There are a lot of people who make their living in baseball who don't like how their product has evolved. After a club executive explains his team's rationale for making a move, making a sound argument based on value, I've sometimes asked: Do you like to watch your game, as a fan?
The waves of relievers? All the strikeouts, with the parade of hitters to and from the dugouts? The extended respites between moments of action? The record-setting number of teams that are simply non-competitive?
And often, the answer has been: "No, I hate it."
We should view the Toronto Blue Jays' signing of left-hander Hyun-Jin Ryu through this prism, rather than through an algorithm designed to measure per-dollar acquisition efficiency. By the 21st century standards of how signings are assessed, an $80 million investment over four years was probably a mistake, and more likely than not, the Blue Jays' baseball operations department will regret what is regarded as a high-risk deal.
Ryu will be 33 in the spring, and bearing a long injury history, he has reached 160 innings in one season among the past five. That sort of track record is why Dallas Keuchel was unsigned last March, why a lot of starting pitchers on the back nine of their respective careers have had to wait for offers. Risk-averse front-office analysts look at Ryu and they fret about wasting dollars on the injured list, for good reason.
Ryu has a reputation for an on-again, off-again relationship with conditioning, and because of shoulder and elbow trouble, he made a total of one start in the 2015 and 2016 seasons. After taking the ball consistently in the first four months of 2019, he seemed to fade down the stretch, enough to make evaluators wonder if Ryu tired under what was, for him, an unprecedented workload.
All of this means there are plenty of reasons for the Blue Jays and other clubs to steer around Ryu at those kinds of dollars. If Gerrit Cole was the perfect free-agent case for a starting pitcher, Ryu was perfectly imperfect.
But you know what? The Blue Jays will probably be better with Ryu on the days he pitches.
Are they as good as the Yankees or the Astros? Hell no -- not even close. They finished 29 games behind the second American League wild-card team last year, the Tampa Bay Rays, and if they cut that gap in half in 2020, that'll probably be an accomplishment.
But when they open their season against the Red Sox on March 26, in the Rogers Centre, there would seem to be a good chance their new ace will be on the mound and the Blue Jays will be more competitive against Boston because of it. When he makes his second start, perhaps in Yankee Stadium for New York's home opener April 2, Toronto will have a better shot at winning. Ryu makes them better.
Better. More competitive. More interesting.
These are elements of a simple concept that has slowly disappeared, as some front offices decided that if their team wasn't championship caliber or destined to become championship caliber, it was better to cash out -- to slash payroll and design a losing team, finish at the bottom of the standings and at the top of the draft order.
Some second-graders think along the same lines: If you're not going to win, flip the board and quit. Saves time and effort, right?
The strategy worked for the Astros, for sure, giving them access to talents such as Carlos Correa, Alex Bregman and others, and in the copycat world of professional sports, other teams followed their example, working to replicate Houston's success.
But while tanking is guaranteed to help an owner's bottom line, it also helped to create an all-or-nothing league and product. The Orioles went 47-115 in 2018, 54-108 last summer, and if they approach 60 wins in 2020, that'll probably be a shock. The Yankees beat them in 17 of 19 games, outscoring them 151-83, a differential of more than three runs per game. The 2019 Yankees were excellent, for sure, but when the Yankees and Orioles played, that was just bad baseball.
Unwatchable. There have been too many unwatchable games, and anybody who has worked in the game knows that. A lot of them say it, privately.
Last season, the Blue Jays had a rotation ERA of 5.25, which ranked 22nd in the majors. Since then, they have added Ryu, Tanner Roark and Chase Anderson, and they should be better. On a given day, they'll probably be more competitive.
Is there risk in the Ryu deal? Absolutely. Rogers Communications, which owns the Blue Jays, is apparently worth something north of $20 billion. It can afford Ryu, and can afford to make its team more watchable. More interesting. Not every team can afford to spend in the same way. Hopefully, the teams that can spend more will ditch the non-competitive behavior and do so, and improve a product that needs help.
Good for the Blue Jays. They're trying.