Jose Bautista isn’t going to back off his contract demands

“To me, it’s not a cloud”, Atkins said.

Many assumed that Bautista was saying he asked for less, but Jon Heyman of MLB Network reports that Bautista’s camp actually asked for more, in both years and dollars.

To contextualize, over the past five seasons, the Blue Jays have paid Bautista $64 million.

YANKEES HAVE MONEY TO BURN: While this offseason of avoiding free agents at all costs was refreshing for some Yankees fans, don’t expect it to continue forever.

It does, however, increase their chances of negotiating with Bautista at a more reasonable level, assuming his current demands do not already rest there.

He spent the last three seasons with the Blue Jays and led them in innings pitched each time. We discuss what Bautista is worth (13:04), what he means to the Blue Jays (15:15), and why these negotiations matter for the future of the team (17:00). “I think I’ve proved myself, and the question has been asked – what will it take – and I’ve given them an answer”, Bautista said. But that’s not how contracts work, making it completely unfair and irrational to say he signed a hometown discount. “There’s a lot of trade rumours, there’s a lot of trade discussions; we have them constantly”.

“I did not go to them”.

“I think I signed a very lucrative deal that I was compensated very fairly at the time for my production”. “He’s in a great shape and he’s still a productive player but there is no way Mark and Ross are going to pay a player a $30 million AAV through his age-40”.

“As far as my expectations go, I didn’t really know who he was”, admits manager John Gibbons now. Now, it’s in the Blue Jays’ hands to decide if they want to meet that asking price. Bautista was well-prepared and armed with impressive numbers that include what he cited as an $800-million bump in share value for Rogers Communications that corresponds to the Blue Jays’ stretch run. Instead, it turned into one of the best deals in club history. At $13 million per year, this contract has been a steal for a player who has averaged 38 home runs the last six seasons and is as popular as Bautista.

Using the contract comparisons offer a more fruitful look at the situation as it’s realistically impossible to build a monetary argument on a year-to-year situation using WAR/$.

We have about 10 months to worry about Bautista’s potential free agency and by that time, Toronto may have locked him up to a long-term deal, one in which they caved and signed him.

With stars like Bautista, reigning AL MVP Josh Donaldson, Edwin Encarnacion, and 2015 trade acquisition Troy Tulowitzki, the Blue Jays appear fit to contend for a second straight AL East pennant in 2016.