It's safe to say the Toronto Blue Jays are doing a really bad job with allowing contract negotiations with their players to hit the mainstream media. First it was Jose Bautista, now it's Edwin Encarnacion.
Both sluggers are entering the final year of their contracts, and many speculated the Jays would make a concerted effort to re-sign both of them due to their monumental contributions to the team over the past few years. However, that has yet to work out in either side's favor.
Encarnacion is the latest player to hit a wall in his negotiations with the club. He set an Opening Day deadline for those talks, so at this point it's not very promising a new deal is agreed upon.
"There is nothing new," Encarnacion said earlier today. "At the last meeting that took my attorney we did not reach any kind of agreement in terms of age. We have not spoken of sum [of money]. What is of more interest to us are the years and we did not get an agreement.
"Now I hope to finish my year, finish my healthy year and go to free agency. I do not rule out [an agreement] yet, but there is less chance that percentage is not made to be done."
The 33-year-old indicated he was hoping for a four- to five-year extension to remain with the Jays.
Encarnacion has yet to make his spring debut with the team due to an abscessed tooth, and now he'll be sidelined for an additional week after straining his side. However, that shouldn't a big deal because he's been one of MLB's most prolific power hitters over the past four seasons. Over that span he's scored 352 runs, belted 151 home runs and driven in 423 runs in a total of 567 games.
He's currently finishing up a six-year, $43 million deal he signed before the 2011 season back when Alex Anthopoulos was the team's general manager. He'll make $10 million this season, but his salary does not justify his offensive production for the team.
Since coming to Toronto in 2009, Encarnacion has accumulated a 20.5 WAR, including a career-high 5.0 WAR in 2012 and a 4.7 WAR last season.
I would imagine new president and CEO Mark Shapiro as well as general manager Ross Atkins aren't interested in paying Encarnacion, which comes as no surprise because they worked for the Cleveland Indians for a number of years and are frugal when it comes to rewarding players for their contributions.
The biggest contract that was handed out under Shapiro's watch in Cleveland (and the largest in the history of the franchise) was Travis Hafner's four-year, $57 million deal, which turned out to be an absolute disaster.
If the Jays' management fails to retain Bautista or Encarnacion, it's going to be a dreary 2017 for Toronto.
