I know that there’s been a lot of Francisco Lindor discussion in here recently but honestly, my personal top target for the Jays this off-season is Trevor Bauer and I hope that the org is all in on him.
Elite starting pitching is the hardest thing to acquire. So in an off-season like this, with a depressed market and perhaps other team owners limiting expenditures, Rogers and the Blue Jays org have a special opportunity to add a top 10 SP in baseball who checks all of the boxes on the field at a potential value.
Just take a look at his success last year:
- 2.5 fWAR ranked 4th
- 73 innings pitched ranked 9th
- 1.73 ERA ranked 2nd
- 2.88 FIP ranked 8th
- 36 K% ranked 3rd
- 29.9 K-BB% ranked 3rd
- 0.79 WHIP ranked 2nd
- .159 batting average against ranked 1st
- 12.9% swinging strike rate ranked 14th
- 2.94 SIERA ranked 4th
All while posting a 99th percentile xwOBA and xERA according to baseball savant. Dude is incredibly talented!!!
He’s also proven highly durable in his career, ranking 6th in innings pitched over the last 3 years with 461.1 IP. Also notable, over that 3 year time period, Bauer ranks 6th in fWAR.
In terms of committing term to him as he enters into his 30’s, I think they shouldn’t have many hesitations. His 100th percentile fastball spin rate and 92nd percentile curveball spin rate should allow him to thrive using the “Blake Snell method” (elevated fastballs and breaking /off-speed stuff down) even with slightly diminished velocity and be productive as he ages.
To me, this is the Jays opportunity to add a true top of the rotation sort of arm that’s needed to compete in the playoffs and ultimately for championships. I look at it similarly as to when the Nationals signed Max Scherzer back in 2015. With a talented group of hitters breaking out at the major league level and talented group of prospects behind them, now is the time to invest in the type of elite pitching that’s so difficult to find. And again in today’s economic climate, it may come at a relative bargain.