OverDrive - Matheson on Guerrero Jr. failing to reach a deal, his outlook in Toronto and entering free agency

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

MLB.com Blue Jays Reporter Keegan Matheson joined OverDrive to discuss the headlines around the team, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. failing to reach a contract extension with the Blue Jays, why a deal wasn't reached with the franchise, the managerial focus of Guerrero Jr.'s stance, the next steps for the team and more.

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the second you hang up with us, Keegs? You know what, fellas? I'm going to run out the show with you guys because this this means more to me than a crisp delicious balcony beer here in Florida let me tell you. Pegan, so let's just get down to it obviously Vladimir Guerrero Jr. the deadline was set it was not met and then we've heard from Vladdy we heard from Shapiro we heard from Atkins today what do you make of everything that went down the last 24 hours with Vladdy in the non-extension? Nothing good happened today. Absolutely nothing good. Nothing encouraging to take from it whatsoever. It was a ugly morning for the Blue Jays as an organization and

for Vlad, it was a fascinating morning because I thought that Vlad handled this quite well. He has, as we've heard from others, he's grown up a lot in these last couple of years and I think he has come to understand this business side at just the right time. Now growing up around the game helps that, but this level of decision could be overwhelming for a kid that is 25 going 26 he seems oddly comfortable with it strangely comfortable with it he's really managed it well from what I can see obviously what fans heard from Ross Atkins and then later Mark Shapiro was not what anyone wanted to hear because people wanted this to be a celebratory day they wanted Vladie extended this deadline has been hanging over camp now and from here on it's

going to hang over the season guys I understand why Vladie set that deadline and I think it was wise of him but every story I write this year will have that line in it but this is Vladdy's last year potentially. Every question we ask will have a little twinge of this to it. This is really going to hang over everything we see from this team because this competitive window was all tied to Vladdy.

Yes, it was about Bo and other prospects adding the Springer's and Rieu's and Gosman's and everyone else but Vladdy was in the center of this this entire thing for the last almost decade since those 15 and 16 teams and if you lose a Vladdy you can spend a hell of a lot of time looking for your next Vlad. Sometimes you don't find them for a while and the Blue Jays now are looking at that major risk, which is not exciting anybody.

How did we get here today Keegan? What is it about Vlad E? And people do need to understand you can ask for the world and you're not necessarily going to get it. So there might have been some outrageous number that the Jays just weren't willing to go to. But in the day and age of star players getting paid, why was he not paid today? And it's a good point that we don't know the numbers. That's a big factor in all of this.

Now, the closest we got was Ross Atkins saying that this would have been a record-breaking contract. So I said, Ross, what record would it have broken? And he said, the blue jays record george springer is the biggest blue jays contract that means it was over a hundred and fifty million dollars i would hope so my goodness that probably the first four years of the deal

on the numbers keegan you think that lead the numbers will get leaks relatively and so i think they will and the first time I hear it I will not believe it when you hear it the first time I'd be awfully hesitant it's something I would want to hear in detail from both sides and the numbers like you mentioned oh are a big part of this because it's possible the Blue Jays were really lowballing it's possible Vlad he was asking for a billion. We don't know that right now. But it is clear guys, like you mentioned, star player contracts in Major League Baseball

have taken off. It doesn't matter that Vladi is not Otani and he's not Soto, because he isn't. But contracts are moving in one clear direction and it's happening pretty suddenly. And that's turned all of this into a moving target that the Blue Jays have had to chase a little bit. I don't view this as a front office that chases things. They like to set their values, stick to that, to the word discipline, I know is what everyone wants to hear right now, that really fires folks up. But this has been a moving target and like Vladdy said, they were not close. The word close got twisted and beat up a bunch today.

I don't know what it means anymore. But Vlad says they weren't close and that's what matters. So is there any chance, and you might have answered the question already, but I just maybe I'm twisting it a bit, that this could be taken to the muck a little bit where the agent starts leaking stuff or you start negotiating in the media and you go in different directions to try and manipulate the situation. It seems like everything with the Blue Jays and Atkins and Shapiro, they're tight lipped. They keep everything to the best, but maybe the agent starts to stir it up on the other

side and maybe forces their hands to negotiate a little bit more in public where we do know numbers or we do know scenarios that could maybe either explode the situation or help bridge it. It sure could happen, guys, and the point that I would keep an eye on like time wise would be if Vladdy just gets off to an unbelievable start. We're two months into the season he's already into the 20s of home runs he's OPSing over a thousand he might be an MVP candidate. Wow the Blue Jays didn't give him X number maybe that's when it trickles in and again it's something I'd want to hear from both sides I'm always hesitant when you hear

it the first time why is it coming out who is motivated to have that out I'm always a little wary but when it reaches that point it can get messy guys like we've talked about the Aaron judge example from a couple of years back a lot of times going into 2022 I remember how shocking that was. We're kind of out of nowhere. Brian Cashman said, Hey, this guy turned down this many years and this many dollars. And it was a bit of a shocking moment that I don't think Aaron Judge loved.

Eventually that was repaired. But I think the Blue Jays are quite the opposite of that. We've seen that through Otani Soto and this thing They don't like to say much in these situations I'd expect it'll stay that way but if Vlad is on a tear to start the year some things might loosen up How is this gonna resonate back when they get home or back to Toronto Keegan? I mean Vlad he said he didn't want to negotiate during the season. He thought that would be distracting I almost feel it would be more distracting with this scenario.

Like, how does this bleed into the fans coming to the game? Are you guys going to be asking Vlad on a weekly basis if there's an update? It just seems like this could get ugly when they get back to Toronto. Yeah, that's not going to go well because while I understand that Vlad does not want to negotiate through the season, it is the single most important story about the Blue Jays this year and for several years, frankly. It's going to get asked about.

If he's playing well, it will get asked about. If he's playing poorly, it will get asked about. If he gets hurt, it will get asked about. And fans are going to be all over this because this one guys is where I really need to think of your casual fan who wants to go to the game, have a beer, watch a couple of games on TV each week. They don't care all that much about

where the numbers might have been, which we still don't know. They don't care much about how first baseman are valued or market valuations, blah, blah, blah blah any of those multi syllable words. They care about the fact they love Vladdy. Vladdy is a Blue J and he wants to stay a Blue J. He keeps saying that. That's going to catch people because fans love this guy. The Blue J's history is full of either star players who have left later in their career, think about a holiday at Delgado, or star players who came to the Blue Jays when their careers

were already established. You look at Joe Carter, Jose Bautista, there's lots of examples. This is the shot at a guy who stays and plays 15 years and takes a run at being the greatest Blue J of all time. People are going to grab to that. There's going to be the We Want Vlad E. Champs and I think he's probably going to give them a lot of reasons to do that along the way. If you were the J's PR guy Keegan and after the scrums were over and you sat down in a room with Mark and Ross and they said how do you think we handled the questions today what would you say to them?

Well fellas that's when I would crack the beer I think right then and there. I mean I don't know if there's any way to break that news and do it in a way where fans are going to appreciate what you have to say but they just have a way of not sounding like human beings answer. They couldn't get into the word close and it was just an awkward exchange. You talk about Vladdy bringing it back to Toronto. Can those two bring their act back to Toronto and not be hated? Is that possible?

That's awfully difficult this point guys because fans one bloody and they connect that directly to this and to ross ackins the march of viral who we heard from today ship i wrote with the more direct over the two uh... he's saying he'll saying that there's no such thing as close you get the guy or you don't which i agree with that i don't care about close in a negotiation free agency

anything it doesn't exist one team get the guy. I don't care about close in a negotiation, free agency, anything. It doesn't exist. One team gets a guy, 29 don't, period. But I do understand that what fans wanna hear at this point is something more in the direction of listen, we didn't get it done right now, we love this guy, we think we can get close, we're gonna keep this rolling all season long,

we wanna bring him back. It happened with Aaron Judge, let make Vladie a Blue J because when you do speak about valuations and about discipline etc etc you're speaking to a very small percentage of a fan base I believe and guys this is something I try to remind myself day to day when I'm doing my job is that 95% of fans are a casual fan Who has a couple of favorite players? They love Vlad E. They love going to a ballgame they love the Blue Jays and they don't care what the exit velocity was at the launch angle and It's going to be awfully hard to connect with those fans

Who are being told something they don't want to hear which is is that Vladi might be going to free agency where 29 other teams can bid on him, especially guys after we have seen those free agent processes run their course with the Blue Jays coming close at the top of the market but not landing the Otani, the Soto, the Roki Sasaki recently. That's a very tough sell and let's call it a room. I'm happy i was not in the fellows that's a good way to call with the game at the same i want to go back to the close discussion and you know bladdy was a pretty pretty you know blunt when asked if they were close he said no and then you know mark in and uh... and i can't

had a different interpretation what the work close was but i'm curious if you think it's because but why weren't they close is it more so cuz they're unsure of what bladdy is like is he the mvp that he was a year ago or is he the you know good player that he was a two seasons prior or is there maybe just some discrepancy in pay based on you know positional value like why weren't they close yeah that was the big one today let me I've walked all the way across the hotel room fellows because I want the quote on my laptop it just

depends on how you define close that's too big of a word to talk specifically about and I'm not comfortable talking about numbers was how Ross second that and what would have been the what would have been the worst case scenario if he said, you know what, we were $100 million apart, we just, like, would that be just, would that piss off their agent? What would be the harm in saying that? Agents wouldn't like it, I don't think,

when you crack that open. I often think there's too much paranoia around that, frankly. I don't think agents would love it getting to this point, but when you talk about close guys, a year ago, it was really hard to evaluate Vladdy because he was not coming off this great year. He was coming off of good years, not great ones. Right. Now he has a great 2024 and he had that great 2021 when he almost won MVP. Yeah, it's a little tougher with a first baseman

instead of a shortstop or an outfielder. It's a little tougher to find that sweet spot. But we're not talking about a situation where they should be hundreds of billions off or five, seven years of length off. They should have a bit of a closer middle ground than that. Now, if you are Vladdy, you can also ask for the world right now, knowing that nine months from

now, you are going to have a pretty cool opportunity to sit at the table and be the most attractive free agent on the market in a big spending winter. That's a pretty fun place to be. But the definition of close, I certainly aired more to the Mark Shapiro side, which is that there's no such thing as close. And Vladdy's answer is what matters most. He was very short, direct. He said, no. Were you close?

No. Well, I mean, the only thing I could take away from that, guys, is let's say there were 10 million a year apart on a 13 year deal that's 130 million but you're defining close if you're 5 million a year apart technically that's not a lot but if you're doing it on a term deal now you're at 50 60 million dollars apart so I think maybe that's where Atkins is saying well define close you're going down to yearly or you're going to the life of the contract. But the fact that they won't share numbers, we won't be able to define whether it's close or not just based on lack of information.

And the annual value is something that's way more important than it gets discussed about. I think in baseball, we and I'm at fault for doing this too much saying, oh, it's a 400 million, it's a 500 million. Well is that seven years or 20 years? What are we talking about here? I think with Vladdy, the average annual value, which I think we do a much better job of in hockey contracts, for example, the average annual for Vladdy, you're probably looking into those high thirties going into the low 40s range. That's a rough 10-year 400 million. Do you go up from there, down from there,

up in years, down in years? Then you get into deferrals and opt-outs and all the more complicated factors. But it's better and simpler to focus on that annual value. That's a smaller thing. It's more controllable. And you go from there. because if it's a big gap, yikes. But if once you start getting within a few million, you start asking yourself, well what is this guy worth to ticket sales? What is he worth to how we're going to be able to track other free agents, which is a whole other conversation now. But that's where you've got to get. There's a sweet spot that they are clearly just not close to. Well and if they remain not

close between now and the trade deadline how likely is it that the Blue Jays start fielding calls on Vladdy? You absolutely have to unless the Blue Jays are making a legitimate run in which case you swing the other way you say this is Vladdy from the last year maybe this is Bo's last year, maybe. You've got to make a run at it. Blow out and make a run at it this time, more than ever before. But, if the Blue Jays are having a poor season, or even more awkwardly, guys, if they're stuck in the middle, you've got to look at that as a potential turning point for the franchise. And I don't want to get too doomsday ahead, but this is part of what

the Blue Jays are looking at now. If they get into the season and it's not going well, when you look down on the farm there's not another Vladdy coming, there's not another Beau Bichette coming right now. They have some top guys, but not a Vladdy, not a Bo, not a guy who you can definitively build around in the next couple of years. If that presents an opportunity to find one of them, it's something they're going to have to very uncomfortably entertain because it is not easy to find these guys and the last six or seven years are not a good example of this but

it's the most important thing that you can find it's like having a rookie QB on that cheap deal and you can add stars around him you know it's so valuable to have those young developed stars who are progressing through their cheaper years you got to find them I don't think the Blue Jays have one coming right now uncomfortable as it is Vlad he might end up being that opportunity six, seven months from now. Well you talk about the organization and the franchise and the leadership. What group gets to withstand all that and continue to make decisions

for the organization moving forward i mean they blew out josh donelson into a little in all these guys and they were starting over and then they said they were world series contenders which a lot of other people also thought they were they haven't won squat they haven't won a playoff game and are they going to be allowed to be a part of another cycle through it's tough

man three different ways i look at this quickly. One is going through managers. You go from Gibby to Montoya to John Schneider. This group has gotten a few managers. They've gone through a few pivots as well. They started with that veteran team, tore down, rebuilt. They built up to make the playoffs 2021. They had that incredible offensive team.

Then they pivoted away from that to defense now they're trying to pivot back a little bit to offer that's multiple pivot at this point as well do you get to go into another full rebuild that is likely that does not happen much in major league baseball where one failed rebuild lead into another without changes especially guys when at the end of the day, the biggest number here is a zero.

Zero postseason wins since those 2015, 2016 teams. If the Blue Jays were to end this, this Vladdy and Bo era with zero postseason wins, that's just crushing. That's absolutely crushing. This was the dream duo you rarely get a duo like this coming up who are not just this good but that beloved that marketable by fans

to go through all of this without a postseason win until now that's rough that's really rough really quickly keegan i mean now that the deadlines passed for vlad like you think they'll end up circling back on Beau Bichette here? I think that they will have that conversation but I don't consider it all that likely but Beau especially coming up last year, if Vlad is hard to find a number for, my goodness, Beau is extra hard. I think he is a guy who will be motivated to have a

huge year, maybe chase that really a Dom ask ask money But I would still expect Bo to be in free agency next year I don't expect to do a fun free agency for Jays fans next year. It sounds stressful already Yeah, it hasn't been for the last couple years key tani watch and Soto next year is gonna feel terrible, especially if he ends up with the Red Sox who apparently are the leading contenders in the Vladimir Guerrero sweepstakes already. Oh boy. Alright, we'll get you out of here so you can get back to your balcony beer pal. Look at that. Oh we're sitting here looking at snow snow banks you're looking at some beautiful beautiful lake out there

in Dunedin I am a very very jealous man Keegan thank you for doing this as always pal we'll chat again soon I'll have one for each of you fellas take care vegan Matheson Blue Jays reporter for MLB.com This February I her radio celebrates Black History Month By amplifying the voices that define black excellence like the pond and celebrate history and culture from curated playlists Celebrating iconic black artists to powerful podcasts my grandmother's March with Martin King. And Black History Month radio. We're shining a light on the music, stories, and culture that inspire us all. Black history is our history. Celebrate with us. History to make it.

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