The Blue Jays had some largely “exploratory” commerce talks involving Bo Bichette early final offseason, TSN’s Scott Mitchell writes. This isn’t precisely new information, as a number of reviews final November indicated that the shortstop’s identify certainly come up in commerce discussions, although these talks had been portrayed as different groups checking on Bichette’s availability. Mitchell, nonetheless, specifies that “the Jays did certainly store Bichette.”
As at all times, there’s loads of grey space when parsing hot-stove terminology, as the excellence between actively attempting to maneuver Bichette and listening on Bichette commerce presents might be fairly skinny. Executives routinely talk about scores of gamers in commerce talks with different golf equipment, simply as a matter of due diligence in gauging curiosity. For example, if Blue Jays GM Ross Atkins had discovered {that a} rival membership had a specific curiosity in Bichette and had a participant or gamers that the Jays appreciated, Atkins may need been extra inclined to “store” Bichette in that exact route in an effort to swing a positive commerce for Toronto. In any case, as Mitchell observes, revisiting any commerce talks involving Bichette this winter might be tough as a result of the shortstop is coming off an injury-plagued down 12 months, so the Blue Jays aren’t prone to land a premium return even when they did look to maneuver Bichette.
Extra from across the AL East….
- “Some clear discord” developed between the Crimson Sox and Masataka Yoshida final April, MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo writes, when Yoshida was positioned on the 10-day injured checklist with a left thumb sprain. Yoshida selected to hunt out second and third opinions on his sprain, which apparently didn’t sit effectively with the workforce, who felt the preliminary evaluation (that Yoshida wouldn’t want surgical procedure) was sufficient. Yoshida ended up not needing surgical procedure, and spent a little bit greater than six weeks on the IL earlier than returning in mid-June. Between this example and Yoshida’s displeasure at being a DH-only participant who largely confronted solely right-handed pitching, Cotillo wonders if either side would profit from a commerce this winter. Such a transfer is less complicated mentioned than completed, in fact, as Yoshida is owed $54MM over the 2025-27 seasons, and has been good (112 wRC+ in 1001 plate appearances) however not nice over his two Main League seasons. Yoshida was additionally enjoying via a shoulder downside for a lot of 2024, which may symbolize one other purple flag for any commerce suitors.
- Nestor Cortes is slated to throw between 20-30 instances throughout a sport of catch at the moment, the Yankees left-hander instructed The Athletic’s Brendan Kuty. This represents the primary time Cortes has thrown since struggling a flexor pressure in late September. Cortes mentioned he was “feeling good” in his restoration thus far, and “if my physique responds and if my arm responds, we’ll attempt to be as fast as potential” in charting out a possible return to the mound. The Yankees would naturally must advance to a minimum of the ALCS in an effort to give Cortes any probability of pitching once more in 2024, and even when New York does get deeper into October, it stays to be seen if Cortes will have the ability to be wholesome sufficient to advantage a roster spot.
