Rogers has definitely spent the money - 5th highest payroll in the league and over $400m spent on renovations for the ballpark (they could have easily asked the govt for money) plus great minor league facilities (the best?).

They've definitely done their part to make the Jays a winning team but there are some tough choices to make for next year - excluding their free agents they're already on the books for $193m so if they keep the budget about the same there's only about $50m left to spread around make sure they have 5 starters, re-sign Bichette and deal with all the arbitration deals. I don't think the numbers add up too well to keeping all of them - I get a feeling Bichette is the one that goes if the budget is the same as last year. Right now the rotation is just Gausman, Yesavage, Berrios and maybe Lauer (as a 5th or long bullpen guy). Maybe Beiber liked it enough to do a 2 year $50m year as he recovers from TJ surgery but you probably still need another arm. Bassitt is 36 but will probably still want $20-25m/yr.

2026 payroll: https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/toronto-...ll/_/year/2026


2025 Payroll list:

New York Mets, $323,099,999
Los Angeles Dodgers, $321,287,291
New York Yankees, $293,488,972
Philadelphia Phillies, $284,210,820
Toronto Blue Jays, $239,642,532
Texas Rangers, $220,541,332
Houston Astros, $220,217,813
Atlanta Braves, $214,836,398
San Diego Padres, 208,909,333
Chicago Cubs, $196,288,250

The Dodgers actual payroll is probably in the neighborhood of $380 million per year, but the deferrals have lowered the actual amount with the dollar being worth less 10 years from now when they actually have to start paying the bulk of the contracts.

bluejays bandwagoner here... big ouch the way that game ended.
jays played really well all series, didn't make that many errors, lots of great fielding, and managed to always keep it close with the most stacked team in the game.
really entertaining to watch, even my wife was jumping up and down watching game 7 and she's never watched baseball until i had it on almost every day these past few weeks.
anyway as disappointing as it was, have to be proud of the way they played.
the teams were playing as equals and it literally could have gone either way so easily

Yeah, it's big buck for sure and after taxes it's even higher - I've read they are on the hook for a tax bill of around $150-160m for 2025 which would put them past $500m in spending. I think only the top 5-6 teams will pay this year (the Jays pay a small amount).

They, of course, can afford it as they brought in about $1b in revenue last year. They are definitely a team that can afford to overpay their players based on on field performance as they make it back in so many other ways like how Ohtani pays for himself even outside of his on field stuff (crazy).

I don't follow the Jays, but I jumped on the bandwagon. As I've gotten older, I understand how rare these opportunities are to watch a David-v-Goliath sports story.

Sure, it's great to be proud of the Jays' effort, but as we've seen with Canadian-based teams in other leagues over the years, there's very little chance that we see the team get another shot for a championship in the same window.

The Jays had the title slip through their fingers. It wasn't just the 9th inning - they had multiple innings in Game 7 with multiple runners on base where they couldn't get another run or two. That's probably what hurts more for die-hard fans. It wasn't like the Canucks or Oilers who completely were outclassed in their Game 7s.

They should've won the series, but they didn't. Now Jays fans will have to live with that, likely for a generation until the next lightning-in-a-bottle opportunity comes.

^ too early, too soon for reason and logic.

:lawl:

You guys think there's a chance next year with current roster?

This is the cold hard reality of it all. Baseball might be the biggest fluke in sports as far as winning a championship. Yeah if you're the Dodgers and can spend to the moon as well as nabbing every new all-star that comes out of Japan now that they have Ohtani, but beyond that even the fucking Yankees can't get it done anymore.

Everything has to align perfectly, like Springer turning back the clock and winning us a game with a homerun at the last minute, all the way to a guy like Yesavage being an unknown rookie to confuse the fuck out of hitters this postseason. Neither of those things happen next year most likely. You gotta win when you get your chance or it's back to square one, there's no element of surprise next year.

I think the one that hurts the most was if IKF had a bigger lead with the bases loaded, he could have just ran home easily it wouldn't have been close. Sucks lol

Yeah, the stars aligned, so you gotta take your chances and execute. The Jays had the game and they lost it, despite some clutch at-bats by the Dodgers in Game 7.

Story of sports at the end of the day, despite all of the metrics, strategies, and analysis. You don't execute, you don't win.

"The game is rigged!" :derp:

Definitely not rigged, but it sure seemed like the baseball Gods weren't favoring the Jays with everything that went wrong towards the end lol

One change I'll be happy about next year is challenging balls and strikes. The strike zone was absolutely horrid for both teams on many occasions. Will love to see it come up on the big screen showing how awful of a call it was.

This. You can't use the already cooked books to compare spending.

While ROGERS is certainly spending money, they don't come close to the Dodgers. Jays are the #5 biggest spenders in the league this year, at around $277M. Dodgers are at around $550M, almost double.

Jays revenue will be around $387M, so even if they spent literally every penny they made, they'd still be several HUNDRED MILLION behind what the Dodgers spend. And the Dodgers still made around $200M on top of that, because Ohtani is so insanely lucrative!

Again you can't go after the players or fans for this, but these championships should have an asterisk beside them. It's broken

If I was a hardcore Jays fan (or any team other than the Dodgers or Yankees really) I would be furious and would question my fandom of the sport. The advantage really kicked in during game 7, where both teams could go back to their starting pitchers and the Dodgers had about $1 billion worth of starters to use rather than having to rely on their weak bullpen. Good for Yamamoto though!

^Think that's one of the primary reasons baseball has been in decline in terms of viewership over the years.

Too few haves, and too many have-nots makes for lack of parity, and a boring sport. Ohtani might bring some views in the short-term, and MLB has done some things to speed up the sport to make it more viewable, but they have much more work to do.

Getting a proper hard salary cap would be a great start.

its also quite boring of a game. too many uncontrollable variables and wayyy too long. come on 9 innings !? sheeesh... cut it in half and im good with that.

They should just make every pitch hittable and move the game out into the field more. Too much riding on whoever's pitching.

Also make every random ball or so explode in a cloud of dust. Then the batter has 2 mins to run the full circuit home while half-blinded while the opposing team tries to tackle him.

i feel like even with a hard cap, some teams will still not spend the money simply because attendence is so poor in certain ballparks and teams

but the sport is growing, however, its just not growing too much inside North America.

Damn Straight ... one hearbroken Jays fan is comforted by this !

For MLB, the quality of pitch calls from umpires must improve. I recall countless times that the home plate umpire got the call wrong on a pitch for both the Blue Jays and the Dodgers.

Umpire then calls the next pitch a strike when we fans at home see the pitch is away from the strike zone graphic in order to make up for a mistake from calling the previous pitch wrong.

Automated ball strike challenge next season will fix some of the issues with the ump getting the pitch call wrong:

An automated ball-strike system (ABS) is a technology used in baseball that uses cameras to make a definitive call on balls and strikes, which will be implemented as a challenge system in Major League Baseball starting in the 2026 season. The system uses Hawkeye cameras to track a pitch's location against a batter's individualized strike zone, and players can challenge a call by tapping their helmet. Each team receives two challenges per game, and a successful challenge allows them to retain it, while an unsuccessful one results in its loss.

Individualized strike zone: Before the season, the system takes body scans to create a precise strike zone for each individual player, which accounts for differences in height.


Player challenge: The system functions as a challenge system, where only the batter, pitcher, or catcher can immediately challenge an umpire's call by tapping their helmet.
Review and result: If a challenge is made, the system will display the result on the scoreboard almost instantly. If the challenge is successful, the original call is overturned, and the team retains its challenge. If the challenge is unsuccessful, the call is confirmed, and the team loses a challenge.

Challenge rules: Each team begins the game with two challenges. In extra innings, teams that have no challenges left are given an additional one.

Man...AI even coming for the Ump's job.

There's an incoming FA that will be posted soon
Munatake Marukami

A Power Hitter, excellent 3rd and 1st base guy.

Yankees? Jays again?

u know some teams are gonna cry foul when the Dodgers have the entire NPB as their farm system.

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/why-blue-j...141112874.html

Shane Bieber opts into his player option of $16m - this is a huge steal as media were predicting that he could easily get a 3y/$75m deal on the market. This is probably both a bet on himself so he can get an even bigger contract and him confirming that Toronto is a great destination for players (lots posted the last couple days from players and their partners about how awesome Toronto is).

Rotation now looks like Gausman, Bieber, Yesavage for sure with Berrios and Lauer as options. Bassitt and Scherzer could be back too (I like the idea of Max/Lauer sharing the 5th spot and taking turns with it or the Jays go with a 6 man rotations at times so neither has to throw more than 120 innings).

Yeah Bieber opting into his player option is good news, seems like the wives of the club have a pretty tight knit relationship as well so I'm sure that is having some influence on the decisions. It seems like the Jays are doing a good job in making the team culture alluring to players, coupled with things like some of the best training facilities and staff in baseball. Yeah you might be able to squeeze an extra big contract out of some other teams, but if you can really make the experience enjoyable for those that come to the team maybe they'll be more inclined to stay than in the past.

Hopefully we can nab a couple of new bullpen arms in free agency, and rid ourselves of some of the shitty ones.

Is Scherzer worth bringing back, guy is >40.
Maybe as a relief?
I would like to see them open the wallet for Bichette and pay him his worth. Maybe slightly under what other teams might give him in FA? Hometown, Vladdy best friend, run it back discount?