Where does Myles Straw trade rank among the Blue Jays' worst moves of the Atkins era?

The Toronto Blue Jays landed one of this offseason's big name free agents last Monday, bringing Anthony Santander north of the border to kickstart things.

But one move doesn’t negate a string of bad luck and questionable decision-making by the front office, and maybe no move has been more head-scratching than the trade to get Myles Straw from the Cleveland Guardians.

Yes, the main part of the deal was to acquire international bonus pool money, whichwe all believed was going to be used to sign Roki Sasaki. However, when Sasaki ultimately signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers, it was chided as a long-decided outcome. The Dodgers are even being accused of using Sasaki's free agency to steal proprietary information from other clubs.

Whether Toronto felt like something fishy was going on or not, we’ll probably never know, but it does make the deal for the international bonus pool money confusing, especially now that they are on the hook for Straw’s $13.8 million over the next two seasons. Toronto had to be savvier, and couldn't let themselves get baited into believing they had to bolster their Sasaki offer.

It certainly looks like it was a move that will not yield anything in return.

It’s also an awful look from an operations standpoint, as it made the Blue Jays look silly for not doing their homework and getting duped by someone outside the organization.

‘Where does the Myles Straw trade rank among the Blue Jays' worst moves of the Ross Atkins era?’

Jays Journal asked this question on Twitter, and trying to answer that question felt like inspiring experiment. After all, there have been a couple of these “bad look” moves that stand out during Atkins' time as Blue Jays GM.

November 18, 2016: Blue Jays sign Kendrys Morales to a three-year, $33 million deal.

The Blue Jays were coming off a second straight trip to the ALCS, but unfortunately fell short again, losing the series 4-1 to Cleveland.

They still had a load of talent in place for the 2017 season, and while it was a group that was getting older, it looked like the Blue Jays had the pieces to keep the competitive window open. However, there was a big misstep at the beginning of the offseason, and it actually set the wheels in motion for a rebuild.

Just two weeks after telling Edwin Encarnacion to go test the waters as a free agent, the Blue Jays signed Morales to be their primary DH and handcuffed themselves from being more flexible with their lineup.

There was a lot of frustration from fans at this point. Edwin was a fan favorite, and he had just hit a walk-off home run to win the AL Wild Card game.

He talked about wanting to return to Toronto, and so did his agent. But when the news of the Morales signing came, it pretty much closed the door on Edwin returning.

In two seasons, Morales hit 48 home runs with a .249/.318/.442 slash line and 103 OPS+. That’s not awful value for that price tag. However, it makes it look so much worse when Encarnacion, who was the same age as Morales and could play the field more flexibly than Morales, signed with Cleveland for three years and $60 million.

Encarnacion hit 70 home runs and slashed .252/.358/.490 with an OPS+ of 123 in two seasons with Cleveland. He then hit another 44 home runs over his final 153 big league games with Chicago, New York and Seattle, carrying an OPS+ of 115.