As core nears free agency, missed chances are adding up for Blue Jays

MINNEAPOLIS – The end of a baseball season arrives quickly. One moment you’re batting with the bases loaded against the Twins. The next you’re hugging teammates goodbye, making travel arrangements and answering questions about an early playoff exit, beer in hand.

"We got outplayed," Matt Chapman said from the visiting clubhouse at Target Field late Wednesday evening. "It's just never fun. It sucks when you sacrifice a lot to get to this point."

By now, the 2023 Blue Jays know a thing or two about sacrificing a lot and about having less fun than expected. They did plenty of both during a season that ended in frustrating fashion against the Twins this week.

Depending on your perspective, the way in which the Blue Jays lost was somewhere between demoralizing and infuriating. But beyond how the week unfolded, there’s also what those losses mean – and that part may actually be just as problematic. 

First, how it happened. Instead of trusting Jose Berrios while he was dealing, the Blue Jays pulled him for Yusei Kikuchi. Tactically speaking, there was a case to be made for the move, but aesthetically it was displeasing and it didn’t reflect confidence in the players to do their jobs. Most important, it didn’t work.

“You can sit here and second-guess me, second-guess the organization, second-guess anybody,” an emotional John Schneider said afterwards. “I get that.”

Add to that the incredibly costly baserunning mistake by Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and the way this one ended was especially painful. Simply put, the Blue Jays got in their own way.

But there’s also what this loss represents. It feels distant already, but as recently as a couple days ago the Blue Jays had a real chance to move past a frustrating regular season with a strong showing in the playoffs. Objectively, their World Series odds were excellent – fourth best in baseball behind only Atlanta, Houston and the Dodgers. They could have re-written the story of their season.

Now, that opportunity is gone. And after missing the playoffs in 2021 and losing in two games in 2022, these missed chances are adding up. Baseball’s too unpredictable to count on winning in any one season, but the belief is good teams will break through over time if given enough shots. The problem for the Blue Jays is, they keep spending those chances without any results.

(After underwhelming on offence all season and scoring one run with one extra-base hit when it counted most, it’s time for the Blue Jays to take an honest look at their hitting coaches and processes with a willingness to make changes as needed.) 

Granted, two-game samples don’t tell you everything. If Chapman’s batted balls have a slightly different trajectory, the narrative around this team might well be different right now. But if you’re letting the Blue Jays play revisionist history with two at-bats, you have to let the Twins do the same, don’t you? End of the day, Minnesota deserved to win here.

And remember, there actually is a way to avoid the randomness of the wild card series: win the AL East and earn a first-round bye to the ALDS. You can’t lose games you don’t have to play, right? But the Blue Jays haven’t won the AL East since 2015.

Now of course it’s not easy, especially in this division, but finishing first needs to be the goal ahead of an off-season that’s sure to bring plenty of change. Winning 54 per cent of your games might work for Jerry Dipoto, but the Blue Jays must aspire to be better. To aim for anything less is to invite this kind of early October exit again in 2024.

Soon, this roster will look much different. A few days after the World Series ends, Kevin Kiermaier, Whit Merrifield, Brandon Belt, Matt Chapman, Hyun Jin Ryu and Jordan Hicks will all hit free agency. After next year, Yusei Kikuchi and Danny Jansen will hit the open market, too. And after 2025, it’s Cavan Biggio, Bo Bichette and Guerrero Jr. who will reach the end of their tenure in Toronto barring extensions. 

Meanwhile, George Springer is 34 years old with declining power. Kevin Gausman and Chris Bassitt had incredible seasons, but those results aren’t automatically repeated. Will the 2024 Blue Jays be as healthy as they were in 2023?

The point being, the chances with this core are finite. Each one is precious. So far, the Blue Jays and their fans have little to show for this era of baseball. And while celebrating Jose Bautista was well-deserved and perfectly executed by the Blue Jays this summer, the time is now for a new defining moment in Blue Jays history.

The 2023 Blue Jays didn’t deliver a single one. Actually, maybe they did. The problem is, it was the manager taking the ball from his starting pitcher on Wednesday.

“It's brutal,” Schneider said. “It sucks, and it takes a while when you head home for everything to wear off.”