Report: Blue Jays expressed serious interest in impact starting pitching market at GM Meetings
Photo credit: Brett Davis-Imagn Images
By Thomas Hall
Nov 8, 2024, 12:00 ESTUpdated: Nov 8, 2024, 12:06 EST
The Toronto Blue Jays entered this off-season in need of a fifth starter to round out their starting four of ace Kevin Gausman, José Berríos, Chris Bassitt and Bowden Francis. But it appears management’s search has stretched beyond the traditional back-end starter’s market.
As all 30 teams departed this year’s GM Meetings on Thursday, among the biggest surprises was learning Toronto’s front office had shown serious interest in the starting pitching market and spent time gathering information on several arms such as Max Fried, Luis Severino and Japan’s Roki Sasaki in San Antonio, Texas, according to Sportsnet’s Ben Nicholson-Smith.
That’s a pretty significant development, especially considering general manager Ross Atkins also hopes to procure an impact hitter or two and overhaul the club’s bullpen. Not an easy assignment, given they’re dealing with a projected competitive balance tax (CBT) payroll of approximately $211 million for next season per FanGraphs’ Roster Resource.
It seems the premise behind canvassing the free-agent starter tiers below Corbin Burnes and Blake Snell — this off-season’s top available starting pitchers — is it’d allow the Blue Jays to fortify their rotation and bullpen with a single transaction, pushing Yariel Rodríguez to a relief role.
This potential scenario would also allow Atkins to continue allocating resources to a position with a lower volatility rate, maintaining the organization’s history of limiting its salary commitment to relievers. Having said that, they’d still likely need to add a few relief arms either via free agency or trade.
If prior off-seasons can provide any indication, the Blue Jays will probably be reactive to this winter’s starting pitching market rather than proactive, as they wait for a prime opportunity to strike. And that time could arrive much sooner than last year, with free-agent discussions already gaining steam, at least for Scott Boras’ clients — which include Burnes, Snell, Sean Manaea, Yusei Kikuchi and Max Scherzer, among others.
“The great thing is you get a clear voice from the teams about how they value each starter,” Boras told reporters Wednesday, including Nicholson-Smith, at the GM Meetings.“Some we see them the same, others we place in [different] priority. We really learn the teams have opinions about what they want to do with particular players, how they value one pitcher over the other, and for other teams. It’s reversed. So we have an opportunity to learn so much about how teams think and why they think it. We’re able to transfer that to the players and really know what. What team best suits each starter.”
Developing homegrown talent has been a long-standing concern for Toronto, leading to a shortage of big-league-calibre starters at the upper minor-league levels. And that deficiency is why they must explore all corners of the starting pitching market this winter.
Three of the five starters (Gausman, Bassitt, Rodríguez) that occupied the Blue Jays’ starting rotation for most of 2024 were acquired via free agency — four if you include Kikuchi. Then there’s José Berríos and Bowden Francis, both of whom joined the franchise via trade during the ’21 season.
Of the 10 pitchers who made at least one start for Toronto last season, only Alek Manoah — who underwent Tommy John surgery after throwing just 24.1 innings — was drafted by the organization, whose starting rotation ranked tied for 14th in starter’s ERA (3.95) one season after finishing third (3.85) in the majors.
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