HOUSTON – There are layers to this non-waiver trade deadline for the Toronto Blue Jays, and that’s even before an examination of the Aaron Sanchez situation that is an entire onion on its own.
The acquisitions of Francisco Liriano plus well regarded prospects Reese McGuire and Harold Ramirez from the Pittsburgh Pirates, swingman Scott Feldman from the Houston Astros and depth starter Mike Bolsinger from the Los Angeles Dodgers was largely painless.
On a day when Top 100 prospects were being flipped all over the place, Drew Hutchison was the only notable farm system asset the Blue Jays parted with, and that movie probably plays better in the National League Central than it did in the American League East.
Interestingly, the currency the Blue Jays yielded to bolster their club was actual currency, as they ate the remainder of Jesse Chavez’s $4 million (who was sent to the Dodgers for Bolsinger) and Franklin Morales’s $2 million (designated for assignment to make better use of the roster spot), while picking up the roughly $4.5 million left for Liriano this season plus the $13,666,667 he’s owed next year, and the $2.6 million still owed to Feldman.
They didn’t get the biggest names in play – see the Texas Rangers, Los Angeles Dodgers and Cleveland Indians for that – but nor did they need to. Instead, they swapped out a struggling swingman in Chavez for one pitching well in Feldman, replaced the triple-A depth Hutchison provided with Bolsinger and set themselves up for Sanchez’s transition to the bullpen with Liriano.
As a bonus, they added catcher Reese McGuire and outfielder Harold Ramirez, both assigned to double-A New Hampshire, and they’re now among the club’s top-10 prospects.
All in all, some clever strategic plays.
"We had some financial flexibility that allowed us to acquire prospects in the deal," general manager Ross Atkins said during a conference call. "The opportunities that were there, we were able to add experience, add depth and add talent and really what it comes down to is we feel like we made our team incrementally better in several ways, while adding depth to our organization."
Now, how the next two months play out will determine exactly how smart it all was.
Sanchez will make his next scheduled start Friday, manager John Gibbons said, and after that who knows. Atkins said "we haven’t worked through the details" of when the transition happens and Liriano, 6-11 with a 5.46 ERA and 1.619 WHIP in 113.2 innings over 21 starts, arrives in need of some adjustments. Reuniting with former catcher Russell Martin should help and Atkins said the Blue Jays "expect some correction" in his performance.
Still, pulling Sanchez from the rotation because of workload concerns is going to hurt, and mostly won’t be well received in the clubhouse, although some do see the benefit he’ll bring to the bullpen.
"I’ve never been a big fan of having Sanchie go back to the bullpen, but then again it’s not up to me," said Martin, who loved all the acquisitions. "I don’t know how Sanchie feels about it, but obviously as a player you want to do what you think is best for the team today and what’s best for the team in the long run, and that’s it. Would I like to see Sanchie close out the season and keep doing what he’s doing? Absolutely. I just feel like he’s been an ace this year, he’s pitched in every start and he hasn’t had that many stressful innings. I would be the kind of guy like, hey, if he feels good, I’d ride the wave, ride that horse. I don’t know what our great minds are thinking, so we’ll see."
There is no guarantee that moving Sanchez to the bullpen, where Atkins said after a period of transition he’d be subject to the same usage as any other reliever, will do anything more to save his arm. Sure, he’ll throw fewer innings, but he’ll be dealing with back-to-backs and constant leverage. Worth remembering is that the Blue Jays have far more proprietary information than the general public. At the same time, the science on the pitching arm is very far from foolproof.
"I try not to think about it man, that’s not my call, I’m not a GM, I’m not the president," said Josh Donaldson, who praised the Liriano pickup. "I support what they do, obviously there’s reasoning behind it. Nobody knows what’s best for Aaron Sanchez, nobody does. I don’t know, he doesn’t know. The fact of the matter is there’s going to be a decision made and as a team that’s how we’ve got to go. We’ve got to move on and continue to do what we do and hopefully it works out for our favour."
The Blue Jays have debated what to do with Sanchez since the end of last season, and the conversation simply hasn’t stopped. Prior to the deadline, Atkins said the front office decided that if the team was going to win the World Series, it had to ensure the 24-year-old would be able to pitch through October.
That led them to the conclusion that "the best odds of Aaron Sanchez being a part of the team was at some point some transition to the bullpen. With that in mind, we considered alternatives and now we have the option to do that."
Liriano was one of 20 starting pitchers the Blue Jays started researching two months ago, but he was far from the only arm they considered. Rich Hill, Jeremy Hellickson and Ervin Santana were among the other possibilities they looked at, but Liriano was the only deal that lined up.
The Dodgers picked up Hill and outfielder Josh Reddick from the Oakland Athletics for right-handers Grant Holmes (No. 60 in Baseball America’s mid-season prospect rankings), Frankie Montas (No. 82) and Jharel Cotton.
Hellickson and Santana both stayed put, while Will Smith, one of the left-handed relievers they considered, went to the San Francisco Giants for righty Phil Bickford (No. 50) and catcher Andrew Susac.
The Blue Jays had three prospects in Baseball America’s top 100 – righty Sean Reid-Foley (No. 84), centre-fielder Anthony Alford (No. 86) and righty Conner Greene (No. 90) – but kept their stash of kids untouched.
"We were in on every single starting pitcher that was rumoured available and many that weren’t rumoured available," said Atkins. "Acquisition cost is always a part of it. Our focus going into it was how do we make our team better, increase our depth, increase our experience and that talent? We feel like we did that with the acquisition cost here also bringing in young talent into our system. We didn’t plan on that as a focus going into it, but we were opportunistic when it presented itself."
In the long-term, there may very well be payoff for that. In the short-term, we’ll soon find out.