Blue Jays: Estrada reportedly placed on waivers on Friday

According to Ken Rosenthal, the Blue Jays have reportedly put Marco Estrada on revocable trade waivers as of Friday. Given his recent resurgence and the ever present need for pitching in baseball, it makes sense that the front office is gauging interest in him, at the very least.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, except for maybe how long it took for the Blue Jays to place Marco Estrada on waivers. According to a report from Ken Rosenthal, the Blue Jays did just that on Friday, as they have with other veterans like Jose Bautista.

I covered the idea a few days ago here at Jays Journal, and looked at the potential teams that could have serious interest in the Mexican born right-hander. If he’s going to pitch the way he has in his last four outings, there could be plenty of teams that would benefit from adding him in August.

It makes sense that the Blue Jays would place him on waivers at this stage, for several reasons. If you’re unfamiliar with how things work, the move gives the other teams around the majors a chance to put in a claim for the prize. If someone does, then they have 48 hours to work out a trade, or the Blue Jays could always choose to let the claiming team take on the contract, as was the case with Alex Rios several years ago. I could get into more if we’re talking about a scenario where multiple teams make a claim, but this is the gist of the idea.

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If no one puts in a claim for Estrada, then anyone around the league can trade for him without restriction. Given his recent performance and relatively modest salary, there’s a good chance that someone is/was interested. That doesn’t mean there’s an imminent deal to be had, but it’s not nothing either.

For what it’s worth, I think the Blue Jays should be exploring an August trade for the change-up artist. If they can get a worthwhile return (say, something like a Teoscar Hernandez value, maybe?), then why not? Estrada could have the benefit of making a playoff run with a contender, and could still have the option of returning to Toronto for 2018. As I’ve mentioned here many times before, the Yankees did it with Aroldis Chapman, and there’s no reason the Blue Jays and Estrada couldn’t explore the same idea.

*Note- Ian Hunter of www.bluejayshunter.com, provides the video link where Rosenthal discusses the Estrada news.*

It would give the 34 year old a chance to re-establish some of his lost value, and give the Blue Jays a chance to pick up another prospect to add to the stable. At the very least it’s worth exploring, and it sounds like the Blue Jays are doing just that.

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