Blue Jays Staring Risk Right in the Face

When Ross Atkins took over the Blue Jays, we heard about risk tolerance guiding decisions. This offseason has risk written all over it

The Toronto Blue Jays have designs on competing for a championship in 2023. After a rather quick rebuild, they’re in a position to do just that. Over the course of this time, we’ve all watched as the front office went about getting to this point. There were names we wanted to see come to Toronto and there were many we didn’t. While we were screaming to have more of that 2015 magic, the front office decided to take a measured, risk averse approach to building the behemoth that Mark Shapiro envisioned. Well, they’re knocking on the door of behemoth status and showing that they’re willing to take on more risk than ever.

Back in the post Alex Anthopoulos era of Blue Jays history, there were players that the club could have pursued to make fans happy. As one example, think back to January, 2018 when Christian Yelich was available from the Marlins. There was a significant amount of cries from the Blue Jays’ fanbase to trade for Yelich. We’d begun the aftermath of 2015/2016 and wanted a short rebuild. We wanted the stars.

However, back then, the club wasn’t in a position to consider trading $100m of future value in Vladimir Guerrero Jr.for the current value that Yelich offered. In short, adding a player of that impact simply wouldn’t have been enough to put the team over the hump, so there was no point in risking losing that future talent and taking on the financial risk of a Yelich. Fast forward to present day and I’m sure we’re all glad Atkins avoided that risk.

However, that risk aversion wouldn’t last much longer. Signing Hyun Jin Ryu was the first real ‘throwing caution to the wind’ move by Atkins. In order to land the then 32 yr old lefty starter, the club had to agree to an $80m deal, which is not insignificant. But, more than that, the risk of signing a 32 yr old starter to big money has become very clear as he is now recovering from Tommy John surgery. Ryu’s history of injury was known, but the Blue Jays decided to take on the risk to land themselves a legit top tier starter. Whether they got that is a matter of opinion. Regardless, the cost was high as was the risk and Toronto took it on anyway.

We could add George Springer to the list of risky moves. In January of 2021, Atkins handed out the largest contract in franchise history to a 31 yr old Springer. Signing a 31 yr old to a 6yr deal is risky, obviously. That is especially true for a CF who had had injuries in the previous couple of seasons. The obvious risk is that Springer would have to be moved to a corner outifeld spot and/or DH near the end of his contract, if not sooner. But, when you’re in ‘win now’ mode (which this move clearly indicated they were) you put future concerns on the back burner.

We could expand on other risky moves like trading for Robbie Ray and his league leading number of walks. But, none will compare to the amount of risk Ross Atkins has taken on to begin the current offseason. No, there has never been this much intentional risk from Atkins & Co.

Atkins began the offseason by trading Teoscar Hernandez to Seattle for Erik Swanson and Adam Macko. Setting aside the ongoing disagreement about the merits of this deal among fans, what is very clear is the amount of risk Atkins not only took on, but actually created.

Currently, the Blue Jays have an outfield of Springer, Lourdes Gurriel Jr. Whit Merrifield with guys like Nathan Lukes and Otto Lopez rounding out the depth. This group does not exactly scream “championship”. And, the fact that Toronto continues to be linked to the likes of Brandon Nimmo and (hopefully) to a lesser extent Cody Bellinger tells us that the club is not satisfied with their current alignment.

But, that’s the interesting part. Atkins traded Teoscar knowing full well it would create a large hole in his lineup.