OverDrive - Phillips on Verlander’s ranking among all-time pitchers, Barger’s importance to the Jays, and how the Jays should reinforce their pitching heading into the deadline

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

TSN baseball insider Steve Phillips joins us on Mail it in Friday to discuss where Justin Verlander’s ranking is among all-time pitchers. Phillips highlights the importance of Addison Barger and tells us how the Jays should handle their pitching staff heading into the MLB deadline

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Intact Insurance, your auto service ace. Certain conditions apply. Hey, my name is Brett Emmons. I'm from the glorious sons Hi, I'm Nellie Furtado made in Canada the station that champions Canadian music loud crowd No passports required just press play tap into made in Canada now on iHeartradio.ca or the free iHeartRadio app Here's our TSN baseball insider joining us here in the maple toy to hotline here Steve Phillips. How you doing Steve? I'm doing great. Good to be with you Great to be with you and we've been more pumping up the fact that Verlander is in town and this very well could be the last Time he pitches in Toronto

I believe he has two no hitters against the Jays at the Rogers Center. So he loves this building He's obviously going to the Hall of Fame. He's an all-time great. Curious where he ranks for you. You don't have to give me a specific slotting but in terms of the great pitchers of all time, like is he top 20, top 30, 40, 50? Where would Verlander fall on the Steve Phillips list? Yeah, I think that he's, you know know I've got him behind Pedro Martinez in that range. I think Pedro was more dominant than Verlander was but Verlander clearly a Hall of Famer, first battle of Hall of Famery. I have a head of Messina on the list to give you some sense as to where they go. But yeah I

think he's probably if you start to look at it probably pop top 25 And you know, he was a guy that when he first came up He would go out in and he would throw 9596 in the first few innings of the the game and then he would want to throw 99 on his 99th pitch in the game and and did. He just was, he held back early. So we had more fastball to go to later and, uh, and he just really was, uh, just such a dominant pitcher and so competitive on the mound. And, um, you know, it's, uh, it's the same cause he's owned seven this year. He's yet to get a win. Uh, and you know,

he's searching for it a little bit right now. The guy who threw a couple of nohitters isn't around anymore he's really searching for it and and so you know he's just not the same pitcher I mean he's competitive he keeps him in the game but they've not scored enough so I certainly would hope the Jays come out swinging aggressively on him. Yeah that's that's certainly got to be the plan going into tonight and you know it's a big series for them to start at home coming out of the break They stumbled a little bit, you know coming down the stretch losing three or four to Chicago and the athletics

But now that you reset You know all eyes appear to be on Vlad E putting him aside. Is there another guy on the order? Specifically, you know one of the hitters that you have your eyes on that you believe should be relishing this opportunity considering where the team is, how good they've been playing, if so who is that guy? Well, for me, I mean look, they've gotten a lot of Clement and Addison Barger and Springer and Kirk, I mean Lucas. To me it comes down to Bichette and Guerrero that there's I think there's likely to be some regression in the complementary players. They've all played very well but the league's going to make

an adjustment to them and it may take them a little bit of time to adjust back and in the meantime it's not that Vlade and Bichette have been bad, they've not. They've been good but know, they're better than good. And they need to drive the baseball. They, you know, they need to slug, uh, in that part of their game has to, has to blossom right now. And I do think that, that, you know, coming out of the all-star break, I think that, that what I would want, and I always thought this with a manager,

you've got to come out and force action, force movement. I would start runners, I would get guys moving, I would steal bases, I would hit and run. I think you've got to create movement and not make it passive. Don't make it you know base to base and do everything. Try to force things to happen so you get your players jump started into energy in the game and so obviously we see how John Schneider goes out there and tries to manage it because to me it's all about movement and action when you come out of a four-day layoff. Steve is there one of those guys you mentioned the first half surprises that you think is best set up to keep this up in the second half? Well

you know Springer the veteran at least has some idea about the grind of an entire season. You know, one of the things that young position players need to learn is just, you know, how to grind out 162 games, even the minor league season is shorter than the major league season. And it's, it's, it's different in those dog days where it starts getting hot and you're in August, they've got a book on you now where they've seen you a couple of times, you're facing those teams the second time around and they're all going to start to attack the weakness. Uh, but you know, I think,

I think barger to me was so critical because without Santander, they needed a left-handed bat to give them some thunder. And you know, I think that Springer has been the most valuable player, but I think that that Barger's been the most important player for them because you take him out of the mix and what he did and the timing with what you did some of those things and the left-handed nature of it which allowed the the the right-handers on either side of him to not have a right-handed pitcher get into a rhythm where you can start to throw a slider, slider, you know split, two-seam fastball and you get into a rhythm if you have a bunch of right-handers in a row. So

Barger's been big and I think it's important for them that he keeps going but in the meantime Winston Tondair and Varshow Kaback they don't have to be better than they've ever been they just need to be what they've been. And that's for Varsha, a guy that can steal a base and he's got some thunder. He's gonna swing and miss. He's not a big on base percentage guy, but he plays with heart and plays with grit and sound. He's got to come in and slug. It's what he got brought in for. You don't need him to be more than that. You don't need 44 homers the rest of the season, but can you give me 18 homers for the rest of

the season? Can you give me 15 homers for the rest of the season? Can you give me 15 homers for the rest of the season and give this team some of the power they need? Steve, we're working our way towards the trade deadline in the baseball. So when you look at it, how aggressive would you be if you were in charge of the Blue Jays as far as bringing players in, but maybe mortgaging some of your future assets for that as far as young players in, but maybe mortgaging some of your future assets for that as far as young players. Yeah, so ideally, I'd love to trade for players that I can control beyond just this season. So not necessarily the rental player.

If I'm going to give up talent, I'd rather do it to where I've got some controllability to offset the fact I'm giving up a prospect that somebody can have for six years before they become a free agent. But I do think this is an important year for this franchise. And, um, you know, I, you would tell them more prospects than you think. Uh, and you know, then, then what other people think and what the grading systems say, and so, you know, for me, I think they have to be aggressive. I think they have to go for it now. I think they need to give up as much talent as they can

Not mortgaging all of it like Mark Suppire won't do it because remember he criticized Alex Nathopoulos For giving everybody up when he did now They went to the playoffs two years in a row and and you know, I personally would have been okay with what Alex did I did it. I gave up prospects. I you prospects. I think prospects can get general managers fired. I wait for this prospect. I don't trade to get a major league player. I don't get the guy that I need to compete. I don't make the playoffs. Then this young guy's going to turn into the star for me. Then he sort of fizzles out a bit. Then he gets hurt. And the next thing you know, I'm out the door because I waited for this 21-year-old old to turn into something so I want to win now I don't know what next year is going to bring so

I generally am it was always more aggressive at the deadline and my thought was it's up to us to replenish our farm system we need to draft well we need to develop well let's go ahead and give what we need to do to put it and let's go find the next round of prospects in the organization. Steve Phillips Phillips, our TSM baseball insider, Chris Bassett on the mound for the Jays tonight. It's been pretty interesting, yet somewhat predictable I guess, how Gossman, Bassett and Barrios have been almost indistinguishable in terms of their stat line and the way the innings pitched. All three of them are within six innings pitched.

Two of them have given up, I want to say, 11 home runs. The other one's given up 12. Brio's got the best ERA, but not by a substantial margin. When you look at their starting rotation, if they're not going to acquire anyone better than those three guys, how would you feel about those three? Let's let's say they win the division end up with a top seed and they get right into the DS Games one two and three is it that simple? It's Burrios, Gozman and Bassett and you're happy with that. Where would you stand on that? Yeah, I mean I'm it's not exactly where I want it to be

I mean, I would like to get somebody in front of them. The question is who is going to be available that slots in in front of them? What's the price for that pitcher in the meantime? My goal is if I can't find somebody in front of them, I want to shorten the game. I want to be able to take the pressure off, go out there and give me five innings and then give me, because in the playoffs, you know, it's you play a day, you're off, you play another day, you're off, then you play two days, you know, and or you play two and then you're off and play three.

You're so you can really use your key relievers almost throughout the course of a playoff series, but then you're going to have to really build the depth of that bullpen and, and, and that's probably the direction they're going to have to go because the competition for impact starting pitching like Zach Galland's a great name but he's got an ERA over five this year. I like Merrill Kelly but I think he's probably a little bit better than the guys that they have right now the way he's pitched this year but not dramatic so he's not going to be a shut down pitcher necessarily you got to match up against Scubal or

or somebody like that so you know they they're gonna have to really pitch the most quality innings even if it's not the best at the beginning of the game or maybe the best at the end of the game but give me the most in between that's kind of how I built my staffs back in the day that I had now later was my my ace Mike Hampton was my ace but they were they weren't necessarily you know, Randy Johnson and those guys back then, Greg Maddux back then, but they were a tick below that. But they still won a lot of games and gave us a chance to win every day. But I wanted

to make sure that I had all kinds of bullpen behind them, that no matter what the opposition threw out there, we could match up with them. And I think that may be where you see Ross and Mark Shapiro really go to fortify that bullpen if they can't find that pitcher to go to the front of the rotation. Jay's Giants tonight, I said prior to you coming on Steve, this feels like the biggest two weeks of Ross Atkins tenure in Toronto and he's been here for nine years. He's been here for almost a decade, Shapiro even more so. Just based on the volatility in the marketplace, you know, six months ago, let alone a year ago, the position they've they found themselves in, which they've earned

their players have earned their players have put them in this spot. But now you got the market coming alive here and fans are fickle. The media is fickle. There's going to be ebbs and flows like Atkins if he can hit a grand slam or so, even a double or a triple, anything like that, hit for the cycle, I don't care which analogy you've got to use, he can do it in the next two weeks. I think he can almost pull a 180 and basically redeem himself completely within the marketplace. I'm sure he's aware of that.

I know publicly he's going to claim that he doesn't care, but he is human. It's a big, big opportunity for him in a market that's been talking a lot about Ross for the last couple of years, and a large majority of that chatter has been negative in tone. Yeah. So I wrote about it today in.ca. Look, general managers, presidents, they're people too, so they do have feelings. Like they know, they feel the pressure, they know what's going on, they know that you get hired to get fired in these jobs, and yet you can't do something

that's exclusively for you personally, and I use the example, the Mets are retiring David Wright's number tonight and inducting him into the Mets Hall of Fame. Well, when I was Mets General Manager, I knew I was in trouble going into the 2003 season. I could have traded David Wright for any number of players. I could have traded Jose Reyes for any number. I had people calling me all the time, would you do this, that? And maybe trying to sniff out if I was desperate to do something, but it wasn't

the right thing for the organization. So within the constraints of what is reasonable, proper, prudent and appropriate, you make deals. And I think that for Ross, with where they've gotten themselves to right now, it's time to make that, you know, strike that deal, find the guy, don't get a guy you need to fix. You know, my experience generally is that that when you get a pitcher, they tend to pitch as well for you as they did for the previous team. You might get lucky and have a guy really get hot and everything else.

And rarely do you get them all of a sudden they go kaput. You know, generally they keep doing it for you. So if you get a guy who's been pretty good with another team, he's gonna be pretty good for you. I want the guy who's pitching great for somebody to come in and be great for us when I made deals and so I think that's gonna be something to be important. You know, Zach Allen is pitching to a 5-4 ERA. He's got a great name and his last three or four starts have been good and maybe he can get two more starts in and

sell me that he's back on track again but if there's a clunker in there and then a mediocre start in there then he really is the guy with a 5.4 ERA right now. And I can't hang my hat on his name about what he's been. I want to trade for the guy for what he is. With Steve Phillips, and all eyes are going to be on the Yankees and the Red Sox clearly, and we were discussing this earlier in the week, the arms race, so to speak. How does that work in terms of Atkins, let's use Ross as the barometer here because we're talking about the Jays and we're up here in Toronto. How closely are you monitoring or trying to

get a read on what the Yankees and the Red Sox might be doing over the next two weeks? Oh yeah, what I did is I read every news clipping from every baseball city, you know, and especially the ones where I thought I might be in competition for the same players. And I think it's safe to say that the Yankees are looking for starting pitching, the Red Sox looking for starting pitching. They're both looking for bullpen help. You know what, the Yankees are looking for a third baseman.

And you know what, you might be happy with Ernie Clement at third base. Maybe you think I don't have the resources, but I'll tell you right now that I would be in on the conversations on a third base. But if the Yankees are in on A. Eugenio Suarez, I'm going to check in too, just to continue to run the price up, to make it like maybe I'll give you these players in my farm system. Even if I don't want to, I might pretend just to run the price up on it But I think it's going to be and I think the other thing to remember Is that if you're competing for the same guys and you'll know by the chatter the rumors that are out there

Uh, then you might pay a you know, pay a little bit more to get a guy But you understand that you're playing a game of keep away that That if I get them and they don't, that's a double victory. And I think that that has value, talent value in a trade that you have to consider when you're trying to figure out what the right deal is to make. Which of those teams would scare you the most, Steve? Well, I think probably the Yankees more than the Red Sox. You know, although I think the, and look, I'm not, the Rays are not out of this either. The Tampa Bay Rays, there's a real good chance that you could have four ALD teams in the playoffs and then Detroit in the central and Houston out west.

I think the Mariners are going to fade. I just, I don't, I don't believe in the Mariners. And, you know, I listen to what Cal Raleigh's done is amazing, but if he hasn't done it, they certainly wouldn't be five games over 500. I don't know how he can keep doing what he's doing as a catcher. So I do think that the American, the East is the one that you've got to focus on. And, um, you know, I, I think that the Yankees red socks and raid in that order are teams that I worry about, but I think all of them are worth worrying over

And you know those head-to-head matchups when you play those teams so they what they play The Blue Jays play the Yankees. I think coming up in a series right after the first one I think that that you've got to take it take care of business in those series head-to-head matchups are going to matter tiebreakers are going to matter. Tie breakers are going to matter. That ability to get the advantage over the other teams is going to be critical for the Blue Jays to figure out if they win the division and where they seed in the wild card if they fall into that role. When you look around the league, which player is available, playing well, and a team is going to move them out? Which player is going to be that player that everyone's going to want at this trade deadline?

Yeah. Yeah. So I think right now, Arizona's five and a half out of the wild card and I just don't believe that they're going to get themselves back into it. And if they do, I think it's the worst thing for them. The goal is to win the most games over the most number of years and I don't know that this is their year and this is a great year for them. You know, the goal is to win the most games over the most number of years, and I don't know that this is their year, and this is a great year for them to reset. So Eugenio Suarez is, you know, destroying the baseball this year. Since last July 1st, last year, July 1st, he got 55 home runs. I mean, he is, you know, he is a legitimate middle of the

lineup bat. He can play a solid third base, and there are, listen, the Yankees are in on them. Seattle Mariners are in on them. Uh, you know, there are the Cubs, the Cubs, how about this for the Cubs? They're as good as their offense has been this year. Their third baseman, they played six players at third base this year. They've totaled a 1 99 batting average and one home run, one home run. You know, it's been Pete Cromston, Kyle Tuckeruhl, Kyle Tucker, and Seiya Suzuki that have gotten it done for them. They could use a third baseman. And if you can't get pitching, then you might

try to slug people to death. So I think Suarez and then Josh Naylor at first base is, is, you know, for any team looking at a first base when he's the preeminent guy, that's why Arizona needs to make trade. You can get three prospects for Naylor, three for Suarez, you know, three for, for Mer Kelly, and three for Zach Allen. You could trade Lord of the Corial Jr. You could trade Randall Gritchick. You've got yourself 14, 15 prospects. If you want, go sign all those guys in the off season

and bring them back. I just think that Arizona is going to be the big difference maker at the trade deadline. They're going to impact this deadline, I think, more than any other team. Steve, it's going to be an interesting couple of weeks. It's good to have the games back up and running post, you know, All-Star break and you're going to be all over it like always. Sportscenter.ca, TSM Radio, we can't wait to do it again next week. Thank you for this.

You got it, guys. My pleasure. We'll talk to you then. Steve Phillips, our baseball insider, Jay's Giants tonight. Steve, of course, joining us courtesy of the Maple Toyota Hotline. The biggest songs in the world. You've heard them countless times. Now, learn the details of how they came to be. Join Ruby Carr for Encore, the stories behind the songs you love. New interviews and newly unearthed archive footage make for a fascinating weekly deep dive.

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