The Tigers have traded prospect Devon Travis to the Toronto Blue Jays for center fielder Anthony Gose. Here's a look at the newest Tiger.

Anthony Gose is a speedy, 24 year old left-handed hitting center fielder who was drafted in the second round of the 2008 amateur player draft by the Philadelphia Phillies out of Bellflower High School, in Bellflower, California. Gose is known for his speed and his defense much more than for his bat.

In parts of seven seasons in the minor leagues, Gose hit .259/.334/.381 with 37 home runs and 271 stolen bases. He stole 76 bases in his first full season at Single-A Lakewood. The Phillies traded Gose to the Houston Astros at the trade deadline in 2010, but he was quickly flipped to the Toronto Blue Jays. The series of deals sent J.A. Happ to the Astros with Roy Oswalt going to the Phillies. Gose hit 16 home runs and stole 70 bases at Double-A New Hampshire in 2011.

Gose made his major league debut with the Blue Jays in July 2012. In parts of three seasons with Toronto, he has hit .234/.301/.332 with 34 stolen bases in 616 plate appearances. He has been up and down between the major leagues and Triple A. Beyond the Box Scorehad this report on him before the 2012 season.

There are few prospects in baseball who are as athletic and talented as Anthony Gose. Gose is a plus-runner and defender with all of the skills to become a plus-hitter too. He's a strong and physical athlete who has shown glimpses of superstardom in the past, but he hasn't yet put everything together. Gose has been very inconsistent at the plate since he's been in pro ball but really tightened things up in 2011.

Just over six months later, John Sickels of Minor League Balladded a bit more on Gose's defensive abilities.

Despite the mixed results from his bat, Gose can still be a valuable player due to his outstanding outfield defense. His range and arm strength are top-notch, and he has superior instincts to put an exclamation mark behind the pure tools. His makeup is well-regarded, and at age 21 he still has a huge amount of development time left on the clock.

Jays Journalcontinued the praise with another glowing review of Gose's glove.

The scouting report on Gose is an interesting one, and makes the wide array of opinions understandable. One thing everyone can agree on, however, is that Gose is a special defender. In addition to roaming the outfield for his Bellflower, California high school, Gose worked off the mound, where he sat between 92 and 96 mph with his fastball. That arm has translated extremely well to professional baseball, as it serves as an 80-grade tool in center field, and he has recorded 13, 16, and 14 outfield assists in his last three seasons.

Gose was considered a consensus top 100 prospect after his solid 2011 season. Baseball Prospectus ranked him 68th, MLB.com had him at #57, and Baseball America put him just inside the top 40 at #39.

The downside of Gose is that he doesn't make contact that often. He struck out 27 percent of the time last season and has fanned at a 27.6 clip throughout his MLB career. His hitting goes from weak (.234 average overall) to extremely weak (.208 average, .513 OPS) when he faces left-handed pitchers.

The fact that he bats left-handed leads one to believe that he could platoon with Rajai Davis in the outfield for Detroit. He has played all three outfield positions for the Blue Jays, but the vast majority of those have been in center field. Gose has been a plus defender in the outfield, posting a UZR of 9.2 last season with +2 defensive runs saved (DRS). He has a strong arm, being a former high school pitcher who featured a fastball in the low 90s.

Gose posted an fWAR of 1.3 for the 2014 season in just 274 plate appearances. By comparison, his teammate, Colby Rasmus, posted just 0.6 WAR. Austin Jackson was worth 1.0 WAR, Torii Hunter 0.3, and Rajai Davis 1.4 in almost 500 plate appearances. By that measure, the Tigers have already upgraded one position in their outfield.

Dave Dombrowski referred to Gose as a "true center fielder" in his press release about the trade. Gose is also going to be earning the major league minimum for another two seasons. With the Tigers' payroll creeping up, that's a welcome addition to the roster.

Dombrowski was quoted by Mlive.com's Chris Iott

"We believe he has the chance to be an everyday center fielder," Tigers general manager Dave Dombrowski said by phone late Wednesday night. "Now, he'll have to earn that type of spot. He's not going to be anointed that, but he gives us another guy to choose from and a guy we think highly of. ...

"Time will tell on that, but he does have a chance to do it."

Assuming that Gose is to platoon with Davis in center field, that leaves one corner outfield spot to be filled. But is that the plan? According to Dombrowski, maybe not.

"We feel comfortable right now where we are," Dombrowski said of the makeup of the outfield. "We do have J.D. and Rajai out there in two of the spots. Gose gives us a legitimate center fielder. We also think a young guy like (Tyler) Collins is ready to play and I guess it's to be determined on (Steven) Moya to see how he continues to develop, but he's had a real good Arizona Fall League."

Sorry, Dave. That ain't gonna cut it.  Not even close.

The Yankees have a lot of holes in the early goings of the offseason, especially in the infield. They need a shortstop, third baseman, and second baseman before the season starts, but the team is already reaching out wherever they can to put together a team. According to Jon Heyman, the Yankees have inquired on second baseman Howie Kendrick of the Los Angeles Angels, someone they have long had their eyes on.

Kendrick is a known Yankee killer, having hit .342/.404/.480 against them in his career, and though he's not as much of a god-like hitter against the rest of the league, he'd still be a monumental improvement over the likes of Brian Roberts. At the age of 31, Kendrick is owed $9.5 million for the 2015 season, making him an affordable get for one season. The catch is that the Angels are currently looking for starting pitching, something the Yankees don't exactly have an abundance of at the moment, but they also have names like David Freese and Gordon Beckham who could be had for lesser returns.

The Blue Jays have also checked in on Kendrick and seem to be a team with a greater need for a second baseman, since the Yankees have both Martin Prado and Rob Refsnyder who could play the position. While Kendrick could help the offense overall, they should be focusing on positions like shortstop and third base where they don't have any in-house starting options. Depending on what happens this season, the Yankees could always chase Kendrick in free agency next year.

Should the Yankees sign the oft-injured right-hander?

2014 Statistics: 33.1 IP, 8.10 K/9, 4.86 BB/9, 0.54 HR/9, 5.67 ERA, 3.73 FIP, 1.65 WHIP, 0.4 fWAR

2015 Age: Will be 31 on 7/26

Position: Right-handed reliever/starting pitcher

After experiencing several seasons shortened by injuries, the Blue Jays decided not to pick up Brandon Morrow's $10 million option for 2015, thus making him a free agent. He only pitched for one month of the 2014 season before he ended up on the 60-day DL with a torn tendon sheath in his right hand. Prior to the injury he made six starts in the rotation with a 1.72 WHIP, 5.93 ERA, 8.56 K/9, and 5.60 BB/9 (amounting to walking 17 batters in 27.1 innings). Morrow remained on the DL until September, and when he was finally activated, he was sent to the bullpen where he only pitched six innings. Morrow did have some good seasons with the Blue Jays as a starter, particularly 2010 and 2011 when his K/9 was over 10. His career numbers show that he has the potential to pitch better than he has lately, but there's no telling if he can stay healthy enough to do so.

Though the Yankees could probably sign him to a cheap contract, his injury history raises a red flag. He landed on the DL for four consecutive seasons with the Blue Jays, and he missed significant time over the last three seasons. Aside from this year's injury, he missed four months in 2013 with an entrapped radial nerve in his right forearm. He missed over two months in 2012 with an oblique strain. And as previously mentioned, when he finally rejoined the team in 2014, it was as a reliever. Evidently, the Blue Jays thought that moving Morrow from the rotation to the bullpen could cut down on his injuries. He originally pitched as a reliever for the Mariners before they traded him to the Blue Jays, so signing him would increase a team's flexibility. Even though his injuries haven't necessarily been chronic (he did also miss a month in 2011 with right forearm inflammation), it seems like he can be counted on to miss several months every year at this point.

The Yankees could really use a break from pitching injuries, especially after last season. If the Yankees are unable to sign Brandon McCarthy or even Chris Capuano, then it could be worth it to look into Morrow as somewhat of a last resort. With some question marks surrounding CC Sabathia's knees and Masahiro Tanaka's elbow, and with Ivan Nova likely to miss the first several weeks of the season, it might be beneficial to have someone like Morrow available from the pen who could fill in anywhere. At the very least, he should be inexpensive and he might be able to stay healthy long enough to be helpful.

Would you pass or sign Brandon Morrow?

This may seem like a little bit of déjà vu as last year my initial pick for this project was also Mark Ellis, but since I had already written about him beforehand I ended up going with Nate McLouth instead. I couldn't have been farther from the mark for either of those guys so thank goodness the Blue Jays front office didn't listen to me. Ellis signed in St. Louis for one year at $5.2 million and proceeded to only play 73 games due to injuries and wind up with a batting average of.180 and a wRC+ of 31. He was even left off the postseason roster and the Cardinals obviously let him walk after the season thanks to him essentially stealing that $5.2 million from them. McLouth fared no better after signing in Washington for $10 million over two years plus an option in 2016. The outfielder lost a ton of time to injuries as well and played in only 79 games while hitting .173 with a wRC+ of 50. I'm surprised I still get the chance to do this after last year.

As was the case in 2014, I jumped the gun and already wrote about the free agent I think the Blue Jays should target in Chase Headley. To make things interesting I've selected Mark Ellis AGAIN, as he finds himself in a significantly different situation than last offseason. After absolutely bombing in St. Louis, Ellis will be lucky to get a major league contract although I believe it could an opportunity for the Blue Jays to see if he still has anything left in the tank.

It's a well-known fact that the Blue Jays are trying to upgrade their second base position which was shown by their recent acquisition of Devon Travis from the Tigers. Although there are sexier options, like Jed Lowrie, it seems the team is content with riding the hot hand from a group of guys including Maicer Iztruris, Ryan Goins, Steve Tolleson and the aforementioned Travis. It wouldn't hurt to throw Mark Ellis into that group as well since he has proven before that he is capable of providing above average value at the second base position. While there isn't many positive things to say about how Mark Ellis looked at the plate in 2014, besides his usual lack of power there was no massive change in his peripherals to suggest that he had lost his ability to provide average-ish hitting from the right side. Ellis is no longer going to hit more than 10 home runs in a season and certainly won't break a .300 average, but for many years he could always be counted on to get on base at a .330 clip, while keeping the strikeouts down. Then last year happened:

The BABIP didn't help things last season, but no one is going to make the mistake of thinking that Mark Ellis is going to ever set the world on fire with his bat. What he has always reliably provided in a major league uniform is a solid glove at second base. He clears the 5.0 UZR mark every year and if you're into the more traditional stats then a perfect fielding percentage in 2014 should make you happy. For many years what Ellis lost in terms of value at the plate he more than made up for in the field posting fWAR numbers of 3.0, 1.0, 2.6, 1.8 from 2010-2013 with the only ugly spot being the miserable -0.4 from last season. He's currently 37-years-old so eventually the fielding is going to become less consistent but he hasn't shown many signs of a Jeter-esque slowdown yet.

A case can also be made for the presence he brings to the clubhouse along with the fact that he's seen his fair share of the postseason, but that isn't the easiest to quantify so we'll just leave it as an added bonus. You may think that Ryan Goins fills the same role as a great defender at second base who can't hit, but even in Mark Ellis' worst year at the plate in 2014, Goins still managed to be equally as bad.

Source: FanGraphs -- Mark Ellis, Ryan Goins

Since I had been sitting on this idea for a little while, I contacted Ben from Viva El Birdos to ask him his thoughts about Mark Ellis' time in St. Louis. He graciously replied:

The Cardinals signed Mark Ellis after he had a solid age-36 season with the Dodgers, posting a .270/.323/.351 (.300 wOBA, 91 wRC+). Cardinals management maintained that rookie Kolten Wong would be the primary second baseman with Ellis serving as a complement, a role that seemingly included serving as an insurance Plan B as well as right-handed platoon partner. But Ellis sustained an injury in spring training and didn't open the season on the active roster. Curiously, the Cardinals allowed Ellis only a one-game minor-league rehab stint before activating him from the DL in mid-April.

Manager Mike Matheny began using Ellis to the exclusion of Wong and the Cardinals ultimately demoted Wong near the end of April and seemingly handed the job to Ellis. But Ellis didn't hit at all and the Cards ultimately recalled Wong, who grabbed hold of the primary second baseman job. Ellis just looked bad most of the season. He didn't hit the ball hard very often and when he did make solid contact, the ball seemed to find a fielder's mitt. I was actually in Colorado when Ellis went on a mini hot streak and, for a brief few innings, pulled his average up above the Mendoza line. After that late-June game, Ellis was batting for a .202 BA and had a .292 OBP. Neither stat would be that high again all season.

Ellis ended the year with a ghastly .180/.253/.213 (.212 wOBA, 31 wRC+). The Cardinals even saw fit to leave him off their postseason roster. I doubt there's a buy-low candidate on the free-agent market sitting at the subterranean depths of Ellis. I wouldn't give him anything more than a non-roster invitation to spring camp.

Well after hearing from Ben it really does sound like Ellis was as bad in 2014 as his stat line suggests. Ben brings up an interesting option though by suggesting a team could give him a non-roster invitation to Spring Training. Alex Anthopoulos always seems to find these players on the scrap heap who perform well in March and end up seeing time at the major league level and Ellis could be another one of those guys.

It's a toss up whether the South Dakota native will receive a major league contract for 2015, but I'd like to see the Blue Jays take some sort of gamble on Ellis and see if he can make everyone forget about his 2014 campaign. Contracts like this are always hard to predict, but I'd offer Ellis some sort of incentive-laden contract for one year that won't do any damage if he flames out. If Goins, Iztruis, Travis, and Tolleson look like better options entering the season then so be it, but with the way that second base currently looks for the Blue Jays, taking a shot on Mark Ellis isn't the worst idea in the world.

Dombrowski and Anthopoulos decided to swap prospects late last night, and both can be applauded early for their efforts.

Much will be made of how Toronto Blue Jays general manager Alex Anthopoulos traded for the number one prospect in the Detroit Tigers system. However, both general managers should take this deal as a victory for their present clubs going into the 2015 season.

Let's start just alphabetically with what the Detroit Tigers have acquired in Anthony Gose. Long mentioned in trade rumors in Toronto but apparently a favourite of GM Anthopoulos, Gose comes as advertised. He's a potentially great defensive centerfielder (called the best centerfielder the Blue Jays have ever had by Sportsnet radio host Mike Wilner) and speedy baserunner. In 2012, Gose stole 34 bases in 102 games at the AAA level. That includes this gem in which he stole home against Jake Arrieta. Over the course of his abbreviated major league career, he has accumulated 7.1 Base Running Runs Above Average in just 202 games played. Unfortunately, the biggest criticism of Gose during his Toronto tenure was his ability to get on base. Posting a career .285 wOBA doesn't endear you to your coaches when you actually have to be on-base to be good on the bases.

Moving on to the Toronto Blue Jays' return: Devon Travis. According to Baseball America, he is the number one-rated prospect in the Detroit Tigers system. The 23-year old has yet to have his name announced in a major league stadium, but that shouldn't worry anybody. In AA Erie last year, Travis posted a 126 wRC+, with a 8.4% BB% and 13.6% K% in 441 plate appearances. However, he too comes with some lumps: Despite being number one on Baseball America's list of Tigers prospects, he went unnamed in the top 10 according to ESPN's Keith Law.

What is most impressive about this trade, in my opinion, is that each player addresses immediate needs of both of their ball clubs. Since Torii Hunter's leaving, the Tigers could absolutely use an outfielder, and if Rajai Davis starts showing his age, Gose -- 10 years his junior -- will be able to step in while also bringing superior defense. On the other hand, the Blue Jays have needed a second baseman since Aaron Hill left (no offense, Kelly Johnson). With Maicer Izturis, Ryan Goins and (potentially) Steve Tolleson all competing for second base duties, it wouldn't be too outlandish for Travis to see his first major league action in 2015.

Neither projects to be a full-time major leaguer in 2015, but they'll each get a fair shot in the upcoming spring training of their respective clubs. While both prospects come with some negatives -- and what prospect doesn't? -- fans of both the Detroit Tigers and the Toronto Blue Jays should applaud the efforts of Dombrowski and Anthopoulos respectively.

. . .

All statistics courtesy of FanGraphs.

Michael Bradburn is a Contributor for Beyond the Box Score. You can follow him on Twitter at @mwbii. You can also reach him at michaelwbii@gmail.com

When the Blue Jays traded Anthony Gose to the Tigers a few days ago, fans of the team started scouring the web for scouting reports of the second baseman coming back the other way. His name as we know is Devon Travis and he has a lot of people excited about the possibility of a solid player at the second base position with the Blue Jays for the first time since 2011. The reports on Travis aren't earth shattering, but they certainly provide a bit of optimism that he can reach the major league level fairly quickly and become the best option that the Blue Jays have.

His instincts and gritty makeup get the most out of his tools--which aren't lacking. ...He's not flashy but gets the job done. At worst, the Southeastern Conference player of the year will be an all-around second baseman. Offensively, he has a beautiful swing, above-average speed and control of the strike zone. He doesn't have plus home-run power, but he can hit the occasional longball and line balls into the gaps.

Wait a second here. That report sounds like what we've already heard about Travis and he did play at Florida State, but aren't the Seminoles in the ACC and not the SEC? As it turns out, this was actually how former Blue Jays fan favourite and second baseman Aaron Hill was described by John Sickels in early 2005 before the Californian started his year at Triple-A. The similarities between Devon Travis and Aaron Hill are certainly present and should provide even more hope that the next solid Blue Jays second baseman since Hill will actually be a player who fits in the same mould. Just to show how closely related the thoughts are about the two second basemen, here's what Rob Rogacki of Bless You Boys had to say about Travis on another story up on the site today:

He's a bat-first prospect with a decent hit tool and some gap-to-gap pop. His plate discipline is pretty good and most reports I've seen are complimentary towards his ability to wait for his pitch.

Sometimes scouting reports are where the similarities between players end, but that's not the case for Travis and Hill. Both are relatively small in stature, with Travis measuring in at 5'9" and Hill a slightly taller 5'11", while both players are around 200 pounds. The right-handed hitting and throwing second basemen went to college as mentioned earlier and after being drafted (Hill in the 1st round and Travis in the 13th) tore up lesser competition in the lower minor leagues. The stat lines tell an eerily similar story as well, which provides the opportunity to play the always fun game of guess who is player A and player B:

via Baseball Reference

If you have an extremely good memory of the Blue Jays minor leagues, then you'll remember that Hill made it all the way to high-A Dunedin the year he was drafted, which makes him player B. As you can see, both players produced massive OBP numbers in the minors and coupled that with low strikeout rates and some solid gap power. It's not listed above, but both players hovered around 10 home runs per year as well, showing that they had enough power to clear the wall on the rare occasion.

Coming out of college the defence of both players was considered average at best and neither player was strong enough on the fielding side of the ball to be able to play at shortstop, although that's initially where Hill played at LSU. Travis won't be Ryan Goins out in the field, but he sounds competent defensively which is what we also came to expect of Hill in his heyday with Toronto.

Now obviously there is going to be a flip side to this argument and it starts with the fact that Devon Travis is certainly not Aaron Hill. In fact when asked by a certain someone if he saw any similarities between the two players, Keith Law didn't really see it...at all:

@Vikings182 None.

— keithlaw (@keithlaw) November 14, 2014

That's because Aaron Hill was (and is) more talented in terms of tools than Travis. The new Blue Jay has well-documented holes in his swing that haven't been exposed in the lower minor leagues as Law points out:

He has leaky hips and starts his swing from a dead stop with his hands loaded low, making up for it a bit with strength, something that won't work as well against major league pitching.

It's also a given that Hill was considered the better player coming out of college due to the LSU Tiger being drafted 13th overall, while Travis didn't get taken off the board until the 13th round by the Tigers. There's a clear difference in tools, which means we may just have to accept that while at the moment it looks like the Blue Jays acquired Aaron Hill's twin they may have just acquired his mould with a few noticeable cracks in it. That's got to be better than what 34-year-old Maicer Iztruis coming off surgery brings to the table.

I'd like to thank jmarples for the inspiration to this post as he originally saw the similarities between the two players when the trade was made. Unfortunately, due to my extreme amount of love for Aaron Hill I never accepted the fact that any Blue Jay player would ever compare to him in the slightest.

Tom Dakers of Bluebird Banter was kind enough to provide us with a scouting report of the former Blue Jays outfielder.

After the Tigers traded second base prospect Devon Travis to the Toronto Blue Jays for center fielder Anthony Gose, Tom Dakers of Bluebird Banter -- SB Nation's Toronto Blue Jays blog -- reached out to us for a breakdown of Travis' skill set and future potential. Naturally, we obliged. In this exchange, Tom was also kind enough to provide us with a scouting report on Gose, who spent parts of three seasons in a Blue Jays uniform.

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When the Blue Jays traded for Anthony Gose, he was one of those toolsy types that the Jays really like. We traded Brett Wallace -- who was sold to us as the first baseman of the future -- to get Gose, who became the center fielder of the future. The Jays have spent the last 4 years trying to make that happen. He really hasn’t progressed much in those 4 years.

Until this year, Gose was still looked at as the center fielder of the future. Prospect Dalton Pompey had a very good year, starting the season in A-ball and finishing it as a September call-up and passed by Gose in the eyes of the Jays office.

You get a lot of good and bad with Gose.

The good:

• He has a ton of range in center field. He will make some of the nicest catches you’ll ever see.

• A former pitcher, he does have a great arm, we didn’t see it as much as I hoped and when we did see it, he didn’t always hit the target. He’ll occasionally drive you crazy by throwing to the wrong base, trying to impress you with his arm strength.
• He is a very good base runner. He does have some work to do on getting a good jump on pitchers and he gets picked off at the worst moments, but he can go from first to home as fast as anyone you’ll ever see.
• He can bunt for a base hit, which, if your TV commentators are as bad as ours, will get them talking about how he could bunt for a .350 average. He can’t.

And, of course, he is a terrific athlete.

Unfortunately, he didn’t learn to turn that athleticism into offensive ability. All the speed in the world doesn’t matter if you can’t get on base. As a Blue Jay, he hit .234/.301/.332 in 202 games scattered over 3 seasons between trips back and forth to the minors. His biggest problem has been his 27.6 percent strikeout rate. All the speed in the world won’t help you if you strikeout.

Why hasn’t he been able to use that athleticism to become the offensive player we thought he would be? Maybe because baseball is harder than we think. There are reports that he is a little headstrong. He has hated it each time he has been sent back down to the minors. He thinks he is a major leaguer and he sulked when he was send down to the minors, leading to run-ins with his minor league managers. A lot of people felt he played better in the majors than he did in the minors.

In a scouting report Rob wrote for us about Devon Travis, the ‘high baseball IQ’ came up a few times. You will never talk about Anthony Gose using that term. Gose is likely the anti-Travis: he has made it to the majors because of his athletic abilities, but he hasn’t figured out how to use those abilities to turn him into a baseball player.

What should you expect from Anthony Gose? If you can get past the idea that he isn’t going to be a star, I think you’ll be happy with him. If the rest of your offense is good, you can live with him batting 9th and catching everything hit into the air.

I’d find him a right-handed hitting platoon partner (you already have Rajai Davis, he’d be a good choice) and enjoy watching him play defense and be happy with whatever offense you can get from him. Let him get 400 MLB at-bats and see what happens. I think you’ll have a 2 WAR player (mostly on his defense), which you can live with until someone better comes along.

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Once again, a huge thank you to Tom and the rest of the Bluebird Banter crew for giving us the inside scoop on our new center fielder. Be sure to check out Bluebird Banter for all things Blue Jays (including to see if Travis makes the team next spring!).

Since we don't have the rumor du jour yet, I thought we might as well look at how the Blue Jays players that are in the Arizona Fall League did. The leagues regular season ended Thursday and the 'Championship' game is this afternoon, but our the Mesa Solar Sox finished at 15-14, 2 games back of the Salt River Rafters, so they won't be in the game.

Sean Ochinko: Played in 12 games. Hit .310/.362/.500 with 1 home run and 11 RBI in 42 at bats. Sean only played in 24 games split between the Bisons and the Fisher Cats during the regular season (he missed some time with the carry over of a 50 game suspension from 2013) and hit just .213/.250/.263.

Jon Berti: Played in 20 games. Hit .292/.418/.431, with 3 home runs, 8 RBI and 6 stolen bases. He had a slow start to the season but hit .324/.432/.486 in his last 10 games. He had an ok 2014 season with the Fisher Cats, hitting .270/.323/.373 with 7 home runs and 40 stolen bases,

Dwight Smith, Jr.: Played in 11 games. Hit .262/.340/.333 with 5 RBI and 3 stolen bases. He was working out at second base but I don't think he got into any games at the position, but I didn't see all the boxscores. Smith hit .284/.363/.453 with 12 home runs and 15 steals for Dunedin this year.

Dalton Pompey: Played in 19 games. Hit .257/.358/.371 with no home runs, 2 triples, 4 doubles, 2 RBI and 9 stolen bases. He hurt his shoulder on a slide but tweeted that he was ok.

Sean Nolin: Started 7 games. Went 2-1 with a 4.03 ERA. In 22.1 innings, Sean allowed 20 hits, 2 home runs, 6 walks and 24 strikeouts.

Blake McFarland: Pitched in 9 games, all in relief. Went 1-0 with a 0 ERA,  in 12.2 innings. He allowed 9 hits, 0 home run, 8 walks with 15 strikeouts. Blake split time between the Dunedin and New Hampshire bullpens this year, putting up a 2.89 ERA with 4 saves, allowing 46 hits, 4 home runs, 23 walks and 73 strikeouts in 62.1 innings.

Roberto Osuna: Pitched in 6 games, all in relief. Went 0-3, with a 9.49 ERA, in 12.1 innings. He allowed 22 hits, 2 home runs, 4 walks with 15 strikeouts. Still recovering from Tommy John.

Arik Sikula: Pitched in 9 games, all in relief. Went 1-0, with a 2.61 ERA, in 10.1 innings. He allowed 11 hits, 1 home runs, 2 walks and 7 strikeouts. Arik split time between New Hampshire and Dunedin, pitching in 56 game, getting 31 saves. in 58.1 innings, he allowed 50 hits, 3 home runs, 12 walk with 80 strikeouts.

The 31-year-old Canadian catcher's deal is worth $82 million.

The Toronto Blue Jays and catcher Russell Martin have a agreed to five year, $82 million dollar contract, according to Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports. Martin's new deal makes him the third-highest-paid catcher in Major League Baseball, behind only Buster Posey and Brian McCann.

The 31-year-old had a career renaissance over the past two years with the Pittsburgh Pirates, hitting .290/.402/.430 in 2014 with 11 home runs and 67 RBI. He was excellent behind the plate, as well, leading all catchers with 12 defensive runs saved. Martin's 5.3 fWAR, among catchers, trailed only Jonathan Lucroy and Buster Posey

With Travis d'Arnaud entrenched as the starting catcher and Kevin Plawecki pushing for a major league promotion, the Mets were never likely to pursue Russell Martin. The Blue Jays are certainly taking a risk signing a 31-year-old to such a lengthy and high-paying contract, but Martin has been one of the premier catchers in the league over the past two years. While the team may have overpaid, they have also upgraded both their lineup and their infield defense.

The day after the Chicago Cubs were believed to be front-runners in the Russell Martin sweepstakes, the Toronto Blue Jays sign him for 5 years at a reported $82 million.

It took by far the largest free-agent offering from Alex Anthopoulos in his 5 years as General Manager, but the Blue Jays have signed Russell Martin.

Possibly feeling the pressure of his job this off-season, Anthopoulos has been relatively active in addressing needs of his ball club. Many fans of the team felt that the Blue Jays inaction at the trade deadline was the reason for their team missing the postseason.

Russell Martin joins a catching corp that includes Dioner Navarro, Josh Thole, Erik Kratz, Jeff Mathis, J.P. Arencibia, Travis d'Arnaud, and Yan Gomes. In other words, Martin joins a team that is overdue for some luck behind the dish. Though luck is not measurable, it is clear that Anthopoulos is trying to correct some mistakes that he has made at the catching position.

The 31-year old catcher will be signed into his 37-year old season for an average annual salary of $16.4 million. Only $1.1 million over his qualifying offer, Martin, due for some regression, was wont of a long-term deal. For an excellent article on Russell Martin's regression, check out Randy Holt's article here.

It is true, Russell Martin will excite a lot of Blue Jays fans, but I would urge, like many others, to temper expectations. Getting "the best catcher on the free agent market" is definitely a good thing, but Martin is certainly not a superstar. While we shouldn't expect a Martin wOBA of .370 again, we can remain confident that his career average of .334 and his Steamer projected .328 for 2015 is still above average. However, what we can expect is defense. Of catchers with a minimum of 450 PA, Martin finished first in Defensive Runs Saved and third in Def with 14.9 behind only Salvador Perez and Alex Avila.

Although this does address a need of the Blue Jays, it is unclear whether their plan is to carry three catchers into Opening Day. Surely Dioner Navarro stepped in admirably for them last season, carrying a massive workload of 139 games and posting a 2.0 WAR. And with R.A. Dickey on the team, Josh Thole's reps behind the plate are basically guaranteed. Whether this tells of moves to come is unclear but Anthopoulos still has work to do.

For what it's worth and whether we like it or not, it's Jon Morosi giving us the #HotTakes today:

Russell Martin is one of the few free agents who can help change a clubhouse culture. This is a great day for the Blue Jays.

— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 17, 2014

Russell Martin is a great Habs fan. Under the circumstances, I believe the good people of Toronto will respect him for that.

— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 17, 2014

The propensity for fans to discuss whether the money is 'too much' or 'a bargain' when a free agent is signed is undeniable. I'm always somewhat reticent of these discussions because to me it's a) not my money and b) the cost of doing business. That is to say, if you wanted that player, whether you like it or not, that's what he cost. Either you want the player or you don't. The feeling in Toronto is that of excitement, that we got our guy. The feeling everywhere else -- at least according to your twitter reactions -- are "lol", "R E G R E S S I O N", "he's not worth 2 let alone 5" and "That's a lot of money for a guy whose stats are better than he actually is," which I admittedly have trouble making sense of.

That being said, here's a poll!

. . .

All statistics courtesy of FanGraphs.

Michael Bradburn is a Contributor for Beyond the Box Score. You can follow him on Twitter at @mwbii. You can also reach him at michaelwbii@gmail.com

With a contract valued at just under $16.5 million per season, this is a question worth considering.

When the Blue Jays signed Russell Martin to a five-year deal worth $82 million on Monday, they gave themselves a chance to win the American League East—but also devoted valuable funds to a position that wasn't necessarily at the top of their list of needs.

The signing is paradoxical for the Blue Jays. In a sense, they need Martin to win the AL East, because of his immeasurably positive impact on the pitching staff, and also because Dioner Navarro, the third-worst pitcher frameramong all catchers last season and a .255/.313/.375 career hitter, presents an alternative that likely isn't good enough to get the job done.

But at the same time, by dropping more than $16 million annually on an aging, average-hitting catcher, the Jays have potentially precluded themselves from filling their other pressing needs, like second base, outfield and a suspect pitching rotation. Not to mention, they also lose their first-round draft pick in 2015 by signing Martin.

On several levels, however, the deal makes a lot of sense. Martin returns to his native Ontario, Canada, and the hitter-friendly atmosphere of Rogers Centre (and the AL East overall) means the ex-Pirates catcher could realistically produce similar numbers to the .290/.402/.430 slash line he posted last season. Martin's defense also speaks for itself; he was the 10th-best pitch framer in the majors last season by statcorner.com's metrics and threw out a league-leading 37 would-be base stealers. By that measure, the signing essentially kills two birds with one stone by upgrading the catcher position and the starting rotation.

But for how long?

The tiebreaker here is Martin's age. His offensive performance last season, sustainable or not, surely isn't enough to warrant a contract of such proportions when also taking into account Martin's offensive mediocrity from 2009 to 2013, a five-year span during which he didn't hit over .250 once and combined for just 154 extra-base hits in 2,113 at-bats.

That means the Blue Jays paid a significant part of Martin's contract for his ability behind the dish—something that won't last through the entirety of this five-year deal. Martin, 31, has already started 1,074 games in his nine-year career as a catcher, and as veterans like Victor Martinez (828 starts behind the plate) and Joe Mauer (885 starts) transition to first base at even earlier periods in their careers, it's worth questioning how many more years Martin has left in the tank. He turns 32 on February 15, which is rather old (in catcher years) to be starting a five-year deal that's based in large part around Martin's defensive impact.

From the Blue Jays' perspective, this deal's saving grace would be if Martin leads Toronto to a division championship (or even a wild card berth)—and given the postseason's mercurial nature, perhaps a deep playoff run from there.

Now might be the Blue Jays' window of opportunity. The Yankees are stuck with a massive payroll devoted mostly to aging and very costly veterans. The Red Sox are fresh off a 91-loss season and (for now) have a starting rotation that is in shambles. The Rays just lost their brilliant strategist, Joe Maddon, and don't appear to be a postseason threat next season.

Without devoting five years to Martin, the Blue Jays likely never could have completed the deal. But unless we have truly underestimated Martin's longevity, this is a deal that requires immediate results to pay off. In the end, a two- or three-year contract would have made plenty of sense. In 2018, when Martin's defense will have inevitably declined and the Blue Jays will still owe him millions, the second-guessing might really come out in full force.

By now everyone has formed their initial opinions about the massive deal that the Blue Jays signed with Canadian-born catcher Russell Martin this morning. While there are valid points on each side, it's at least exciting to have something to talk about this offseason and it's still only mid-November. It seems like a good time to outline the obvious pros and cons to this deal and see how valid each point is when you really look into it.

Pro: Russell Martin is an excellent pitch-framer

Pretty much everyone that loves this deal is pointing to the upgrade in the pitch-framing department brought about from the difference between Russell Martin and Dioner Navarro. At this point the upgrade is essentially an undeniable fact, although the actual value of the upgrade is up for interpretation. Based on pretty much the only public available data at StatCorner.com, Martin was worth 11.7 RAA last season while Dioner Navarro came in at -20.0 RAA, which is one of the lowest totals in the league for catchers with a sample size of at least 3000. Variances from year to year aren't uncommon, but in 2013 Martin once again was near the top of the league with a 17.0 RAA total, while Navarro once again had a lowly -3.7. There's a lot of debate over how representative this data is, but there's no doubt that the Blue Jays believe that the difference in pitch-framing skill between Martin and Navarro is a sizeable one.

It's an added comfort that Martin is rated as an outstanding pitch-framer by many of the notable measures, although obviously there is a little bit of difference in how many runs he saves per year depending on which one you decide to listen to:

via Hardball Times

Con: Russell Martin is now signed for his age 32 through 36 seasons

Long-term contracts in the MLB are about as risky as anything in sports and often are earned in the first half of their life, while the teams are forced to pay for that additional value in the second half. The Blue Jays may find themselves in that situation in the next half-decade as Martin seems like a good bet to provide the 2.5-3.0 WAR needed to earn his annual contract value in the first few years of his contract ($16.4M/year with 1.0 WAR being worth about $6M). The potential risk comes in the latter half of his contract when he's behind the plate for 120+ games in his age 35 and 36 seasons. There seems to be a misconception that catchers age worse than other position players, but thankfully it's actually not true which should be a slight relief for Blue Jays fans:

via Eno Sarris Twitter

It also is a comforting sign that framing has almost no aging curve at all:

via "Catcher Framing Before PITCHf/x" by Max Marchi

The potential injury risk is also present as the Canadian enters his mid-30's, with the former Pirate spending time on the disabled list earlier this season with hamstring issues and also experiencing groin issues during the team's (short) playoff run this October. Martin has played in at least 100 games in every single one of his professional seasons except 2010 with the Dodgers, so the injury risk isn't as high as it could be when signing an aging catcher.

Pro: Russell Martin is coming off a spectacular offensive season

Beyond what Martin brings to the team in terms of defence he also provided a wRC+ of 140 in 2014, which contained an OBP of .402 and 11 home runs. He provided the Pirates an extremely reliable bat in the middle of the lineup that was patient at the plate and took a fair amount of walks (12.8% BB-rate). This spectacular season earned him some MVP votes, where he ended up 13th, well behind his teammate Andrew McCutchen and fellow catchers Buster Posey and Jonathan Lucroy. Enough about this outlier season.

Con: When accounting for a high BABIP in 2014, Martin is a fairly average bat

I like Martin, w/o question makes Jays better. But: 2014: .290/.402/.430, .336 BABIP, 140 wRC+ 2011-13: .225/.321/.395, .247 BABIP, 99 wRC+

— Chris Toman (@Chris_Toman) November 17, 2014

It can't be said much better than that. An extremely out of the ordinary BABIP in 2014 helped Martin look a lot better than he should have and the Blue Jays may have had to pay a bit more than fair value because of it. The Canadian's wRC+ traditionally hovers around a mark of 100. When you list the offensive performances of catchers from 2011-2014, Martin is on the edge of the top 10 and well behind the front of the pack of truly elite offensive catchers (if you decide to omit his 2014 season then he is quite a bit further down the list). Many people are talking about the Blue Jays acquiring a tremendous bat, but in reality it's much more likely that he's an average bat behind the plate which is also what Dioner Navarro is capable of providing.

Pro: The Blue Jays are proving that they have money to spend and are not rebuilding

I think this point is especially necessary when you consider the growing frustration among long-suffering Blue Jays fans. There was beginning to be suspicion that the team could get blown up this offseason and launched into another painful rebuild, which would have eliminated a lot of the fan interest that has grown since the deal with the Marlins. Thankfully Rogers has provided the money to allow Alex Anthopoulos to essentially make the moves that will determine whether he has a job next offseason. After Martin signed reports started flying around that the team was in on Jon Lesterand Andrew Miller, which is actually terrifying, but shows that the team is serious about winning now.

Con: The team may have no money left to play with

Paul Beeston has stated that there isn't a hard ceiling to the Blue Jays payroll, but in reality there is little chance they eclipse the $145 million mark in 2015. With the Martin signing this obviously means that the team will now be about as financially flexible as an 80-year-old man in a straitjacket. There's a chance that Navarro is traded, which would add a little bit of room to make another signing, but in my opinion it seems unlikely the Blue Jays add any more major financial obligations for next season.

Pro: Martin is Canadian and a veteran player

One thousand words into the piece and we've finally reached points that are unmeasurable. The obvious plus to Martin playing for the Blue Jays is that the team will likely have three Canadian starters on Opening Day next year with Brett Lawrie, Dalton Pompey, and Martin. This is more of a marketers dream than anything, but tickets will need to be sold to make this payroll increase worthwhile and three home-country players should go a long way to filling the stands. Martin has also been praised as a great game-caller and calming influence behind the plate, which should help out the slew of young pitchers the Blue Jays figure to be running out next season.

Con: Martin rubs some people the wrong way

I'll admit it. I have a notion in my head that Martin isn't the friendliest player in the world and has gotten on the bad side of a fair number of people. It may stem back to when he demanded to play shortstop or not at all in the 2013 World Baseball Classic, which put Team Canada in the tough position of not really having a catcher. If you'll recall Brett Lawrie was pretty angry about it too, which could make for an awkward first few days when Spring Training opens next year.

"For him to kind of do that right when we’re about to take off, it’s kind of annoying," Lawrie, a native of Langley, B.C., told the Star. He later described Martin’s decision as "weak" and "not right" to Sportsnet radio.

Martin has also had a few run-ins with the opposing team over the course of his career, including this previous season when he wanted to fight Martin Maldonado of the Brewers in the offseason after the two teams had a brawl during a game:

Martin: "If (Maldonado) wants to have a fight for charity in the offseason. My contract comes up. … I’d be completely willing to do that."

— Travis Sawchik (@Sawchik_Trib) April 21, 2014

Con: The Blue Jays lose their #17 draft pick

For Blue Jays fans who enjoy the draft, the 2015 version will be a slight letdown as the team forfeited their first round draft pick to complete the signing. With Martin rejecting the Pirates' qualifying offer, Toronto was forced to surrender their #17 draft pick, which was actually #18 before the Mets signed Michael Cuddyer earlier this month. The eventual value of this pick is obviously an unknown, but the Blue Jays have made some solid picks in this area over the past few years including Marcus Stroman at #22 in 2012. The added benefit is that if the Blue Jays sign another free agent this offseason that rejected a qualifying offer, they will only be forfeiting their compensatory pick assuming they fail to re-sign Melky Cabrera. This gives the team a leg up on the competition who will likely be facing the downside of losing their more valuable first round pick that the Blue Jays have already lost.

That seems to summarize the main points on both sides of the argument relating to the signing of Russell Martin. As an aside, Martin first broke into the league after he replaced an injured Dioner Navarro in Los Angeles after the Canadian had initially lost the starting job in Spring Training. When Navarro returned, Martin had stolen the job from him and eventually led to the Venezuelan being traded away to Tampa Bay. How history repeats itself.

The Cardinals are certainly in win-now mode, and they pulled off a major trade today by nabbing Jason Heyward in a four-player deal.

In case you've been under a rock and haven't heard yet, the Cardinals, in a move that shores up their outfield and relief corps without significantly damaging the starting rotation, acquired Jason Heyward and Jordan Walden from the Braves in exchange for Shelby Miller and Tyrell Jenkins. Beyond the Box Score's Jeff Wiser broke down the trade from Atlanta's point of view earlier; I'll be looking at it from St. Louis' vantage point.

Why acquire Heyward and Walden?

First, the deal's centerpiece: Heyward. He's been a beast since entering the big leagues in 2010, averaging 4.6 fWAR/600 PA and contributing heavily on both sides of the ball. His defense has steadily improved, to the tune of 22.8 and 24.1 UZR in 2012 and 2014, putting him second in the majors behind Alex Gordon this year. As Baseball-Reference pointed out on Twitter, he's been the second-best defender in baseball over his career by dWAR, behind only Carlos Gomez. He can even play center when necessary, although the Cardinals shouldn't require that given they have Jon Jay and Peter Bourjos on the roster. Randal Grichuk is waiting in the wings in right as well, giving the Cardinals as crowded an outfield as the Braves had before the deal (and less than it would have been sans the Oscar Taveras tragedy). The question is this: will the Cardinals keep their outfield, or move a piece to replace Miller in the rotation? Jay and Bourjos are both under 30 and could probably bring in a decent back-end starter. Only the rest of the offseason will tell.

Since his "down" year in 2011, when he had only a .313 wOBA, Heyward has kept his line drive rate hovering around 20% while increasing his fly ball percentage. At age 25, and having been in the majors for a while now, Heyward is pretty much a known quantity. He'll give you plus hitting, plus-plus defense, and be pretty durable. The Cardinals were already an excellent team, as evidenced by their run to the NLCS before their devil magic ran out, and the addition of Heyward only adds value to the cream of the NL Central.

The more interesting question for the Cardinals is not 2015, but beyond. With Heyward's contract expiring after the season, St. Louis will have to pay big-time to keep him around. I don't think any of us expect him to get Giancarlo Stantonmoney, but at just 25 he'll certainly be looking for something in the range of 10 years/$200 million, as Dave Cameron suggests. The Cardinals are in the middle of the pack in terms of payroll, but it's not out of the question that they'd put their faith and dollars in Heyward if he flourishes.

Jordan Walden, on the other hand, is certainly not going to cost anywhere near $200 million. His fastball pushes 100 at times, and he's shown promise by striking out over a batter per inning for his career, but control is a big issue. He walked 4.86 batters per 9 innings last year, ninth in the majors (right behind new teammate Trevor Rosenthal!). His FIP numbers have been good (2.80 for his career), and he does a good job of keeping the ball in the ballpark, especially in homer-friendly Turner Field (4.9% HR/FB, right behind Craig Kimbrel for 27th in the majors).

Walden, who just turned 27 yesterday, joins Rosenthal, Pat Neshek, and others to form a pretty solid bullpen corps. If former Brave Derek Lilliquist can work some Dave Duncan magic and bring down Walden's walk rate, the Cardinal relievers will become even more fearsome.

Why deal Miller and Jenkins?

Let's start with the easy one: Jenkins. He has decent upside, projecting to be a major-league regular if he can work out a solid secondary pitch, but he's at least two years away from making the bigs. At only 22, this isn't necessarily cause for concern, but the Cardinals are playing for the here and now, and Jenkins won't help with that. Part of the luxury of such a deep farm system is that you can deal players like Jenkins without sacrificing too much depth, and the Cardinals did just that to make significant improvements at the big-league level.

Miller is a bit more puzzling, but there are several reasonable explanations for letting him go. He's never been a power pitcher but has shown the ability to significantly beat his peripherals over 2+ major-league seasons. The issue is that when you're starting from a 4.03 career FIP, even bettering it by .70 in ERA as Miller has still doesn't make you a top-flight pitcher. However, with Adam Wainwright, Lance Lynn, and the recently-acquired John Lackey already in the rotation, the Cardinals don't need top-flight, just consistency. As mentioned above, getting Heyward gives them the flexibility to deal an outfielder for a proven starter, lessening the loss felt by dealing Miller.

St. Louis is basically betting that Miller won't develop into the star they thought he might be when they took him with the 19th overall pick back in the 2009 draft. Their eyes are also on the present more than the future, meaning they'll gladly take some long-term loss of value in exchange for short-term gain. That's the crux of the entire trade as well: even though they'll have the ability to sign Heyward, this move was designed for contention in 2015. The gut feeling many had when first hearing of the trade – "Why would the Braves do that?" – serves as a good indication of who won the trade, at least in the short term. Look out, NL central.

. . .

Statistics courtesy of FanGraphs, Baseball-Reference, and Brooks Baseball.

Steven Silverman is a featured writer at Beyond the Box Score and a student at Carnegie Mellon University. He also writes for Batting Leadoff. You can follow him on Twitter at @Silver_Stats or email him at Steven@SilverStats.com.

The Blue Jays are one of six teams attempting to land the free agent southpaw.

After landing one big name free agent with the signing of Russell Martin, the Blue Jays hope to land another in Jon Lester, according to Rob Bradford of WEEI.com, who notes that Toronto is one of six teams showing "legitimate interest" in the southpaw. Peter Gammons of GammonsDaily.com spoke with general manager Alex Anthopoulos, who downplayed the team's interest, saying that the team "won't go to six years" and "know [they] won't be in."

@pgammo trades. We'll check in on Lester, but we won't go to six years, and we know we won't be in."

— Peter Gammons (@pgammo) November 17, 2014

Lester is entering his first year in the free agent market. After spending nine big league seaons with Boston and part of 2014 in Oakland, Lester is clearly the top left-handed starter in the 2015 market. For the 2014 season, Lester posted a career-best 2.46 ERA, along with a 9.01 K/9 rate over 219.2 IP. Bradford notes that Lester is expected to meet with the Cubs and Red Sox later this week.

The Jays currently have seven potential starters in R.A. Dickey, Mark Buehrle, Drew Hutchison, Marcus Stroman, J.A. Happ, Aaron Sanchez, and Marco Estrada. If they were to land Lester, the Jays could move some of that pitching depth to help fill some needs in the outfield, as well a spot in the infield. The Jays have shown interest in making a trade for Howie Kendrick, as well as bringing back free agent Melky Cabrera.

This is becoming an interesting off-season, which is nice, considering how boring last year was. When the Jays spend a ton of money in an off-season, I get worried because the next year they tend to try to spend anything the next year. It sounds like the Russell signing isn't the end of the moves the Jays intend to make.

Rob Bradford, at WEEI.com, tells us that the Jays are talking to Jon Lester, but Peter Gammons tweets that Alex won't go beyond 5 years and that likely won't do it for Lester, but you never know. I didn't think we'd be all in on Martin either.

And everyone is reporting that the team is going after Andrew Miller. I would have thought they would be looking more for RH relievers, but Miller has looked good against both left-handed and right-handed bats.

SB Nation's Chris Cotillo tweeted this:

Hearing Emilio Bonifacio is drawing interest from many teams who he's previously played for. TOR, KC, CHC make sense for him.

— Chris Cotillo (@ChrisCotillo) November 14, 2014

Somehow I don't believe this one. I doubt that Bonifacio would want back here or that we would want him back.

And, the rumors are that, after signing Martin, Alex's phone has been ringing with GM's asking about Dioner Navarro. He would be a pretty good trading chip.

The Blue Jays already made a free-agent splash in signing Russell Martin. Could they land Lester too?

The Blue Jays could be set to continue spending this offseason, with Toronto reportedly showing interest in left-hander Jon Lester, according to Rob Bradford of WEEI.com.

Per Bradford, the Jays are one of six teams that identified Lester as a target, though the Cubs and Red Sox will meet with the pitcher this week and are both considered likelier landing spots for the 30-year-old. Still, Toronto has gotten the attention of the baseball world after inking Russell Martin to a five-year, $82 million deal, and if their interest in Lester is any indication, the Jays have some money left to spend.

Why this makes sense

Pitching has been Toronto's biggest downfall the past two seasons, with the club's starting rotation the main culprit. In 2014, Jays starters finished with the fifth-highest ERA in the American League, and the team lacked anything resembling a top-of-the-rotation arm. Mark Buehrle, R.A. Dickey and Drew Hutchison led Toronto's rotation in games started, and the Jays also had to depend on J.A. Happ to make 26 starts. The arrival of rookie Marcus Stroman brought some hope for the future, but the Jays lack anyone of Lester's pedigree.

Given the club's decision to plunge into free agency with the signing of Martin, further spending can't be ruled out at this point. The A.L. East is wide open, and Toronto has a solid core already in place. The addition of Lester would go a long way in making the Jays serious players not just in the division, but for the pennant as well.

Why this doesn't make sense

Although Toronto flexed some financial muscle in locking up Martin, the Blue Jays haven't often spent big in free agency. Last winter, the Blue Jays found themselves in a similar place, needing just an addition or two to improve their chances of contention. Instead, they added virtually no one, even though Ervin Santana sat unsigned until March and eventually agreed to a one-year, $14 million deal with the Braves. Will Toronto suddenly spend over $200 million on two players this winter after barely opening the checkbook last offseason?

In addition, the Cubs and Red Sox maintain serious interest in Lester. Both have plenty of money (especially after Chicago lost out on Martin), and Lester is meeting with both clubs this week. The Jays have also shown reluctance to handing out contracts for greater than five years, something Lester will garner elsewhere. Considering the type of commitment it will take to sign Lester, the chances of the Blue Jays outbidding everyone else for the southpaw are slim.

Likelihood: 2 out of 10

There is no doubt that Toronto would love to add Lester and will at least ensure that either the Red Sox or Cubs have to spend big to nab the lefty. But signing a 30-year-old starter to a massive contract isn't the way the Jays have done business in the past, even if their 2015 payroll is set to be the biggest in franchise history.

If the Jays are going to add a starter, a cheaper option such as Santana or James Shields appears more likely. Toronto has surprised everyone once already, though, so one can't unequivocally rule them out as serious suitors for Lester.

What can Wiet expect? Miller headed north for the Winter? Trade ideas, and minor league moves. All that and more to keep your bird nest warm on this Arctic morning.

Could Orioles pay Wieters what Blue Jays paid Martin? | Comcast SportsNet Baltimore
Could they? Sure. Baseball is flooded with money right now. Will they? Nope.

Report: Blue Jays aggressively pursuing Andrew Miller | HardballTalk

Looks like the BJs are trying to win the off-season again. We'll see how that works out for 'em.

Nelson Cruz Home Run Estimates | FanGraphs Fantasy Baseball

Some statistical projection for what any team signing Cruz may expect in terms of HR output.

Camden Depot: Orioles Trade Target: Michael Saunders

Certainly could be one course of action

School of Roch: Orioles sign infielder Ozzie Martinez

Because the minor league rosters need filling out as well. Over/Under number of games this kid sees in Baltimore: 3.5

Happy 52nd birthday to Jamie Moyer. He was a fresh-faced 30 year old when he signed with the O's back in '93. He would pitch a bit over 400 innings of 4.41 ERA over 3 seasons in Charm City. The late Steve Bechler would have turned 35 today. On this date in 1997, Dan Duquette got his second bite at the apple when he lands Pedro Martinez in a trade. When are the O's gonna get a Pedro Martinez, Dan!?

Toronto finds a catcher in free agency for the second straight year, while Sox can build on Tyler Flowers' success

Next up on "How Much Money Do MLB Teams Really Have?", let's welcome the Russell Martin contract to the show.

The Blue Jays signed the market's top catcher in a stunning deal on Monday -- five years and $82 million for a catcher that will turn 32 as teams report to spring training.

We can use "stunning" here for a few reasons. The Cubs were supposedly the leaders for Martin's services, and the Blue Jays usually don't (or can't) compete with large-market teams. But Ken Rosenthal foreshadowed Toronto's "sleeping giant" status...

Caveat to earlier report on #Cubs as leader for Martin: #BlueJays still could be in mix. #Tigers feared TOR would outbid them for VMart.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) November 17, 2014

... and sure enough, the Jays went further than the Cubs by tacking on a fifth year, and at a slightly higher annual rate. The resulting contract exceeded FanGraphs' crowdsourced estimate by a large margin, and even topped MLB Trade Rumors' more aggressive projection by $10 million.

With the aforementioned Victor Martinez contract, theGiancarlo Stantonextension and the Martin signing, you can construct reasons why their contracts overshot assumed value. Martinez's bat was essential to Detroit's win-now plans. Jeffrey Loria will find a way out of a 13-year contract. Canadian teams have to pay extra to lure players out of the U.S., which was underscored by Jon Paul Morosi:

Despite playing in one of the most dynamic and livable cities on the continent, the Blue Jays haven’t had an easy time attracting free agents — particularly Americans who aren’t used to going through customs on a frequent basis. Anthopoulos has been the GM in Toronto for more than five years; not once during that time has a U.S.-born free agent signed a multiyear contract with the Blue Jays.

In this case, though, Martin is Ontario-born and Quebec-raised, so that doesn't seem to apply here. So maybe this mental inflation needs to be figured into our rosterbating arithmetic for teams that want to bolster its chances via free agency?

It's always hard to tell at this point in the offseason, as Jeff Sullivan noted in his evaluation of the Stanton extension:

Seems like the industry usually reacts with astonishment, early in offseasons, before going on to make similar decisions later in offseasons. It’s always startling to recognize how much money there is in this game.

Which is why I'm trying my best to wait for the big picture to emerge, even if this seems more extreme than usual. Because maybe it's just the usual.

The White Sox could have been serious players for Martin had Tyler Flowers not stabilized his career. Rick Hahn said at SoxFest that Brian McCann was the only free-agent catcher in which they had interest, and had Flowers fumbled his second chance at starting, they might've been right back at it.

The Blue Jays were in a similar spot last season, and they went the stopgap route by signing Dioner Navarro to a two-year, $8 million deal. Yet that commitment to a veteran didn't eliminate them from going for the marquee player the next season, even if they risk allocating their resources in a strange fashion.

Sullivan says the Martin signing boosts the Blue Jays' catcher projections from the fifth-worst to the fifth-best. The move probably would've had a similar impact on the Sox, because a respectable 2014 didn't completely Febreze the stink from his 2013, so that dampens future enthusiasm.

But the Sox can crush their own projections through more modest means. The first is protecting Flowers' magic goggles from a cruel fate:

Beyond Flowers, any such projections cast Adrian Nieto or Josh Phegley as the backup, and that seems like something Rick Hahn can't and won't allow to happen. It's only fair to give Robin Ventura two catchers who can work with every pitcher, after forcing him to lean heavily on Flowers last year.

If you believe in Flowers and Hahn, then you probably feel comfortable penciling the Sox in for a couple more wins than the current projections indicate. If you think Flowers' value can collapse, then sitting out of the starting catcher market for another year is probably a bummer.

I'm inclined to think Flowers' rebound was a hard-fought victory in an evaluation season, but the Sox can't really afford to be cavalier about it. After pairing Flowers with Nieto, Phegley and Hector Gimenez the last two years, giving him some real reinforcement would be one way to keep a fringe contender from leaking wins.

There's a long list of catchers the Red Sox could pursure, and Dioner Navarro should be added to it.

At this point, everybody knows one of the tasks on Boston’s to-do list this winter is finding a second catcher to pair with Christian Vazquez. While David Ross has filled the backup role admirably over the last two years, it’s unclear if he’ll continue playing in 2015 given his age and health concerns. Besides him, there are many other options to fill the role. Yesterday, Ben took a look at some of them in the wake of Russell Martin’s signing in Toronto, but there was one guy that he did not include who I wanted to take a closer look at today. That is Dioner Navarro, the man who Martin will be replacing in the Blue Jays’ starting lineup.

It’s not hard to see why he isn’t the most likely man to be brought in to play with Vazquez behind the plate. For one thing, it’s not absolutely necessary for Toronto to trade him. They will also need a second catcher, of course, although they may like the idea of keeping Josh Thole around to catch knuckleballer R.A. Dickey. There is a scenario where they could keep three catchers and let Navarro DH, however.

On top of that, intradivision trades are always looked upon with skepticism, as it’s hard to see teams potentially helping their direct competition. With that being said, the drawbacks are much less severe in scenarios like this, when the players in question are one-year rentals that don’t carry huge value. In recent years, we’ve seen Jed Lowrie traded from Houston to Oakland, Alberto Callaspo go from the Angels to the Athletics, and a Michael Choice for Craig Gentry deal between Texas and Oakland. Which is to say, these things aren’t impossible.

So, if we get past the intradivisional trade part of this, how would he fit with the Red Sox? From my vantage point, Navarro seems like a very good player to pair with Vazquez. As I alluded to above, Navarro is only under contract for 2015, and will be hitting the free agent market after that. Even better, he’ll be owed just $5 million dollars in this upcoming season, hardly draining the team’s payroll. This allows them to let Blake Swihart take his time in Pawtucket this season without having to worry about how they’d fit him on the roster in coming years. If their ideal plan is to have Vazquez and Swihart form the backstop duo in 2016, this does nothing to alter that.

He also gives them a more productive player to put back there than someone like Geovany Soto or Nick Hundley. On the defensive side of things, Navarro is not going to blow anyone away, but he’s somewhere in the slightly-below-average-to-average range. He’s been rated as a below-average framer, but he blocks pitches well and seems to do a good job of dealing with the pitching staff. He’s not great at staving off the running game, but he’s been average at this as recently as 2013. So while the soon-to-be 31-year-old isn’t a defensive wizard, this isn’t another A.J. Pierzynski we’re talking about. Plus, defense is less of a concern when someone like Vazquez is the other backstop on the roster.

Offense is where Navarro brings his value, though. Whereas Vazquez’s bat is a big question mark heading into 2015, Navarro has been a steady hitter in the last couple years. Though he’s not likely match his 2013 line, he’s still been right at league-average production in 2012* and 2013 at a position where that is hard to come by. Looking at the last three years combined, he’s hit .284/.331/.429 in 859 plate appearances, good for a 110 OPS+. In 2014, he put up a 100 OPS+ in a career-high 520 trips to the plate. One downside is that Navarro may not fit the left-handed need Boston seems to be looking for. Although he’s a switch hitter, he’s had much more success from the right side over his career. It should be noted that he showed no discernible platoon split in 2014, but that is a clear outlier for his career.

*He was limited to just 24 games and 73 plate appearances in 2012

Looking at things from a more abstract view, he continues to be a good fit, as he should not have any negative impact on Vazquez’s development. Since Navarro will cost so little, the team should not feel any pressure to give him extra playing time over their young catcher. They can take it on a case-by-case basis and put each in the best situation to succeed. This is made even easier by the fact that Navarro has spent the vast majority of his career as a backup. On the other side of things, he should be productive enough where John Farrell won’t be obligated to overwork Vazquez to keep the Red Sox in the race.

Of course, all of this depends on the price Navarro will cost in a trade. If Toronto has a lot of suitors, they’ll be able to be more aggressive with their division rivals. In this scenario, Ben Cherington would be wise to move on to his other options. If the Blue Jays are more reasonable, though, a deal could very well get done. Assuming Melky Cabrera does not come back (which became more likely after Toronto splurged on Martin), they will have a hole to fill in a corner outfield spot. Jose Bautista will play one corner, but at the moment it appears they’ll be rolling with an Andy Dirks/John Mayberry platoon in the other. It just so happens that the Red Sox have a plethora of outfielders. Perhaps they could work something around Daniel Nava, with Toronto adding a little more value to the deal. If the Blue Jays wanted to go younger, Boston could offer players like Bryce Brentz or Henry Ramos, along with one of their second- or third-tier pitchers such as Teddy Stankiewicz or Jamie Callahan. It’s always hard to gauge how teams value their players, but the framework of a deal could clearly be agreed upon.

There is going to be no shortage of catchers available to fill the second spot on Boston’s roster for 2015, and Cherington will surely do his due diligence on all of them. Hopefully, the intradivisional hurdle won’t be something that stops conversations around Dioner Navarro. His offense would be a welcome addition behind the plate, and his defense is not nearly bad enough to kill them. It will all come down to how many teams show interest in the backstop, and how high Toronto can set their asking price for their division rivals. If the price is reasonable, though, Navarro would be a wonderful fit for the 2015 Red Sox.

The Blue Jays finally made the Russell Martin signing official, sending out a press release that included both official languages, something that I haven't seen in a Jays press release before.

Les BLUE JAYS DE TORONTO ont paraphé un contrat avec le receveur joueur autonome RUSSELL MARTIN d'une durée de cinq ans et d'une valeur de 82 millions de dollars américains. Selon les termes de son contrat, Martin effectuera annuellement un don à la Jays Care Foundation.

It mentions that Martin is a "East York, Ontario" native, that he lives in "Chelsea. Quebec" and that 'he'll make a donation to the Jays Care Foundation" annually, which is a part of most of the Blue Jays larger contracts.

What it doesn't tell us is how the $82 million over 5-years breaks down.

Jon Heyman comes to the rescue:

russell martin contract breakdown, for deal that is now official: 7M, 15M, 20M, 20M, 20M

— Jon Heyman (@JonHeymanCBS) November 18, 2014

Hugely backloaded. It does made some sense. The Jays have very little payroll committed after next season and would like to have more flexibility this year.  This MLB Trade Rumors post shows The Jays had only $4 million obligated in 2018 and nothing beyond that.

Backloading it so much pretty much kills any trade value he would have later in his deal, but I guess the Jays aren't thinking about trading him. Max Pentecost should be looking for playing time by the 3rd year of the contract.

The nice part about the backloading is it shows that the Jays aren't finished spending this year. We can look forward to more moves, maybe more free agents, more trades. It looks to be a fun off-season.

Shi Davidi talks about Martin's leadership abilities:

The dude expects to win, and plays a position where he can really make a difference.

I don't know that expecting to win is a skill but ok. We pick up players for leadership reasons every year. I just hope he plays good baseball.

And there is this from Ken Rosenthal:

Sources: #BlueJays drawing interest in Navarro. Willing to move him to fill other needs, but can still use him as DH and backup to Martin.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) November 18, 2014

I wonder what people would offer for Navarro? Maybe we could get a couple of good bullpen arms? Of course, then we'd be looking at Josh Thole as our backup catcher again. I could do without that.