The Blue Jays join the previously reported Mets as teams with interest in Pirates utilityman Josh Harrison, according to Bill Brink of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The Angels would also be a logical fit for Harrison, Brink notes, though it’s unclear whether they’re actually pursuing him.
Toronto already addressed its middle infield in a notable way when it acquired Aledmys Diaz from the Cardinals on Dec. 1, but general manager Ross Atkins revealed a week later that the club was still in the market for help there and in the outfield. The Blue Jays’ interest in Harrison makes sense, then, given that he has racked up vast experience in the infield and in the grass. The 30-year-old has logged at least 110 career appearances at second base, third base and the corner outfield.
The majority of Harrison’s work both during his career and from 2016-17 came at the keystone, where the Jays have options in Diaz, who’s coming off a subpar season, and the oft-injured Devon Travis. Like those two, Harrison isn’t a sure bet to produce, having endured an up-and-down career, but he is fresh off one of his best seasons. The right-handed hitter batted a respectable .272/.339/.432 and totaled a personal-best 16 home runs across 542 plate appearances, and he added 12 stolen bases.
For Toronto, picking up Harrison would seemingly give the club a front-runner to start at second and protect against further injuries to Travis and another oft-hurt middle infielder, shortstop Troy Tulowitzki, who now has a capable backup behind him in Diaz. Of course, it’s unclear whether the Pirates are truly open to giving up Harrison, especially considering fellow infielder Jung Ho Kang’s iffy-at-best status for 2018. However, Adam Berry of MLB.com suggested earlier this week that Harrison may be Pittsburgh’s most logical trade chip, as the team would still have David Freese, Adam Frazier, Sean Rodriguez and Max Moroff on hand as versatile infielders even if it were to part with him. So, if the low-payroll Pirates view Harrison as a redundant piece, they could look to jettison him and his relatively lofty salary. While Harrison’s pact isn’t onerous – he’ll make $10MM in 2018 and has club options worth $10.5MM and $11.5MM over the following two seasons – he nonetheless ranks as one of the Bucs’ most expensive players.
Jays should just rebuild
I agree. They should rebuild. They have some players they can trade and get some prospects for.
xscalabr, you are right-on. The Jays need to rebuild now, not wait.
… agreed. Jays have long avoided a proper rebuild, but now is the time. Particularly given the arrival of Stanton in the AL East – Yanks are plenty stacked and set for the long run. However, Rogers doesn’t trust the Jays fan base to endure, so mecioctity will prevail. Jays fans deserve a rebuild, not more trademark Jays’ tinkering.
In my opinion the problem with a rebuild right now is that the value of many of the Jays players is at an all time low. Sanchez missed almost the entirety of last season. Donaldson had a good year, but missed 1/3 of the season to injury. Happ, Osuna, Estrada and Pillar all regressed to varying degrees last year. With the way Smoak finished the year, i’d wager most execs are loathe to give up anything of value until he proves his breakout wasn’t a fluke.
I think trying to load up on players with upside and trying to compete is the best option to start this year Try to re-establish player value with the current players and add/build new value with acquisitions. It will be tough to do this if the team declares they are rebuilding during the free agent period.. If the season goes as most predict, throw in the towel come summer. I think the team can greatly increase the value of their returns simply by maintaining the status quo for the time being. If the season goes as many predict, however, I suspect we will see this team start to unload assets come summer.
If the Jays are looking to have a middle infield of Tulo and Harrison with Diaz as the primary backup, and Devon Travis as a backup for 2B and LF (or playing in AAA every day)…then I am intrigued. And not just for 2018, but the next few years.
If that scenario happened, then Morales has to go now, to free up AB for whoever is not starting. Maybe Pearce has to go too (there’s no reason for him to have a glove). I don’t care if the Jays have to eat most of the money.
“No they shouldn’t, final answer.” “And that’s correct! You just won 1,000,000 dollars!”
I agree with a rebuild from a talent perspective, but I hate it from an attendance/fan perspective. Rebuilds are never popular, but it took 20 years for the Jays to recover the popularity they had in the early 90s. The 2015 and 2016 seasons did a lot for Jays fans and Jays popularity, and I have concerns about how the fanbase would handle a rebuild.
I think the fanbase is why Shapiro is saying “we are going to compete” when they clearly cannot compete in 2018. This process needs to be accelerated quickly with a rebuild. The bottom line is that if they do a rebuild they will be years ahead of where they are now, otherwise, another lost year and not enough talent coming into the organization as could be. Sad.
Toronto North Pirates
Harrison would be a great pickup for the Jays, I hope the two clubs can workout a deal. It won’t mean anything for this year though, they still need a #1, #3, 40% catcher, lefty shut down reliever, a healthy shortstop and a powerhtting right fielder if Harrison plays 2nd.
Connor Bryne, Diaz cannot back up Tulowitzki. Diaz is brutal at short and that is why he was moved to 2nd. Enough already with the lines like, “[Tulo]who now has a capable backup behind him in Diaz”. Goins scouts as a much better option than Diaz at short.
Connor Byrne, are you working for the Jays marketing dept?
Considering Goins carries a WAR of -0.8 over the last two years, that’s an absolutely horrid idea. He has the glove, yes, but he’d give away far more with his limp bat than his glove could ever make up for.
Goins limp bat produced last year. 9 hr, 62 RBI, 237BA, 21 doubles and he would be cheap. – -And Diaz can’t pick it up very well and once pitchers figured him out after his rookie year and he couldn’t adjust, well back to the minors. lol.
If you look only at the counting stats his line doesn’t look terrible.
But this sure does: .236/.286/.356, for an abysmal 69 wrc+.
Stroman isn’t a #1 starter? What about this?
3.09 ERA: #4 in AL (qualified)
3.58 xFIP: #8 in AL (qualified)
201 IP: #6 in AL (second consecutive year with 200 IP)
0.940 Home Runs per 9 IP: #4 in AL (qualified)
62.1% ground ball rate: #1 in AL (qualified)
2.06 Range Factor/9 Inn as P: #1 in AL (qualified)
2017 Gold Glove
5.8 bWAR: #4 for AL pitchers
3.4 fWAR: #9 for AL pitchers
Plus, he hit a double and a home run!
Josh Harrison is expensive and if the Blue Jays want to rebuild, J Hay wouldn’t be a great fit.
I thought the Orioles should have tried to trade for him and got booed a bit because he is expensive.
I don’t think that the Jays care about his contract to the degree the Orioles would,….
Lmao at a complete rebuild right now. The only player who would be traded is Donaldson and that’s only if you geez a deal centred around a guy like carpenter plus prospects. I could maybe see stroman or Osuna being traded, but it’d have to be terrible overpays. Maybe ell Smoak high. Everybody else either has low value or is unhealthy. If anything, next offseason is the time to blow it up if they suck this year
And Happ but they still need pitchers
I think the Jays will start off 2018 strong, but the age, quality of players, and quality of depth will catch up fast and leave them out of the playoffs.
As far as trade chips, they have quite a few: Donaldson[of course], Happ, Stroman, Sanchez [if healthy], Smoak for sure, Estrada [if healthy and I don;’t think he will be from what I hear], Loup, Osuna, Russ Martin[with contract help], Travis[giveaway] and Pearce [if healthy]. I say go for it now, all in for rebuild.
A lot of IFs!
This is highly unlikely. Harrison is not an upgrade over Devon Travis/ Almedys Diaz and Harrison is not a left-handed hitter, something the Jays sorely need. Someone is grasping at straws.
Anyone is an upgrade over Travis who can’t stay on the field and is very average defensively and Diaz who couldn’t adjust once pitchers figured him out and was so bad a shortstop he was moved to 2nd.
Travis, albeit brittle, has been above average defensively all three of his years in the league, as per Baseball Reference. He’s been worth 4.5 WAR/162 in his career, which is near-All Star level. I’m not sure what facts you are using to back up your opinions.
Travis gets to about 75% of the groundballs that Goins gets too, that is not measured in the stats, it’s measured by watching everyday and knowing how to scout.
Travis has a good bat, when he is not injured. He can’t play on turf. Period. The shifts kill his knees. He hobbles around off the field. Have you ever seen him walk in street clothes?
The War stat isn’t the great decider of all things baseball.
I’ll trust the statistics over your anecdotal observations. And I watch everyday and have seen Travis make some outstanding plays, so, using your logic, Travis is outstanding. All hail my “scouting”! 😉 Lol Seriously
” By watching everyday
and knowing how to scout?” LoL ! Yea! Ok!
Harrison is easily an upgrade over both. Higher WAR and good defender. Better on the bases and higher OPS. Noticeable upgrade.
As a Jays fan, this pretending to compete stuff is played out. I didn’t like the J.P. era, but Atkins and his bargain barrel shopping is worse!
This team is in limbo with the owners trying to sell the team. They are in a similar situation as the Marlins were last year. Hopefully they handle it better. They should rebuild.
The Blue Jay’s love the Pirates. It’s almost like the show American Pickers they get good stuff for pretty much nothing and can then resell it.
Bahahahahaha. It appears that way doesn’t it?
Totally, Harrison with the two club options screams buy low…ish, sell high…er in July. They’ll give the appearance of competing but I expect most movable pieces to be gone; ie…Marco, Happ, J.D., on and on. The early part of the year will be about re-establishing value. They won’t use the word rebuild…but it’s time
Why on earth would the Jays rebuild? The object is to win I hate the talk of doing a full on rebuild just because there’s a team that looks better on paper. Yeah we lost Joey bats and EE the past couple of years but with even average injury luck next season we have a good rotation, infield and outfield. There aren’t many glaring holes on the roster. Ownership has the pockets to round out the roster.
That being said… IF the ownership already knows they won’t up spending and won’t go after Donaldson he is one guy you have to look at flipping now for young talent at or close to MLB. He’s just too valuable to risk losing for nothing.
My eye says there are many glaring holes in this roster. They need a true #1` and also a #3 starter[Sanchez finger issue not resovled] and like I said last year, Estarda’s back is putty -he might win 5-6 games this year. tulo cannot play everyday at short, or he’ll break down, so shortstop is a hole. Russ martin is aging quickly and only capable of catching 60% of the games, so a 40% catcher that can catch, call a game and hit are needed. Many beleive that Smoak is a one year wonder, including me. Travis is a hurting unit and can’t play on turf. 2nd base and lead-off are a hole. The team needs to replace the rightfielder with an another all-star, that is another hole. They also need a shutdown lefty reliever. This team is full of holes.
The eyes have it!