A look into how the Blue Jays wasted the Vlad and Bo era

Generational players don’t often come around in Major League Baseball; talents a generation of fans can buy into as they invest their time and money into cheering for those players and their team. Think Aaron Judge in New York, Shohei Ohtani in Los Angeles, and Bobby Witt Jr. in Kansas City. The Baltimore Orioles may have three in Gunnar Henderson, Adley Rutschman and Jackson Holliday.

The Blue Jays have two potential homegrown, generational talents at present in Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and Bo Bichette. Both are in their mid-20s, and in their 6th season in Toronto after arriving in 2019; they’ve combined to play in six All-Star Games, and helped the team to a .540 winning percentage in the current competitive window, which opened in the first full MLB season for both players in 2020.

But as Blue Jays fans well know, the team has yet to win either an AL East division title or a Wild Card play-in game in the Vlad and Bo era. Tampa Bay, New York and Baltimore have all won the division since 2020, but not Toronto; and, that 0-6 Wild Card record hangs over their Blue Jays careers, and would only likely be wiped clean from memory with a deep postseason run in 2025.

Generational Blue Jays

MVP-type talents also only come along once in a generation. In the 48 seasons of their existence as an MLB franchise, the Toronto Blue Jays have only ever had two AL MVPs: George Bell in 1987 and Josh Donaldson in 2015. Blue Jays players have led the American League in home runs five times: Jesse Barfield in 1986, Fred McGriff in 1989, José Bautista back-to-back in 2010 and 2011, and Guerrero in 2021; all of them led MLB in those years as well except McGriff.

The Blue Jays have only ever had one MLB batting title champion, when John Olerud hit .363 over 158 games in the World Series championship year in 1993. They’ve only had three players lead the American League in hits: Paul Molitor in 1993, Vernon Wells in 2003, and Bichette, who did it back-to back in 2021 and 2022.

Only four Toronto pitchers have won the AL Cy Young award: Pat Hentgen in 1996, Roger Clemens back-to-back in 1997 and 1998, Roy Halladay in 2003, and Robbie Ray in 2021. Of course, with hindsight, Dave Stieb should have won three Cy Young awards from 1982-1984.

Only three Hall of Famers spent most of their productive MLB career with Toronto (although Stieb arguably has a strong HoF case as well): Robbie Alomar and general manger Pat Gillick, who were both inducted in 2011, and Halladay, who was inducted posthumously in 2019. After 48 seasons, only eleven names have been elevated to the Blue Jays ‘Level of Excellence’, recognising tremendous individual achievement.

Every single one of those Blue Jays players mentioned above played on an AL East division winner with Toronto… except for Clemens, Wells, Halladay, Guerrero, and Bichette. So there is a standard of excellence that’s been set by previous generational talents in Toronto. As Donaldson famously quipped in May 2015, “this isn't the 'try' league, this is the 'get it done' league.”

Why have the Jays wasted the Vlad and Bo era and all their potential?

With both Vlad and Bo potential free agents after next season (absent long term contract extensions), its possible that the current generation of Blue Jays fans are presently witnesses to a wasted era, with the team squandering six years of potential division titles and World Series championships.

It’s not for a lack of surrounding them with other talented players. Starting with the Hyun Jin Ryu signing ahead of the 2020 season, the front office has brought in elite starting pitching talent including fellow free agents Kevin Gausman and Chris Bassitt, as well as José Berríos, who was acquired in a trade deadline deal in 2021.

They’ve signed talented free agents, including George Springer, Marcus Semien, Robbie Ray (who they’d initially acquired via trade in 2020), Yimi García and Chad Green; and, acquired defensive stalwarts like Matt Chapman and Daulton Varsho via trade. International signings Lourdes Gurriel Jr., and Alejandro Kirk have added value. Teoscar Hernández helped carry the offence from 2020-2022, with Toronto fourth overall in MLB with 550 home runs over that stretch; the Blue Jays led baseball with 262 home runs in 2021.

The payroll has been top ten in baseball since the start of the 2022 season, with Rogers spending close to US$700M on their competitive balance tax (CBT) payroll since then, including a $5.5M luxury tax bill for 2023. Hundred of millions more have been spent on stadium, and player development complex renovations. Rogers Centre is a fun place to watch a baseball game.

Problems started at the very top

Where the Blue Jays have wasted the Vlad and Bo era - and all of its potential - has been in poor 40-man roster management and construction, weak scouting and drafting, bad player development, and value destroying moves that worsened the talent level of this ball club.

Team president Mark Shapiro recently called the bullpen “an Achilles for us all year” in 2024, but this isn’t the first time the bullpen has derailed a season. In fact, relief pitching has consistently been the Achilles’ heel of this team. Blue Jays relievers have only added an fWAR of 7.8 since the start of the 2021 season, which ranks them 26th overall in MLB. That’s thanks to a cumulative FIP of 4.28, which ranks 23rd. Toronto relievers have allowed 301 home runs over that stretch, the 2nd most in baseball. 

The 2021 season, when the Jays finished in 4th place in the AL East and out of the playoffs, could have been lost thanks to just awful relief pitching in May of June of that year. The bullpen lost 14 games over those two months with nine blown saves, an ERA of 4.51, FIP of 4.39 and fWAR of 0.5.

The Blue Jays 2022 postseason hopes went up in smoke when Anthony Bass, acquired at the trade deadline, allowed three runs on only 13 pitches without getting an out in game two of the AL Wild Card series against Seattle that year. We all remember what happened in Game Two of the ALWC versus the Twins last October.

And the 2024 Achilles? A bullpen ERA of 5.07 - only better than Colorado - who play half of their games a mile high, and a league worst 69 home runs allowed.

It’s also the anemic offence: Toronto ranks 18th in baseball since the start of the 2023 season in runs scored, and 21st on home runs. They’ve grounded into 224 double plays in the past two years, the 3rd most in baseball, which doesn’t help their .262 batting average with runners in scoring position over that stretch. They’ve batted in 839 runs with RISP since 2023. The Orioles have 979 RBI in those situations since then, while the Dodgers have 987 RBI. Going back three years, Blue Jays fans have had to endure 360 rally killing ground into double plays (GIDP), only less than the Marlins and Rockies.

Depth, talent and farm system rankings

Despite that top ten payroll, the Blue Jays front office has been unable to build up enough MLB-ready waves of talent in the farm system, which has consistently ranked in the bottom 3rd of baseball since 2022, including 23rd in the latest post-amateur draft and trade deadline midseason update from Baseball America (subscription required), and 22nd in the updated ESPN and FanGraphs rankings.

That’s due to poor scouting, drafting and player development. There’s no sugarcoating this: the Blue Jays have one of baseball’s worst scouting departments and player development groups.

So when injuries inevitably hit, or when players regress relative to what the front office was projecting, unlike the Rays or the Dodgers, there just isn’t enough talent to keep the 26-man roster competitive at the MLB level.

That’s been a long running issue, with only one first round pick by general manager Ross Atkins currently active in the organisation in 18-year-old Arjun Nimmala, who plays for Single-A Dunedin. He’s likely 3+ years and a continued progression through Vancouver, New Hampshire and Buffalo away from a potential MLB debut.

It’s been manifested this year in both the dreadful bullpen, which couldn’t compensate for the Jordan Romano injury and ineffectiveness from Tim Mayza and Erik Swanson, and in the 47 starts not made by Gausman, Bassitt or Berríos, where the Blue Jays are 17-30, for a .362 winning percentage. They’re 37-33 (.528) when the ‘Big Three’ start.

As a result, despite that big payroll and all of the resources Rogers has afforded them in terms of facilities, analytics tools and player development gizmos, the front office just hasn’t been able to get the alchemy of building an AL East division winner or deep postseason roster right.

The rosters they have built have all been fatally flawed, as evidenced by zero Wild Card wins; either they didn’t have enough starting pitching and bullpen depth (2021, 2022 and 2024), or they’ve been built around run prevention while not scoring enough runs (2023 and this season).

Since, Kirk and Alek Manoah were rookies in 2021 and both made the All-Star team in 2022, there haven’t really been any impact prospects called up to Toronto. Davis Schneider has had some flashes, and Spencer Horwitz and Leo Jiménez have talent, but that’s it. Orelvis Martinez, the one intriguing MLB-ready power bat in the system, was suspended 80 games for a PED violation.

That’s not on Vlad (career bWAR of 19.7 and OPS+ of 136) or Bo (bWAR 17.4, OPS+ 120), who’ve been generational talents. That’s not on Rogers, who’ve spent $700M since 2022 just for the on the field roster, plus hundreds of millions more on successful renovations in Dunedin and the player development complex there, as well as at Rogers Centre. The fan experience at the ballpark is much improved, which would make October baseball even better.

The focus now shifts to 2025

With only one year of team control left - not only for Guerrero and Bichette - but also Bassitt, Green and Romano, the Blue Jays front office has expressed their intention to build a championship calibre roster for 2025 to compete in the tough AL East. In the Vlad and Bo era, they’ve only ever built teams competing for a Wild Card. The Jays were the 8th and final seed in an expanded playoff format in the pandemic-shortened 2020, the top seed in 2022, and the 6th and final Wild Card seed in 2023.

Along with Gausman, Berríos, Varsho and Kirk, there are certainly enough pieces to build around to reload for 2025. Close to $68M in payroll drops off from the 2024 Opening Day roster, and recent comments from Shapiro suggest he doesn’t expect “any large-scale pullback” on payroll.

Of their arbitration eligible players, only Guerrero and Varsho are likely to see big raises for 2025. Bichette is already signed for $17.6M next year. Apart from $1.2M owed to Pittsburgh for Isiah Kiner-Falefa, there are no retained salaries on the books for 2025. Which means there should be plenty of room for the front office to not only extend Guerrero long term, but also significantly upgrade the 26-man roster by either signing or trading for:

• two difference-making MLB starting pitchers to replace Manoah and Yusei Kikuchi, as well as provide depth given injured top prospects Ricky Tiedemann and Brandon Barriera won’t help in 2025. A few of Corbin Burnes, Max Fried, Jack Flaherty, Walker Buehler, Robbie Ray and Shane Bieber, and trades for MLB-ready starters like River Ryan and Jacob Misiorowski would be nice.

• four impact MLB relief arms to significantly improve upon García, Richards, Mayza and Pearson and provide lock down, high-leverage relief so that the bullpen isn’t “an Achilles” again;

• an MLB-ready catcher acquired via trade like Jeferson Quero or Dalton Rushing to replace Danny Jansen given the weak free agent class at the position; and, most importantly,

• two power-hitting MLB bats that can carry this offence and provide protection in the lineup for Vlad and Bo. Anthony Santander and Teoscar Hernández, for example. Maybe Tyler O'Neill. Or Juan Soto, in our dreams.

If Shapiro and his colleagues are serious about competing with the young and talented Orioles, the much improved Red Sox, and the always competitive Rays and Yankees in the AL East in the final season of the Vlad and Bo era, that’s objectively what Toronto will need to build a championship calibre roster this coming offseason.

Anything less, while expecting to take one final crack at a World Series with Vlad and Bo, would be delusional. Tripling down on “internal improvement” when Springer, Gausman and Green will all be in their age-34 season, and Bassitt will be 36-years old, won’t ‘get it done’, because as Blue Jays fans all know, this isn’t the ‘try’ league.