It\u2019s been a slow burn this winter for the top free-agent hitters as we enter the new year with many of the biggest bats still available.<\/p>\n
Kyle Tucker<\/a>, Bo Bichette<\/a>, Alex Bregman<\/a> and Cody Bellinger<\/a> all remain on the open market with about six weeks until pitchers and catchers report to spring training.<\/p>\n According to ESPN\u2019s Buster Olney, teams and agents are at the grind-it-out phase of the winter where each side tends to digs in their heels and wait for terms to break favourably in their direction.<\/p>\n But when the dust settles, Olney believes the Blue Jays will end up with one of Tucker or Bichette, two players who have been connected to the team all off-season.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that where the Blue Jays are, they\u2019re going to get one of these two guys at a price \u2013 either Bichette or Tucker \u2013 at a price that they\u2019re comfortable with. One of the two,\u201d Olney told TSN 1050 Toronto\u2019s First Up Friday<\/a> with Aaron Korolnek and Carlo Colaiacovo.<\/p>\n Olney likened the free-agent hitter situation to a game of musical chairs. As the off-season drags on, players and teams are going to want resolutions to the free agency of the top players, which he believes is a position the Blue Jays can operate from.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that Aaron, your comparison to musical chairs is exactly right. Because the question is, at some point, if you\u2019re the team, the player, you\u2019re going to want to find a deal. And I think that the Blue Jays are in a great position to get one of the two. And because of the way this has played out, I think that they can just sit back and wait until they get the player at their price,\u201d Olney said.<\/p>\n Olney indicated the Jays have been pushing hard for Tucker, a left-handed hitting outfielder who was the consensus top free agent available this winter.<\/p>\n \u201cBased on the conversations I\u2019ve had with teams and with agents, I think that the Blue Jays have the most money offered to Kyle Tucker<\/a>. Or they\u2019ve indicated that. Teams and the agents will play semantics and say, well, we never formally made an offer. Well, they\u2019ve made an overture to where they said we\u2019re thinking in this range and Tucker\u2019s camp might be saying, well, we\u2019re thinking in this range,\u201d Olney explained.<\/p>\n He added he believes the Jays will be Tucker\u2019s top bidder when it\u2019s all said and done.<\/p>\n \u201cI think the Blue Jays, by the end of the winter, whether or not Tucker signs there, will have made the highest volume offer for him. The most amount of money,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Olney also indicated that free agents might have a diminished market this winter due to the expiration of the collective bargaining agreement on Dec. 1, 2026 that has many bracing for labour uncertainty and a potential lockout in 2027.<\/p>\n \u201cBased on my conversations, there are definitely teams that have been reluctant to spend because the owners are not sure about the start of 2027 with the impending labour situation. So they don\u2019t want to extend themselves until they have more certainty,\u201d Olney said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we\u2019re at a stage where with Bichette, and with Bellinger and with Bregman, et cetera, what you have is a case where the agents are playing a higher value, without a doubt, than what some teams are comfortable with.\u201d<\/p>\n Toronto has made the biggest free agent splash of the winter thus far, signing right hander Dylan Cease<\/a> to a seven-year, $210 million deal. The Jays also signed righty starter Cody Ponce out of the Korea Baseball Organization and had Shane Bieber<\/a> opt into a one-year, $16 million player option.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s been a slow burn this winter for the top free-agent hitters as we enter the new year…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":383909,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[712,82218,49,48,101322,462,82,75156],"class_list":{"0":"post-383908","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-apple-news","9":"tag-bo-bichette-sports-baseball-player-player-statscom-917949","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-canada","12":"tag-kyle-tucker-sports-baseball-player-player-statscom-874240","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-toronto-blue-jays-sports-baseball-team-team-statscom-238"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=383908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/383909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=383908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=383908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=383908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}