Blue Jays’ deal with Dylan Cease under the microscope after Tigers' latest signing

The Toronto Blue Jays got the jump on the winter shopping market when they signed Dylan Cease to a seven-year $210 million contract in early December. By all accounts, Cease was the guy they wanted right from the get go and were maybe willing to pay a little more to bring him north of the border.

However, the deal itself, the richest ever handed out to a free agent by the Blue Jays, may be under the microscope after the Detroit Tigers landed Framber Valdez on a three-year $115 million deal.

Blue Jays’ deal with Dylan Cease under the microscope after Tigers' latest signing

The 32-year-old Valdez now gives the Tigers a dynamic 1-2 punch at the top of their rotation as he'll slot in behind Cy Young award winner Tarik Skubal. The lefty from the Dominican Republic was regarded as the last "top" free agent on the board. Going into the offseason, Valdez, Cease and Ranger Suárez were looked at as the cream of the crop of the free agent pitching market. Cease went to Toronto, while Suarez landed in Boston on a five year, $130 million deal.

It took a while for the market to develop for Valdez perhaps for a couple of reasons. One could be his age, as he is two years older than both Suárez and Cease. There was also a lot made about an incident in September in which he appeared to intentionally cross up his catcher in Houston. Valdez threw a hard sinker right at the chest protector of César Salazar, and although both players said it wasn't intentional and made amends quickly, it was an incident that continually popped up as something that was scaring teams away from signing the southpaw.

But now that he has been locked up for a few years with the Tigers, the comparison's will start. Valdez has eight years of MLB service time, making his debut with the Astros in 2018 at 24-years-old. Cease came in a year later, debuting at 23 for the Chicago White Sox in 2019.

Both hurlers have played in 188 games with Valdez owning a career 18.9 bWAR and Cease right behind him at 16.8. Valdez has the edge in innings pitched (1080.2 to 1015.1) ERA (3.36 to 3.88) ERA+ (124 to 110) and walk rate (8.7% to 10%). Cease has the edge in overall strikeouts (1231 to 1053) and strikeout percentage (28.6% to 23.5%).

So while there is a little bit of difference in terms of their ages, they have produced very similar results in their time playing in MLB. So the issue for the Blue Jays will be if Cease's contract doesn't age well, frustrated fans may point back to the Valdez deal saying the Blue Jays should have just gone for the short term deal, regardless of the Annual Average Value.

And it's not as if the Blue Jays didn't have interest in Valdez. They reportedly met with him earlier in the offseason and then were rumored to be interested in signing him a few days before he officially signed with Detroit. But with Cease already locked in, they probably weren't in the market of spending what would have been (on average) $60 million per year on just two pitchers. However, it's not as if the Cease deal has hampered the Blue Jays from doing future business.

After signing Cease they also dished out deals for Cody Ponce, Tyler Rogers and Kazuma Okamoto, while they were also making a very healthy and competitive offer for outfielder Kyle Tucker. So as long as Cease performs to his expectations, this deal should not be looked at as an overpay, regardless of how the Valdez deal turns out for the Tigers.

The Blue Jays saw first hand how much pitching depth is needed to get to the World Series just last year, and bringing in Cease should go a long way to helping them get back to the Fall Classic.