Blue Jays lose potential key bullpen arm to free agency

The risk versus reward portion of the MLB season is in full swing and the Toronto Blue Jays aren't immune to some risky decisions that could come back to haunt them down the road. On Monday, the Blue Jays announced that reliever Nick Sandlin is officially headed to free agency, ahead of the MLB 40-man roster deadline on Tuesday at 6 p.m. EST.

The risk is the Blue Jays are losing a serviceable bullpen arm that can help them in 2026. The reward is they get to keep a couple of younger, high upside players on their roster to avoid them being snatched up in the Rule 5 Draft.

Blue Jays lose potential key bullpen arm to free agency

Sandlin wasn't a Blue Jay for very long as he was a part of the trade during the 2024 offseason with Cleveland that brought Andrés Giménez north of the border. Sandlin had lots of potential in a Blue Jays 'pen that had remodeled itself after a disastrous '24 season. Toronto brought back Yimi Garcia, and added Jeff Hoffman while committing to Yariel Rodriguez as a full time bullpen guy. Sandlin looked to be a part of that equation in 2025.

Unfortunately, the Blue Jays only got 16 innings of work from Sandlin after he suffered an injury and wasn't able to pitch any more than that. But in those 16 innings, he showed a ton of promise by striking out 16 hitters. He finished the season on the IL and last week, Sandlin was sent outright to Triple-A Buffalo, which meant he was removed from the 40-man roster.

On Monday, Sandlin cleared waivers and elected free agency, allowing the 28-year-old to sign with any other team in MLB and he could end up being an under the radar type signing. In his four years with Cleveland before the trade, Sandlin averaged 48 innings with 55 strikeouts and an ERA+ of 126. And while he would certainly look good as a member of the Blue Jays bullpen, the team felt they couldn't risk keeping him while exposing a couple of prospects to the Rule 5 Draft.

On Tuesday evening they will have to make a choice on which five prospects they put on the 40-man roster. That group includes LHP Ricky Tiedemann, OF Yohendrik Pinango, OF Victor Arias, SS Josh Kasevich, and C Edwan Duran. All five of these players are ranked within the top 13 prospects in the Blue Jays system. The Blue Jays currently have 37 players on their roster so Toronto will likely put at least two of these players on the 40-man before the deadline, if not three of them.

The risk in doing that is, if they end up signing someone between now and then, they would potentially have to expose someone else to waivers by removing them from the 40-man to make room for the player they signed. This is the balancing act that Blue Jays GM Ross Atkins is having to play this offseason. Toronto's roster is in a good position, but he's hoping to make it even better. While at the same time he also has to be mindful of the younger players that could impact the big league roster in the not-so-distant future.

At the moment, that balancing act has led them to losing a potential quality arm in Sandlin so that a couple of those younger players can remain in the system beyond the Rule 5 Draft in December.