Toronto Blue Jays: The 10 worst moves by GM Ross Atkins since 2015

With this being the 30th anniversary of the Blue Jays last World Series championship, Toronto fans are surely expecting something better than 4th place and a 6-15 record against division opponents in the AL East. The additions of Kevin Kiermaier, Daulton Varsho, Brandon Belt, Chris Bassitt and Erik Swanson, a freshly renovated Rogers Centre, and pre-season prognostications of a potential deep postseason run have all excited the fan base.

So it may come as a disappointment to some fans that, now 40% through the season, the Jays sit in 4th place in their division, 10.5 games back of Tampa Bay with a 36-29 record. They’ve only won six games in twenty-one tries so far against AL East opponents, and went through an 11-17 slump in May. Thankfully the baseball season is a long one, with lots of room to turn things around.

However, despite all of that excitement surrounding the team, we cannot forget a few key truths. As mentioned, it’s been 30 long years since the last World Series title in Toronto. The team hasn’t won a single playoff game since the 2016 ALCS, and they’ve finished in 4th place four times in seven tries since Ross Atkins become the General Manager after the 2015 season. Compare that to his predecessor’s record with the Atlanta Braves, including five straight NL East pennants and the 2021 World Series championship, and perhaps there’s reason for Jays fans to be a little restless?

The 10 Worst Moves by GM Ross Atkins Since 2015

To understand how we got here, it’s perhaps instructive to look at some of the worst transactions in Ross Atkins’ tenure as GM. We can all point to his successes, including the free agent signings of Robbie Ray, Marcus Semien, George Springer, Kevin Gausman and, more recently, Kevin Kiermaier.

There have been some winning trades, highlighted by Matt Chapman and José Berríos. He unearthed Teoscar Hernández from the Houston Astros organization, and then flipped him for set-up man Erik Swanson. He also drafted superstar Bo Bichette, pitchers Alek Manoah and Nate Pearson, and signed catchers Alejandro Kirk and Gabriel Moreno, as well as OF Lourdes Gurriel Jr.

But those moves haven’t come in isolation. The competitive landscape in Major League Baseball, and in their division in particular, is extremely dynamic, with all teams trying to get better via trades, free agent signings, and through the draft. Since Ross was hired to replace Alex Anthopoulos as the Blue Jays GM, their AL East division rivals have also worked hard to construct competitive rosters.

The Yankees have been to the playoffs every year since 2017, losing three times to Houston in the ALCS. Tampa Bay has been to the postseason every year since 2019, losing the 2020 World Series to the Dodgers. The Red Sox have been to the playoffs four times since 2016, and won the 2018 World Series over Los Angeles. Even the Baltimore Orioles are on the cusp of postseason success, with an exciting young core that currently has them behind only Tampa in the AL East.

Toronto has been to the postseason three times since Atkins was hired, running it back to the ALCS in 2016, but then bowing out without any wins in the ALWC in both 2020 and 2022. This is now his 8th season as the Jays’ GM, and he’s on to his third manager after replacing Charlie Montoyo with John Schneider last July; in other words, it’s fully his team. Ownership has ‘bought in’, with a top five MLB luxury tax payroll of $256 million, which should incur an additional tax penalty of $4.9 million at the end of the season according to Spotrac.

After eight seasons with Atkins at the helm, the farm system is bare, with only one top 100 prospect and very little MLB-ready depth. MLB put the Jays farm system 20th in their pre-season ranking, while Baseball America (subscription required) ranked them 17th and noted they have “interesting prospects to restock around”, i.e. not much in the way of waves of MLB-ready talent that Ross Atkins has promised Blue Jay fans.

In an August 2019 interview with radio station TSN 1050, Atkins said, “Ultimately we feel we’re at a point now where our young position players have transitioned, and we have several waves of very, very talented pitchers coming through our system that we couldn’t be more excited about… We’ll have a system that will provide us talent, a system that if need be we can trade away from. We’ll have financial flexibility, and we have an incredible process in place.”

Fast forward four years later, and the only homegrown pitchers on the 26-man roster who were either drafted or signed by Atkins and developed in the Blue Jays organization are Alek Manoah and Nate Pearson. Jordan Romano, who Atkins exposed in the Rule 5 draft and almost lost, as well as Tim Mayza, were drafted by Anthopoulos and already in the farm system when Atkins arrived.

And with former Houston Astros GM James Click apprenticing in Toronto as a Vice President, Baseball Strategy, a potential replacement for Atkins already exists in-house if the Jays cannot turn things around over the next few months and then go deep into the postseason.

So what have been the biggest missteps in those eight seasons so far that might help to explain the lack of postseason success and the nearly empty cupboards in the farm system? Could some of these transactions have held back the Jays rebuild and delayed their competitive window?

10. Free agent pitcher misses: Tanner Roark, Kirby Yates

Ahead of the 2020 season, the Blue Jays signed then-33-year-old free agent starter Tanner Roark to a two-year, $24 million deal to help stabilize a rotation that had used 21 starters in 2019. It ended up being an abject disaster, with Roark DFA’d by April 2021. He pitched his way out of baseball after making only 12 starts in a Toronto uniform, with a 6.75 ERA and 7.03 FIP over only 54.2 innings. The self-proclaimed “diesel engine” never became the durable workhorse he’d been from 2016-2019, when he made 30 or more starts each season, posting a 3.99 ERA over that stretch with Washington, Cincinnati and Oakland. In fact, Roark allowed the 3rd-most homers in MLB as a Jay in 2020, plus three more in his one start for Toronto in 2021.

That mistake was compounded with failed trades for pitchers like Chase Anderson, Trent Thornton and Anthony Kay, constant injuries to free agent starter Matt Shoemaker, and eventually led to then 23-year old rookie Alek Manoah being called up in May 2021 after only 9 starts and 35.0 innings in the minors. Could some of Manoah’s struggles so far in 2023 be attributed to being overworked over 51 starts and 308.1 innings pitched in 2021-2022?

While Hyun Jin Ryu, Robbie Ray, Steven Matz and Taijuan Walker helped the Blue Jays rotation, other attempts to stabilize the rotation and bullpen via trades and free agency as the Jays entered their current competitive window proved to be misses. 33-year old closer Kirby Yates was signed on a $5.5 million gamble ahead of the 2021 season despite two physicals that should have raised red flags, and underwent Tommy John surgery that spring.

9. Trading Rowdy Tellez for Trevor Richards

As a result of that awful relief pitching in May and June of 2021, Ross Atkins was forced to scramble and trade for pitchers Adam Cimber and Trevor Richards. On July 6, 2021, he moved left-handed hitting first baseman Rowdy Tellez to Milwaukee for Richards and prospect Bowden Francis. In other words, he compounded his Kirby Yates mistake above with another mistake in moving Tellez, who at the time was one of only three left-handed hitters getting regular at bats along with infielder Cavan Biggio and catcher Reese McGuire.

Tellez has gone on to slug 54 home runs with 143 RBI on the Brewers, while slashing .231/.311/.461/.772 with an OPS+ of 113 and bWAR of 1.5 over parts of three seasons. Richards has been just average at best as a Blue Jay, with a bWAR of 0.1, ERA of 4.44 and FIP of 4.25 over 123.2 innings; his ERA+ of 91 in Toronto means he’s actually been below league average on ERA. And Francis is now 27 years old and has only pitched 0.2 innings in MLB.

8. Overpaying on Contract Extensions and Free Agent Deals

While Atkins would make some bad subsequent trades (see above, and more on that below), he did have a decent offseason of trades in 2017/18. He acquired Randal Grichuk from St. Louis for relievers Dominic Leone and Conner Greene, and then in a separate deal with the Cards, he acquired infielder Aledmys Díaz for busted 2016 2nd round draft pick J.B. Woodman. Of course he missed out on trading Josh Donaldson to St. Louis for starter Jack Flaherty, but the the deals he did consummate worked out.

However, after a decent first season in Toronto, where Grichuk hit 25 home runs with 61 RBI and slashed .245/.301/.502/.803 with an OPS+ of 117 and bWAR of 2.5, Atkins offered him a completely unnecessary five-year, $52 million contract extension ahead of the 2019 season. For a rebuilding ballclub, the contract made little sense as Grichuk was notoriously streaky, ground in to far too many double plays (47 over four seasons in Toronto), and was turning 28 that August. It ended up being completely gratutous with the Jays losing 95 games that year.

Grichuk ended up being only an average (to below average) hitter during the rest of his tenure, accumulating a bWAR of only 1.8 combined over the next three seasons in Toronto, with a paltry slash line of .242/.286/.448/.733 and below league average OPS+ of 94. For over $10 million AAV per season, that was poor production, and Grichuk ended up being dumped along with $9.7 million in cash to the Colorado Rockies for Raimel Tapia and prospect Adrian Pinto. In fact, to add insult to injury, the Jays are still paying $4.33 million of Grichuk’s salary this season.

What’s odd is that the front office has also extended other players they’ve acquired via trade like José Berríos, but has yet to extend any of their own homegrown stars including Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, Danny Jansen, Alejandro Kirk or Jordan Romano beyond their arbitration years. They’ve also offered big free agent deals to George Springer (six-years, $150 million), Kevin Gausman (five-years, $110 million), Hyun Jin Ryu (four-years $80 million, when no other team offered a 4th year), Chris Bassitt (three-years, $63 million) and Yusei Kikuchi (three-years, $36 million, which no other team came close to matching).

7. First Round Draft Pick Mistakes

Only three of Atkins’ eight 1st round draft picks are still with the organisation. Alek Manoah and Nate Pearson are both on the 26 man roster, and lefty Brandon Barriera is at Single-A Dunedin, but none of his other top picks - including T.J. Zeuch, Logan Warmoth, Jordan Groshans, Austin Martin and Gunnar Hoglund - remain in the organisation. Second round mistakes include J.B. Woodman and CJ Van Eyk, although drafting high schooler Bo Bichette at #66 in 2016 has been a steal.

The biggest miss under Atkins was likely Austin Martin at #5 in 2020 after a 95-loss season in 2019. The Jays paid him a $7 million signing bonus before trading him along with Simeon Woods Richardson in the 2021 trade deadline deal for starter José Berríos. They picked him over players already in MLB, like Angels starter Reid Detmers, White Sox reliever Garrett Crochet, and Giants catcher Patrick Bailey.

Of course, Atkins isn’t the only Jays GM with a poor record on top draft picks. Alex Anthopoulos also failed badly when it came to top draft picks.

6. Signing Kendrys Morales over bringing back Edwin Encarnación

Edwin Encarnación “walked the parrot” 239 times in eight season in Toronto, and was a fan favorite and key member of the Blue Jays back-to-back ALCS teams in 2015 and 2016. He’d had bWARs of 4.9 and 4.1, repectively, over those two years, and was still only 33-years old in 2016. However, Ross Atkins inexplicably decided to play a ‘game of chicken’ in contract negotiations, and ended up making a huge error by rushing to sign the declining Kendrys Morales to a three-year, $33 million contract before Edwin could even reject the Jays’ four-year, $80 million offer in November 2016. Morales was barely a 2.0 bWAR player in decline, and was never going to replace the production from Encarnación. EE ended up signing a three-year, $60 million deal with Cleveland.

As per Yahoo!Sports, “Morales posted an underwhelming .760 OPS during his Blue Jays tenure, and was traded, along with cash considerations, to the Oakland Athletics right before the start of the 2019 season. Simply put, the deal was a bust.”

Encarnación posted OPS numbers of .881, .810 and .875 with 104 homers over those same three seasons. And the Blue Jays finished in 4th place in the AL East for three straight years from 2017-2019, with the key lesson hopefully learned that you cannot replace a 4.0 WAR player with a 2.0 WAR player in decline.

4. Trading J.A. Happ for Brandon Drury and Billy McKinney

In what was to be the first major trade in the Blue Jays full rebuild under GM Ross Atkins, lefty workhorse J.A. Happ was moved on July 26, 2018 to the New York Yankees for infielder Brandon Drury and outfielder Billy McKinney. Happ was one of the best starters available ahead of that trade deadline, and was on a team friendly $13 million contract in the final year of his deal. While he was just a rental, he would go 7-0 with a 2.69 ERA in 11 starts and 63.2 innings down the stretch for the Yankees, with 63 strikeouts against only 16 walks, and an ERA+ of 157. In other words, “money”.

He also had postseason experience in 2016, so should have garnered a better return as the Jays went full rebuild. In 525 plate appearances for the Blue Jays, Drury would take at-bats away from replacement players while posting a -1.7 bWAR and pitiful .208/.253/.353/.606 slash line with an OPS+ well below league average at 61. In 407 plate appearances, McKinney also had an OPS+ below league average at 94 while slashing .230/.291/.439/.730. They did not accelerate the Blue Jays rebuilding efforts at all. Unfortunately, as you’ll see below, that wasn’t the worst trade (or non-trade) Atkins made (or didn’t make) in the rebuilding.

3. Trading Gabriel Moreno and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. for Daulton Varsho

The early returns on this December 23, 2022 trade of Moreno and Gurriel Jr., for Varsho do not look great. Gurriel Jr., and Moreno have combined for a bWAR of 3.4 so far in 2023 to help propel the Diamondbacks into first placed ahead of the Dodgers in the NL West.

While Varsho has played some great outfield defense, with a total defensive runs saved above average (DRS) of +9, he’s struggled at the plate and has been exposed on high fastballs. His slash line of .216/.286/.394/.680 adds up to an OPS+ of 95, below league-average.

The 23-year old Moreno certainly looks like he could be a core piece for Arizona for the next decade or more, and his ability to throw out base runners with one of the best “pop times” of any catcher in MLB is a skill that’s been sorely lacking for Toronto this year. He ranks 6th overall in MLB at 1.89 seconds on pop time to 2B. In contrast, Danny Jansen ranks 36th at 1.98 seconds, and Alejandro Kirk ranks 40th at 1.99 seconds, and the Blue Jays have allowed almost one stolen base per game to rank 28th overall on that metric.

And in his contract walk year, Gurriel Jr., is second on the Diamondbacks with in OPS+ at 147, with 9 home runs and 35 RBIs to go with a slash line of .310/.359/.550/.909, and a DRS in LF of +2.

2. Trading Marcus Stroman for Anthony Kay and Simeon Woods Richardson

Simply put, here was another huge loss in terms of WAR deficit. Marcus Stroman was traded on July 28, 2019 with 1.5 years left on his contract, along with the optionality of extending him a Qualifying Offer after the 2020 season. He’s gone on to post a 3.20 ERA in 81 starts covering 450.1 innings since being traded for pitching prospects Anthony Kay and Simeon Woods Richardson ahead of ther July 2019 trade deadline. That’s been good for a bWAR of 10.0 since then, which the Jays could have benefitted from if they’d extended Stroman in 2019.

If we follow that trade tree, Kay posted a bWAR of 0.0 over 70.2 innings with a 5.48 ERA in Toronto before being DFA’d last December. Woods Richardson has a 6.52 ERA and -0.2 bWAR in only 9.2 MLB innings since being traded to Minnesota along with 2020 5th overall draft pick Austin Martin for starter José Berríos, who has a 1.4 bWAR in Toronto.

Martin has tumbled out of the top prospect rankings and is currently injured. We need to also consider the $7 million signing bonus the Blue Jays gave Martin as part of the transaction cost there, plus the cash considerations the Jays paid to the Mets when they dealt Stroman.

As Bob Nightengale of USA Today wrote after the Jays traded Stroman, “The Mets just acquired a guy who has the fifth-best ERA in the American League (2.96) despite pitching in the AL East… And all it cost was their fourth- and sixth-best prospects in a farm system that’s considered among the worst in baseball.“

1. Trading Josh Donaldson for a PTBNL

If any one transaction epitomizes how badly the Blue Jays rebuild was set back by poor moves under GM Ross Atkins, it was the August 31, 2018 trade that never should have happened under MLB rules of 2015 AL MVP Josh Donaldson to the Cleveland Indians for a player to be named later, who became the always injured Julian Merryweather, a pitcher who was rehabbing from March 2018 Tommy John surgery at the time. While Merryweather had tantalizing velocity, he was below replacement value for Toronto with a bWAR of -0.1, and pitched to a 5.64 ERA, 4.64 FIP and ERA+ of only 74 in his pedestrian 52.2 innings as a Blue Jay over parts of three seasons. Donaldson has gone on to a cumulative bWAR of 12.0 in his post-Toronto career.

Atkins destroyed any value moving Donaldson could have added to the Blue Jays rebuild by waiting too long to trade him. Ahead of the 2018 season, St. Louis expressed interest in trading top pitching prospect Jack Flaherty and another player to Toronto for Donaldson; Ross whiffed. He’d could have also waited and made a qualifying offer (QO) to Donaldson after the 2018 season, and received a compensatory draft pick if Donaldson rejected the offer, but gave up that optionality as well. The following season, Donaldson helped the Atlanta Braves win the NL East pennant with 37 HRs, 94 RBIs and a .259/.379/.521/.900 slash line and OPS+ of 126.

Atkins had inherited the then 29-year old 2015 AL MVP when he was hired to be the new Blue Jays GM in December 2015. Donaldson had three years left on his contract and was a core player on the back-to-back ALCS teams in 2015-2016. But all of that value was squandered. The return of a PTBNL for a former MVP may, in fact, be one of the worst moves in modern MLB history.

Bad Moves Delayed the Rebuild

With James Click waiting in the wings to take his job, Atkins is certainly on the hot seat this season. We can certainly find fault in many of the moves he’s made going on eight seasons now as Blue Jays GM, plus his critics can point to the lack of postseason wins, as well as the weak farm system. He squandered many of the assets and trade capital at his displosal when he came to Toronto, which delayed the rebuild.

Let’s hope the team can turn things around from here as the weather heats up and they don’t have to face the Tampa Bay Rays or New York Yankees again until the second half of September. And in what must be termed as a “World Series or bust” season given a top five luxury tax payroll at $256 million, and the fact that his predecessor built the core of the 2015 and 2016 ALCS teams in only six seasons of work, Ross Atkins better be hoping that turnaround comes in a hurry. Let’s go Blue Jays!