Blue Jays must not be interested in re-signing Taijuan Walker

It’s a reunion that’s always felt like it made sense, but so far Taijuan Walker remains available on the free agent market. Are the Blue Jays interested in the right-hander at all?

It’s a fair question as we’ve reached the last day of January and the veteran is still without a team for 2021. He’s far from the only free agent in that position, and chances are he’ll get a few offers over the next week or two. With time running out, I’m starting to think that the Blue Jays aren’t interested.

My assumption was that the delay on a new deal was that the Blue Jays wanted to explore their options before committing much in terms of their budget. However, they’ve moved beyond that place in the offseason now that they’ve signed George Springer, Marcus Semien, Kirby Yates and more, and it’s given Ross Atkins a better idea of how much/if there is any money left to spend. Even after their heavy lifting, it feels like the Blue Jays could still use another starter, and Walker would seemingly fill the need.

I would have understood if the Blue Jays went in another direction with the rotation instead, but so far they’ve shied away from big-money deals for rotation arms. That said, they’ve already spent money that theoretically could have been used to bring Walker back. MLBtraderumors.com predicted that Walker would receive two years and 16 million as a free agent, or roughly eight million for this season’s budget. Who knows if that’s enough to get Walker to return, but the Blue Jays have already allocated the same amount when they jumped to re-sign Robbie Ray near the beginning of the offseason. They also just agreed to take on the full 5.2 million owed to Steven Matz this year. It’s possible they’re still saving a bit of the budget for a late addition to the rotation, but from the look of things, Atkins is spending the payroll in other ways.

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What’s been particularly interesting has been watching Walker’s interactions with the Blue Jays on social media over the winter. If you’ve been paying close attention, you’ve probably noticed that it seems like Walker is trying to subtly keep his name in the back of the Blue Jays’ minds. Whether it’s tweeting out support of his former teammates, or liking posts that “everybody wants to play with Ryu”, the hints are there that Walker is fond of the Blue Jays, and he seems more than open to a return.

The strange thing is, the Blue Jays could really use another arm, and now that they’ve committed their big free agent dollars to position players, it makes even more sense that they’d bring back the 28-year-old. I would have understood if they had designs on signing someone like Trevor Bauer or Masahiro Tanaka instead, but that’s obviously not happening. They’ve yet to move on others like Jake Odorizzi or James Paxton either, who also remain available.

It’s possible that the Blue Jays plan to use a creative approach to the rotation, but I think we can all agree that they could use another bonafide starter. If you signed Walker and bumped a few guys down, then the depth chart might look like this:

1- Hyun Jin Ryu
2- Walker
3- Nate Pearson
4- Robbie Ray
5- Steven Matz

Depth: Tanner Roark, Ross Stripling, Anthony Kay, Trent Thornton, Julian Merryweather, etc

It doesn’t quite match their high-powered offence, but if the group can stay healthy then it should be enough to make them very competitive in the AL East and/or for a Wild Card spot in 2021. That clearly needs to be the goal, and looking at a rotation that’s lacking established starters behind Ryu, bringing in another arm feels like a must.

All along I’ve believed in the back of my mind that Walker would likely re-sign with the Blue Jays. However, while discussing the idea with a friend this week, he made a point I couldn’t argue with when he said, “if they were going to bring him back, they would have done it by now”. It’s still possible that a deal could come together, but I couldn’t help but agree with his point. For one reason or another, perhaps the Blue Jays just aren’t interested.