The Blue Jays will acquire right-hander Julian Merryweather as the player to be named later in the Josh Donaldson trade, tweets Fancred’s Jon Heyman. Paul Hoynes of Cleveland.com tweeted at the time of the deal that Merryweather “was rumored” to eventually be Toronto-bound, while Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi tweeted more recently that Merryweather “is expected” to eventually be announced as the PTBNL.
An official announcement doesn’t seem likely to happen until after the season. The 26-year-old Merryweather underwent Tommy John surgery during Spring Training and has spent the season on the minor league disabled list. Because he’s not healthy enough to begin a rehab assignment, he won’t be passed through waivers before the end of the season, so it seems that a formal announcement could yet be more than a month away.
Prior to the 2018 season, Baseball America ranked Merryweather 17th among Indians farmhands, praising a fastball that reaches 97 mph with regularity, an above-average but inconsistent changeup and another pair of potentially average breaking pitches (slider, curve).
Merryweather breezed through Double-A last year as a 25-year-old, pitching to a 3.38 ERA with a 52-to-10 K/BB ratio and a 48.9 percent ground-ball rate in 50 2/3 innings. He was too homer-prone in a later stint at Triple-A, leading to a 6.58 ERA, but his K/BB numbers and ground-ball tendencies remained strong. Fangraphs’ Eric Longenhagen wrote shortly after his promotion to Triple-A last year that both his changeup and curveball could be plus offerings, calling Merryweather a potential mid-rotation starter.
While the Blue Jays will assuredly exercise caution when working Merryweather back from Tommy John surgery next spring, he’ll give the team an arm that could help either in the bullpen or in the rotation as soon as next summer. And, because Merryweather didn’t spent the 2018 season on the Major League disabled list, he didn’t accrue any MLB service time and will thus remain controllable through at least the 2024 season — if not the 2025 campaign.
That proximity to the Majors, it seems, was enough for the Jays to deem Merryweather a more appealing and more valuable piece than the draft pick they’d have received upon extending a qualifying offer to Donaldson and allowing him to test free agency. (Indeed, GM Ross Atkins told Sportsnet’s Arash Madani that the PTBNL is someone the organization considers to be an “exciting upper-level talent.”) It’s also possible, perhaps even likely, that the team simply didn’t feel comfortable making that type of offer to Donaldson on the heels of his injury-ruined season — especially with wunderkind Vladimir Guerrero Jr. waiting in the wings to hold down third base for the foreseeable future.
I think Merryweather has the stuff to be a starter and could be serviceable there, but could be *really* good in the bullpen. He’s a pretty solid return for a month or two of Donaldson, but in playing devil’s advocate I also think trading a 26 year old who’s coming back from Tommy John and hasn’t yet prevented runs at AAA is a reasonable gamble if it means taking a flyer on Donaldson.
Cory Kluber was a late bloomer, but he learned a new pitch that turned his career around.
Funny you mentioned the bullpen. With Calloway as pitching coach, the Indians had a string of relievers that showed up as fairly irrelevant arms. Yet year-after-year the Indians had one of the deepest pens in MLB. Callaway – Eiland have quietly begun that process with the Mets this year. Meanwhile, the Indians brought back Shapiro’s – Wedge’s favorite pitching coach, Carl Willis. The Indians bullpen is now a proven disaster, and only Miller can play the injury card. The starters were developed over years by Calloway. Francona can keep an eye on them for a bit. But at some point they’ll need to make adjustments, and as fans of the Shapiro Indians, Red Sox, and Mariners will tell you, it’s inexplicable that Carl Willis finds work. The Indians window began to close when the Mets hired Calloway. Don’t laugh, Royals are coming fast.
What is this word salad
I laughed, apologies.
The talk in Toronto is that because Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins previously worked for the Indians they took a low return to favour the Indians and thus betray their present employer. Seriously. You can’t make this stupidity up. A nut job in the Toronto Star, the largest daily in Toronto, also hinted at this. I doubt there is any ‘fanbase’ (if you can call it that) more uninformed, childish and unhinged than Toronto. It’s a an embarrassing, one sport hockey town.
Can’t disagree Eddie.
I totally agree Ed.
As a Torontonian I have to disagree. The talk since Shapiro came to Toronto is that Shapiro built consistent losers in Cleveland. Jays fans don’t like the trade because it’s objectively a bad trade.
I also went to every playoff game in 15/16 and I think if you had been in the stadium for one of those games you might have to eat some of your comments.
Merryweather is about to be 27 and has only seen limited action as high as AAA. I’m not buying the mid-rotation potential. Maybe he could be a back end of the bullpen kind of guy. I’m not getting my hopes up for more than that. Then again, I’ve never seen the guy pitch. Maybe he’ll surprise me.
I’ve seen him pitch seven times. The term innings eater isn’t quite good enough to describe his talent. The term staff ace is well above what to expect from him. Julian Merryweather, first and foremost, is a strike thrower that commands and controls the zone exceptionally well with his fastball. Everything he does works off his fastball.. He has two types of breaking balls.. w/ his slider having a two plane move that can miss a LOT of bats. His change up is an awful pitch.. He should never throw it unless it gets a LOT better.. He pitches.. He doesn’t throw.. What’s being seen, and should be supported by stats, pitchers with three and four pitch mixes are developing at a later age. Merryweather is one of those guys. Everyone already knows Jays fans would be happier with a healthy, hale, and hearty 3B in the form of Donaldson, however, that ship appears to have sailed.. leaving them with few choices. With Merryweather, the Jays have a reasonable chance of getting a serviceable mid-rotation starting pitcher at best.. and a reliable bullpen piece, if he comes back fully healthy. Shapiro & Atkins are very much aware of this guy..
We’ll see..
That seems like a fair deal for both sides. 6 years of a starting pitcher with some potential coming off of Tommy John, for a former MVP having an injury riddled season as well
That’s a disturbingly low return for Donaldson. There’s a good chance that the Indians would expose him to waivers after the season and he’s basically worth nothing
I don’t think there’s much of a chance they’d have done that. They could’ve designated him, released him and re-signed him to a minor league deal if they were willing to risk losing him for nothing. That’d have given them more roster flexibility all season.
Instead, they effectively operated with a 39-man roster all year specifically because they didn’t want to lose Merryweather. Why go through all that and then simply outright him once the season ends?
I’m surprised that you are not aware of how major league rosters work.
Players on the 60 day disabled list do not count against the 40 player limit during the season. It’s common for teams to expose injured players rather than reinstating them after the season ends.
Turn the page.
If the Jays kept Donaldson, they’ed have to offer a QO to get a draft choice back for him. A very good chance that no one would beat it, so he’d take it.
Many players come back from TJ surgery throwing even harder. But it takes a couple of years to work their way back. The Indians medical plan payed for the procedure. Merryweather is irrelevant. The Jays got out of a potential expensive contract to rehap a veteran player in a year they will not compete. They took a flyer on an old minor leaguer that they can dump same as they dumped older vets this year if he washes out. They only wish they could do something like this with Tulo.
This isn’t really a comment on this scenario specifically, but the “come back from Tommy John throwing harder” idea is largely a false narrative. Most post-TJ velo increases are because of a shift to a short relief role or because their velocity was already down prior to undergoing Tommy John (likely because of damage in the elbow). In other instances, it’s been because someone has TJ at a relatively young age and then adds some velocity as he fills out.
I’m sure there are some instances of physically developed starters who have TJ and have increased their velocity upon returning, but that’s more of an exception than it is a rule.
Yes, everything is a false narrative.
I long ago lost count of pitchers, including starters, that came back throwing harder as an implanted healthy ligament took hold. Happened to a number of catchers as well. I’m too old and too tired to query it.
Surgery is unnatural. Most people are worse off after having any, I’m one. The issue for MLB owners is why TJ surgery has been an ever-growing epidemic for over 10 years now.
Pitchers also get chances to improve their bodies substantially while they’re shelved with major arm injuries. Squatting 5 days a week while your arm heals has quite a way of helping velo.
It’s reasoning like yours that lead hundreds of fathers across the country to bring their 15 year old sons to a surgeon and say he needs TJ, he’s not throwing hard enough. It has nothing to do with the surgery and entirely to do with the 12 months of hardcore rehab pitchers go through. And most of those guys don’t throw harder right away, and eventually they peak, then come back to normal levels.
“I don’t have solid evidence so I’ll just claim to be too lazy to cite any”.
Trade s recent MVP for the 26 year old who hasn’t made their major league debut? Prospects sure are overvalued these days.
Never met a cub fan yet that knew anything about the game.
I mean he’s not wrong. Seems like Merryweather is gonna have to be good fast for this to work out. I’d have preferred the comp pick personally.
I think if it weren’t for the option of the draft pick from the QO, this would be a fine trade. This is what the market will pay for having a really good yet injured player. The fact that they could have submit the QO and either had him at that cost for a season (and likely traded him once he’s healthy) or gotten a draft pick that would have likely been a better prospect than Merryweather, makes this a bad deal
Kluber made 3 starts in his age 25 season and 12 in his age 26 season, he came into his own at age 27 where he still didn’t pitch a whole season
Merriweather is 27 already and has yet to make even 1 (quite likely won’t have any/many in 2019 either, if we are honest)
Plus there is the little issue of him being absolutely nothing like Kluber, and a guy that the team who developed Kluber didn’t even think was good enough to have a similar path
A recent MVP!!!::: LOL!!! Does the DL have an MVP? Because that’s where Donaldson spent 2018. After missing a third of 2017. Not one team was willing to claim him for NOTHING off waivers because they didn’t think he was worth his salary alone. MVP! LOL!!
No one claimed him because it would have made a trade harder.
And so when you have an injury your talent level is never capable of coming back to any extent? That’s your theory is it – Donaldson’s career is over because he missed most of 2018?
By the way, I suggest you lay off the caps lock, it merely hurts your argument. In fact, I kind of assume most people ignored your comment as the rants of a triggered teen
There is no chance that Merryweather is an “exciting upper-level talent”.
Yikes, did the Shapiro/Atkins regime mess this one up. As said in these very MLBTR blogs over a year ago, the time to trade Donadlson was last year when they had no chance at competing.
I heard the commentators called the current Jays Executive as more “risk adverse” that other GMs. In other words, Shapiro is terrifed of making mistakes and wants time to solve his problems.
Cashman, Epstein, Dombrowski all took 2 years to rebuild the MLB level. Shaprio and Atkins have had that same time already and are suggesting it is going to be 3, yes 3 more years before they are competative again. I suggest with these two at the helm of the BlueJays it is going to be at least 5 more years.
It is very difficult to be a BlueJays fan with Shaprio/Atkins running the show. Go Yankees.
FYI, I see Merryweather as a injury-prone reliever type. He might have a career like Dustin McGowan – late bloomer, a few good reliever years then his arm falls apart again. Terrible return for an MVP calibre player. I would have QO Donaldson, paid the salary and rolled the dice on health, played him and traded him. #Scoutseyes
Blue Jays were excited about Esmil Rogers. Another former Indian. How did that go?
Rumors Shapiro is linked to Mets job. Let him have it.
What a load of garbage this post is. Hindsight and wild assumptions. #IdiotsEyes
Hey don’t talk like that to the smartest man on these boards
Nobody would mistake you for smart JDGoat. GB85 didn’t have a real point to make which makes him and the 3 upvoters look like tools.
“Shaprio and Atkins have had that same time already and are suggesting it is going to be 3, yes 3 more years”
What the heck are you talking about? The Blue Jays went into both the 2017 and 2018 seasons, at the demand of the owners, trying to compete – not rebuild. These two seasons the Blue Jays had their highest salaries ever; both about 30 million higher than it was in 2016. Over that time they were not trading ageing Vets for prospects – they were adding more ageing Vets to desperately try and hang on to relevance (and keep the owner happy)
So they have had 0 years of rebuilding so far, not 2
And rebuilds generally take 5 years, not 2, I don’t know where the freak you even get that either – “5 year rebuild process” is an extremely common line you hear all the time in baseball commentary. Of the names you bring up as supposedly doing it in two, 2 didn’t even truly rebuild – they retooled off an already solid but ageing and young, mismatched foundation, spending fortunes doing it. And Theo did rebuild over a 3 (not 2) year span, but check the 2012 roster he inherited against the 2016 club. I believe Rizzo is the only real holdover. He spent a ton of money to quickly turn over the complete organization – how is that remotely comparable to what the Jays have done the past couple years? Or honestly are even expected to do over the next couple years either?
Otherwise, give us an example of a real team doing a normal real rebuild (meaning not just spending endless money to buy stars or on rented stars they then flip for prospects) and being done in even 4 seasons, let alone 2.
Your logic is so comically flawed from the very start that it’s truly difficult to take you seriously at all (as others haven’t, we see – although the manufactured argument against the chosen scapegoat does apparently please the echo-chamber ears of some other not-living-in-actual-reality Toronto fans, I will give you that.)
The Jays are at a massive disadvantage when it comes to landing destinations. Players generally don’t want to play in Canada (or so it seems) and those who do have to deal with high taxes.. A two year rebuild will never happen up here because the Jays can’t add solid value to their roster with choice free agents. They get the role players and have to accomplish everything else via trade or draft.
Comparing the Blue Jays to the Yankees or Red Sox is utterly laughable.
Blue Jays, if they wanted, could outspend the Yankees and Red Sox without blinking an eye. That is how loaded they are.
New York State has high taxes too. Cost of living is actually higher. Massachusetts also a blue state, which means taxes.
Canadian Dollar around .76 cents US is a bit of a disadvantage for the Jays. Again, Rogers is loaded.
As for the “major disadvantage”, going to the ALCS two years in a row is very attractive to free agents. All the Jays had to do was go out, spend, screw the luxury tax and tell every Jays fan they are in it to win it. American players might not want to go there. The rest would be fair game.
Yah Sovt, the Jays could never sign a Roger Clemens 41-13 with a 2.33 ERA over 2 years here, or Dave Winfeild, or Paul Molitor or Jack Morris, or Joe Carter or Scott Downs or or or. Yeeesh. Sarcasm heavy.
To a lesser extent, Randy Myers, Benito Santiago, BJ Ryan, AJ Burnett, Frank Thomas.
Jays also had a self-imposed payroll “cap”. When you compete, you spend more. Rogers were not willing to spend within $15-mil of the luxury tax threshold.
The point is, ownership was looking to make money and not take the necessary risks to win. That’s not how you compete.
Rogers is the wealthiest owner in all of baseball. Unfortunately still run by the stockholders and the newish CEO wants to sell the team so he has to make it look pretty to get his 1.5 billion for the stockholders.
That’s not how to compete year after year though. The BlueJays need to be spending to the max every year.
Could be worse Anthopoulos used to run the show
Wish anthopoulos was still running the show. Would be better than the gong show we have right now
I agree. AA is a professional and not afraid to make the big necessary deal. Doesn’t mean he is perfect, but he is an upgrade over the current regime.
The thing is, the Jays deserve an elite GM in the capability of a Cashman, Dombrowksi, Epstein or Gillick and there are not that many like that available.
I dunno Jimmer. If ownership is clamping down on the spending or imposing the payrolls I don’t know if AA could have done any better. People gloss over AA’s numerous mistakes because of the gutsy week before the 2015 trade deadline.
The other problem is AA trusted guys like Tinnish way too much. Jays need to get rid of him. He’s been in way over his head for a long time in the Jays organization.
It took AA 6 years to get anything done I’ll take my chances with Shapiro
I hear it was Tinnish that did either the Gricuk or Diaz trade. I’ll give him kudos for Diaz, although he is best at 3rd or 2nd. Grichuk not so much.
Diaz is starting to hit the ball to right and is growing as a hitter, but he is still dead red. Anyone who can book him, [high inside heat, low and away soft stuff] can get him out. I have seen him hit one curveball all year long. Similar for grichik, can’t hit offspeed and is a dead pull hitter.
All Tinnish.
Yeah. I wonder if these guys can handle pressure. A lot of guys can swing the bat when out of contention and in transition.
JR91 – Can’t argue there. It took a while.
On the other hand, they made a ton of moves to finally get it right. We all wonder if this regime can be as bold.
If you listen to the fan590, Mckowan has voiced a theory for years about the Jays in September. That the Jays can’t play under pressure well and when the pressure is off in Sept they light it up.
He backed up his theory with some Sept perfromance observations.
He seems to agree with you.
i think its a fair deal for both CLE gets a guy that can help them in the stretch if he can get healthy and tor at least gets something because the way things were looking jd was going to take the QO i dont see him getting anything 18+/year coming off a injury plagued season being on the wrong side of 30
Excitement wasn’t the first thought about an ageing minor leaguer.
Majority of people here and the front office seemed too afraid at the possibility of Donaldson accepting a QO. What people don’t understand is if he did accept it would have been perfectly fine.
Due to the fear, a snap decision was made to deal one of the greatest Blue Jays in history. Yeah, I said it.
$18-mil in a wash and rebuild year and a rich owner was not the be all and end all here. Small market team, sure. Not Toronto. We could have taken that risk on a player that earned the right in this city.
Merryweather might become a nice little reliever. Would have taken my chances with Donaldson for one more year.
That assumes he’d be healthy (increasingly unlikely assumption based on 2017 and 18). And, if he were, that blocks Vlad Jr at 3B.
So the Jays would he rebuilding with THREE aging players making about 20m apiece with the best prospect in the game blocked by one of them.
That’s a terrible idea.
If he were healthy, your return is presumably better, helping the rebuild. If he isn’t, then you’re not blocking Vlad.
Seeing as Merrywheather is all the Jays got, I’d have rolled the dice that that’s the floor for the return.
In that case the options are trotting him out for a couple of months if he’s healthy but risking a repeat of this year if not. With a top 5 farm and huge salaries for injured or underperforming vets already hanging around the team’s neck for 2019, the risk/reward just doesn’t add up. Rolling the dice on health has proven to bite them more than once now – it feels like losing by taking the less risky option but it’s the right, if unspectacular, choice in this instance.
Assuming that is the floor would be assuming Toronto took the lowest offer. They took the highest offer they could get. That would be called a ceiling.
JD would play 1B and 3B, not blocking Vlad. Smoak is the guy you deal this offseason. Then you deal JD if he’s healthy and performing. That brings you more return for Smoak and then JD.
Money is irrelevant. Can’t continue to look at the price tag. Considering Estrada is coming off the books there would have been money saved. Regardless, money is a manufactured issue.
You didn’t think this one through Infractor.
Look, with the Jays out of playoff contention, there was every chance that with another small setback, they may nit have put JD back on the field this. Even if he did come back, what was he going to do for them down the stretch?
While you may be down on the prospect they look to be getting back in Merryweather, I don’t think they were going to get much better based on how many times JD had a setback in his recovery over the past month or so.
This is a money move. Jays don’t pay Donaldson 18M next year, and the Indians pay for the rest of this year. Oh, and the Jays get a 26 yo minor leaguer recovering from TJ.
Jays paid most of the rest of this year’s salary (2.7M of 3.7M iirc).
Meh.
Don’t “meh” it’s disrespectful – Toronto fans are really trying to talk themselves into believing this old, injured, C prospect with minimal success over his entire career in his short stops at each location is the top-of-rotation type they have been looking for.
Beats believing that this injured shell will lead my team to the promised land.
That injured shell is going to get healthy and rake. Then he can be traded for a high celing piece.
The Jays are not going to the promised land with or without JD, with or without Merryweather.
It is aboiut maxmizing return in assets. Who cares about the money it is irrelevant t0 Rogers.
Thank you Jimmer. People do not get it. They look at a QO for Donaldson and think “OH NO! HE MAKES TOO MUCH MONEY!!!”.
Spare me the bullcrap. JD is worth more than $18-mil to the Toronto Blue Jays. Jays could afford 1 more year with that money and have a ton off the books after 2019.
Jays suddenly had more leverage over JD and opted not to hold onto it. Pathetic.
This seems like the Jays would have been better off taking the comp pick. A 26 year old coming off injury? Unless they knew for certain Donaldson would accept the QO and ty weren’t comfortable paying him 18 million dollars next season.