Bautista Trade Rumors – Blue Jays Looking For Pitchers, Mets Need To Be Creative

Nick Carfardo’s report today in the Boston Globe gave another piece of clarity to Jose Bautista trade market. According to Carfardo the Blue Jays are looking for two starting pitchers and they are willing to move Bautista and Encarncion to make that happen.

As it goes for the Mets, if Harvey was healthy, moving a starter wouldn’t be a problem. However, the Mets find themselves down a starter and moving one would be difficult. As it goes for the Mets and problems. I am in the camp that if it took Jon Niese for Bautista or Montero/Gee with Ike Davis for Encarncion/Bautista, I still think I would pull the trigger. It also goes without saying that just Niese for Bautista or Montero/Gee with Davis won’t be enough. If something like this were to happen, there would need to be some eating of salary on the Mets end and additional lower prospects with high ceilings but are far away from the majors (which happens to be what the Mets are full of). At the end of the day, the Jays are looking for pitching and they also need to retool their farm system, which is something the Mets could help with.

There were multiple reports today about the Mets could be timid in the free agent market as other teams are going to be aggressive on salaries. If that is the case, the Mets will need to be more creative in trades and how they reorganize the pieces they have (which is similar to the reports from the start of the GM Meeting).

For the Mets this off-season is looking more and more like which piece falls into place first. Who ever is acquired or moved at the start will dictate all of the following moves, which is probably why Sandy Alderson is targeting 16 players.