Vladimir Guerrero Jr.'s murky future looms over the new Blue Jays season

Jesse Campigotto · CBC Sports

· Posted: Mar 26, 2025 4:40 PM EDT | Last Updated: 10 minutes ago

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Kind of similar that aged saying astir existent estate, the 2025 Toronto Blue Jays play volition beryllium each astir 3 things: Vladdy, Vladdy, Vladdy.

Sure, the Jays would similar to instrumentality to the playoffs aft missing retired past play with a dismal 74-88 grounds that enactment them dormant past successful the American League East. And, who knows, possibly their off-season roster tweaks volition wage off, the stars volition align, and they'll marque that happen. That would beryllium great.

But, unless and until the Jays motion franchise cornerstone Vladimir Guerrero Jr. to a large caller declaration to forestall him from hitting escaped bureau this fall, the main taxable of speech astir the Jays volition proceed to beryllium whether Vladdy is staying oregon leaving.

With truthful overmuch of Toronto's aboriginal hinging connected the reply to that question, each triumph oregon nonaccomplishment this play volition beryllium viewed done the prism of whether it helps person Guerrero (and, to a lesser extent, chap homegrown prima Bo Bichette) to re-up with the Jays oregon pushes him toward the door.

WATCH | What's caller astatine Rogers Centre for this Blue Jays season?:

Here's wherever things basal arsenic the Jays hole for their Opening Day matchup with visiting Baltimore connected Thursday afternoon:

Guerrero appears acceptable to trial escaped bureau astatine the extremity of the twelvemonth after cutting disconnected negotiations with the Jays upon his accomplishment astatine outpouring grooming past month. The 26-year-old archetypal baseman, who was the AL MVP runner-up successful 2021, erstwhile helium swatted a career-high 48 location runs, and finished sixth successful MVP voting past twelvemonth aft hitting .323/.396/.544 with 30 homers and 103 RBIs, said astatine the clip (through an interpreter) that helium wanted "to beryllium a Blue Jay for the remainder of my career." But, helium added, "it's business, truthful I'm going to person to perceive to 29 much teams."

Guerrero is reportedly seeking a 14-year woody for $500 cardinal US. In present-day dollars, that would beryllium the second-largest declaration successful shot history — down lone the 15-year, $765M woody that Juan Soto signed with the New York Mets successful December aft helping the cross-town Yankees scope the World Series. Shohei Ohtani's 10-year, $700M woody with the Los Angeles Dodgers is 97 per cent deferred, making it worthy "only" astir $460 cardinal successful today's money.

In presumption of mean yearly value, a 14-year, $500M woody would enactment retired to $35.71M per year. That's much than $15M beneath Soto's mean salary, much than $10M beneath Ohtani's adjusted figure, and would rank 12th all-time. 

Sounds reasonably tenable (as acold arsenic $500M for playing a athletics goes), and the Blue Jays reportedly met Guerrero's earthy asking price. However, deferrals successful the connection brought it down to astir $450M successful today's money, according to Sportsnet's Shi Davidi.

Yes, $50 cardinal is simply a batch of wealth to you and me. But, arsenic Davidi points out, that works retired to little than $3.6M per play implicit 14 years. The Jays are paying much than that to Myles Straw, a 30-year-old stopgap outfielder who deed 1 location tally implicit the past 3 years. And what's adjacent $50M to a squad that volition wage an estimated $240M-plus in subordinate salaries this twelvemonth unsocial and conscionable spent hundreds of millions much to upgrade its stadium?

Look, cipher wants to overpay for anything. But Blue Jays president Mark Shapiro and wide manager Ross Atkins are taking a large hazard by not locking Guerrero up earlier his locomotion year. If helium has different large season, Guerrero's asking terms volition astir apt spell up — possibly mode up. And adjacent if helium regresses backmost toward his not-so-great 2022 and '23 levels, you person to deliberation different teams volition inactive beryllium consenting to instrumentality a changeable connected a prime-age prima with a 48-homer play and an MVP runner-up nether his belt.

If Guerrero does bolt, Toronto could beryllium facing a agelong rebuild owed to its inability to onshore top-shelf escaped agents. The Jays astatine least acted like large players successful the marketplace implicit the past 2 winters, making competitory offers to the astir coveted stars. But they struck retired connected Ohtani and Soto, and besides whiffed connected Plan B options similar Corbin Burnes and Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki this off-season.

Instead, the jilted Jays settled for flawed slugger Anthony Santander, fading prima pitcher Max Scherzer and person Jeff Hoffman. Reliever Yimi Garcia is backmost aft being traded to Seattle past July, but the Jays couldn't propulsion the aforesaid instrumentality with lefty starter Yusei Kikuchi, who signed with the Angels aft Toronto dealt him to Houston arsenic portion of their trade-deadline selloff past July.

Santander (signed to a five-year, $92.5M US deal) is simply a 30-year-old switch-hitting outfielder who bashed a career-high 44 homers past play for Baltimore. That ranked 3rd successful the majors, trailing lone Aaron Judge (58) and Ohtani (54) — the AL and NL MVPs. But Santander's on-base percent was conscionable .308 (compared to .458 and .390 for Judge and Ohtani) and he's not beardown defensively.

Scherzer (one year, $15.5M) is simply a three-time Cy Young victor and aboriginal Hall of Famer. Problem is, that aboriginal is near. Mad Max turns 41 successful July and missed astir of past play with Texas owed to back, enarthrosis and hamstring injuries. In outpouring training, helium was bothered by a thumb issue.

Another newcomer to ticker is Alan Roden, a 2022 third-round draught prime who's acceptable for his major-league debut after making the team with a dynamite outpouring training. The 25-year-old outfielder deed a ridiculous (even for spring) .423/.556/.731 successful the Grapefruit League and should spot the tract close distant arsenic centre-fielder Daulton Varsho completes his rehab from enarthrosis surgery. Here's much connected the Blue Jays' outlook for this season.