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The perks of a losing season for the Blue Jays
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Photo credit: Nick Turchiaro-USA TODAY Sports
Ryley Delaney
Jul 23, 2024, 07:00 EDTUpdated: Jul 22, 2024, 21:29 EDT
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The 2024 Toronto Blue Jays season was basically over before it even began.
This past off-season, the Jays attempted to sign Shohei Ohtani, and nearly got him before he signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers. However, they didn’t get that big power bat they needed, losing Matt Chapman and signing Justin Turner and Isiah Kiner-Falefa, while re-signing Kevin Kiermaier.
While Turner and Kiner-Falefa have been solid, Kiermaier has regressed significantly, as has the team’s pitching core. The Jays’ bullpen is one of the worst in the leagues, while Kevin Gausman’s injury to begin the season has seen him post a 4.55 ERA, a far cry from his 2023 season where he earned a Cy Young nomination.
Not upgrading their bats and relying heavily on the health of pitching has gotten the Blue Jays in a deep hole, as they have a 45-54 record and are 15 games back of the division lead and 9.5 games back of the final Wild Card spot.
The team would like to contend in 2025, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that the team will need to re-tool, this can be achieved by trading players who’ll be free agents at the end of the season. Yusei Kikuchi is seen as their highest-valued player, but Turner, Kiermaier, Danny Jansen, Yimi García, and Trevor Richards could net them some prospects.
That said, it’s going to be a tough last two months of the season, as this team is going to go from bad to worse. But there’s some good news, for starters, the Blue Jays could get under the luxury tax. Moreover, Major League Baseball introduced a draft lottery, so the team doesn’t need to finish last for a chance to get the first-overall pick in the 2025 draft.
Let’s take a look at how the Jays could turn lemons (a bad season) into lemonade (a good future).

Avoid paying the luxury tax

On top of acquiring prospects to help the future, moving players such as Yusei Kikuchi, Justin Turner, Danny Jansen, and others has other ramifications – tax implications.
For the first time in franchise history, the Blue Jays went over the competitive balance tax in 2023 and as it stands, they are still over the CBT. If they are unable to drop below the $237 million threshold, they’ll have to pay 30% in overages at the end of the season, and are currently about $10 million over it according to Joel Sherman’s New York Post article.
If the Jays wish to contend in 2025, getting below the CBT will be a big step, as it would reset the overages to 20% if they wish to go over the $241 million threshold next season. If they can’t get the salary below the 2024 threshold, the overages will increase to 50% next season.
According to an MLB Trade Rumor article, here’s what each of the six players will have remaining on their contract at the July 30 trade deadline.
Justin Turner: $4.24 million
Yusei Kikuchi: $3.91 million
Kevin Kiermaier: $3.42 million
Yimi García: $1.96 million
Danny Jansen: $1.7 million
Trevor Richards: $700,000
Of course, there are other ramifications to being over the CBT as well. The Blue Jays received a pick after the fourth-round when Matt Chapman declined his qualifying offer and signed with the San Francisco Giants. Had they been under the CBT last season, that pick would’ve been after the second-round, as it was when the Jays got compensatory picks for Marcus Semien and Robbie Ray during the 2022 draft.
There are two players who could receive qualifying offers for the Jays if they aren’t traded – Yusei Kikuchi and Danny Jansen. If they move one to free up salary (let’s say Kikuchi), and keep Jansen in an attempt to re-sign him, if he receives a qualifying offer and leaves, the Jays would receive a pick after the second-round instead of after the fourth-round.
It works both ways though, if the Jays want to sign someone with a compensatory pick attached under the CBT (Juan Soto, for example), they’ll lose their second-round pick and $500,000 in international signing bonus pool money. If they’re over the CBT, they’d lose $1 million in IFA signing bonus pool money, as well as a second-round and a fifth-round pick. 
They’ll have to find a way to maximize return, while also getting under the CBT if they plan on competing in 2025 and beyond.

The Blue Jays and the 2025 draft

As it stands, Toronto’s 45-54 record is the sixth-worst in the league. However, both the Chicago White Sox and the Oakland Athletics are unable to receive a pick higher than 10th due to constantly being a lottery team, according to Tankathon odds.
If the Blue Jays get hot and start winning games (which is less than ideal at this point), the team could conceivably go up higher in the standings, as they are just three games back from being tied for the 14th-worst record, albeit with a ton of teams to jump over. 
If the season were to end today, they technically have the fourth-best odds of winning the draft lottery, or 10.68%. However, if the Los Angeles Angels (42-57) surpass them, they’d have 14.23% odds of winning the lottery. Where they want to be is alongside the Miami Marlins (35-64) and the Colorado Rockies (36-64), as each team has a 23.49% chance of winning the lottery.
The season is a wash, but that doesn’t mean the future is. 

To the future, and beyond

Before the start of the 2022 season, the Texas Rangers signed Corey Seager and Marcus Semien to big dollar deals, and while they were pitiful in 2022 (68-94), they were able to pick fourth in the 2023 draft, selecting Wyatt Langford. You want to know what else the Rangers did in 2023? They won their first World Series in franchise history.
I mentioned the Blue Jays potentially signing a player like Juan Soto earlier in the article. Would it be difficult to sign him? Absolutely. However, the Jays have shown in the past that they’ll go after big-money free agents, such as Shohei Ohtani during the 2023-24 off-season.
In recent years, the Blue Jays have been on super agent Scott Boras’ good side, and Soto is represented by Boras, interestingly enough. Of course, Soto would still have to want to sign with the Jays, and the Jays posting a losing record this year is a tough sell, but if they offer enough like the Rangers did with Semien and Seager, who knows.
There are other good free agents available. Pete Alonso, Gleyber Torress, Alex Bregman, Willy Adames, potentially Cody Bellinger, and numerous other bats could be available. Overall, it’s a much stronger class than the 2024 free agency.
On top of that, the 2025 draft class is looking strong. The consensus #1 overall pick for the time being is high school shortstop Ethan Holliday, the younger brother of the game’s top prospect, Jackson Holliday. However, Jace LaViolette, Cam Cannarella, Jamie Arnold, and a few others would certainly rank high in the Top 100 prospect lists immediately after being drafted.

Whatever happens, the Jays need to ace this trade deadline

The Blue Jays future hinges on the July 30 trade deadline. This season is done, there is next to no chance they’ll make the postseason, as their odds range from 2% to 4%. However, if they acquire MLB ready prospects and get lucky in the lottery, this deadline will do wonders setting up the future of the Blue Jays.
As always, you can follow me on Twitter @Ryley_L_D.

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