The Canada to Philly Pipeline??

 

Here is a shortlist of players that the Philadelphia Phillies have discussed with the Toronto Blue Jays. Kevin Gausman, Daulton Varsho, Jeff Hoffman, Shane Bieber, George Springer. Any of those guys would definitely be the jolt that Philly needs to finish the season. I'm not sure how many will end up being dealt, and how many of our guys will be affected [is this where Painter goes? Is this where Rincones goes?], but it's certainly promising.

Let's be clear, the Jays are responsible for one of the most important pickups in Philadelphia Phillies history, the Roy Halladay trade of 2010, where two inconsequential Phils prospects [and also Travis d'Arnaud] were sent to Toronto and the Phils got a legend who looked good in red. Other than that, the Phils and Jays have never really been on opposing sides of the aisle around this point. And yet here, the Phillies need help, the Jays aren't competing, so here we are.

So let's talk about why Daulton Varsho would be a great fit for the Phillies. Let's start with the obvious. Daulton Varsho, if he lands in Philly, would conclude a very special MLB story. Gary Varsho played for the Phillies in 1995, alongside Darren Daulton, stopped playing after the season, then nine months later his son was born, and he would be given the name Daulton after Gary's former teammate. And now there's a possibility that Daulton Varsho could be playing in Philadelphia, where his story essentially began thirty years ago. 

Plus, Varsho's just a handy guy to have around. Terrific center fielder, great power bat, great clutch hitter, very multi-faceted, thrives in October. Last year in the playoffs he was very helpful, and had 3 homers and 10 RBIs in 18 games. I think he'd do well in Philly. I also think Gausman or Springer or Bieber would probably also do well in Philly but Varsho especially. Jeff Hoffman in Philly though....hmm, I don't even know what that would look like...

If the Jays drop the hammer, they still have enough left to work with going forward. Brandon Valenzuela might be a stronger bet than Alejandro Kirk behind the plate, Trey Yesavage and Dylan Cease can certainly line a great rotation, Okamoto will still be around for a bit, and the team's still centered around Vlad for the foreseeable future. They are still fundamentally a good team, and have enough to still compete for a bit. The lightning that made them a threat last year could not strike twice, and the team could not hold up for long enough to really go for it. So here we are. 

If the Jays deal people to Philly, I hope they continue their strong work and deliver something great. I'd even be alright with Springer in Phils colors. It'd be weird rooting FOR Springer for once, after all this time rooting against him, but I'm open to the idea. 

Coming Tonight: How weird is it that after he got mad at Willson Contreras his season only improved?

Occam's Jay-zor

 

Sometimes the simplest explanation is the correct one. The Toronto Blue Jays have the #1 seed in the AL, from the looks of things, and have become one of the best teams in the AL...because they just put the 14 best people to succeed in positions to. Having to choose between Myles Straw and Daulton Varsho in center field is not the worst problem to have. Hmm, I dunno, do we want the defensive whiz who doesn't hit, or do we want the defensive whiz who hits for power?

And the thing is, if Varsho hadn't have come back blazing, this still would probably be a 1st place team. Myles Straw is just a good guy to have around. He may not always be the best at contact work, but you want him in the outfield, it just helps. Varsho, however, has been the difference maker. In a shortened but still valid season, Varsho has an .846 OPS with 19 homers and 51 RBIs. This run has occurred during the insane Jays stretch in this second half where they've commanded the AL East and shocked the nation. 

Varsho's just one of many people on this team who've aided a playoff run by being exactly where they need to be. The Jays kept George Springer in the leadoff spot, and he rewarded them with a 30-homer year and his best season since leaving Houston. Nathan Lukes and Davis Schneider have both been extremely effective in bench roles, with both trading off having wild power performances. Addison Barger and Ernie Clement have turned fill-in roles into huge leading performances. Even Joey Loperfido is taking off, he's hitting .337 since coming back up. 

The name of the game with the Jays is efficiency. Just efficient performers put in position to lead, punctuated by the crowd-pleasers like Vlad and Bichette and such. And sometimes that is enough. The Jays could have like a flashy sort like Alek Manoah, but that doesn't work anymore, so plugging in Kevin Gausman, Chris Bassitt, Jose Berrios and Shane Bieber just works a lot more. The trouble is that not every other postseason competitor is emphasizing efficiency. The Mariners have built themselves as a mega-power team, as have the Yankees. The Guardians have built themselves as a mega-contact team. The Tigers have a unified youth movement. So something like this is the kind of thing that only works for a short period of time, and who knows how far it'll take the Jays. But getting a bye is a very good thing, and it could set them up for a decent playoff schematic. I do not think they're a World Series team yet, not with their current momentum, but they could always catch fire like they did in July.

Coming Tonight: Since coming up he's fought for third base with a fellow young call-up. Last year his competitor won the position. This year it's been his turn. 

Skip Trace

 

Sometimes, when you have all the talent you need to win and just aren't getting it done, there's no palpable one thing that's wrong, and improvement requires retooling multiple facets over a long period of time. Other times, the thing that is wrong is the person managing the team, and once that is removed the problems go away. I'm not an expert on the inside aspects of baseball, but my guess is that the 2024 Blue Jays fall into the latter category.

The best you can say about John Schneider is that he elevated the Blue Jays from a divisional also-ran to a playoff team. Unfortunately, these Schneider Jays teams have never gotten further than the Wild Card round, even with Bichette, Guerrero, Gausman, Romano and Springer having prime seasons. The problems have only multiplied in 2024, with Bo Bichette having his worst season to date, Daulton Varsho leading the usually power-heavy team in homers with 6, and numerous tough losses that weren't especially close. You're seeing a more irate version of Schneider, one that's been thrown out a lot recently, and hasn't been as fun to be around. 

There are a bunch of managers that people are already going 'how much better would the bench coach be?' at this point. The suspects you'd expect, y'know, Grifol, Marmol, Espada. Which is ironic considering that Espada used to be a coach anyhow. And with Schneider I think it'd be the most cathartic if the firing did happen, because the Jays fans aren't especially loving his work. A colleague of mine, a Jays fan, has never especially been a fan of his, and has noted how 'exposed' he's felt recently. And yeah, while a lot of this team working isn't exactly his fault, it is his fault that it hasn't gotten better. 

Daulton Varsho is still one of the best players on this team, and it's concerning because he's a rare non-homegrown young hitter. Varsho's not only excellent in the outfield, he leads the team in RBIs with 17, and homers with 6. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. only has 4 home runs right now, and that should be extremely concerning, even if he's began to heat up in the last week or so. Bichette, Springer, Biggio and Kirk are all toiling around .200. There's some production from newcomers like IKF, Davis Schneider and Justin Turner, but not a ton. The pitching is solid enough but the ERAs are higher than they should be. Is it the strength of the division? Maybe a little. But it'd be interesting to see how well this team could do without some of these circumstances. 

Like, y'know how Oli Marmol got ejected like seconds into the Cardinals game yesterday, then the second he was ejected the Cards were able to come back and win? The Blue Jays need an 'aha' moment like that, or else this season's gonna be even more disappointing than the last few.

Coming Tomorrow- He was traded to Miami for a player that didn't even make October with his old team. Now he's just seen a teammate be traded back to his old team as they're competing. I just feel bad for this guy.

Darin' Daulton

 

I feel bad for George Springer. I mean not entirely, he is still a member of the 2017 Astros, but a little. He's an average fielder who's in his early 30s, and he has to share the outfield with two of the best defensive outfielders in the game. Kevin Kiermaier's accomplishments need no explanation, but Daulton Varsho may be just as much of a threat in left, and has made them even stronger of a defensive squad. If you had to share an outfield with Kiermaier and Varsho, you'd feel inadequate too.

Daulton Varsho in Toronto is something I figured would work the second I heard the news of the trade. On one hand, trading Lourdes Gurriel may have been a bit unwise in hindsight, as DHing Springer and having a Gurriel-Varsho-Kiermaier OF would have been awesome, even if the D-Backs weren't giving up a core piece for nothing. But Varsho was just coming into his own, and needed somewhere he could really fit in, and it feels like Toronto is one of those places. I saw him have some awesome hits in Spring Training, he looked impressive even then, and so his excellent defensive start doesn't surprise me whatsoever. He also have 10 steals, 26 RBIs and 11 homers, which is also extremely good. 

Even for a team that is somehow only fourth in the AL East, the Blue Jays have one of the most fearsome lineups in all of baseball, and have managed to get Jose Berrios, Kevin Gausman, Chris Bassitt and Yusei Kikuchi all cooking at the same time. All of those starters have five wins or more, 70 strikeouts or more, and have made all 14 starts. Even in a rotation that is once again missing Hyun-Jin Ryu, that is a scary level of consistency, and while a fifth man has yet to really appear just yet in the absence of Alek Manoah, it's implied that Mitch White's return to the rotation is forthcoming, and hopefully he'll continue that level of consistency. 

The problem I have right now with this team is honestly a strange one. The starters are all doing pretty well, there's just not a lot of depth. Not a ton of proven emergency contingency strategies if more of these guys get beaten up. The younger bench guys, Nathan Lukes foremost, aren't inspiring a ton of confidence. It's cool to see Ernie Clement beginning to figure it out though. Along with Owen Miller and Nolan Jones, it's nice to see so many former Cleveland utility men begin to figure things out. But yeah, I really hope this lineup stays healthy, because I'm not sure what the plan b is gonna be. If what's happened to the Yankees happens to them, I don't know if they'll be as lucky.

There's also just...as good as this team is, there's still three in the AL East that are better than them. Which, while odd, does still track.

I think the Blue Jays are still capable of great things this year, and the standings are gonna keep swishing around and bending all over the place. With the lineup the Jays are currently working with, I think they'll be alright in the long run, they just need to be careful.

Coming Tomorrow- A rookie catcher given a golden opportunity to stake his claim that he's 100% capitalized on.

Chasing the Namesake

 

I dunno, putting a catcher with the name Daulton on a 1988 Donruss design just kinda felt right.

The Arizona Diamondbacks did something I didn't think they'd do this season. 2 things, really. They made it above .500 and spent some games at 4th place. That they did that alone is worth celebrating.

They're honestly not doing too badly, at 19-21, but for a team that was always gonna come in either 4th or last, the D-Backs have a lot to say for themselves right now. For instance, yesterday they had a guy, namely Josh Rojas, hit 3 home runs in a game. They also have a rotation where no one has an ERA over 4.50, which is rare for a last place team. Their marquee stars, like Ketel Marte, Zac Gallen, Christian Walker and Merrill Kelly, are actually worth the price of admission this year, and are beginning to get fans back in seats.

And what's most exciting about this team is that the slow rollout of the youth movement in Phoenix actually seems to be working. At the end of the 2020 season, the D-Backs brought up Pavin Smith and Daulton Varsho, and now they're both integral parts of the oufield. Varsho's having an excellent season, with 17 RBIs, 7 homers and a .790 OPS. Smith has 15 RBIs and 26 hits. Meanwhile there's guys from the latter half of 2021, like Seth Beer and Jake McCarthy, who got some stuff done earlier on but are hanging back in the minors.

And then there's some actual 2022 rookies. Gerardo Perdomo is starting at SS, and he's an excellent defender, especially alongside Marte. Alek Thomas is off to a phenomenal start in the outfield, and had a homer yesterday amid all the Rojas ones. Humberto Castellanos is starting regularly and doing pretty damned well, keeping his ERA around 4. The layering of the different incarnations of this team's youth movements is being very well handled, a lot better than the Tigers honestly. 

I don't expect the D-Backs to accomplish a great deal, but if people like Varsho, Gallen and Marte end with great seasons, more power to them. It'll be better for the long run, especially if they stick around.

Coming Tonight: All rise..

2020 Topps Final Edition: Cards #55-63

 Okay, this is the day that I still have engrained into me to do these posts. Fridays are gonna need a few more repetitions, but Monday is firmly in there. Here's the next 9 cards of the set. Some intriguing inclusions here.

Card #055- Nick Margevicius, Seattle Mariners

Nick Margevicius was one of the first players in the 2019 incarnation of the now-ironclad San Diego rotation. Margevicius was brought up with Chris Paddack and Pedro Avila as a way of sprucing up the rotation with youth. It didn't especially work, and Margevicius struggled after his first few starts. So the Padres waived him, and Seattle bit. Due to the overwhelming lack of rotation options, Margevicius started 7 games, ended the year with a 4.57 ERA and was a decent lower-rotation pick after Gonzales, Sheffield and Dunn. Not sure if there'll be room for him in the rotation in 2021.

Card #056- Edward Olivares, Kansas City Royals

Edward Olivares was fulfilling the Franchy Cordero 'extra outfielder' role in San Diego before going the way of Cordero himself and being traded to Kansas City for a reliever. Olivares, though, got to some contact hitting in 18 games in KC, hitting .274 with 17 hits and 7 RBIs, and factors into the starting outfield conversation for 2021. Not bad for one of many Padres outfield prospects to be splayed across the AL. 

Card #057- J.T. Realmuto ASG, Philadelphia Phillies

Realmuto, the catching giant of Philly, would have actually missed the NL starting gig for the ASG voting by a few meters, thanks to some voting from the LA general area. But he'd still make the team as a reserve, because he's one of the best catchers in the game, is one of the best elements of a still-meh Phillies lineup, and, if 2020 had been normal, could have been in his last season in Philly, so to get an ASG nod in both Philly seasons would have been pretty cool.

Card #058- Eric Yardley, Milwaukee Brewers

Another member of the sprawling but mostly anonymous Milwaukee bullpen, Eric Yardley is, heh, YET ANOTHER FORMER PADRES FARMHAND who was waived by San Diego during the 2019 offseason. The Brewers picked him up, and Yardley responded with a 1.54 ERA and 19 Ks in 24 appearances, along with 2 postseason strikeouts against the future World Champions. Yardley is 30, but will still be a crucial piece of the 2021 Brewers bullpen, especially with Devin Williams and Josh Hader looking to be healthy. 

Card #059- Daulton Varsho, Arizona Diamondbacks

The high-ranking Arizona prospect finally made it to the bigs in 2020, but the output may not have been what the fans were hoping for. In 37 games, Daulton Varsho only bat .188 with more strikeouts than hits. He was still an impressive defender and roster piece, but by the end of the season the D-Backs were bringing up Pavin Smith as an alternative. Interesting to see where he spends the majority of the 2021 season.

Card #060- Bobby Dalbec, Boston Red Sox

He appeared on the scene like a freight train. A longtime Salem & Portland slugger, Bobby Dalbec finally made it to the majors in 2020, and made a name for himself quickly, hitting 8 homers in 23 games, his first few all in consecutive games. Dalbec is looking at a starting role with the Sox, and a new young power hitter is exactly what the Sox need right now. 

Card #061- Austin Hedges, Cleveland Indians

After five seasons of low-average, decent-defense work as the catcher in San Diego, Austin Hedges was finally moved out of a starting role thanks to Francisco Mejia and, eventually Austin Nola. Hedgey, along with Josh Naylor, would be traded to the Indians for Mike Clevinger, and Hedgey sort of limped along for 6 games, hitting .083 with only one hit. He'll likely be backing up Roberto Perez this year in Cleveland.

Card #062- Trevor Story ASG, Colorado Rockies

Story would have been the third of three NL shortstops on the proposed 2020 ASG team, and would have been a reserve member. But it would have been his third straight ASG nod, and a foreshadow of his status in 2021 as one of the few marquee Rockies left on the team after Arenado's departure. Story is a fantastic player, and has improved so much since his rookie year, but I worry that his time in Denver is coming to a close.

Card #063- Kyle Finnegan, Washington Nationals

Brought up in the wake of the Nationals' WS win, Kyle Finnegan was one of the many young, unestablished bullpen tools brought in to keep the team strong despite the lack of most of its 2019 core. Finnegan was one of the better relievers on the team in 2020, with a 2.92 ERA in 25 games, with 27 Ks. Will definitely be of use in a stronger, rebound year for the Nats.

The next 9 of these will come on Friday. Some of the most intriguing uniform changes are in this one.