2022 Houston - 2nd
2023 Texas - 15th

6 of the past 9 World Series winners were Top 5 in team K% (66%).
Only 1 of the past 9 World Series winners were in the bottom-half of the league in team K%.

Here is what he actually said: "In today's game, you have to be cognizant of strikeouts when you add power." There is nothing factually incorrect about what he stated. It has been proven time and time again that contact hitting becomes incredibly important in the playoffs. You are literally seeing it play out in real time with the Padres and Royals ranking #1 and #3 in K% this season. The Royals just blanked the Orioles, and the Padres are well on their way to quick-timing the Braves.

The Houston/Detroit series is the opposite of this trend so obviously this isn't a "law", but its not some far out conclusion to see that timely hitting generally becomes more important in the playoffs because the drastic increase in pitching quality makes relying on home runs to be less successful than it normally is in the regular season.

 

[MK78]

Baltimore is in pretty much the exact same position the Jays were in a year ago.

Regular season success after a rebuild without any playoff success. It’ll be interesting to see how they approach it compared to what Atkins “did.”

They also completed an ownership change this season, so they may just start spending more.

Hopefully not for the Jays sake, hehe.

 

[LaP]

Shapiro is protecting his own job by keeping his fall guys alive as long as possible. He's a used car salesman.

If he keeps then alive too long it might cost him his job though. Atm if i'm the jays owner i feel like the only way Atkins is gone is if Shapiro is gone too. My leash would be very short next season.

 

[LaP]

Dear god, take a Valium.

He did not state that home-runs (or power) aren't important. Can you try to not be hyperbolic?

Here is a fun stat for you all: the team K% ranking of each World Series winner since 2015:

2015 Kansas City - 1st
2016 Chicago - 15th
2017 Houston - 1st
2018 Boston - 3rd
2019 Washington - 5th
2020 Los Angeles - 3rd
2021 Atlanta - 22nd
2022 Houston - 2nd
2023 Texas - 15th

6 of the past 9 World Series winners were Top 5 in team K% (66%).
Only 1 of the past 9 World Series winners were in the bottom-half of the league in team K%.

Here is what he actually said: "In today's game, you have to be cognizant of strikeouts when you add power." There is nothing factually incorrect about what he stated. It has been proven time and time again that contact hitting becomes incredibly important in the playoffs. You are literally seeing it play out in real time with the Padres and Royals ranking #1 and #3 in K% this season. The Royals just blanked the Orioles, and the Padres are well on their way to quick-timing the Braves.

The Houston/Detroit series is the opposite of this trend so obviously this isn't a "law", but its not some far out conclusion to see that timely hitting generally becomes more important in the playoffs because the drastic increase in pitching quality makes relying on home runs to be less successful than it normally is in the regular season.

Both the Padres and Royals can run the bases though. Royals are 11th for SB and Padres 14th. They both are close to have double the Jays SB. The fail in Atkins reasoning is his team doesn't run. You wont score many runs with singles and the occasional doubles unless you steal bases. On top of that you have Kirk who wont score from 2nd on a single and wont score from 1st on a double.

 

[HairyKneel]

Shapiro is protecting his own job by keeping his fall guys alive as long as possible. He's a used car salesman.

They get what they deserve leaving these clowns in power.

 

[Bjindaho]

Is Guerrero Jr. a generational player? Blue Jays will have to pay to find out

Is Vladimir Guerrero Jr. a generational player? The only way the Blue Jays get to see that answer for themselves is if they’re willing to pay him like one.

www.sportsnet.ca

 

[Discoverer]

Both the Padres and Royals can run the bases though. Royals are 11th for SB and Padres 14th. They both are close to have double the Jays SB. The fail in Atkins reasoning is his team doesn't run. You wont score many runs with singles and the occasional doubles unless you steal bases. On top of that you have Kirk who wont score from 2nd on a single and wont score from 1st on a double.

The Padres have solid speed up and town the lineup, but the Royals... meh. Bobby Witt is fantastic at everything and not something the Jays can match speed-wise. Maikel Garcia stole 37 bases - that's great! He also had the lowest wRC+ among qualified hitters (69). They would have been way better off with someone else in that spot. Dairon Blanco is exclusively a pinch-runner. He's excellent at it, but I don't think his role would be that hard to emulate by rostering a guy like Clase next year.

Also, Sal Perez is slower than Kirk.

Edit: This isn't a defense against the Jays baserunning ability. It wasn't good this year, though I do believe the injection of young talent should move it in the right direction. It's just that, for all their reliance on speed, the Royals would have been MUCH better if they could have replaced Garcia's 37 SB with a half-decent player who stole none.

 

[stickty111]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841860883128922364

Yikes

 

[tmlfan98]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841860883128922364

Yikes

Ben Nicholson-Smith should have had the courage to expose Shapiro for this before now.

Also there's a nice 2nd part to this mini-thread:

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841872920336876009

 

[Dr Pepper]

Ben Nicholson-Smith should have had the courage to expose Shapiro for this before now.

Also there's a nice 2nd part to this mini-thread:

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841872920336876009

Lol @ "atkins 2 alcatraz", that's clever.

Also re: Cavan, I was scouring the FA list early Monday for last minute adds in my Yahoo league, and only then did I discover he had found his way to Atlanta.

Thought he was still kicking around the Dodgers' bench but I guess they didn't keep him around for long either.

 

[tmlfan98]

Lol @ "atkins 2 alcatraz", that's clever.

Also re: Cavan, I was scouring the FA list early Monday for last minute adds in my Yahoo league, and only then did I discover he had found his way to Atlanta.

Thought he was still kicking around the Dodgers' bench but I guess they didn't keep him around for long either.

He also had a brief stint with the Giants org before going to Atlanta, but he only played for their AAA team.

 

[Discoverer]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841860883128922364

Yikes

God, people are stupid. Imagine hearing "We had a conversation and he conveyed that he disagreed with my stance" and turning that into "He essentially scolded him for it".

 

[Eyedea]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841860883128922364

Yikes

These prospect lists are becoming more and more useless in identifying valuable players. Spencer Horwitz, Lawrence Butler, Xavier Edwards, and Tyler Fitzgerald were 4 of the top 5 most productive rookie bats this season and none of them featured in the top 100 prior to graduation. Granted Edwards and Fitzgerald are probably not as good as their numbers suggest, but these lists are so fixated on the hyper athletic beasts with age cutoffs that they miss out on plenty of talent.

Also the Jays may have had a lull in internal competition, but that was full on display after that article came out in the 2nd half of the season. Plus it doesn’t take into account the IFA market (Kirk, Moreno, Leo), signing young talent (Gurriel, Yariel), and acquiring young talent (Teo, Espinal, Clement) and the most recent trade deadline acquisitions. Even when they flip prospects they generally acquire young and controllable talent (Chapman, Varsho, Berrios).

 

[MS]

These prospect lists are becoming more and more useless in identifying valuable players. Spencer Horwitz, Lawrence Butler, Xavier Edwards, and Tyler Fitzgerald were 4 of the top 5 most productive rookie bats this season and none of them featured in the top 100 prior to graduation. Granted Edwards and Fitzgerald are probably not as good as their numbers suggest, but these lists are so fixated on the hyper athletic beasts with age cutoffs that they miss out on plenty of talent.

Also the Jays may have had a lull in internal competition, but that was full on display after that article came out in the 2nd half of the season. Plus it doesn’t take into account the IFA market (Kirk, Moreno, Leo), signing young talent (Gurriel, Yariel), and acquiring young talent (Teo, Espinal, Clement) and the most recent trade deadline acquisitions. Even when they flip prospects they generally acquire young and controllable talent (Chapman, Varsho, Berrios).

Yeah, I posted about this a month or so ago.

Baseball prospect lists and rankings are really bad, and hugely overrate recent young high draft picks playing at lower levels and hugely underrate NCAA picks who are in AAA at age 24 or 25 because they're 'too old' even though they've quickly moved up levels since being drafted at age 22.

Ben Nicholson-Smith should have had the courage to expose Shapiro for this before now.

Also there's a nice 2nd part to this mini-thread:

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841872920336876009

This is a bit of a pointless stat because there are like 3 guys in all of baseball drafted after 2019 that have 5+ WAR for their careers.

A list of 'highest WAR amongst players drafted since 2016' is basically just a laundry list of players drafted in 2016 and 2017.

 

[trellaine201]

Lets trade Bo and sign Adames

 

[shaner8989]

Ben Nicholson-Smith should have had the courage to expose Shapiro for this before now.

Also there's a nice 2nd part to this mini-thread:

https://x.com/i/web/status/1841872920336876009

So let’s bring back the whole crew of f***ing morons again. Brilliant idea. What a sack of shit organization

 

[Zack47]

Why are Shapiro and Atkins still employed here? How much evidence do you need? Shapiro is a grinning car salesman and Atkins is a high school nerd in over his head -- way over. They have run this team into the ground.

 

[tmlfan98]

A Jays media member should probably ask Shatkins if they at least talked to Francona.

https://x.com/i/web/status/1842023323732963480

 

[Cloned]

Brewers just lost in the most Jays way possible.