Into the gap: Vlad Jr.’s value compared to expectations

There are a lot of confusing things about the Toronto Blue Jays season so far.

How did the entire bullpen end up getting injured? Are the hitters trying to avoid home runs? Why do people spend so much money to sit in the fancy new seats behind home base and then stare at their phones the entire game?

The biggest puzzle, however, is the Vlad Paradox. He’s an elite hitter, but also a disappointment. He plays the game with obvious joy, which is generally ideal, but can come across as a little insensitive when the team is struggling so much. And while he’s long been expected to give up his years of contractual control over the team after signing a massive long-term contract extension that will likely set a franchise record, that’s undoubtedly no longer a good idea.

So what should we make of Vladimir Guerrero Jr.?

First the good: After a terrible April, Guerrero was mostly excellent at the plate, an improvement somewhat obscured by the Blue Jays’ general malaise. His April OPS (.629) was only good enough for 48th in the American League, but he ranked 11th in May (.917) and 10th in June (.962).

His underlying numbers are even more impressive: His average exit velocity and hard hit percentage are near the top of the American League and in the 98th percentile according to Statcast data. These statistics are not far off his career highs.

But, and there’s a but: He just didn’t hit the home run numbers that people thought he would, especially compared to his hard-hitting peers. When he was a teenager – and one of baseball’s most promising young players – Blue Jays coaches talked about the way the ball bounced off his bat as if they had found a religious attitude. This kid had the makings of his Hall of Fame father, but he also had batting discipline. His potential was way up there.

He has only delivered on that promise once over a full season: in 2021, when the Blue Jays split their home games between Dunedin, Buffalo and Toronto, shortly after the 2020 season was shortened due to COVID. He hit 48 home runs with a 1.002 OPS and would have been AL MVP in any world that didn’t include Shohei Ohtani. Then he hit 32 home runs in 2022, 26 last season and 14 in 95 games in 2024. Will he hit 30 this season? Maybe.

Aside from the craziness of Aaron Judge and his 34 home runs, Vladdy is far from being included in the AL’s bomber class. That group includes eight other hitters with at least 20 home runs, four of whom are in the AL East. Guerrero is tied for 25th in the AL (with little Jose Altuve among others).

Examining the loss of his home run prowess – so rare for a hitter between the ages of 22 and 25 – has become a hobby in Toronto, but has produced no clear consensus. Jays coaches suspected that Guerrero tried to hit the ball higher after spring training, which led to his poor April. By focusing on hard contact instead, his natural power has returned. Essentially, he’s hitting more home runs by not trying to hit home runs.

But the wait for Guerrero to develop into the 2021 Masher of the Year and fulfill the fearsome promise of his teenage years has become endless. In his sixth major league season, there are many more signs that the rest of his prime years will go roughly as he showed this year: above-average hitting power on all fields, excellent on-base percentage and good run production when the guys ahead of him in the lineup get on base (which was largely not the case in 2024). If all goes well, he’s a 30-home-run, 100-RBI player. That’s highly desirable, and if it came from Davis Schneider, the Jays would feel like they struck gold. If it came from George Springer, they would feel like they got their money’s worth. From Guerrero, it feels like a consolation prize; not the dream house in Muskoka, but a washer-dryer set.

And that’s, like I said, pretty good. But is it worth the $300 million-plus mega-contracts that players like Rafael Devers, Corey Seager and Trea Turner have landed in recent years? Not long ago, the answer to Vlad would have been yes before the question was even finished. Now, it’s at least a question, and a certain Jays general manager, Ross Atkins, would likely respond with a series of ramblings that don’t even come close to a clear yes or no. If management was excited about giving such a deal to the key player on a team that should be contending for a championship, they would have done so already. Instead, there are reports that contract negotiations between the Jays and Camp Vlad are far apart.

All of this makes the remaining year before Guerrero is eligible for free agency a tricky one for Blue Jays fans. The player side has to assume that some team out there is going to give him the big prize. The Jays have almost certainly adjusted their spreadsheets from what they had planned a few seasons ago. Will they find common ground?

It would help everyone if he just hit a few more home runs.

Scott Stinson is a contributing writer for theScore.