TORONTO - Suspense turned quickly into disappointment for the Toronto Blue Jays after Kyle Tucker chose the Los Angeles Dodgers Thursday night and Bo Bichette landed with the New York Mets Friday morning.
While nothing can fully be ruled out as long as Cody BellingerS still out there, Tucker clearly represented the blue Jays’ best shot at turning a strong off-season into a historic one. The specifics aren’t known, but the Blue Jays made a legitimately competitive long-term offer to Tucker, who preferred the Dodgers’ record-setting proposal of $240 million over four years with opt-outs after the second and third seasons.
The parting with Bichette will be more emotional for fans, players and staff alike considering he first joined the Blue Jays nearly 10 years ago as a second-round pick in 2016. The 27-year-old singled in his first ever MLB at-bat, homered off Shohei Ohtani in Game 7 of the World Series to end his Blue Jays career and hit .294 with 111 home runs in between. Now, he’s set to play third for the Mets, who signed him for $126 million over three years with opt-outs after each season.
Barring a scenario in which the Blue Jays swoop in on Bellinger and out-bid the Yankees for his services, their major off-season moves are now done, meaning an off-season that started with a record deal for Dylan Cease would end a little anticlimactically.
Now, as Blue Jays fans can attest after 2025, you can have a great season without necessarily winning the off-season. And with a roster that has more projected FanGraphs WAR than any team but the Dodgers, the Blue Jays are positioned well. Still, those two deals sting.
as ever, contracts of that magnitude have lots of ramifications throughout the baseball world. Here’s a closer look at a few of them:
• While the Blue Jays made Tucker a serious long-term offer that he was considering untill the end, it’s not yet clear if they made Bichette a formal offer or simply lurked on the edges of his market. The Phillies were reportedly hopeful of signing Bichette.
