From the day Vlad Guerrero Jr. was signed by the Blue Jays, a 16-year-old diamond unearthed from the baseball rough of the Dominican Republic, he was a dream acquisition for Canada’s team.
The year was 2015 and coincided with a nice run of optimism that was building around the team. Later that fall, the Jays would make their first of memorable back-to-back playoff runs to fuel optimism not seen around the club in decades.
And the dream gained momentum as it unfolded in real time, breathing life into a countrywide fan base as it followed Guerrero’s rapid rise, first to a big-league debut while still in his teens, and soon after to widely heralded stardom.
It was real for Guerrero, the son of the original Vlad Guerrero, a Hall of Famer already endeared to Canadian baseball fans from his years playing for the Montreal Expos in the city where his namesake, soon-to-be-famous son, was born.
It was real for the franchise and then-general manager Alex Anthopoulos, who had the vision, persistence and procurement of ownership cash to land one of the brightest young prospects in the game, and then to set up the foundation for his measured development.
And it was real for the long-suffering fan base that was transforming into a new generation from the one that more than a quarter-century previously had celebrated back-to-back World Series titles in 1992 and 1993.
In the decade since Anthopoulos was able to sign the raw teenager to a contract for US$3.9 million, Guerrero has been the enduring beacon of optimism for a team that, as recently as three years ago, was seen as one of the most promising of Major League Baseball’s 30 franchises.
A powerful hitter with sublime bat-to-ball skills, Guerrero has largely flourished with the Jays, and a city and a country has seen him grow up before their eyes.
From the chubby teenager who was erratic in his conditioning, to the budding star who hit an MLB-high 48 homers in 2021, to the player who struggled in the next two seasons, to the resurgent Vlad of 2024, it has been a journey.
And now this. Now the team and its fan base are faced with the prospect of seeing Guerrero walk away for nothing via free agency in 10 months. The young first baseman’s uncertain future has become a talking point not just in Toronto, but throughout baseball, where the obscene amounts of money spent on free agents is in a stratosphere never before seen.
The unravelling of the relationship between Blue Jays management and a once (and possibly still) prized possession is as befuddling as it is potentially ruinous to Canada’s only big-league baseball team.
How did we get here?
The obvious, too-easy answer pushed by a faction of the disgruntled fan base is front-office incompetence.
Depending on the narrative you choose, it’s either that or a growing indifference from general manager Ross Atkins and team president Mark Shapiro to keep Guerrero around long-term. There have certainly been mixed signals from management about how much it values Guerrero as the face of the franchise and the central figure to its competitive future.
In many ways, it’s a stunning turn for a player who could well be the most popular athlete in the only city he’s played big-league baseball.
A four-time all-star, a past Home Run Derby champion, and one of the more versatile power hitters in the game, Guerrero is now trending toward being another team’s superstar for the peak seasons of his career. That trajectory could change in an instant should Jays management lock Guerrero up with a big-money, multi-year offer too monstrous to refuse. But with each passing day, the prospect of that happening diminishes.
Though Guerrero avoided the indignity of an arbitration hearing in which he would have had to listen to a Jays presentation highlighting his shortcomings, there is still a gulf between the two sides that is reportedly as high as US$100 million. In a December appearance on a Spanish-language podcast, Guerrero indicated that he would continue to talk extension with the Jays, but only until the official start of spring training in mid-February.
After that, and without a long-term extension, the pathway to free agency in November would be all but cemented.
Given that ultimatum, the one-year pre-arbitration contract of US$28.5 million that Guerrero agreed to earlier in January means little. And the fallout associated with the ongoing stalemate remains severe.
If the Jays are unable to secure Guerrero to a significant extension, it would be just the latest kick to a fan base that has seen the promise built around the wildly popular athlete erode over the past three seasons, culminating with a plunge to a last-place finish in the American League East in 2024.
It would also be a possible indicator that the team’s data-driven front office thinks less of Guerrero’s upside than it previously indicated.
So why did the Jays let this happen to a player who will be in hot demand as next year’s darling of free agency, should the situation get that far?
For starters, it’s a product of MLB’s complicated financial structure and arbitration process, one in which teams have “control” of a player for six seasons once they make their big-league debut.
If you want to be the best player, you have to think that you’re the best player. That’s the way I always think.
Vlad Guerrero Jr.
Along the way, there’s always the possibility of extending a player to a long-term contract to take free agency out of the equation. For elite players, the front office’s degree of difficulty in reaching terms on an extension rises exponentially the closer he gets to free agency.
The arbitration process that unfolds each off-season is a built-in mechanism to allow players to earn annual raises based on performance in previous seasons. Both sides file a salary number before the January deadline and if a middle ground can’t be reached, a hearing is set for February where management presents its case against the player to a panel of independent arbitrators.
While the Jays avoided that bit of testiness with Guerrero this year, in 2024 they did not, a development that certainly may have set the stage for the current chasm between the two sides.
In the longer game, it’s fair to surmise that the Jays haven’t helped themselves by letting things get this far without a deal. It’s also fair to wonder whether management truly sees him as a franchise-defining superstar. But more on that later.
Lingering effects and uncertainty
Fair or not, the Guerrero situation — careening toward impasse as it is — appears to significantly be affecting the way the Jays are able to do business as they attempt to reverse the current slide in form.
To be fair, the dithering by the Jays front office may have been a factor in getting to this point. But the dramatic change in the free-agent landscape in the past two years has conspired against them as well.
First, it was global star Shohei Ohtani signing a then-record deal of US$700 million with the Los Angeles Dodgers in December 2023. A year later, slugger Juan Soto took it to a new plateau, going to the New York Mets for US$765 million as high-end free agent inflation seemingly has no ceiling. Averaged over the 15-year term, Soto will collect an average of more than US$51 million per season. The details are staggering: A US$75-million signing bonus, a full no-trade clause and, unlike Ohtani’s deal, there is no deferred money.
The Blue Jays, as widely reported, were suitors to the end for both of those megastar free agents, the team brain trust given clearance by owner Rogers Communications to spend in that stratosphere. This off-season, the Jays have reportedly been “in” on the bidding for a number of free agents, but have seemingly been unable to get those at the top end of the market to take the cash. The latest examples started with Soto, before the bidding with Mets owner Steven Cohen got too out of control, and continued with pitchers Corbin Burnes, who signed a six-year, US$210-million deal with the Arizona Diamondbacks, and Max Fried, who landed with the New York Yankees for eight years, US$218 million.
That’s a long-winded way of getting us to the Guerrero influence in all of this. The uncertainty of Vlad’s contractual future with the Jays is driving not just the narrative, but the front office’s ability to paint Toronto as an attractive landing spot for winning-minded players.
Why doesn’t the top echelon of players want to latch on to the bundles of Rogers cash? It’s complicated, but has nothing to do with Canadian taxes or the Canadian dollar (all big leaguers are paid in U.S. currency, after all).
Instead, it comes down to winning. With so many suitors for the high-end free agents, players can look beyond the riches coming their way. Given most of these deals are seven years or longer, there is a priority in the minds of most free agents to go to a team that has a solid prospect of competing for multiple World Series titles. Many players are doing their own handicapping before deciding on their new home.
And the perception around this year’s class is that if the Jays can’t even lock up their one bona fide superstar — Guerrero — how optimistic can the team’s future be?
The fact that the front office has had its struggles building around Guerrero with the addition of a big bat has been an ongoing saga for two-plus years and, as such, a high-voltage warning sign to other free agents on the market this winter. Some of the volume on that narrative turned down on Jan. 20 when the team agreed to a five-year, US$92.5-million deal with former Orioles slugger Anthony Santander.
“Anthony is about as good of a fit as we can find,” Atkins said of the outfielder, who hit 44 homers for the Orioles in 2024. “Putting the ball in the seats (regularly), his ability to do damage on a nightly basis is exactly what were were looking for and a great addition to the lineup.”
Without a long-term deal with Guerrero, however, the Santander signing looms as a short-term fix rather than salvation for the retooling team.
It’s not exaggerating to suggest what happens between now and Guerrero’s arbitrarily imposed mid-February deadline could notably direct the immediate future of the franchise, if it hasn’t already.
The potential remains for things to get ugly should the Jays struggle on the field once again. The social media-driven narrative associated with Guerrero’s plight spreads far and wide. There is already speculation as to where he would end up, if not the Jays, most notably suggestions that the division-rival Boston Red Sox are enthused about the idea.
That will continue in 2025. The Jays may as well erect a circus tent when they visit AL East rivals such as the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees, where large media contingents will converge on Guerrero.
Zooming out, the uncertainty surrounding the team’s lone game-changing superstar creates angst within the team’s clubhouse. Players such as starting pitcher Kevin Gausman signed with the Jays because they wanted to be part of a winning team and saw Guerrero as a big part of such aspirations.
“I’m sick of the talent talk,” Gausman said in an interview with Postmedia in the final month of the 2024 season. “We’re so talented, this and that. We’ve got to start winning games. I’m only getting older. (Fellow starter Chris Bassitt) is only getting older. If we want it to happen with this group, it has to happen soon. So, what are we going to do?”
Signing Guerrero to a long-term extension would be a good place to start.
How a breakout 2024 season changed things
If the Jays front office had reason to question the fiscal wisdom of a long-term, hundreds-of-millions-of-dollars extension to Guerrero, it would have come following the 2023 season.
There were nagging injuries and health concerns. There were struggles at the plate. And at times there was a lethargic feel to Guerrero’s play as he had yet to consistently regain the brilliance he showed in his breakout 2021 campaign.
From that standpoint, perhaps the Jays would have been justified in their apparent hesitancy to lock the still-developing star up at that time.
In the meantime, to his credit, Guerrero recognized his need to be better and took control of his fitness and, by extension, his career. Working with Tampa-based personal trainer Nicole Gabriel, he reported to spring training 2024 in the best shape of his life.
“I know what I can do. I know what type of player I am,” Guerrero said in an interview with Postmedia in the Jays’ Dunedin, Fla. clubhouse on the final day of spring training last year. “And I know that if I prepare myself the way I have to, I can put up great numbers.”
How prescient those comments were as a winter of hard work soon paid off handsomely. Guerrero activated superstar mode in the weeks and months ahead, unleashing a season in which he recorded a career-high batting average of .323 while displaying his versatility by appearing in 159 of the team’s 162 games. He also put up career highs in hits (199) and doubles (44) while belting 30 home runs, reaching that plateau for the third time in his career.
“It’s simple,” Guerrero said. “If you want to be the best player, you have to think that you’re the best player. That’s the way I always think.”
Whether it was maturation or frustration with not living up to what Guerrero and his many supporters felt he was capable of, he responded. His ability to mash a baseball was once again in evidence as he led the American League in hard-hit balls (defined as anything higher than 95 miles per hour) with 287. That was 25 more than runner-up Soto at 262. The only player in baseball with more was National League leader Ohtani with 288. That’s the type of elite hitting company Guerrero kept last season.
Guerrero’s physical transformation has been ongoing and notable. Working with Gabriel again this off-season, images posted to the trainer’s Instagram account show an athlete who may be even stronger than he was a year ago.
“My plan is to every year get better physically,” Guerrero said in our interview before last season. “A lot better.
“Baseball teaches you a lot, especially when you don’t prepare yourself for a season the way you should. Baseball will let you know that.”
It certainly sounded as if Guerrero was essentially admitting that perhaps the 2022 and 2023 seasons got the better of him. Not that he ever took anything for granted, but with a looming major payday and unrealized potential, it was time to buckle down.
“It’s important to me to be the best,” Guerrero said. “Not just for me, but for my family and for the organization.”
What is Guerrero worth?
In the frenzied free agency world of professional baseball, all of a sudden there seems to be no ceiling to the value of the top-end players. The goalposts continue to shift, further exacerbating the Jays’ perceived misplay of not locking up Guerrero earlier in his career.
So, what is he worth on the open market? It depends on the number of suitors and their means, but if Guerrero has a season somewhere in the range of his 2024 offensive output, the soon-to-be-26-year-old would surely garner offers significantly higher than the US$340 million he said the Jays offered him this winter.
I know who I am, and I know my value.
Vlad Guerrero Jr.
How high will it go? In Guerrero’s mind, at least US$100 million higher, but it isn’t a stretch to suggest his price tag would venture into the $500-million range over 10 years or more.
“I know who I am, and I know my value,” Guerrero said last summer on a rare occasion when he even acknowledged his looming free agency.
More importantly, of course, is what the Blue Jays believe he’s worth. Do they think he’s overvalued or did they just misplay the market by letting Guerrero’s contractual situation get to this precipice? This is a front office that notoriously sticks to its internal valuations of players and rarely yields to irrational temptation.
But sometimes a player’s value extends beyond the boxscore. From a business perspective, for example, what would a world without Vlad look like for the Jays financially?
A two-year renovation project of the Rogers Centre that cost more than $400 million has come with more expensive seats and demands to keep revenue up. As the Jays’ season veered off the rails this past summer, attendance dipped to an average of 33,102 for 2024. That was still the third highest in the American League, but a slide of more than 4,000 per game from the previous season.
The steady decline in performance over the past few seasons, plus frustration with the front office, has certainly ratcheted up the angst of a free-spending fan base that has been wildly loyal for close to a decade. So, what if attendance drops by another 10,000 per game, which is not out of the question if the team starts slow? There are enough indicators that Jays fans are in a wait-and-see mode before they spend on expensive tickets this winter, which further heightens the urgency for management to make Guerrero the showpiece of the future.
Season-ticket holders have already endured a significant bump in prices — as much as 25 per cent in some categories from 2023 to 2024 — though the increases have been less than five per cent in most sections this winter.
The difficulty going forward, of course, is that the market sets the price, not the Blue Jays. Guerrero is well aware of the money the team was willing to spend on Ohtani and Soto and isn’t about to be bullied by a lowball offer.
What has changed?
Over time, Guerrero’s assertions of his desire to be in Toronto for an extended portion of his career have been consistent, if not exuberant. At best, his comments offer plenty for interpretation. At worst, they hint at a frustration with the team’s current management, a feeling that likely has deepened the closer he has moved to free agency.
“I’d love to be in Toronto,” Guerrero said this past July. “My family loves Toronto. My kids love Toronto. But at the end of the day, it’s a business. We all need to understand that. So, whatever happens, happens.”
Ah, yes, we all need to understand that — words that may as well have been directed at the front office and the potential for an eventual dissolution of the partnership. Nobody doubts that Guerrero loves the city and its fans. In a conversation late in the season, he spoke of his ability to walk around the city largely unbothered, and how much his two daughters enjoy Canada for the months they are here. But there are larger issues at play and a lot of nice baseball cities in North America.
On the other side, Jays management has decidedly toned down the enthusiasm it once willingly heaped upon Guerrero. At his season-ending news conference, Shapiro was noncommittal when asked whether the team viewed its first baseman as a generational player.
“Generational player? Like, what’s your definition of that?” Shapiro said. “I’m not sure. He certainly has the opportunity to be a generational player and how young he is. But to make that decree at 26 years old (which Guerrero will be in March) … he has the opportunity to be a generational player.”
Atkins was even more vague when asked about the threat of losing Guerrero and shortstop Bo Bichette to free agency following the 2024 season.
“Well, we’re prepared for anything that can happen to us,” Atkins said. “If you’re asking what does that mean to our organization, we have to continue to think about what’s best for us to win.”
Gone are the days when the Jays seemed like the darlings of MLB, a big-spending team with such a bright future that it attracted stars from all around. Paired with extensive renovations at the Rogers Centre stadium in Toronto and at the team’s Player Development Complex in Dunedin, Fla., the attraction grew further.
Some of that shine has diminished, given the team’s recent performances.
Earlier in his career, the Jays handled Guerrero with great attention and care as a team would with a player who has such a bountiful upside. From those days to the present, he is the most important asset of Atkins’ tenure with the Jays. How the rest of it unfolds could be critical to the GM’s future with the team.
The case against Vlad
As with many elite players in any professional sport, the path to stardom has not been a straight line for Guerrero. His uneven career arc is in part due to youth — for as accomplished as he is, it wouldn’t be a stretch to suggest that the peak years are to come for the still youthful slugger.
So, why have the Jays been reluctant to lock up Guerrero long-term? Again, it’s complicated, given some of the growing pains Guerrero has endured as the face of a young team that as recently as three years ago many around baseball felt would be a serious contender for multiple seasons going forward.
Are those growing pains at the root of the Toronto front office’s reluctance to get Guerrero contractually secured before free agency arrives?
Perhaps there is a sense from Shapiro, Atkins and the number-crunchers in the Jays’ vast analytics department that Guerrero isn’t actually a generational player.
Accounting for the vagueness to such a grandiose handle, Shapiro’s most recent public comments on Guerrero’s status with the team and in the game raised some eyebrows. Guerrero may not be a generational player, but he is an excellent one who may just be settling into his most productive years as he continues to mature.
On one hand, Jays management’s commitment to being meticulous in its valuations of players is a responsible way to run a professional sports franchise. On the other, the moment they let Guerrero walk for nothing would be the day they start looking for his replacement. To do so could go down as one of the great blunders in franchise history, which is saying something.
Highlight reel
They are the flashpoint moments of a franchise that, for going on a decade, seemed destined and determined to be built around a Dominican prodigy with Hall of Fame pedigree.
There was the time in his sensational 2018 minor league season with the Double A New Hampshire Fisher Cats that Guerrero rocketed a home run off a window in the hotel beyond the centre field wall at the team’s Manchester, N.H. home stadium. That was one of the first of many viral moments that would follow his career.
There was his coming-out party at the MLB All Star Game in Cleveland in 2019, when Guerrero finished second to the Mets’ Pete Alonso in the Home Run Derby but almost stole the show as a 20-year-old when he belted 91 home runs in the contest.
There were his first two big-league homers in San Francisco earlier that year, both in a May 14, 2019, game against the Giants. It was a celebration for those in the organization who had been championing him so long. The first was measured at a whopping 438 feet, and the followup was more prodigious, travelling 451 feet with an exit velocity off his back clocked at 113.74 miles per hour.
“He’s that good,” then-manager Charlie Montoyo said at the time. “He could carry a team if he gets hot. I don’t want to put that much pressure on him, but that’s the No. 1 prospect in baseball. He can do stuff like that.”
Along the way, Guerrero has provided all the feels for a franchise that was enjoying a rebirth with its fans standing like a proud parent watching his rapid development.
Before long, Guerrero wasn’t just a hit in Toronto and across Canada as his star power transcended the sport. His popularity in Toronto has long been off the charts, even through the highs and lows of his performance. According to MLB figures released last summer, he was 12th in jersey sales among all big-league players.
All about control
Baseball is unique in professional sports in that the word “control” is part of the contractual lexicon for young players, as noted in our explanation of the free agency process.
The Jays under Shapiro and Atkins have been notoriously reluctant to offer such extensions to players in their own developmental pipeline. While it’s true that in recent years the team has shopped aggressively in free agency, the Toronto front office is on the brink of allowing Guerrero and fellow homegrown star Bichette walk in free agency.
From Guerrero’s perspective, however, the concept of control takes on a different meaning.
“I control what I can control and whatever happens after that, I can’t control,” he said during the 2024 season.
Somewhat ironically, then, Guerrero is clearly the party who holds more potent cards. He persevered through the challenges of establishing himself as a major-leaguer, made fitness a priority, and matured as both a player and as a clubhouse leader.
And now, with the free agent dollars being spent wildly, he’s in a position to call his own shots, putting all the pressure on the Jays’ front office to extend him with a contract that likely would be four times more than the organization has ever paid a player.
The harsh reality of baseball’s current economic climate is that there is very little incentive for Guerrero — or most superstars — to sign a long-term extension just a year away from free agency. The Jays missed their opportunity to do so, and now Guerrero holds all the cards.
Like father, like son?
The circumstances are vastly different, and baseball is a significantly changed game from how it was when Vlad Guerrero Sr. played his final game in Montreal on Sept. 14, 2003.
The elder Guerrero had a different build and a different approach at the plate than his son, but both have proven to be all-star talents at their craft.
The iconic picture from a year earlier — of Guerrero Sr. and Jr. doffing their caps to the Olympic Stadium crowd — has been an endearing image throughout young Vlad’s rise from a teenager with enticing upside to an elite superstar. The image linking the two to Canadian MLB teams received plenty of play when Guerrero Jr. made his Blue Jays debut in 2019, and speaks to the father-and-son connection both hold dear.
“He’s been playing baseball since he was three years old, practising with me in Montreal,” Guerrero Sr. said in an interview way back in 2018. “In Montreal, he would use my bat, and it was like a 32-ounce bat, and he would hit with that even back then. He’s always been working hard to be the best.”
And now for the next parallel between the two Guerreros. Though Guerrero Sr.’s exit from Canada at age 28 was long expected by Expos fans, given the state of the franchise and the poor attendance at the time, it was still seen as a blow to the sport in this country.
Will his son follow the same path at 26? We’re about to find out.