Blue Jays rumors: Club ‘absolutely interested’ in reunion with popular slugger

It has been an eventful week so far for the Toronto Blue Jays and it has only been a little more than half finished. Despite missing out on big-time free agent targets in Juan Soto and Max Fried, the Jays managed to make a shocking trade in acquiring star infielder and three-time Gold Glove winner Andrés Giménez from the Cleveland Guardians. With the ball now officially rolling, Toronto should not just stop there.

Recent rumors have suggested that the Jays are indeed pursuing a potential reunion with a former fan favourite. According to Sportsnet, Jays GM Ross Atkins has confirmed at the Winter Meetings that the club is ‘absolutely interested’ in bringing back popular slugger Teoscar Hernández.

“Teo is a great teammate, great person, great player,” Atkins commented. “Certainly could be a piece to the solution.”

Blue Jays ‘absolutely interested’ in reunion with Teoscar Hernandez

Why wouldn’t he be? After all, Hernández is coming off a World Series championship-winning season with the Los Angeles Dodgers where he played a big role in helping the club achieve its ultimate goal. This past season, Hernández put up career highs in home runs (33), total bases (295) and walks (53), along with a solid .272 batting average, .840 OPS, 84 runs scored, 99 RBI and 12 stolen bases in 154 games played. He continued his impactful production for the Dodgers during the postseason, ranking third on the team in home runs (3), and fourth in both RBI (12) and batting average (.250). The Jays could surely use that type of consistent production to significantly boost their offensive potential for the 2025 season.

More importantly, the chances of Toronto making it happen has improved drastically from what had taken place in the past few days. According to Sports Illustrated, the Dodgers’ president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman revealed at the Winter Meetings some uncertainty surrounding whether Hernández will be returning to Los Angeles.

“It’s hard for me to answer," Friedman said. "He had a really good year. He put himself in a great position and I know he has talked about wanting to and I know that we have talked about him wanting to and he and his family get to go through the interest and figure out what makes the most sense for them. So while we’re hopeful, at the same time, if he ends up signing somewhere else, we have no choice but to wish him well and on a personal level we’ll be really happy for him and professionally not so much.”

With the outfield pool slightly diminished with the signings of Soto, Michael Conforto and Tyler O’Neill, the Jays should act now and bring home the one that truly deserves a second shot with the team. Even though Hernández might have previously expressed his desire to stay with the Dodgers, that shouldn’t stop the Jays from making a strong, heartfelt, convincing pitch to the 32-year-old slugger. After all, having won it all in 2024, Hernández can potentially be a huge difference maker in transferring that winning formula to Toronto going forward.