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	<title>Toronto &#187; Kendrys Morales</title>
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		<title>Kendrys Morales: An All-Time Unlikely Base Stealer</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2018/05/24/kendrys-morales-an-all-time-unlikely-base-stealer/</link>
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		<pubDate>Thu, 24 May 2018 10:22:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Mike Passador]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/?p=15930</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[No matter how poorly a season goes, there’s always something fun to take away. It could take the form of a memorable play, a guy coming out of nowhere to play his way into the future plans or the arrival of some promising young talent, among other things. The point being, there’s a whole lot [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>No matter how poorly a season goes, there’s always something fun to take away. It could take the form <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3BDn2K6sgo" target="_blank">of a memorable play</a>, a guy <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OuPI38AMS0" target="_blank">coming out of nowhere</a> to play his way into the future plans or <a href="http://mlb.mlb.com/images/0/5/8/269783058/032618_gif_vlad_headshake_mid.gif" target="_blank">the arrival of some promising young talent</a>, among other things. The point being, there’s a whole lot that can happen over 162 games of baseball – even when things feel at their worst, there’s always something unique or entertaining to file away in the memory bank.</p>
<p>Even if this slog of a season (the Blue Jays are somehow within striking distance of the postseason despite everything that’s gone wrong, and we <em>are</em> only 45 games deep) were to end tomorrow, we’ve probably seen one of the most unlikely occurrences in franchise history. It’s far from a milestone, but Kendrys Morales&#8217; recent steal of second was stunning enough to get me wondering: Could this be the most unlikely stolen base in Blue Jays history?</p>
<p>“Unlikely” is a bit of a nebulous term that can be defined in a number of ways. There’s a few different angles we’ll take once we get down to the cream of the crop but for starters, I went to find all the players in league history who had played over 1,000 games with fewer than 10 stolen bases. There were 82 such names, with 19 of them having spent time with the Blue Jays.</p>
<p>Among those luminaries, seven are removed from contention as none of their career steals came with Toronto. Cliff Johnson, Mike Matheny, Kevin Millar, John Buck, Miguel Montero, Cecil Fielder, and Greg Myers get off at this stop of the journey. Most of those players only played one year or less with the team, cutting down their chances considerably. One omission in particular was great news for the remaining contenders however (assuming this is recognition that people might actually want), as Fielder is probably the king of the category with only two steals on eight attempts in 1,470 career games. Myers is also up there with three steals in 18 years of MLB play, all of which came in one season with the then-California Angels, though he only appeared in 1,108 games.</p>
<p>That leaves us with the following: Roy Howell, Alan Ashby, Darrin Fletcher, Buck Martinez, Rick Cerone, Pat Borders, Ed Sprague, Rod Barajas, Adam Lind, Bengie Molina, Justin Smoak, and Kendrys Morales. A whole lot of catchers, unsurprisingly.</p>
<p>A brief sweep of their career stats didn’t do much, but it did eliminate Howell from the race. Multi-steal seasons aren’t backbreakers by any means, but four steals in just 96 games in 1977 are probably a bit too much to hang with the rest even if he ended up stealing only five in 516 outings with the Jays. We bid goodbye to Howell and his nine steals in 1,112 career games.</p>
<p>It’s at this point where we can really start to think about what “unlikely” means. Should a stolen base from a high-OBP player be considered more improbable than one from a low-OBP player? Is it more unlikely to see a steal from a player who gets lots of chances but never goes or one from a player who spends less time on the basepaths, period? Taking that to the next level, what about successful steals versus mere attempts? You get thrown out on 100 percent of the shots you don’t take – but does attempting more steals take some luster off the rare feats of the fleet or does a poor success rate actually help a player’s case here? And how should we treat players who only made a brief stop in Toronto whose games played totals and inactivity on the basepaths stacked up in other organizations? Should we lean towards players who spent more time with the Blue Jays or those whose brief stints led to some true “shooting star” moments?</p>
<p>There’s no right answer to those questions. You can mix and match those arguments to something that feels right for you, knowing that the following players are all incredibly slow. I was rooting for Bengie Molina, personally, as he waved to a 12-year-old me from the bullpen before a game once. Each steal on the list below should be treasured as something special, something only people insane enough to sit through mostly-mediocre baseball seasons from start to finish can share. They’re all winners in a way.</p>
<p>Let’s look at everyone’s career totals. I’ve created a loose approximation of the amount of times each player reached base by multiplying their OBP by their plate appearances. Some rounding issues pop up but nothing that should change the shape of our highly scientific study.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/CareerSteals.jpg"><img class="alignnone wp-image-15931" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/CareerSteals.jpg" alt="CareerSteals" width="700" height="260" /></a></p>
<p>Going off this list, we can pretty much erase Ashby, Borders, Lind, Sprague and the silver fox himself, Buck Martinez, on the basis of rate stats. Rick Cerone earns points for sheer ineptitude (shoutout to the coaches who kept sending him) but doesn’t make through the second round of cuts. The standouts look to be Rod Barajas, Darrin Fletcher, and Bengie Molina. Smoak and Morales are undoubtedly hurt but being active players in this regard, as both are likely to see major “improvement” here as they continue to age, play, and not run.</p>
<p>Although Morales does have some surprisingly not-rock-bottom rate stats, he earns points for time off between his steals. Before his first of the year on May 1, his last stolen base came all the way back on October 2, 2009. That’s the largest gap between steals for any of our contenders. While the multiple steals this year hurt his candidacy somewhat, it’s remarkable that he’s stolen two in just over two weeks after taking it easy for eight and a half seasons.</p>
<p>Despite the lengthy layoff between swipes, Morales loses a little shine as both steals came with a runner on third. The same goes for Barajas, whose lone steal as a Blue Jay came with a runner on third in extra innings against the Angels in 2009. Fletcher stole second as the sole runner in 2000 against the Rangers while Molina somehow accomplished the same on a botched hit-and-run against the Angels back in 2009. There was something about Anaheim in 2009, clearly. Funnily enough, Morales was in the lineup to witness Barajas race down to second. He was just Kendry back then but it still counts.</p>
<p>He’s certainly part of the conversation in terms of Blue Jays in Major League history, but what about when we restrict that to Jays-only numbers? We’ll set the cutoff at a minimum of 175 games and three steals or less to keep Morales on the board for comparison’s sake.</p>
<p>Those restrictions produced a 19-player list that includes contemporary names like Dioner Navarro (3 steals, 209 games), Troy Tulowitzki (2 in 238), Smoak (1 in 457), Matt Stairs (3 in 238), and J.P. Arencibia (2 in 380). Cutting the non-contenders out of that bunch yielded the following group, with Morales in there for kicks. There’s some carry over from the last list as well.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/BlueJaysSteals.jpg"><img class="alignnone wp-image-15932" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/BlueJaysSteals.jpg" alt="BlueJaysSteals" width="700" height="323" /></a></p>
<p>Darrin Fletcher again emerges as a top contender, while Ed Sprague and John Olerud are definitely in the running as well. The fact that Olerud posted a .395 OBP over eight seasons with the Blue Jays is absolutely nuts, as is the fact that he only stole three bags despite being on base so often. Sprague shines here after his numbers in our first run through were tanked by his three steals in 1999 as a member of the Pirates. As for our subject, Morales is the only player on this list to have a multi-steal season with Toronto. Given his full body of work, that seems pretty unlikely even if it hurts him from a numbers perspective.</p>
<p>A tip of the hat goes to Carlos Delgado, who swiped nine bases in 1,423 games with the Blue Jays.</p>
<p>As for more modern metrics, Morales’ sits as the 13<sup>th</sup> slowest player in the Majors via Statcast’s Sprint Speed numbers at a glacial 23.7 feet per second. Surprisingly, both the slowest and second-slowest players (Nelson Cruz and Jesus Sucre) each have steals this season while the ninth-slowest, Yadier Molina, has two. That said, Morales is up from 23.5 feet per second last season. It’s no wonder he’s racking up the steals this time around.</p>
<p>And while he’s not the star of the show, Dioner Navarro was the slowest player in baseball for 2015 and the sixth-slowest in 2016. You can also find Justin Smoak’s name on those lists without scrolling all that far.</p>
<p>So Morales might not have the least-likely steal in Blue Jays history to his name, but he almost certainly has the most improbable pair. Baseball&#8217;s history books are filled with frivolities if you take the time to look. There are countless oddities and random happenings that aren&#8217;t often appreciated until the passage of time puts them in the proper context. Consider his output in the month of May like a slow, lumbering comet that dawdles across the sky. You never know when you’ll see something like it again and chances are we’ve seen it for the last time in a Blue Jays uniform. Either way, he’s now technically in the company of guys like Ed Sprague and John Olerud in franchise lore. Any time you can try to spin some positives for a DH hitting .163 in mid-late May, you’ve got to give it a shot.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo © Nick Turchiaro-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>The Three Biggest Swings of 2017</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2018/01/12/the-three-biggest-swings-of-2017/</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 12 Jan 2018 11:08:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Greg Wisniewski]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Steve Pearce]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/?p=14879</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It&#8217;s cold out where I live, and the large plains of white snow outside my window are about as far away from green infield grass as you can get. I keep opening tabs on my browser with the promise that spring training is only days away. At this point, especially in this glacially slow-moving offseason [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>It&#8217;s cold out where I live, and the large plains of white snow outside my window are about as far away from green infield grass as you can get. I keep opening tabs on my browser with the promise that spring training is only days away. At this point, especially in this glacially slow-moving offseason (with apologies to all the Jays Bruce fans out there), many folks are looking forward to try and divine what 2018 might bring. I, for one, agree with Yoda when it comes to trying to predict the next season: “Difficult to see. Always in motion is the future..”</p>
<p>So instead, I choose to look back. Although the 2017 season did not end as planned for our blue birds, there were still some standout moments. The fields were green, the air was warm, and the sun was bright.</p>
<p>Now, although a player&#8217;s ability to be good &#8220;in the clutch&#8221; varies from year to year, there are definitely clutch situations in many games throughout the 162-game schedule, and on any given night, any player can be the one to come through. We have a fairly straightforward way to measure how much of a difference a particular plate appearance had on the outcome of a game. It&#8217;s called <a href="https://www.fangraphs.com/library/misc/wpa/" target="_blank">Win Probability Added</a>, or WPA, and if you click the link, it explains what percentage of a team&#8217;s win belongs to a particular player or plate appearance. Let&#8217;s look at the three most dramatic performances in terms of WPA in 2017, arguably the most exciting performances of the year.</p>
<h3>Third place: Kendrys Morales, July 27th &#8211; WPA: .538</h3>
<p>Any WPA over .50 is impressive, since a team begins a game with about a 50 percent chance of winning. You might say, then, that Morales&#8217; contributions alone were enough to win the game. That&#8217;s an oversimplification, though, so let&#8217;s dive in and see what exactly Morales accomplished to move the needle on this 8—4 Jays win. After each play, I will list the WPA changed by the result of each of his plate appearances.</p>
<p>In the bottom of the first, he struck out (-.03 WPA). Then, in the bottom of the fifth, he led off the inning with a first-pitch home run (.13 WPA) that cut Oakland&#8217;s lead to 3-2. In the bottom of the sixth, he grounded out (-0.04 WPA).</p>
<p>Morales returned to the plate in the ninth inning, facing Blake Treinen, the Jays in a 4—3 hole. The at-bat unfolded as follows: Morales swung through a 97-mph sinker, laid off a 98-mph sinker outside, and took a changeup low. Now behind in the count, Treinen thought he had the answer for Kendrys, rearing back for a little extra and delivering a 99-mph sinker to almost the same location as his first pitch.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/morales-july-27.gif"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-14880" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/morales-july-27.gif" alt="morales july 27" width="600" height="400" /></a></p>
<p>It was, from Treinen&#8217;s perspective, the wrong answer.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><iframe src="https://www.mlb.com/video/share/morales-homer-ties-the-game/c-1657047683?tid=69808956" width="500" height="280" scrolling="no" ></iframe></p>
<p>That&#8217;s a game tying home run in the bottom of the ninth, increasing the Jay&#8217;s odds of winning by .43 WPA!</p>
<p>And here&#8217;s why baseball is so much fun: If I asked you about this game you would probably only remember the last play of the game, when Steve Pearce hit a grand slam to seal the 8—4 victory. That play was 34 percent of a win—not quite as large an impact as when Morales kept the game alive one inning earlier.</p>
<h3>Second Place: Kendrys Morales, May 5th &#8211; WPA: .715</h3>
<p>Yes, it&#8217;s Morales doing the heavy lifting once again, this time versus the Rays on the road in Tampa Bay. Here&#8217;s how his game went: a strikeout in the second (-.02 WPA) and a double in the fifth (.06), then a two-run home run (.26) in the seventh, driving in Russell Martin and tying the game 3-3. And in his final plate appearance in the eighth, Morales hit another homer, this time driving in Kevin Pillar as well as Martin. That second home run was worth .42 WPA. He worked hard for this one, hitting it out on the sixth pitch of the at-bat.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/morales-may-5th.gif"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-14883" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/morales-may-5th.gif" alt="morales may 5th" width="600" height="400" /></a></p>
<p>As an aside, they say you usually only get one good pitch to hit in an plate appearance. Pitch number five there is an 89-mph slider. Nobody throws a belt-high slider middle-in intentionally, so that was mistake number one. Morales fouled it off. Jumbo Diaz is a generous man, it seems, and he got a lot of the plate with the 99-mph fastball that followed. I wonder if Blake Treinen somehow misread the scouting report on Morales, which probably reads &#8220;He doesn&#8217;t care how hard you are throwing the ball.&#8221;</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><iframe src="https://www.mlb.com/video/share/morales-go-ahead-three-run-hr/c-1356377783?tid=6479266" width="500" height="280" scrolling="no" ></iframe></p>
<p>This drive turned the game from a 4—4 tie into a 7—4 Blue Jays lead, and Justin Smoak added a solo shot off the next pitcher the Rays brought in, proving that it&#8217;s possible for good things to happen at the Trop. Once in a while, at least.</p>
<h3>First Place: Steve Pearce, July 30th &#8211; WPA: .852</h3>
<p>The WPA list is topped by none other than Steve &#8220;Beers&#8221; Pearce. His performance on July 30th was nothing short of amazing, within the single-game top ten for 2017 across all of baseball.</p>
<p>It started off innocuously enough, with a first inning flyout (-.02 WPA), then a double in the third (.07). This hit was reviewed to see if it was a home run, according to the play log, but the original call stood and the Blue Jays lost the challenge. (Shocking, I know.) He followed with a walk in the sixth (.02 WPA) and a lineout in the eighth (-.01). Had the game ended there, it would have been one of the more pedestrian performances of his career.</p>
<p>By the time the bottom of the ninth rolled around, the Jays were down by six, and Pearce was due up a distant eighth. This is the wonderful thing about WPA—it rewards you most when everything is on the line.</p>
<p>Here is how the bottom of the ninth unfolded. Goins walked. Pillar homered, and by this point, it was already obvious something weird was going on. A Rob Refsnyder double chased Brooks Pounders, and in came Bud Norris; Carrera singled and Martin singled, scoring Refsnyder. Smoak grounded out, then Morales walked to load the bases again. That&#8217;s seven batters and only one out, and the score was now 10-7.</p>
<p>At this point, down three in the bottom of the ninth, the Blue Jays only had a 21 percent chance of winning the game. Time for Steve Pearce to see what he could do.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/pearce-july-30.gif"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-14885" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/pearce-july-30.gif" alt="pearce july 30" width="600" height="400" /></a></p>
<p>For whatever reason, Norris started the at-bat with two cutters. Neither of these pitches were close enough to the zone to tempt Steve. I assume he wasn&#8217;t trying to get too cute and was just trying to hit the fastball. Norris tops out around 95 mph, and there&#8217;s no reason to expect he won&#8217;t try to use one at some point. A 2-0 count seems like when you&#8217;d really be ready for a fastball, and, sure enough, Norris threw the fastball. The problem with this particular fastball, of course, might have been that it was exactly three feet off the ground, and probably would have traveled over the point of the plate had it been allowed to get that far. Pearce likes meatballs. The ball found the seats instead of the catcher&#8217;s glove.</p>
<p>That&#8217;s a walkoff grand slam! And yes, I already talked about Pearce hitting a walkoff grand slam in the other entry. This isn&#8217;t that one at all, of course. This is three whole days later. I know I&#8217;ve had this conversation on Twitter, and elsewhere, but hitting a walkoff grand slam is pretty much the only thing you imagine when you&#8217;re ten years old and trying to learn how to self-hit. There you are, in the schoolyard, or out in a dusty lot, talking yourself through the situation: bases loaded, bottom of the ninth, down by three. Steve Pearce lived that. At the highest level of competition that his sport has to offer, he delivered on a childhood fantasy. Maybe next time, Mr. Pearce, it will be in the playoffs.</p>
<p>Pearce, HR, (.79).</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><iframe src="https://streamable.com/m/1668927183" width="500" height="280" frameborder="0" ></iframe></p>
<p><em> Lead Photo © Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
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		<title>Which of 2017&#8217;s Disappointing Blue Jays are Poised to Bounce Back?</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/10/23/which-2017s-disappointing-blue-jays-are-poised-to-bounce-back/</link>
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		<pubDate>Mon, 23 Oct 2017 13:59:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Mike Passador]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Aaron Sanchez]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kevin Pillar]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Roberto Osuna]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Toronto Blue Jays]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/?p=13958</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It should go without saying at this point, but just in case you weren’t paying attention for the last six months or so, not a lot went right for the Blue Jays this season. It could also be said that way more than expected did go right for the team in 2015 and 2016, but [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>It should go without saying at this point, but just in case you weren’t paying attention for the last six months or so, not a lot went right for the Blue Jays this season. It could also be said that way more than expected did go right for the team in 2015 and 2016, but there’s no denying that 2017 saw a number of declines and poor fortunes that <a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/10/17/the-season-that-was-exaggerated-oversold-and-bound-to-disappoint/" target="_blank">we either didn’t expect to see or willfully ignored</a>.</p>
<p>Rather than go over the current state of baseball, which would involve either talking about random Twitter beefs or giving even marginal praise to the recently-eliminated Yankees, I decided to wade through the muck of last season to catch up on a few Jays who were letdowns and look at whether a bounce back could be in order.</p>
<h3>Aaron Sanchez</h3>
<p>This one is essentially a free space, as Sanchez was limited to just 36 innings due to persistent blister issues. He had poor numbers across his eight starts, no doubt helped along by his finger troubles. Sanchez surrendered career-highs with 10.5 H/9 and 5.0 BB/9 and watched his strikeout rate sink to boot. For a guy with a deadly sinker, Sanchez also achieved just a 48 percent ground ball rate, this after topping 55 percent in each of his first three seasons.</p>
<p>Even though things weren’t going great in general, he still had room for some rotten luck. His HR/FB ratio jumped from 10.7 to 17.1% and he was stuck with a BABIP of .310 despite no substantial change in the amount of hard contact he gave up. Somehow, Sanchez’s 5.71 ERA actually outperformed his Deserved Run Average (DRA), which sat at a ghastly 6.96 mark.</p>
<p>In fact, Sanchez actually had the worst season of any Blue Jays pitcher by WARP, accumulating a -0.56 mark in his abbreviated campaign. J.P. Howell was at 0.14. Even Jason Grilli was at 0.17. If Sanchez can get his fingers back to full strength, there’s plenty of reason to believe that he’s going to return to form in 2018. If nothing else, he almost has to get better results than these.</p>
<h3>Kendrys Morales</h3>
<p>Morales hit a few timely early-season homers when the rest of the batters were struggling &#8211; and the fact that we can point to his season achievement as “being the best of a bad bunch for a couple minutes” will tell you most of what you need to know. With a line of .258/.308/.445, it was a major letdown from Toronto’s supposed stalwart at DH. Do not be fooled by the 28 homers and 85 RBI – this was a dreadful season by just about any measure that goes past the surface level.</p>
<p>Among 206 hitters with 400 or more plate appearances, Morales’ WARP of -.50 put him 193<sup>rd</sup>overall. His TAv of .254 puts him at a much more palatable 166<sup>th</sup> on the same list, but we’re not going over a very high bar here.</p>
<p>Are there signs of hope? Maybe, sort of. Morales has rebounded from ugly seasons before. In 2014 he posted -0.6 WARP in 39 games with Minnesota and tacked on another -0.2 in 59 games with the Mariners. He followed that up with years of 2.3 and 1.2 WARP in Kansas City. Additionally, Morales continued to hit the ball incredibly hard. Among players with at least 150 batted ball events, Morales was ninth in the league with an average exit velocity of 91.1 miles per hour.</p>
<p>Now for the bad part. Morales hit far more grounders than he did in Kansas City, meaning his hard hit balls had much lower chances of turning into hits than they did in the past two years. He continued to have a hard time with breaking pitches and saw curveballs on 16 percent of pitches this season, well up from the 11.8 percent he saw in 2016. How much of a hard time, you ask? Morales posted a career-worst season in terms of contact rate (the percentage of pitches swung on where contact is made; 71 percent against a career average of 75.8 percent), zone contact rate (81 percent in 2017 with a career average of 86 percent) while also shattering his career high in terms of swinging strike rate (29 percent easily surpassed his previous career-worst of 25.7 percent from 2012).</p>
<p>At age 34, hoping for a complete turnaround in so many areas is asking for a lot.</p>
<p>Morales’s presence on the roster has suddenly become an unavoidable obstacle following Justin Smoak’s breakout. With Smoak now deserving full-time at bats at first, Steve Pearce loses playing time at one spot he was signed to shore up. That forces the injury-prone Pearce into the outfield, which is bad news for everyone involved. Given the need to keep players like Pearce and Josh Donaldson healthy, the team would be wise to open up DH at bats for both. Suddenly the Jays have $23 million on the books for a part-time DH, lest they choose to play him regularly for the rest of his decline.</p>
<p>With few attractive ways to offload this contract, there’s going to be some more days off in Morales’ future. Getting less playing time might be better for the on field product, but it’s far from ideal for a team with oft-discussed payroll limitations.</p>
<h3>Kevin Pillar</h3>
<p>Remember when Kevin Pillar talked the talk about <a title="How Kevin Pillar Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Plate Discipline" href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/03/29/how-kevin-pillar-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-plate-discipline/" target="_blank">changing his approach</a>? And then when he did it for a little bit? Well things didn’t go so great the rest of the way.</p>
<p>He posted OBPs of .339 and .328 in April/March and May, drawing 15 walks in his first 51 games. Pillar would then go on to walk 18 times over his last 103 games of the year, posting an OBP of .282 in that time – well down from his career .302 mark. That list of hitters with 400 plate appearances? The one where Morales ranked 193<sup>rd</sup>? Pillar was 187<sup>th</sup> with a WARP of -.05. This all happened despite Pillar setting a career high in zone swing rate and posting a sterling 93.3 percent zone contact rate.</p>
<p>Pillar’s reality isn’t exactly an untenable situation, but the sudden decline of so many other spots in the lineup around him only highlighted the problem. When this team is at full health, Pillar really won’t need to be occupying a high-profile spot in the lineup. Of course, counting on this particular roster (as currently constructed, at least) to stay at full health for long might be a big ask.</p>
<p>Still, Teoscar Hernandez’s presence should at least give the Jays a viable alternative if they insist on going with a traditional leadoff man. Lord knows they need it after Pillar logged 270 of his 632 plate appearances atop the order. For reference, Pillar made just 184 plate appearances from the bottom third of the order. We often wring our hands far too much about lineup construction, but this is pretty blatant.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, that first chunk of the season looks like a mirage; a window that let us look at a better world for about 50 games of bliss (if you focus on his production only and not, you know, everything else). You hope Pillar will bounce back in the sense that his last two thirds of the year were well under his career numbers, but it’d be silly to count on a return to the .330-plus OBP levels unless there’s a noticeable, sustained change in approach. Here’s hoping that it sticks next time around.</p>
<h3>Roberto Osuna</h3>
<p>Osuna presents the most curious case of the bunch, though there is a pretty quick and convenient explanation for his second half struggles.</p>
<p>The first half of that story, however, is that Osuna actually had a very strong season by several advanced measures. He posted a career-best 2.1 WARP in a career-low 64 innings. He also posted career-bests in BB/9 (1.3), K/9 (11.7), ground ball rate (47 percent) and HR/9 (a minuscule 0.4). Digging deeper, he also posted his personal bests in out-of-zone swing rate, swinging strike rate and contact rate.</p>
<p>Things begin to diverge with his zone rate – simply the percentage of pitches thrown in the strike zone. After two years above 50 percent, Osuna slipped down to just 43.9 percent this season. On pitches he did land in the zone, contact was made on over 80 percent of them – up from 78 percent a year ago and just 73 percent as a rookie.</p>
<p>Piecing that all together, it seems like Osuna got lots of swings and misses on his pitches, but primarily on those that were out of the zone. Hitters were able to make contact with anything in the zone better than ever before, which brings us to the elephant in the room.</p>
<p>Osuna famously lost some fastball velocity in July and August, leading to a handful of painful blown saves and close losses where the team’s previously-dependable closer wilted at the worst possible time. Those rough outings followed stretches <a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/08/14/whats-up-with-roberto-osunas-fastball/" target="_blank">where Osuna was called on multiple times with limited rest</a>, as he averaged just 1.2 days off between appearances while working in 21 games from the All Star break to the end of August.</p>
<p>His fastball velocity actually increased in September and October when he averaged 3.4 days between outings. Though he certainly would’ve traded the days off for a spot in the hunt, nobody benefited more than Osuna from the team’s quick exit from the playoff picture. Hopefully a long winter (with no World Baseball Classic this time) keeps him a bit fresher.</p>
<p>The anatomy of a losing season is deep and complex and the front office should be cooking up all sorts of fixes for the offseason. While newcomers, either promotions from the lower levels or new faces from other organizations, are always a welcome sight after a disappointing campaign, there’s a few reasons to believe that some of Toronto’s disappointments in 2017 will come back looking a little more like their usual selves. This team is going to need some new blood, no doubt – but for a team with visions of retooling on the fly, every little bit helps.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo © Kevin Sousa-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>The Most Surprising Stats from an Underwhelming Blue Jays Season</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/09/05/the-most-surprising-stats-from-an-underwhelming-blue-jays-season/</link>
		<comments>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/09/05/the-most-surprising-stats-from-an-underwhelming-blue-jays-season/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 05 Sep 2017 10:00:46 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Nick Dika]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[John Gibbons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Michael Saunders]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/?p=13285</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[As the calendar flips to September, the Blue Jays and their fans have accepted that there will be no pennant race at the Rogers Centre this season. While the team headed into 2017 with an eye on a third straight playoff appearance, injuries and subpar performance made this season a rather underwhelming one on the field. But [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>As the calendar flips to September, the Blue Jays and their fans have accepted that there will be no pennant race at the Rogers Centre this season. While the team headed into 2017 with an eye on a third straight playoff appearance, injuries and subpar performance made this season a rather underwhelming one on the field.</p>
<p>But just because the season was a frustrating one doesn’t mean nothing interesting happened. To <a href="http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/instagraphs/look-here-for-your-justin-smoak-optimism/">almost everyone’s</a> surprise, Justin Smoak broke out, turning himself into an elite hitter in the middle of the Blue Jays’ lineup; Josh Donaldson played shortstop; and Aaron Sanchez, like many of his peers, couldn’t quite grip the new baseball without tearing open his fingers in the process.</p>
<p>Those were some of the biggest stories of 2017, but they weren’t the only ones. Here are some of the most surprising stats &#8211; some of them good, and some of them bad, from a Blue Jays season that got away.</p>
<h3>Team Strikeouts Are Way Down And So is Their Run Scoring</h3>
<p>In a year when strikeouts are more prominent than ever, the Blue Jays have managed to cut down on their strikeouts from a season ago. The Jays rank in the bottom third of the major leagues in strikeout rate, posting a team strikeout percentage of 20.9% &#8211; a surprise for a team that struck out so frequently in 2016.</p>
<p>When a team struggles to score runs, strikeouts are often said to be the root of the problem. Many were quick to suggest that the Blue Jays, who went into an offensive funk in September of last season, were striking out far too often to be a good offense. But preventing strikeouts is not always the way to increase a team’s offensive output and the 2017 Blue Jays are demonstrating why:</p>
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td width="63">Year</td>
<td width="56">K%</td>
<td width="78">League Avg</td>
<td width="43">Rank</td>
<td width="85">Runs Scored</td>
<td width="41">Rank</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="63">2016</td>
<td width="56">21.9%</td>
<td width="78">21.1%</td>
<td width="43">8th</td>
<td width="85">759</td>
<td width="41">9<sup>th</sup></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="63">2017</td>
<td width="56">20.9%</td>
<td width="78">21.6%</td>
<td width="43">19th</td>
<td width="85">582</td>
<td width="41">24<sup>th</sup></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>In 2016, only 7 MLB teams struck out more than the Blue Jays but the team managed to score the 9<sup>th</sup> most runs in baseball. This season, the Jays have significantly cut their strikeout rate, yet their offensive production has cratered as well.</p>
<p>Strikeouts don’t matter. Even if they feel like they do.</p>
<h3>Michael Saunders is a Speed Demon</h3>
<p>…relative to the rest of his teammates. We all knew the 2017 Blue Jays were going to be slow, but this is still surprising. More surprising than Saunders, who signed with the Phillies last offseason being back with Toronto this September? Still, yes.</p>
<p>Saunders, who was once a stolen base threat, tore his meniscus in 2015 and hasn’t possessed the same foot speed since. But despite Saunders’ surgically repaired left knee, he is actually STILL one of the fastest members of the 2017 Blue Jays.</p>
<p>According to Statcast, with a sprint speed per second of 27.4 feet, only Kevin Pillar and Ezequiel Carrera are faster. Saunders’ sprint speed of 27.3 feet/second in 2016 suggests that his 2017 number isn’t an aberration, either. This quirky stat could change if Anthony Alford, Dwight Smith Jr. or Teoscar Hernandez see any significant time with the team in September.</p>
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td width="131">Player</td>
<td width="146">Sprint Speed (ft./second)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="131">Kevin Pillar</td>
<td width="146">29.9</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="131">Ezekiel Carrera</td>
<td width="146">27.7</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="131">Devon Travis</td>
<td width="146">27.4</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="131">Michael Saunders</td>
<td width="146">27.4</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="131">Darwin Barney</td>
<td width="146">27.2</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="131">Josh Donaldson</td>
<td width="146">27.0</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<h3>Kendrys Morales: Not Very Valuable, Despite the Offence</h3>
<p>As of September 5<sup>th</sup>, Kendrys Morales was sitting on a line of .247/.303/.456 with 26 home runs; an offensive performance fairly similar to his 2016 output (.263/.327/.468, 30 HR) with the Royals. But as we continue to see home runs being hit at record paces, a pure slugger’s contributions become less helpful than they once were.</p>
<p>Wins Above Replacement Player – the stat that measures a position player’s overall contribution to the team on defense, offense and the base paths, has not been kind to Morales this season. Even if you don’t believe in advanced stats, it’s pretty easy to make the case that Morales hasn’t been too valuable on the bases or in the field. Of the 43 players in the major leagues with at least 25 home runs this season, only one has been less valuable (per WARP) than Kendrys Morales: Texas’ Mike Napoli. Morales didn’t change, but its starting to look like the game has.</p>
<h3>Gibby: Not Getting Ejected at his Usual Pace</h3>
<p>In September of 2016, while the Blue Jays were embattled in a fight for the American League wild card spots, John Gibbons was chasing history. The Blue Jays manager, who had been kicked out of seven games at this time last year, was in line to possibly break the <a href="https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/sports/baseball/blue-jays-manager-gibbons-making-a-run-at-record-for-ejections-toronto/article31827217/?ref=http://www.theglobeandmail.com&amp;">Blue Jays’ all-time record</a> for managerial ejections (8) set by Bobby Cox.</p>
<p>But like a fine wine (or a team with little to play for and hence, to scream about), John Gibbons has mellowed with age; having only been thrown out of five games so far in 2017. The Blue Jays manager will need to belligerently ratchet up the kicking and screaming this September if he has any intention of breaking the franchise ejection record he came oh-so-close to last season.</p>
<h3>The 2017 Team Might Not Really Be Unlucky</h3>
<p>2017 has brought with it some frustrating losses. These hair-pullers, the ones where the team can’t hold a late lead or isn’t able to push that one extra run across the plate cause some to dream on what could have been. If the team was just a little bit luckier; if Roberto Osuna would have been able to save just a couple more games, or if Josh Donaldson could have hit just a couple more home runs, those blown saves and one run losses could have turned into wins and the season would look a lot different.</p>
<p>But the Jays, who currently sit at 64-74, might have been lucky to get to 64 wins according to several stats that attempt to remove luck and random distribution of run scoring. While the Jays have posted an ugly 5-12 record in extra inning play, the team is 21-21 in one-run games, suggesting that they haven’t been that unlucky (or lucky) in close games at all.</p>
<p>Based on the teams -90 run differential (they’ve allowed 90 runs more than they have scored), Baseball Prospectus’ expected winning percentage for the team sits at .428, or 59-78. Similarly, Baseball Reference has the Blue Jays’ Pythagorean win-loss record sitting at 59-78 as well.</p>
<p>Stats like expected winning percentage and Pythagorean win-loss are far from perfect, and they don’t account for the role that bullpens play in close games, but combined with the Jays’ poor run differential and .500 record in one-run games, the team might not be as unlucky as we’d hoped they were.</p>
<p>Here&#8217;s to an interesting end to the 2017 season (how great would a 5 stolen base month from Kendrys Morales be?) and a better 2018.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo: Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>Bold Predictions for the Blue Jays in the Second Half</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/07/07/bold-predictions-for-the-blue-jays-in-the-second-half/</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 07 Jul 2017 11:05:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Nick Dika]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Aaron Sanchez]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Josh Donaldson]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Justin Smoak]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Russell Martin]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/?p=12176</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Monday night’s game against the Yankees marked the official midpoint of the 2017 Blue Jays’ season. While the season hasn’t played out the way Blue Jays fans would have liked thus far, there are 78 games still to be played. And a lot can happen in 78 games. Speaking of a lot happening in 78 [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Monday night’s game against the Yankees marked the official midpoint of the 2017 Blue Jays’ season. While the season hasn’t played out the way Blue Jays fans would have liked thus far, there are 78 games still to be played. And a lot can happen in 78 games. Speaking of a lot happening in 78 games, this season has given us plenty of surprises so far: Justin Smoak raking, a month of Kevin Pillar walking, and the Rogers Centre roof being closed almost every damn day.</p>
<p>Making predictions might be a fool’s errand, but you can’t say I told you so if you don’t make them. And given the Blue Jays recent losing streak, looking to the near future may be more appealing than venting or unpacking the team’s current struggles. With that in mind, here are some bold predictions for the second half of the 2017 season. Bold, bold. Not Doritos “bold taste” bold, but that Indian place you have to remind yourself not to get the hot option bold.</p>
<h4>Russ Martin Moves to Second, Josh Donaldson to Catcher</h4>
<p>So far this season, injuries and poor performance have wreaked havoc with the Blue Jays starting lineup. John Gibbons has been forced to start players out of position. Jose Bautista has seen time at third base and Russ Martin has started at both second and third. With the Blue Jays trading for catcher Miguel Montero today, there is some speculation that Martin could play even more second base.</p>
<p>Stars playing out of position will go to an even further extreme in the second half when Gibbons experiments with starting Josh Donaldson behind the plate. Donaldson, who last caught in 2012, will push Russell Martin to second base &#8211; allowing Martin to avoid the physical tolls of catching everyday and Gibbons to keep Ryan Goins on the bench. Despite playing below average defense at the position, Donaldson’s bat makes him worth 4.5 Wins Above Replacement in just over 40 innings. Donaldson becomes the most effective Blue Jays catcher at stopping the running game. We still don’t see Kendrys Morales in the outfield.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h4>The AL East Continues to Get Great Production from Unexpected First Basemen</h4>
<p>Forget Miguel Cabrera, Edwin Encarnacion, and the rest of name brand first basemen of the AL Central. The AL East provides more first base production for a fraction of the price. Seeing Justin Smoak and Logan Morrison on the American League offensive leaderboards has been a surprise to everyone. So much so that no one seems to notice the Red Sox’s Mitch Moreland having himself a nice little season of his own – posting a .264/.350/.468 slash line through Sunday.</p>
<p>Expect the trend to continue in the second half when James Loney signs with the Orioles and posts a career highs in home runs, on-base percentage and RBIs – all in half a season while filling in for the injured Chris Davis.</p>
<p>And speaking of Justin Smoak…</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h4>Justin Smoak’s Success Leads to Many Emulating His Approach</h4>
<p>As Smoak continues to mash the baseball from both sides of the plate, his unorthodox diet begins to catch on with the rest of the team. Players like Jose Bautista and Russell Martin, known for their dedication to healthy eating and training, begin to emulate Smoak’s nutritional regiment and start eating pasta topped with mayonnaise instead of their preferred tomato sauce.</p>
<p>Bautista and Martin also begin to listen to country music and chewing Skoal brand tobacco. Their production spikes accordingly.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h4>The Blue Jays Sign Taz Tulowitzki</h4>
<p>With Bo Bichette and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. in the midst of impressive seasons with the single-A Lansing Lugnuts, the Blue Jays front office begins to believe they have identified a new market inefficiency in the quest to build a winning baseball team: employing the children of former major league players.</p>
<p>In a piece of shrewd business, Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins sign Troy Tulowitzki’s 3-year-old son, Taz, to a 30-year contract reminiscent of shady backroom dealings that happen in professional soccer. Scouts project Taz to contribute on both offense and defense in the middle of the diamond but fear a steep drop in his offensive production during his early 30s. The younger Tulo is paid a signing bonus significantly higher than that given to Cavan Biggio.</p>
<p>The contract will run through Taz’s age 34 season &#8211; which is the age the Blue Jays had wished his father’s contract would have expired.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h4>Kendrys Morales Hits the Longest, Hardest Single of the Season</h4>
<p>Kendrys Morales has always hit the baseball hard. The Blue Jays designated hitter is regularly atop Major League Baseball’s year-end exit velocity leader boards. Unfortunately for Kendrys, a lot of his scorched balls are hit on the ground, where they do minimal damage. In another spat of bad luck, Morales hits the longest single of the season when he laces a 400-foot line drive off the top of the centre field wall at the Rogers Centre.</p>
<p>The ill-fated combination of Morales’ lack of footspeed and an incredibly well-struck baseball leaves Kendrys standing at first base and the proud owner of baseball’s longest and hardest hit single of the season (and the Statcast era).</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h4>Blue Jays High Performance Department Hires Eddie Van Halen to work with Aaron Sanchez</h4>
<p>With more traditional baseball remedies remaining ineffective, Gil Kim enlists the help of 80s guitarist Eddie Van Halen to help keep Sanchez’s blister’s and fingernails in check. Kim, who was impressed with the famous guitarist’s ability to practice for hours on end without ruining his hands, hopes Eddie will be able to transfer some of his hand preservation secrets to the Blue Jays’ young ace.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h4>After Winning the World Series, the Jays are Invited to Meet PM Trudeau. Several Players Elect to Not Attend.</h4>
<p>After being eliminated in the American League Championship Series two years in a row, the Blue Jays finally do the dang thing and advance to the World Series, where they beat the Nationals in seven games.</p>
<p>As per tradition, the team is invited to meet with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau during the offseason. However, several notable players don’t show up.</p>
<p>The consummate professional, Troy Tulowitzki elects to remain at the Blue Jays’ spring training facilities in order to not disrupt his offseason workouts. Coming off another MVP-caliber season, Josh Donaldson, who recently purchased Battlefied 4 for Xbox 360, has some buddies over to his place to play multiplayer and declines the invitation (but he does invite PM Trudeau to join their online game). And like the Cubs’ <a href="https://www.sbnation.com/lookit/2017/6/28/15891598/cubs-carl-edwards-jr-skipped-white-house-visit-for-dinosaur-museums">Carl Edwards Jr.</a>, Joe Biagini skips the meeting in order to take in the dinosaur exhibit at the nearby Museum of Natural History in Ottawa.</p>
<p>Before you call these too bold, go ahead and pull up Justin Smoak’s 2017 stats. And after you do that, remember that what makes baseball so great is all of the improbable things that happen each and every season. And with that in mind…cue the second half comeback, Blue Jays!</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>Kendrys Morales Versus the Shift</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/02/03/kendrys-morales-versus-the-shift/</link>
		<comments>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2017/02/03/kendrys-morales-versus-the-shift/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 03 Feb 2017 14:00:34 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Elie Waitzer]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Shift]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Shifting]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/?p=8772</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The most frequent target of a defensive shift is a slow-footed, pull-happy slugger. Think David Ortiz, Albert Pujols, and Prince Fielder. Since his power breakout in 2012, Edwin Encarnacion has faced more shifts every season. Encarnacion was shifted in 36 percent of his plate appearances in 2016 compared to just eight percent back in 2012. Part [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>The most frequent target of a defensive shift is a slow-footed, pull-happy slugger. Think David Ortiz, Albert Pujols, and Prince Fielder. Since his power breakout in 2012, Edwin Encarnacion has <a href="http://www.fangraphs.com/splitstool.aspx?playerid=2151&amp;position=1B/3B/DH&amp;splitArr=82,83&amp;strgroup=season&amp;type=1&amp;startDate=all&amp;endDate=all&amp;filter=">faced more shifts</a> every season. Encarnacion was shifted in 36 percent of his plate appearances in 2016 compared to just eight percent back in 2012. Part of that increase is a reflection of the general trendiness of shifting, but the greater conclusion is that if you demonstrate a repeated unwillingness to beat the shift, teams are just going to shift you more. Kendrys Morales, who was signed this offseason as an Encarnacion-lite to replace the parrot&#8217;s production, has seen a <a href="http://www.fangraphs.com/splitstool.aspx?playerid=8610&amp;position=1B/DH&amp;splitArr=82,83&amp;strgroup=season&amp;type=1&amp;startDate=all&amp;endDate=all&amp;filter=">similar progression</a> since 2013.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/01/morales.png"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-8807" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/01/morales.png" alt="morales" width="419" height="200" /></a></p>
<p>There&#8217;s almost an unspoken deal in place with sluggers of this kind: &#8220;I&#8217;ll give you a few yanked grounders, but I&#8217;m still getting my moonshots.&#8221; Of course, we&#8217;re talking about the best baseball players in the world. Many of these guys can and will try to beat the shift if it&#8217;s put on. That&#8217;s why slow, pull-happy sluggers are the safest bet to shift on. They&#8217;re not out there to poke the ball the other way; even if they could, it&#8217;s not what they&#8217;re being paid to do.</p>
<p>Here&#8217;s a leaderboard of players who faced the shift (traditional and/or non-traditional) most often in 2016. Note that by &#8220;most often&#8221;, I mean the highest <em>proportion</em> of shifted plate appearances.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/02/shiftlead.png"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-8837" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/02/shiftlead.png" alt="shiftlead" width="462" height="201" /></a></p>
<p>Boy, the league really figured out David Ortiz in 2016, no wonder he retired. On the whole, that leaderboard is pretty sound evidence that the shift works.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/01/wrclead.png"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-8806" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/01/wrclead.png" alt="wrclead" width="462" height="190" /></a></p>
<p>By wRC+, only ten hitters who faced a shift in &gt;150 PA managed to do better than league average against the shift. I&#8217;d guess that Freddie Freeman (137 wRC+ against shift), Brandon Belt (132 wRC+), and Joey Votto (129 wRC+) are going to see fewer shifts next season. With the exception of Adrian Gonzalez, every player who outperformed the league average against the shift had some speed.</p>
<p>On the other end of the spectrum, we get some truly abysmal performances, including Kendrys Morales&#8217; 38 wRC+ over 263 shifted plate appearances.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/02/shiftlag.png"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-8836" src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/02/shiftlag.png" alt="shiftlag" width="461" height="200" /></a></p>
<p>In all likelihood, Howard will retire after this season, assuming someone signs him, and I see no reason why teams shouldn&#8217;t be shifting Howard in 100 percent of his remaining PA.</p>
<p>Back to Morales. He was shifted in some way in almost half his plate appearances last season. It worked pretty well for the other teams. Back in May of last season, before he got <a href="http://m.royals.mlb.com/news/article/187180770/kendrys-morales-keeps-swinging-red-hot-bat/">red-hot</a> down the stretch, the Kansas City Star&#8217;s Rustin Todd <a href="http://www.kansascity.com/sports/mlb/kansas-city-royals/article78019557.html">looked at his struggles</a>.</p>
<p><em>&#8220;The simplest reason for Morales’ struggles, according to rival scouts and advanced metrics, stems from the way opposing teams are defending him with extreme shifts and attacking him with offspeed pitches.</em></p>
<p><em>When Morales hits from the left side, opposing teams have almost exclusively put three defenders on the right field side of second base. The defensive alignments are not altogether new for Morales, but they have confounded him. In 114 plate appearances from the left side, he has just eight singles.&#8221;</em><br />
Part of the reason Toronto acquired Morales was for his switch hitting abilities. To be able to insert lefty power bat against righties. The problem with that, though, is that he hit .231/.307/.423 from the left side in 2016 versus .330/.369/.560 from the right. Trying to pull the ball between three defenders will do that.</p>
<p>There&#8217;s also good news. For his career, Morales has actually been <a href="http://www.fangraphs.com/statsplits.aspx?playerid=8610&amp;position=1B/DH&amp;season=0">substantially better</a> from the left side. Just last season, he was 36 percent better as a lefty by wRC+. Maybe shifting doesn&#8217;t explain that entire swing, but it&#8217;s part of the answer. The seven percent increase in shifts from 2015 to 2016 wasn&#8217;t just a jump in volume, it was also a jump of intensity. Watching game footage from last season makes that clear. Here&#8217;s a picture of Morales circling the bases after homering from the left side. Look how deep the second baseman is playing on the right field grass.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/01/shifg.png"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-8808 " src="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/01/shifg-300x130.png" alt="shifg" width="496" height="215" /></a></p>
<p>Teams have committed to putting on more extreme shifts against Morales, and it has limited his value as a switch hitter. But there are some signs that Morales is making a counter-adjustment. As Morales saw more and more shifts, he responded by going <a href="http://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.aspx?playerid=8610&amp;legend=1,2&amp;statArr=207,206&amp;split=base&amp;time=game&amp;ymin=&amp;ymax=&amp;start=2016&amp;end=2016&amp;rtype=single&amp;gt1=60">up the middle</a> more often and pulling the ball less. Last September, Jeff Zimmerman <a href="http://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/mixing-fantasy-reality-anderson-freeman/">looked at</a> how Freddie Freemen used the centre of the field to beat the shift and key a second half surge. Looking at the stats, it appears that Morales adopted the same tactic as Freeman. Here are his Cent% and wRC+ by month, from July to September last season:</p>
<ul>
<li>July: 30.2%, 76</li>
<li>Aug.: 38.3%, 115</li>
<li>Sept.: 47.8%, 154</li>
</ul>
<p>It <em>is</em> a bit of a misleading comparison to make. Freeman finished the season with the best wRC+ against the shift in all of baseball. Meanwhile Morales, in the midst of his torrid September, was still averaging just .190 against the shift. Correlation does not imply causation, but the correlation is there nonetheless, so I&#8217;ll put forth a theory concerning a psychological aspect of the shift. When a hitter is committed to pulling the ball no matter how extreme the shift, he&#8217;s focused on one thing: not grounding out. That can lead to a spike in pop ups as the hitter tries extra hard to get under the ball. Here are Morales&#8217; Cent% and IFFB% by month, from July to September last season:</p>
<ul>
<li>July: 30.2%, 19%</li>
<li>Aug.: 38.3%, 13.3%</li>
<li>Sept.: 47.8%, 0%</li>
</ul>
<p>By going up the middle more often, Morales took some of the pressure off. Faced with the monumental task of replacing Encarnacion&#8217;s production, Morales will be no stranger to pressure in Toronto. But if he can maintain his anti-shift approach from last September, he&#8217;ll have a much better shot at filling Edwin&#8217;s shoes while also providing much-needed value as a lefty bat.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo: © John Rieger-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>Give the Blue Jays Off-Season Some Time</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2016/11/15/give-the-blue-jays-off-season-some-time/</link>
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		<pubDate>Tue, 15 Nov 2016 11:18:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Gideon Turk]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Edwin Encarnacion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Jose Bautista]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mark shapiro]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ross atkins]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Toronto Blue Jays]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[It&#8217;s Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins&#8217; second winter at the helm of the this club, and they are tasked with the daunting assignment of trying to appease a fanbase that is thirsty for a winner after back-to-back ALCS appearances and exits. Getting the team back to the post-season will be harder in 2017 than it [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>It&#8217;s Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins&#8217; second winter at the helm of the this club, and they are tasked with the daunting assignment of trying to appease a fanbase that is thirsty for a winner after back-to-back ALCS appearances and exits. Getting the team back to the post-season will be harder in 2017 than it was in previous years though, because Edwin Encarnacion and Jose Bautista are free agents, officially rejecting their qualifying offers yesterday. There are going to be a lot of narratives that emerge when we look back at this Blue Jays&#8217; off-season, and most of them will likely tie back to those two players; franchise cornerstones who will have their names on the Level of Excellence  once they finish their respective careers in the next decade. But as Jenn Smith <a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2016/11/14/this-week-in-blue-jays/" target="_blank">discussed ever so eloquently</a> in this same space yesterday, there are other ways for the Blue Jays to go. This winter isn&#8217;t just about Jose Bautista and Encarnacion. The front office has already done their best to show us that in the opening few weeks.</p>
<p>Last year, when David Price was departing the Blue Jays, the same fan hysteria was taking place that is occupying social media now with Bautista and Encarnacion. At that time, Shapiro showed that he is able to separate business and emotion, and he let Price walk. However, before doing that, he secured back up plans. Instead of trying to replace Price, he took a page out of the <em>Moneyball</em> playbook and recreated him in the aggregate, spending money on bringing back Marco Estrada and J.A. Happ to Toronto. Both of those moves occurred early on in the off-season, before December 1st. Shapiro showed a willingness not to wait around for any one player or one team to decide what the market would look like. He got his guys at a price he liked, and pounced.</p>
<p>This winter, Shapiro and Atkins have done the same thing. They made an offer to Edwin Encarnacion, but it had an expiry date. They made it clear that they weren&#8217;t going to wait around and then be in a position to miss out on all their other options because their number one target was taking too long to make a decision. So, when Encarnacion rejected the offer &#8211; which <a href="http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/blue-jays-transformation-underway-two-franchise-icons-depart/" target="_blank">Shi Davidi reports</a> was around the range of four years/$80 million &#8211; the Blue Jays moved on to Kendrys Morales. That deal materialized quickly, and by Friday, reports had surfaced that the club and Morales had agreed to a three year deal with an AAV of $11 million.</p>
<p>But Kendrys Morales isn&#8217;t going to replace Edwin Encarnacion. He isn&#8217;t good enough to do that. However, just like last year, when J.A. Happ and Marco Estrada were able to replace the production of David Price, Morales will be able to do the job if he is supplemented with additional talent around him. The Blue Jays have lots of holes to fill right now. First base is open. So is a corner outfield spot. The same can be said for the backup catcher position. Morales wasn&#8217;t brought in to be Encarnacion, he was brought in to build the base of the foundation that will fill the hole Encarnacion&#8217;s likely departure has left. Compliment him with any of the plethora of options on the free agent market (Dexter Fowler, Steve Pearce, Josh Reddick, and Matt Holliday are all solid options) and suddenly, losing Edwin and Bautista doesn&#8217;t hurt the club too much, if at all. Thus, it is important to keep in mind that it is only November 15th. How many times, in off-seasons of the past, has a team stayed silent at the start of free agency only to end up as one of the &#8220;winners&#8221; of the winter? How about the opposite, when a team makes a big splash right away but does nothing else until Spring Training arrives? The baseball season is 162 games, and we tell ourselves daily from April through October to take that into consideration before making conclusions about any one team&#8217;s play. So, shouldn&#8217;t we take the same approach to the off-season, a just-as-grueling part of the calendar that isn&#8217;t won on one or two days?</p>
<p>Yes, we should.</p>
<p>The winter meetings are still close to a month away. There, some big deals will happen. The Blue Jays may or may not be in on them. However, it doesn&#8217;t necessarily matter if they are or not. If Edwin Encarnacion and Jose Bautista are leaving, good for them. They deserve to get paid, but this team doesn&#8217;t need to be the team to do that. This team needs to be the team that makes smart business decisions that allow for the roster to be just as good or better than it was in 2016, and still make financial sense. That has started with Kendrys Morales, and it will continue, be it with a big power bat or a guy who can get on base and lead off.</p>
<p>Perspectives change. Right now, it may seem like the Blue Jays are replacing Edwin Encarnacion with Kendrys Morales. But that clearly is not the case. Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins are smart people. Give them a chance to work their magic. There are plenty of different ways to skin a cat. Not every one involves the two franchise icons that are going to require the big contracts.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo: Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>Report: Blue Jays Sign DH Kendrys Morales</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2016/11/11/report-blue-jays-sign-dh-kendrys-morales/</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 11 Nov 2016 21:03:47 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Joshua Howsam]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Toronto Blue Jays]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Transaction Friday indeed! Apparently Ross Atkins was busy at the GM Meetings, as the Toronto Blue Jays have apparently just completed their second big move of the day: Kendry Morales deal with the Blue Jays is for 3 years. &#8212; Christopher meola (@DfineNrmLC) November 11, 2016 @JimBowden_ESPN @MLBONFOX Done Deal: Blue Jays Sign Kendry Morales [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Transaction Friday indeed! Apparently Ross Atkins was busy at the GM Meetings, as the Toronto Blue Jays have apparently just completed their second big move of the day:</p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Kendry Morales deal with the Blue Jays is for 3 years.</p>
<p>&mdash; Christopher meola (@DfineNrmLC) <a href="https://twitter.com/DfineNrmLC/status/797165268736897024?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 11, 2016</a></p></blockquote>
<p><script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/JimBowden_ESPN?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JimBowden_ESPN</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/MLBONFOX?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MLBONFOX</a> Done Deal: Blue Jays Sign Kendry Morales for 3yrs 33 million</p>
<p>&mdash; Christopher meola (@DfineNrmLC) <a href="https://twitter.com/DfineNrmLC/status/797168444709990405?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 11, 2016</a></p></blockquote>
<p><script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></p>
<p>Fresh off of announcing the signing of <a href="http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2016/11/11/blue-jays-bridge-gap-sign-lourdes-gourriel/" target="_blank">international free agent Lourdes Gourriel</a>, the Blue Jays have acquired their 2017 designated hitter by signing another Cuban, inking Kendrys Morales to a three year deal with a total value of $33 million.</p>
<p>It’s easy to see why the Blue Jays were interested in the switch-hitter. Morales hit .290/.362/.485 in 2015, and then .263/.327/.468 this year, which included a .296/.357/.531 line from June 1st until the end of the year. Keep in mind that half of those games were at Kaufmann Stadium, a notorious pitchers&#8217; park. With the number of hitters parks in the AL East, those numbers could definitely shoot up.</p>
<p>Morales is known for having plenty of power, hitting 30 home runs in 2016, following a season of 22 home runs and 41 doubles in 2015. However, unlike some of the the other slugging options (many are outlined in this piece) on the market this year, Morales makes enough decent contact not to strike out 150 times in a season.</p>
<p>As a switch hitter, he also shows no real platoon splits in his career, which is something the Jays seemed to be targeting (especially people who hit well from the left side) this offseason. Interestingly though, in the last two seasons his splits have been…well…split. In 2015, most of his power came against right-handed pitching to the tune of a .284/.363/.538 triple slash line (His .298/.359/.412 line against lefties was fine, but lacked punch). Then in 2016, everything reversed. Morales absolutely destroyed lefties to the tune of .330/.369/.560, but struggled against righthanders (.231/.307/.423). However, that latter number was driven by a .244 BABIP, which is well below his career mark when hitting from the left side. The Jays are clearly betting on the career numbers being real.</p>
<p>There are some real downsides to Morales as well, of course.</p>
<p>Unlike many of the other players available in this year’s free agent class, Morales has absolutely no defensive value whatsoever. He is limited to being a pure DH, and only playing first base in emergency situations (despite hilarious attempts to play him in the outfield in recent years).</p>
<p>Morales also makes Justin Smoak look fast. This isn&#8217;t exactly a shock considering he lost over a year of his career after <a href="http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/0/v8473485/sea-laa-morales-hits-walk-off-slam-hurt-celebrating" target="_blank">breaking his leg on a walk-off grand slam celebration</a>, but it&#8217;s still notable. He doesn’t make up for that with any kind of special instincts, either. Simply put, he’s a terrible baserunner. As a bat-only player, being a negative on the bases carries more weight than it does for other players.</p>
<p>Morales is also going to play half of next year at 34-years-old (his birthday is June 20th), so there’s a very good chance that the bat will slow at some point soon, rendering him unusable. The last year of this deal could be pretty ugly.</p>
<p>Finally, there’s the matter of Edwin Encarnacion. To many, this signing signals the end of the Toronto pursuit of their star slugger. It’s tough to say if this is true, as the Jays seemed more willing to play Encarnacion as an everyday first baseman last year. However, if Toronto DID sign Morales as an Encarnacion replacement, they likely did so knowing that their former slugger had officially priced himself beyond their willingness to spend.</p>
<p>All of this being said, Morales isn’t a great signing, but it <em>is</em> a solid one. He provides them with some switch-hitting offense in the middle of the lineup, at least in the short term, and most importantly, he didn’t cost <em>too</em> much ($11M AAV), even if he&#8217;s signed for too long.</p>
<p>If rumours of payroll increases are indeed true, the Blue Jays still should have a lot of money left. By addressing a specific need early, and without eating up too much payroll both in the short and long term, the Jays can now be a little more flexible with how they fill out the rest of the roster. They can use the money they have left, or they can backload for players who will command longer deals (Dexter Fowler? Edwin Encarnacion?)</p>
<p>Welcome to Toroto, Kendrys. Now keep ‘em coming, Mr. Atkins.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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		<title>10 Under the Radar Free Agent Options for the Blue Jays</title>
		<link>http://toronto.locals.baseballprospectus.com/2016/11/08/under-the-radar-free-agent-options/</link>
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		<pubDate>Tue, 08 Nov 2016 12:00:37 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Joshua Howsam]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Articles]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Featured]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[blue jays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Free Agent]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kendrys Morales]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mike Napoli]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Neil Walker]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Wilson Ramos]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[With teams finally able to negotiate with free agents from other clubs, the news is soon to be flooded with stories of team interest, contract demands, and the ever-present &#8216;Mystery Team&#8217;. From a Blue Jays standpoint, it will likely mean constant stories about the two big bats, Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion, and endless rumours [&#8230;]]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>With teams finally able to negotiate with free agents from other clubs, the news is soon to be flooded with stories of team interest, contract demands, and the ever-present &#8216;Mystery Team&#8217;. From a Blue Jays standpoint, it will likely mean constant stories about the two big bats, Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion, and endless rumours surrounding their free agency. Heck, it has already started with Rick Westhead reporting that <a href="http://www.tsn.ca/agent-encarnacion-worth-as-much-as-125-million-over-five-years-1.602298" target="_blank">Encarnacion is looking for a five year deal for $125M</a>.</p>
<p>The sad truth is that both Joey Bats and the man who was once derisively nicknamed &#8216;E5&#8242; are possibly long for other franchises. As such, the attention will likely turn, at least partially, towards potential replacements.</p>
<p>There are some obviously ideal options, such as Dexter Fowler, Yoenis Cespedes, and Justin Turner, but those players will all have plenty of suitors in a free agent market lacking in stars. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t want the Blue Jays to go after these players (we absolutely should), but at the same time it would be good to keep other options in mind some options that are cheaper. <em>In no particular order</em>, here are ten under the radar free agent options that the Blue Jays could/should consider to augment the 2017 club (and beyond).</p>
<h4>10. Luis Valbuena</h4>
<p>I imagine many people reading this were not expecting to see Luis on this list, as this is a man that was once released so the Blue Jays could hold onto the carcass of Omar Vizquel, but Valbuena has turned himself into a very valuable player.</p>
<p>Valbuena’s original “breakout” occurred in 2014 with the Cubs, when he hit .249/.341/.435 in 149 games, with 16 home runs and 33 doubles. He followed that up with an interesting campaign with Houston where he saw a power spike (25 HR), but it was accompanied by a dip in average/on-base, as he ended the season with a line of .224/.310/.438.</p>
<p>Then finally this year, it seemed as though Valbuena was putting things all together. Through the first 90 games, he was hitting .260/.357/.459 with 13 HR. One of the biggest changes for Valbuena was that he lowered his chase rate from 26.1 percent in 2015 to 21.7 in 2016. Not only did this help raise his walk rate to 12.9 percent, but it also got him into more hitters&#8217; counts to do damage. Unfortunately for him, Valbuena&#8217;s big year was cut short when he suffered a season-ending hamstring injury that required surgery.</p>
<p>However, Valbuena’s misfortune could be his new team’s gain. With the injury-shortened season, he likely won’t be getting any sort of long term deal. He also offers plenty of position flexibility, as while he played mostly third base the last couple of years, he is more than capable at first base and can even handle second base. Given his athleticism, it also wouldn’t be a shock if Valbuena could handle an outfield corner with regularity. If the Jays sign him to cover first base, he would be more than capable of filling in for Donaldson on days when he needs a rest and his flexibility would also provide the team with more options to filter players through first base and the DH slot.</p>
<p>In addition, as a left-handed batter he would provide the team with a little more left-right balance; something the team has openly said they are targeting in this offseason. He does struggle a bit against left-handed pitching (he’s not AWFUL, just not good), but at what will likely be a very low cost, the team can afford that.</p>
<h4>9. Matt Holliday</h4>
<p>Holliday is something of an interesting study. Outside of St Louis, many people probably forget that he’s still in the league. He’s not young (he’ll play next season at 37), he gets hurt a bit, and he&#8217;s always been somewhat unassuming as a person. But, he can hit.</p>
<p>Holliday is coming off a subpar season that included a broken thumb, but he&#8217;s been pretty much a lock for 20 plus home runs, a solid batting average and on-base, and has shown no platoon splits in his career. For a team that leans heavily right-handed, the ability to hit both sides well is of great value.</p>
<p>He can still play the outfield somewhat (after seeing Saunders and Bautista all year, the standards are much lower), but would probably be ideal as a designated hitter. Holliday could also easily shift to first base, which he started playing last year for the first time. If the Jays had Valbuena, this could be done when Donaldson needs a rest day at DH, or when the team is facing a tough left-hander. Either way, Holliday would be the type of bat that can move around just enough to be valuable.</p>
<h4>8. Carlos Beltran</h4>
<p>It might be a stretch to call Beltran an under the radar pickup, as he&#8217;s an acknowledged star, but there’s a reason he fits this list: he&#8217;s old.</p>
<p>For a team that wants to get younger, signing a guy who will play next season at 40 may not seem like a wise idea. However, he’s also a switch-hitter with power who takes walks and doesn’t strike out a ton. Without the youth, that’s pretty much exactly what this team is looking for.</p>
<p>He hit .295/.337/.513 in 2016 with New York and Texas, and also hits just as well from the right side as he does from the left. By sticking him into the middle of a lineup, the Jays could avoid platoon matchups that can plague a team late in games if they lean too hard to one side.</p>
<p>The Jays had interest in Beltran back before he signed with St. Louis, but he reportedly turned them down due to an unwillingness to play outfield full time on turf and no desire to be a designated hitter. Obviously neither of those things matter anymore, as Beltran spent more time at DH than in the field two of the last three years. That being said, he has still logged plenty of time in the outfield, and while he’s no longer a good defender (or even an average one), he can still fill in there if necessary.</p>
<h4>7. Kendrys Morales</h4>
<p>Like Beltran, Morales&#8217; best defensive days are behind him. Once a viable option at 1B and the OF, he is now strictly a DH. But, like Beltran, it doesn’t really matter. Morales is paid to hit, and he’s quite good at it.</p>
<p>He’s not the star people thought he’d become before an unlucky broken leg (on <a href="http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/0/v8473485/sea-laa-morales-hits-walk-off-slam-hurt-celebrating" target="_blank">a walk-off grand slam celebration</a>) took away over a year of his career, but he can still provide plenty of value at the plate. Morales hit .290/.362/.485 in 2015, and then .263/.327/.468 this year, which included a .296/.357/.531 line from June 1st until the end of the year. Keep in mind that half of those games were at Kaufmann Stadium, a notorious pitchers&#8217; park.</p>
<p>Morales also still has plenty of power, hitting 30 home runs in 2016, following a season of 22 home runs and 41 doubles in 2015. Most of that power this year came against left-handers, but it was the reverse last year. In fact, like Beltran again, Morales has no real platoon split throughout his career.</p>
<p>The difference between the two power switch-hitters is that Morales is fully confined to designated hitter, but also younger and less at risk of missing time for injury. He declined his half of an $11.5M option and didn’t receive a qualifying offer. As a result, he won&#8217;t be overly cheap, but also won&#8217;t be super pricey.</p>
<h4>6. Neil Walker</h4>
<p>Walker is something of an out-of-the-box suggestion in that he is a primary second baseman, and has been for his entire career. The Jays are pretty set in that area (assuming Travis recovers from his postseason injury).</p>
<p>However, Walker does have power and has been an above average hitter for his entire career. The 31 year old was also on the way to career season in 2016 with 23 home runs and a .282/.347/.476 line through 113 games before a back injury forced him to the 60-day DL. If he is fully recovered and would be willing to move to first base, Walker would provide a solid switch-hitting bat who once again shows no real heavy platoon splits (though is slightly better from the left side)</p>
<p>He would also provide nice insurance if Travis can’t stay healthy at second base, with Justin Smoak in the lineup instead of Darwin Barney or Ryan Goins.</p>
<p>The hiccup here is that the Mets gave Walker a qualifying offer, so his signing would cost the Jays a draft pick. But, if they’re playing in this water, they’ve probably already gained two picks from EE and Bautista, so it shouldn’t be a huge problem.</p>
<h4>5. Wilson Ramos</h4>
<p>Signing Ramos would have seemed outlandish as recently as mid-September; Ramos was set to hit the market as an elite-level catcher at age 29. Instead, his right ACL gave out for the second time, and he is now talking about <a href="http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/09/wilson-ramos-discusses-knee-injury.html" target="_blank">needing to find a team that can let him DH from time to time</a>.</p>
<p>When healthy this year, Ramos seemed to be put it all together. He hit .307/.354/.496 in 132 games, while continuing to be a solid receiver who shuts down the running game (40% CS). He may miss some early season time, but Ramos would make a perfect DH and part-time catcher while he prepares for a return to full-time catching duties in 2018. That would solve both the DH and backup catcher holes in one go.</p>
<p>The biggest downside is that Ramos may not be ready in time for spring training due to his surgery.</p>
<h4>3. and 4. Brandon Moss/Pedro Alvarez</h4>
<p>When it comes to lefties with platoon issues, these two hitters offer very similar production. They are going to hit a lot of homers, as they hit 50 long balls between them in 790 PA this season. Neither fits the apparent overall doctrine of getting faster, but when used optimally, the two thumpers can give teams fits. In a strict platoon last year, Alvarez hit .249/.322/.504. Moss saw more PA vs LHPs (against whom he posted a .664 OPS), but did plenty of damage against RHPs with a .223/.303/.525 line.</p>
<p>Each has advantages over the other. Alvarez is younger, but Moss is actually a passable corner outfielder in small doses. As such, Moss is probably the more suitable candidate.</p>
<p>Both of these men would require a platoon partner of some kind&#8230;</p>
<h4>2. Steve Pearce</h4>
<p>That platoon partner? Right here. Pearce would be a perfect fit with the Jays. He owns left-handed pitching (.263/.359/.499 for his career), and he can play first, second, third, left, and right. This versatility is important, as Justin Smoak&#8217;s presence on the roster as a 1B-only backup necessitates the need for platoon options to play multiple positions.</p>
<p>Pearce is also serviceable enough against righties that he can spell players all over the diamond and still end up playing 100-120 games if he stays healthy. He&#8217;s currently recovering from a major surgery, which could hurt his market and make him more likely to accept a part time role.</p>
<h4>1. Mike Napoli</h4>
<p>Napoli is sort of the right-handed version of the Alvarez/Moss duo (though he&#8217;s not hopeless against same-sided pitchers). He won’t hit for average and takes plenty of walks, but his main calling card is power. He is coming off a season in which he set career highs in many offensive categories (including home runs with 34), and played 150 games for the first time in his career.</p>
<p>A one-time catcher, Napoli has proven himself average as a first baseman, but is also very comfortable in the DH-role. However, with the Cleveland World Series run and his big season, look for Napoli to command dollars that are beyond some of the others on this list. If he comes cheap, though, the Blue Jays should absolutely be involved.</p>
<p>None of these players is going to replicate what the Jays got from Encarnacion, and only some will match Bautista’s 2016 contribution, but all of them would represent upgrades to the roster and can help this team. If Toronto can sign two or three of them, the lineup should be strong again in 2017.</p>
<p><em>Lead Photo: Thomas B. Shea-USA TODAY Sports</em></p>
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