Blue Jays shore up middle infield with nifty Diaz deal

At the outset of the offseason one of the Toronto Blue Jays’ most obvious needs was middle infield help. When they decided to non-tender Ryan Goins on Friday that appeared to become more acute, but less than an hour after his departure was announced, there was a new shortstop in town by the name of Aledmys Diaz.

The former St. Louis Cardinal is an intriguing acquisition because his value is difficult to peg. Last year he hit just .259/.290/.392 and earned a mid-season demotion to Triple-A while posting negative defensive metrics. In 2016, however, he was a National League All-Star who hit .300/.369/.510 with a .312 BABIP that suggested his luck was good, but not the driving force of his production.

It’s hard to say exactly what to expect from here, but the smart money is that he’s somewhere in the middle. Not a fantastic hitter, but not an utter black hole who will cost you some runs in the field. That doesn’t sound like the most exciting profile, but a cheap middle infielder who projects roughly as a league-average hitter is nothing to sneeze at. Diaz’s game is kind of like what Rob Refsnyder’s was supposed to be — but decidedly wasn’t — for the Blue Jays last season. As insurance and bench support for the oft-injured duo of Troy Tulowitzki and Devon Travis, Toronto could do much worse.

Going the other way is outfield prospect J.B. Woodman, the team’s 28th-ranked prospect by MLB Pipeline. Woodman has pedigree as the 57th overall pick of the 2016 draft, but his results in the minor leagues haven’t been eye-popping yet. The outfielder out of Ole Miss hit a solid .297/.391/.445 across two levels in his debut season, but just .240/.320/.378 at Single-A Lansing in 2017, where he was old for the league.

The outfielder turns 23 on Dec. 13, meaning he needs to move fast to avoid falling off the map as a prospect. Also not helping is the fact he’s struck out more than 30 percent of the time at every level so far and his top concern coming into the draft was his hitting. Before calling him a lost cause, though, it’s worth noting that he’s a strong athlete who could hold up in centre field and there’s some power in his bat. No one has a better history of turning little-known college draftees into key contributors than the Cardinals, so perhaps he’s landed in the perfect place.

At first glance this looks like a coup for the Blue Jays, who get someone who’s had success at the big-league level for a lottery ticket. There’s a chance that giving up on Woodman could come back to bite them, but that doesn’t seem probable at this point.

Really, the worst case scenario is that Diaz has lost all of his 2016 magic and he’s essentially a replacement-level player. The Cardinals wouldn’t have made this deal unless they thought that was a strong possibility. Even if it comes to pass, he’s still arguably an upgrade on the offensively-anemic Goins with a league-minimum price tag.

If he finds even a fraction of his All-Star form then this trade is a steal. Diaz is just 27 and doesn’t become arbitration eligible until 2020 and is under team control through 2022. If there’s any kind of bounce-back the Blue Jays get to reap the rewards for a long time. If not, the investment is modest.

With Tulowitzki and Travis topping Toronto’s depth chart, the club needed the type of player who wouldn’t steal their jobs, but could fill in for extended periods if necessary. Diaz is exactly that kind of guy and brings a sprinkling of long-term upside at a very reasonable cost — both in terms of salary and prospect capital.

Friday’s deal won’t go down as the biggest move of the Blue Jays’ offseason, but there’s no doubt it’s a nifty one.