The calendar has turned to May, and that means it's officially a three-month sprint to the Major League Baseball trade deadline.
The Toronto Blue Jays were stuck in last place at the deadline a year ago, and that forced them to become sellers. They hope to avoid a similar fate this season, but the early returns have been a mixed bag.
Though the Jays are tied for third place in the American League East, there's enough time to dig themselves out of whatever minimal hole they currently find themselves in. But the elephant in the room is that they have chips to sell that they could get nice returns for at the deadline.
Right now, Chris Bassitt looks like Toronto's best trade chip. He's got a 2.62 ERA in six starts this season, with 39 strikeouts in 34 1/3 innings, and he's a rental, so teams wouldn't necessarily have to pay crazy prospect hauls to get him.
On Thursday, Athlon's Sam Bernardi came up with a hypothetical trade that would ship Bassitt to the Chicago Cubs for top catching/first base prospect Moisés Ballesteros and right-handed pitching prospect Brody McCullough.
"Toronto has limped out of the gates, going 14-16, and faces an uphill battle to the postseason even in a relatively weak American League. Should Bassitt wind up on the trading block, Chicago should be one of the first callers," Bernardi wrote.
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"Toronto has not gotten enough production from its starting catcher, Alejandro Kirk (.239 batting average, .610 OPS, 74 OPS+). It also lacks top catching prospects, and Ballesteros would flip that narrative around."
Ballesteros is a 21-year-old native of Venezuela who has been crushing the ball at Triple-A to begin the season. With a 1.055 OPS and 40 hits in 25 games, he looks as though he might be a candidate for promotion before the Cubs can consider moving him.
Obviously, the Blue Jays' preference is to stay in contention and hang onto Bassitt. But getting Ballesteros to be a good offensive catcher for them for six years wouldn't be a bad Plan B.
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