Blue Jays Mailbag: We’re Actually Talking Playoff Baseball

We’re into the dog days of August, and the Blue Jays are… relevant again???

MLB’s addition of a second wild-card spot is doing exactly what it was meant to, keeping teams that would be also-rans in most normal years still in the thick of the hunt. And you know what? I’ll take it! PLAYOFFS!!!!

And it sounds like most Jays fans—though not all—will take it, too. At least judging by the questions I received for this week’s edition of the mailbag. So let’s dive in, shall we?

If you have a Blue Jays question you’d like me to tackle for next week, be sure to send it to stoeten@gmail.com. As always, I have not read any of Griff’s answers.

This is obviously referring to the fact that it was reported over the weekend that Marco Estrada had been placed on MLB’s weird, revocable, August trade waivers. First of all, I think we need to review how the waiver process works. A player is only on these waivers and claimable for 47 business-day hours—meaning that, if the Jays put Estrada on waivers over the weekend, he’ll have passed through by the end of Tuesday night. The Jays won’t need to pull him back unless a team actually claims him. If a claim is made, which it apparently was according to Jon Morosi, the Jays would have 48.5 business-day hours to decide whether to let that club take him for nothing, to work out a trade, or to pull him off waivers (in other words, to revoke the waiver) and keep him. They will apparently keep him.