UWHabs
Well-known member
There's reason both ways. Rogers probably not too happy that Shapiro haven't kept them as competitive, but Shapiro probably really frustrated at what cheap-asses Rogers are being.
OT: The Toronto Blue Jays
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Deckie007
Well-known member
With a shitty team, the Jays are still top 5 in attendance in the AL - outdrawing places like Seattle and Cleveland. I can't find TV ratings, but I doubt they are bad. The money is there to make improvements to the Dome, but Rogers sucks. If they do a proper rebuild - cut payroll and funnel the money into improvements, I could get behind that. It shouldn't be that way - Rogers could afford to have a healthy payroll and fix up the Dome. After visiting Safeco, PNC, Great American Ballpark and Progressive Field, the Dome is a ****ing dump.
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leafman101
Well-known member
Yeah, agreed. Based on the track record of both neither should be surprised though. Not sure why either expected anything else.
JackBurton
Well-known member
If I am an organization I'm not a big fan of paying so much to upgrade a 30 year-old stadium.
The one really tough issue about the Rogers Centre is it might be the BEST location in MLB out of all the stadiums. It is 10/10.
Volcanologist
Well-known member
UWHabs
Well-known member
The problem is the stadium needs something like 500M in upgrades to really get it up to par. And you're not going to get any public financing, and won't even get the benefit of being able to claim a whole new stadium for people to come to. So that's a really hard budget line item to throw onto Rogers' balance sheet with virtually no guaranteed return on the investment. But they really can't build a stadium in a better location in the city, and any new stadium is going to be 1B+ anyways, so they really just have to suck it up. If they do a good job with it, they can easily boost attendance even more - I mean, even if the team is hella shitty like this year, if being in the park had the atmosphere that the other new stadiums around the league has, I'd totally head out to way more games.
MyNameIsJonas
Well-known member
I can see a world where Shapiro wanted a teardown in 2017 and Rogers told him no, and i think it seems fairly clear when he was hired that he was told the renovation money would be there and would be moving a lot more quickly.
I'm not sure what Rogers could really expect given they haven't allowed him to spend more money and some of the injury luck they have had, As much as i'm not thrilled with a lot of Shatkins decisions there is a lot that is not in their control as it comes to health, and potentially even more with budget and direction of the club
I'm not sure what Rogers could really expect given they haven't allowed him to spend more money and some of the injury luck they have had, As much as i'm not thrilled with a lot of Shatkins decisions there is a lot that is not in their control as it comes to health, and potentially even more with budget and direction of the club
Deckie007
Well-known member
When you don't have Bautista and EE on bargain contracts providing elite production with guys like Tulo and Martin taking up huge amounts of payroll and your owners don't allow you to increase payroll, I'm not sure what management is supposed to do. This may be a situation where we want to blame Shatkins but the fingers should be pointed at Rogers for lack of support.
They probably weren't even allowed to offer a bad long term deal for Price or Fowler. And yes, both those guys are under performing their contracts in year 2/3 already. Oh and btw guys, EE is a 0.4 WAR player this year. Better than Kendrys, but not by much. So all the bitching about the loss of EE is much ado about nothing. He wouldn't have got us into the playoffs last year, and sure wouldn't have this year. Once things started going wrong last year there should have been a fire sale to get us futures that could start contributing in 2019 and beyond.
They probably weren't even allowed to offer a bad long term deal for Price or Fowler. And yes, both those guys are under performing their contracts in year 2/3 already. Oh and btw guys, EE is a 0.4 WAR player this year. Better than Kendrys, but not by much. So all the bitching about the loss of EE is much ado about nothing. He wouldn't have got us into the playoffs last year, and sure wouldn't have this year. Once things started going wrong last year there should have been a fire sale to get us futures that could start contributing in 2019 and beyond.
Volcanologist
Well-known member
the finger is always pointed at Rogers. They hired a career loser and now they're unhappy about it.
Deckie007
Well-known member
That's the thing. I don't think they brought him in to win. They brought him in to improve other parts of the business then didn't give him the resources to do it. They didn't understand that the status quo wasn't going to be good enough on the field. What a shit show.
MindzEye
Wayward Ditch Pig
Not come riding into town claiming that if you were smart enough to win 80+ games with 80 million that competing in the AL east with 150 million would be no problem?
What do you do? Same thing AA did, show some marbles and pull out the magic trade machine and see what happens. Aka "try". ****ing try to put a ball club on the field. These ****s didn't even try, let's not let that just slide.
Por que no los dos?
Price has been 8 WAR since he signed the contract, while missing ~20 starts last season. If he had stayed healthy last year he'd be somewhere in the range of 11 WAR and looking like a good bet to be about 12.5 WAR or better over the first 3 years of the contract. Is he the 6-7 WAR fire breathing dragon we had? No. But he still looks like a 4+ WAR front of the rotation guy, okay value for money. Would have been far better value than the "safe" money that Shatkins decided to spend.
.237 babip man. If I had to choose who to pay next year, EE for 20 or Kendrys for 10. EE all day. 3 WAR in 1.5 years of a contract (10 million per Win) or -0.6 WAR for 15 million. Tough mother****ing decision to make. It's not about EE getting us into the playoffs by himself in any one year, it's about a decision making process that leads to decisions like the set Shatkins made.
Yep, the only thing I'd add here though is that last year was destined to go wrong. Shatkins wasn't even trying to compete, they were just trying to look like they were competing. Shapiro was offered the job under the idea that a tear down was necessary, and he never seemed to shake that idea despite the fact he actually got handed a legit WS contender.
Deckie007
Well-known member
Sure, but you're probably trading Bo or Vlad or one of the other high end kids in the system to prop up an aging roster. I feel like that's a course of action that gets you a WC game loss and a lot of bad years down the road.
For sure, I just put a larger percentage in Rogers lap then most, is all.
Can't use injuries as an excuse for Price. It's part of being a pitcher and he's been worth $64M on a $90M salary for the past 3 years. Not good enough. Happ's been worth $66M.
Well yeah, they should have signed neither. I'm just saying the weeping and gnashing of teeth over EE was overblown for a player that wouldn't have helped enough.
I'm not sure the 2017 Jays were a WS contender. The Red Sox, Yankees and Astros had clearly passed them in pure talent. A 100% healthy team was a WC team for sure, but they were toast.
MyNameIsJonas
Well-known member
I think most of us would have understood a sell off at the deadline in 2017 and certainly in the Winter. Everything in Shapiro's past suggests he would have preferred to go this route as well, and everything we know about Rogers suggests they would have been scared shitless about losing the fan base with that kind of message while at the same time not approving a payroll increase.
At that point what is Shapiro supposed to do really? We can quibble about the talent choices he made like Morales, Jaime and whoever else, but moving Vlad/Bo/Jansen for a short term fix with no cash behind to support them and the tank job some of the teams core has sustained doesn't exactly look any better. He might have been forced into this risk free half in, half out approach and in that he's at least yielded a couple of interesting pieces in Grichuk and maybe Diaz.
Their drafting seems to be on point, with Biggio, Smith, Bichette and Pearson all looking really good relative to their draft spots and only Logan Warmoth looking busty.
As for the stadium, even the biggest Shatkins haters would have to admit they can see a scenario where Rogers promised him money for the stadium upgrades when he was hired and has now dragged their feet too long on the process to piss him off
At that point what is Shapiro supposed to do really? We can quibble about the talent choices he made like Morales, Jaime and whoever else, but moving Vlad/Bo/Jansen for a short term fix with no cash behind to support them and the tank job some of the teams core has sustained doesn't exactly look any better. He might have been forced into this risk free half in, half out approach and in that he's at least yielded a couple of interesting pieces in Grichuk and maybe Diaz.
Their drafting seems to be on point, with Biggio, Smith, Bichette and Pearson all looking really good relative to their draft spots and only Logan Warmoth looking busty.
As for the stadium, even the biggest Shatkins haters would have to admit they can see a scenario where Rogers promised him money for the stadium upgrades when he was hired and has now dragged their feet too long on the process to piss him off
zeke
Well-known member
maybe don't spend another $70m on replacement players?
MyNameIsJonas
Well-known member
My main quibbles with Shatkins would be in 2017, when we were still a contender, their additions to the roster were Melvin Upton and Fransisco Liriano ( and only because the Pirates threw in a couple of prospects). I'm legit curious to know what arms they passed on so they could add an OF4 and backup C prospect to the system. Regardless that's a pretty shitty pair of adds to make to a WS contender.
I also loathe the Happ deal as it still reeks of trying to maintain a shred of relevance now at the cost of a higher upside kid going forward, all the while not spending any actual money.
Assuming Solarte's option is picked up and Garcia's isnt, and with raises the Jays should have about 105M committed to the 2019 roster, with not a terrible amount of holes to fill and a fair amount of kids at AAA that i assume they want to look at. With the 2018 payroll at 160M or so, that leaves 40M- 55M of money to spend assuming there is no massive decrease in payroll.
I see 4 options for the club
a) cite attendance and really decrease the payroll
b) do what the phillies did this year and get some value FA's like Santana/Arrieta maybe a year earlier than you wanted to pair with Vlad
c) trade for dead money and keep building the farm
d) identify a few guys who you see as long term assets and give them front loaded extensions so they are cheaper when you expect to be good ( Grichuk and Stroman might fit here)
I also loathe the Happ deal as it still reeks of trying to maintain a shred of relevance now at the cost of a higher upside kid going forward, all the while not spending any actual money.
Assuming Solarte's option is picked up and Garcia's isnt, and with raises the Jays should have about 105M committed to the 2019 roster, with not a terrible amount of holes to fill and a fair amount of kids at AAA that i assume they want to look at. With the 2018 payroll at 160M or so, that leaves 40M- 55M of money to spend assuming there is no massive decrease in payroll.
I see 4 options for the club
a) cite attendance and really decrease the payroll
b) do what the phillies did this year and get some value FA's like Santana/Arrieta maybe a year earlier than you wanted to pair with Vlad
c) trade for dead money and keep building the farm
d) identify a few guys who you see as long term assets and give them front loaded extensions so they are cheaper when you expect to be good ( Grichuk and Stroman might fit here)
UWHabs
Well-known member
Yeah, hard to say what direction they take for next year. Although assuming no major moves, there's not really a ton of holes around, especially on offense. Martin/Jansen/Maile at C (likely dump Maile), Smoak/Travis/Ghost of Tulo/Vlad on the infield, with Solarte, Drury, Gurriel, Diaz as backups (and maybe Biggio/Bichette coming ready soon too). OF lacks top end talent, but still have Grichuk/Pillar/Hernandez. Pitching is a little thin, although a few of the kids are getting closer - depends a lot on how much you trust out of Sanchez/Stroman.
The real flaw is that the lineup is just a ton of meh. You got a few decent bats, but Vlad is probably the only guy who will be more than a 2-win player. You need at least 1-2 more quality players to be in the hunt for a playoff spot, and you have a real danger of Angels-ing by having a superstar without a supporting cast. And the pitching would still be relying on a couple guys who've had serious injury issues, followed by a bunch of rookies. Really not sure what the answer is.
MindzEye
Wayward Ditch Pig
Which Bo or Vlad did we trade to get what we were a contender with? Noah? Sure, but we could have traded Sanchez instead allegedly. We wouldn't have traded Bo or Vlad, we would have traded Alford, Zeuch, Urena, etc.
I hated Rogers before it was cool, but at the end of the day Shatkins inherited a contending team with a strong low minor league farm system and a decent payroll. They've lit the payroll on fire, & let that contending team get old without making any additions or even trying to extend the window.
You're in 2014 man...1 unadjusted WAR in 2017 cost 10.5 million. As for Price v Happ again I'm forced to ask por que no los dos?
He only wouldn't have helped enough because Shatkins was inept at putting a decent team on the field. Last year alone would have been a 3 WAR swing between the two players. A couple more intelligent moves or a ballsy trade or two and we're right in the mix for the division. I've covered the possibilities before on here. It would have been easier to make a 90 win team out of last season's mess than it was the 76 win team it turned into.
I've seen crazier shit happen. Were they better than those clubs? No. Could they have been good enough to catch a bit of goofy lightning in a bottle? Yeah.
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MindzEye
Wayward Ditch Pig
These type of arguments can be shifted around and made for almost every failed management group in MLB. What were they supposed to do? Not set the available payroll on fire, and shown some marbles in the trade market? If they had kept the very top end of the MiLB talent group, sold off some of the middle of the top 10 types and brought in some MLB talent, and spent their money better it's probably a 90ish win team. If because of the decline of the old core that just wasn't good enough, okay fine, that's liveable, at least they tried to take a shot while the door was open. Then you have all sorts of runway for a proper rebuild.
Yeah, that's entirely fair. I have zero love for Rogers, I've been screaming for years about how they're only interested in cheap advertising/live product for their core business, and to attach their shitty brand to one that's actually beloved across the country. They're a ****ing abomination. If there was true competition in the Canadian telecom sector they would get gutted. We see what type of product they deliver when they're forced to actually compete for their dinner and it's ugly.