{"id":46133,"date":"2025-07-29T23:00:05","date_gmt":"2025-07-29T23:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/46133\/"},"modified":"2025-07-29T23:00:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T23:00:05","slug":"blue-jays-reportedly-willing-to-trade-major-league-position-players","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/46133\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Jays Reportedly Willing To Trade Major League Position Players"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Blue Jays are first in the American League East and clear buyers ahead of Thursday\u2019s deadline. Mitch Bannon of The Athletic<\/a> reports that they are willing to trade from their position player depth, including guys who are currently on the big league roster or in Triple-A.<\/p>\n

The Jays came into this year with a cluster of players on the roster who hadn\u2019t yet taken hold as big league regulars. That group includes Addison Barger<\/a>, Nathan Lukes<\/a>, Davis Schneider<\/a>, Joey Loperfido<\/a>, Will Wagner<\/a>, Leo Jim\u00e9nez<\/a>, Jonatan Clase<\/a>, Alan Roden<\/a> and Orelvis Mart\u00ednez<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Every player in that group apart from Mart\u00ednez has seen some big league time this year, some more than others. Barger has separated himself from the rest of the pack and established himself as a middle-of-the-order bat in Toronto\u2019s lineup. He has 14 home runs, a .264\/.316\/.500 slash and 122 wRC+ this year. He hits from the left side while most of the club\u2019s other everyday players are righties. He provides defensive versatility by moving between third base and right field. Presumably, the Jays wouldn\u2019t let go of him without getting something massive in return.<\/p>\n

The other players in that group have played smaller roles. Lukes has 257 plate appearances on the year but almost exclusively against righties, with just 28 of those coming against southpaws. He\u2019s been good as a strong-side platoon guy, which has been great for the Jays with Daulton Varsho<\/a> missing so much time this year. Schneider is also having a good year, though doing most of his damage against lefties.<\/p>\n

Loperfido has a huge .341\/.396\/.500 slash line this year but in just 16 games, as he was only just recalled from the minors a few weeks ago. Wagner has a .236\/.331\/.302 line in 37 games, having also spent some time in the minors. Jim\u00e9nez was playing well in the minors but has a .071\/.133\/.179 line in the big leagues.<\/p>\n

Those guys are all currently on the big league roster. As noted by Bannon, both Varsho and Andr\u00e9s Gim\u00e9nez<\/a> are expected to return from the injured list soon, which will push a couple of those guys back down to Triple-A, where they would join Roden, Clase and Mart\u00ednez. Roden has a massive .331\/.423\/.496 line for Buffalo but just a .204\/.283\/.306 slash for Toronto. Clase also has some decent Triple-A numbers but a big league line of just .210\/.288\/.300. Mart\u00ednez is not having a good year but is not too far removed from being a top 100 prospect.<\/p>\n

The Jays won\u2019t be able to give playing time to all of these guys down the stretch, so it\u2019s logical for the club to think about using some of that depth to add to the pitching staff. They are known to be looking for both rotation and bullpen upgrades. Many selling clubs, meanwhile, will be looking for upper level players who could be plugged right onto a big league roster. A team doing a long-term rebuild might prefer younger prospects but some clubs are looking to do a quick sell at the deadline before attempting to return to contention in 2026. It\u2019s also possible a team looking to do a buy\/sell hybrid, such as the Padres, might look to acquire some of these cheaper players in a win-now move.<\/p>\n

Since these guys are controllable, the Jays would be subtracting from their long-term position player depth. But if they can work out a trade involving guys in this cluster, it could allow them to hang onto more highly-touted prospects who are further away from the big leagues, such as Arjun Nimmala<\/a> or Trey Yesavage<\/a>. They also don\u2019t face huge roster turnover this coming offseason, as Bo Bichette<\/a> is the only position player slated for free agency after this season.<\/p>\n

Jim\u00e9nez, Clase and Mart\u00ednez are all slated to be out of options next year and haven\u2019t fully established themselves as big league regulars, so the Jays might be especially motivated to move on from that group. Though of course, those players will have less trade value than some of the other guys who are putting up more impressive numbers or who still have more option years after this one.<\/p>\n

The Jays are presumably evaluating various possibilities ahead of Thursday\u2019s deadline. Bannon reported<\/a> yesterday that the front office is \u201cturning over every stone\u201d in pursuit of bullpen additions. The Jays have also been connected to starting pitchers such as Dylan Cease<\/a>, Zac Gallen<\/a> and Mitch Keller<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Photo courtesy of Brian Fluharty, Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Blue Jays are first in the American League East and clear buyers ahead of Thursday\u2019s deadline. Mitch…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":46134,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[384,36338,36339,36340,36341,36342,380,36343,99,36344],"class_list":["post-46133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-addison-barger","tag-alan-roden","tag-davis-schneider","tag-joey-loperfido","tag-jonatan-clase","tag-leo-jimenez","tag-nathan-lukes","tag-orelvis-martinez","tag-sports","tag-will-wagner"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46133\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}