Blue Jays Notebook: How tight standings could affect trade market

TORONTO – With the exception of the White Sox and Orioles, basically everyone in the American League is a good week away from being where they need to be.

And beyond the Yankees and Tigers, everyone’s a bad week away from being in real trouble. Otherwise, there’s just not much separation so far this season.

Case in point: the Athletics, who were positioned well until a nine-game losing stopped any momentum they’d built, and the Angels, who just swept Oakland to climb to within a single game of .500. For the league, it’s a good thing — the expanded playoffs are serving their intended purpose and giving fans lots of reasons to stay engaged. 

For the executives charged with making tactical roster decisions this summer, though, the expanded playoff field means it takes longer for a clear picture of buyers and sellers to emerge. That’s not new exactly, but it’s a little more exaggerated this year with fewer super-teams and only a small handful of truly non-competitive ones.

Entering play Friday, 24 of 30 MLB teams were within five games of a playoff berth, and there will be consequences the longer this continues. While there’s a long way to go before the July 31 deadline, some executives around the league wonder if we’ll see a market with relatively few impact players in which teams essentially have what they have, plus or minus some complementary moves.

That could be heightened by the fact that the most obvious seller — the 8-42 Rockies — has limited talent to offer as well as a reputation among executives as a particularly difficult team to line up with on trades.

Granted, if a market is starved for sellers, an opportunistic contender or two could jump in and offer up difference-making players. There’s always talent available if you’re willing to pay exorbitantly for it, and the Rays, Brewers and Guardians have historically been willing to make unexpected and unpopular moves.

So while it’s too early to say precisely who will be available, obvious trade targets like Luis Robert Jr. of the White Sox, Sandy Alcantara of the Marlins and Andrew Heaney of the Pirates won’t be the only ones out there — but talent will likely come at a high price as parity league-wide leads to limited supply and more leverage for non-contenders.

One such seller could be the Orioles, who reached the playoffs in both of the last two seasons but have already fired manager Brandon Hyde after an abysmal 16-32 start. It stands to reason that pending free agents like Cedric Mullins, Ryan O’Hearn and Tomoyuki Sugano would be available in trades within a couple months unless Baltimore reverses course soon.

If that’s the path the Orioles follow, they could conceivably be conducting a sell-off in late July when the Blue Jays play four games in Baltimore in a three-day span from July 28-30. But there’s a long way to go before the Orioles have to choose a direction, and the same applies to the Blue Jays.

First, GM Ross Atkins will likely wait to see how much injured players like Max Scherzer, Erik Swanson and Ryan Burr can offer while also integrating recently signed right-hander Spencer Turnbull into the rotation. The progress of Alek Manoah will also be worth monitoring as he recovers from internal brace surgery, with a late-season return still on track.

Then, as the Blue Jays learn more about what that group can offer, their needs will become clear. Like every contender, the Blue Jays would be shopping for pitching, be it rotation help, bullpen reinforcements or both. And they’d benefit from offensive help too, whether that means an everyday bat for third base or the outfield or simply a right-handed hitter to complement a group of position players that tilts to the left.

Of course, if things go badly for the Blue Jays, they would be one of those surprise sellers just as they were a year ago, and pending free agents like Bo Bichette, Chris Bassitt and Chad Green would be among the most coveted players out there. But at 25-24, that’s not their current trajectory.

Comprehensive trade talks don’t begin for weeks, so for now that’s mainly speculative. But executives are watching closely to see where more sellers emerge because at this point, there’s not much to choose from.

Quietly, the Blue Jays have been an elite team when it comes to preventing stolen bases. Only two teams — the Royals and Mets — have prevented a higher percentage of stolen-base attempts than the Blue Jays, who are stopping nearly two out of every five attempted stealers (38.1 per cent caught stealing rate).

The pitchers have done their part, but it’s catchers Alejandro Kirk (9 CS, 21 SB) and Tyler Heineman (7 CS, 5 SB) who deserve most of the credit.

At a certain point, teams may start running less against the Blue Jays, yet that might not be until after this weekend when Chandler Simpson and the typically aggressive Rays host them for three in Florida.

The decision to remove Bowden Francis from Thursday’s game after just four innings wouldn’t have been made ten years ago, but there was a strong rationale behind the move even if it’s not sustainable to rely on your bullpen for five-plus innings every day.

Opponents have hit .371/.450/.686 when facing Francis for the third time in a game this year, context that contributed to manager John Schneider’s early bullpen move. Yariel Rodriguez then struck out the side, including the notoriously tough-to-whiff Luis Arraez, and the bullpen kept it close from there.

Analytically speaking, the move gave the Blue Jays an advantage because it prevented Fernando Tatis Jr., Arraez and potentially Manny Machado from seeing Francis a third time on a day he was solid but not dominant. And from a common sense standpoint, the Blue Jays’ bullpen was well-rested so this was the day to do it.

Now, there’s a limit to how often you can pull this off, as the Blue Jays’ bullpen had to cover seven innings and will now be at less than full strength for the series opener in Tampa on Friday. But there’s something to be said for winning the game in front of you, and the Francis-for-Rodriguez swap contributed to a Blue Jays sweep by keeping the game close.