Toronto Blue Jays: Latest 2020-21 Offseason Predictions

The Blue Jays have been pretty much linked to almost everyone

Unlike basketball or hockey, where free agents typically come off the board once free agency starts, in baseball the offseason is developed at a much slower pace. Most players and teams aren’t necessarily in any rush to make a huge move right away as players, agents and organizations in baseball typically want to see how the market develops before doing anything.

This offseason could be slower than usual due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many teams are expected to cry poor due to the losses they suffered without fans in the seats, and other sources of income being nonexistent during the shortened 2020 campaign.

Despite many teams expected to be cheap, the Toronto Blue Jays won’t be, as they’ve said they won’t be limited financially and they’re at an advantage due to the fact that the team is corporately owned.

So far this MLB offseason, not many free agents have signed. The MLB winter meetings where things typically start to ramp up have come and gone and very few moves were made. Big name free agents like George Springer, DJ LeMahieu, J.T. Realmuto, Trevor Bauer and others remain unsigned and could stay like that heading into the new year.

There have been some moves that have been done though that have included the Blue Jays. In fact, the Blue Jays were the first ones to strike in free agency when they brought back Robbie Ray on a one year deal worth $8 million. That definitely won’t be the Blue Jays only move though as they’ve been linked to a bevy of players including high profile ones.

Here’s what could happen with the Blue Jays this offseason.

Blue Jays sign a veteran catcher

The Blue Jays have immense catching depth in their organization. At the big league level, they employ Danny Jansen, Reese McGuire and Alejandro Kirk behind the dish. In the minors, they have prospects Gabriel Moreno and Riley Adams who were added to the 40 man roster just recently to prevent them from being exposed in the Rule 5 draft.

Even with all those guys, the Jays will bring in another catcher by signing a veteran who has experience catching major league games.

They did so last offseason when they signed Caleb Joseph to a minor league deal. While roster rules may be different this coming season, Joseph travelled with the team all season and was huge in building chemistry amongst the players. For an example of this, look no further to when he gave his speech after the Blue Jays clinched a playoff spot.

The reason why they’ll bring in a veteran catcher though is to help the development of Jansen, McGuire and Kirk. All three of those guys are young with minimal catching experience at the major league level.

By a veteran catcher, they won’t be bringing in the top one on the market in J.T. Realmuto, but they’ll sign one who they can use at the AAA level and call up in case of injuries.

Maybe a reunion with Joseph could be the cards, but other guys like Sandy Leon, Austin Romine or Matt Wieters could be a handful of guys that could be options as well.

Homecoming of sorts

Even though the Blue Jays will most likely acquire pitching help through trades as mentioned by Ross Atkins, it doesn’t mean they won’t sign a single free agent that’s a pitcher.

In fact, they will sign a free agent pitcher in the name of James Paxton, who’s a Canadian that hails from Ladner, British Columbia and is nicknamed “The Big Maple”. He even has a tattoo of a maple leaf on his right arm to show his Canadian pride.

In 2020, Paxton was limited to five starts posting a 6.64 ERA with an opponent average of .284. He was only able to make five starts due to a flexor strain in his throwing arm, which is just one of multiple injuries he has suffered throughout his career.

When healthy though, Paxton is a widely underrated pitcher. In his career he’s 57-33 with a 3.58 ERA striking out 829 batters compared to 684 hits given up in 753.1 innings pitched across 136 starts.

Signing Paxton to a “pillow contract” with a team option for a second year would work for both sides. The Jays would hope for a bounce-back season from Paxton and if he does well, they’d be able to have him for one more year.

Blue Jays dip into the international free agent market

Last offseason, the Blue Jays brought two players from the international market to the major leagues. They signed Rafael Dolis who played with the Hanshin Tigers in Japan before he signed with the Blue Jays, and they also signed Shun Yamaguchi who came from the Yomiuri Giants.

From the Yomiuri Tigers, pitcher Tomoyuki Sugano has been posted by the team and has until January 7th to sign a major league contract. While the Blue Jays have been linked to him, they won’t be the ones to sign him.

If you fly two hours from Japan to South Korea, that’s where the Blue Jays will dip their toes as they’ll sign Ha-Seong Kim of the Kiwoom Heroes of the Korean Baseball League.

Kim is a versatile infielder who is primarily a shortstop but can also play third base and possibly other positions on the diamond. Last season in 138 games, he slashed .306/.397/.523 with 30 HR, 109 RBI, 163 hits, 23 SB on 25 attempts with more walks (75) than strikeouts (68).

Just about a week ago, he had dinner with Korean Blue Jay Hyun-Jin Ryu at the request of Kim.

He has until the new year to sign a contract and he will ultimately join his countryman in Ryu and put pen to paper with the Blue Jays.

A disappointing offseason

Every good free agent that’s available or even almost any player that’s able to sign with any team they please, the Blue Jays have been linked to them.

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Ross Atkins and Mark Shaprio have even mentioned that they’d like to add some really good players to the team this offseason.

After getting the fanbase excited all offseason about being linked to big time players and all the talk the front office has made, they will fall short of the expectations they put out for themselves and will ultimately disappoint.

They won’t be able to lure any of the top free agents north of the border in Bauer, Springer, Realmuto, LeMahieu or other big names that come to mind, nor will any trades of major significance.

Their biggest move of the offseason will most likely be bringing in Kim from Korea, and while he could do well in the major leagues, there’s no guarantee that it’ll be a smooth transition to North America.

Blue Jays fans are expecting a big name player to join the team, but the front office won’t be able to do that and the fanbase will start questioning whether Atkins and Shapiro are the right people for the job despite all the work they’ve already done in building the roster as it is. We’ll see how it ultimately plays out, but this is how I predict the rest of the winter goes for the Blue Jays.