Here’s a small morsel of food for thought to start your Tuesday, as Jeff Blair looks at the Jays’ stockpile of prospects in this morning’s Globe and Mail, among them Noah Syndergaard, pictured above.
“When the Oakland Athletics spoke to the Blue Jays about a trade for Gio Gonzalez,” he writes, “they had Syndergaard at the top of their list.”
Syndergaard, of course, wasn’t moved in the off-season. Nor would he alone have been enough to pry Gonzalez from Oakland, who eventually ended up flipping the innings-eater to the Nationals for four minor leaguers, including three of the their top ten prospects, per Baseball America (as relayed by MLBTR)– right-handers Brad Peacock (#3), AJ Cole (#4) and catcher Derek Norris (#9).
It speaks once again to the depth of the club’s system, therefore, that Syndergaard ranked eighth in the Jays system, according to BA, behind catcher Travis d’Arnaud, outfielders Anthony Gose and Jake Marisnick, and pitchers Dan Norris, Justin Nicolino and Aaron Sanchez. And that depth, according to Blair’s piece, is in good hands, as he writes about the “two years of compiling what assistant general manager Tony LaCava describes as being ‘bits and pieces’ of wisdom and analysis to finally put together the Toronto Blue Jays’ player development manual.”
The entire article is worth a read, especially if you want to get back into a warm safe place after yesterday’s descent into nitpicking madness over the McGowan extension– and believe me, I do– but I think it’s the nugget about Syndergaard and the A’s that really stands out as newsworthy. Assuming, y’know, that we didn’t already know this and I’d just forgot.
Dec. 29
http://blogs.thescore.com/djf/2011/12/29/blair-the-as-wanted-syndergaard-for-gio/
Hahahaha. Amazing!
haha. That post, combined with Stoeten’s last sentence of the post is pretty funny.
That’s some funny shit.
I think in your drunkeness you may have just forgotten about this nugget. Blair’s mentioned this Syndergaard business on his radio show a couple of times these last few months. It’s been out there.
The A’s flipped Gio for 3 of their own Top 10 prospects?
Reading comprehension fail?
Baseball America’s top 10. and they were from the Nationals.
The Nationals top 10, as per Baseball America.
A haul of 3 top 10 BA prospects would be enough for pretty much any player in baseball (assuming they were on the block, of course)
I know, I was calling out the editor. It has since been fixed.
Pretty impressive depth we have, that the A’s WANTED our 8th top prospect as the centrepiece in a trade for a player of Gio’s caliber…..and speaks even MORE to our depth that we said no.
How many teams would absolutely jump at the chance to trade their 8th best prospect for Gio? All of them?
Jays should have snap accepted that. Anytime you can get rid of a Dutch person you do it. Name one successful person of Dutch heritage.
Van Helsing
Michael, you know I can’t stand racial intolerance.
Andrew Stoeten ???
Bert Blyleven
Dick Van Dyke
Victor Von Schroopenstiltser
The only thing I hate more then racism is the Dutch….
Pretty sure Syndergaard is a Norwegian (or possibly Danish) name.
But he’s Texan, so maybe he should’ve been traded anyway.
He’s 100% Viking
Peter Stuyvesant
Rutger Hauer
Vincent van Gogh
I like those three. Pass the Dutchie too.
Mark Mulder
Blair: The A’s Wanted Syndergaard for Gio
Blair: The A’s Wanted Syndergaard for Gio
Blair: The A’s Wanted Syndergaard for Gio
This should be a blog post every 3 months on here just to remind us.
One last thought on the McGowan extension: is it possible this type of deal makes McGowan more likely to go along with any “DL listing” that the Jays propose without incurring a grievance or wrath from the player. Now it is all nudge and wink in order to ensure he remains an asset and can be shuffled back and forth as need be given the risk he is. Since he is out of options, DL is really the only way to “hide” him for various periods of time. Just a conspiracy thought.
Probably a pretty safe bet that they wanted one of gose/marisnick too and d’arnaud probably as well. Glad we said no.
The extra A in Syndergaard is for BYOAA.
What is that extra A for?
the extra A stands for Dutch
That’s a fantastic picture. Where did you get it?
Hey there, why no photo credit?