The Toronto Blue Jays’ trade for Andrés Giménez on Tuesday was a case of the organization seizing the opportunity to acquire an impact player at a low ebb in his value.
Over the last three seasons, Giménez ranks 26th in the majors in fWAR, narrowly ahead of big names like Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, and Willy Adames. That ranking drops to 53rd over the past two seasons with his career year of 2022 removed, but he remained far more valuable than the average starter. In 2024 he slashed an awful .252/.298/.340 and was still a top-10 player at his position by fWAR.
It’s generally not easy to pry guys with that kind of overall value loose, but the Blue Jays were able to, thanks to the combination of a relatively sizeable contract with nearly $100 million left on it, and valid concerns about the trajectory of his offence:
The Blue Jays can run Giménez out in the middle of the diamond and be confident that he’ll be a valuable player almost regardless of how he hits. This is a guy who’s produced nine more defensive runs saved (43) than any player in the majors since 2022, and at 26, he’s in the middle of his physical prime. He’s also a plus base runner who’s stolen 60 bases and been caught just 11 times over the last two seasons. His floor is about as high as any player in the majors.
That’s all well and good, but if the Blue Jays can’t get a little more out of Giménez’s bat than he’s shown lately, they will have put a valuable trade chip against his acquisition — and reduced their financial flexibility in a critical off-season — just to further weaken an offence that ranked 23rd in runs last season.
In 2027 and beyond, when Giménez’s contract hits $23.57 million, it will be difficult for him to provide the Blue Jays value with defence-only profile. The Blue Jays would not have made this deal if they didn’t think he could hit better than he did last season.
That’s not a far-fetched assumption at first glance.
Giménez produced a 141 wRC+ just two seasons ago, and FanGraphs’ Steamer projection system has him putting up an above-average 103 wRC+ in 2025. If he hits that well while continuing to provide the same defensive impact he’s had in recent seasons, the Blue Jays can pat themselves on the back for this trade.
Before the back-patting begins, the barriers between Giménez and even league-average offence are worth acknowledging.
The second baseman is an extreme free-swinger. Since he came into the league, he’s one of 104 hitters to log more than 2,000 plate appearances. Just three of them have a lower walk rate than Giménez’s 5.1 per cent. He’s not quite in the Ernie Clement zone (2.4 per cent in 2024), but it’s a notable limitation.
Giménez compensates by making plenty of contact. His strikeout rate was in the 86th percentile in 2024 and the 74th the previous year.
This low-walk, low-strikeout profile means the hitter’s ability to make quality contact accounts for a large percentage of their offensive value — and that’s been an issue for Giménez.
In the metrics most closely associated with hitting the ball hard, the infielder faltered in 2024:
His expected wOBA on contact was .322, way below the MLB average (.368) and between Alejandro Kirk (.335) and Kevin Kiermaier (.310). One way to conceptualize Giménez offensively last season was Kirk without the walks, which is pretty grim.
An optimist might say that Giménez never hit the ball hard even when he excelled offensively in 2022, and that is true — although he was significantly better across the board even if he wasn’t approaching average:
His 2022 results also look fairly luck-aided. His BABIP of .353 was fifth among qualified hitters despite not hitting the ball hard, and the difference between his xwOBA (.326) and wOBA (.364) was large. Only eight hitters overperformed their wOBA by more that year.
None of this paints a glowing picture of Giménez’s offensive potential, but there are a couple of things that could help him mitigate his shortcomings.
The first is his speed.
Over the last three seasons, Giménez ranks in the top 10 in the majors in infield hits (55) and top five in bunt hits (17). His combined total between the categories (72) is bested by only Trea Turner and Jeremy Peña. That may not sound remotely exciting, but it is a repeatable skill for a left-handed hitter with 89th-percentile sprint speed — and it’s the type of production that often isn’t well captured by expected stats.
He also has a little pull-side pop. Giménez has a 170 wRC+ on balls to right field, which is respectable as the MLB average for balls to the pull side has exceeded that number just once since he came into the league. His 162-game average is 14 home runs, and he’s hit the odd impressive bomb, like his career-long (422 feet) tater off former teammate Corey Kluber:
Giménez’s career max exit velocity (110.2 m.p.h.) is in a similar realm to Davis Schneider (109.3 m.p.h.), Spencer Horwitz (108.1 m.p.h), Cavan Biggio (109.8 m.p.h.) and Danny Jansen (111.4 m.p.h.). At times the Blue Jays have had some success getting power production out of players like that with middling raw power but an inclination to pull the ball in the air.
It’s possible Giménez can try to follow that path, particularly considering he’s generally pulled the ball at an above-average rate…
… but there’s also risk in encouraging a fast player with unimpressive raw thump to elevate the ball. It’s possible Giménez would produce more by keeping his average launch angle low.
It’s hard to know what the Blue Jays see in Giménez’s bat on a more granular level, but the best argument for it is probably the most general one. The infielder has one elite offensive season under his belt, and he’s produced a 103 wRC+ in 2,148 MLB plate appearances. That’s a large sample of competence, even if there are reasons to doubt the greatest heights Giménez has reached.
He is not the middle-of-the-lineup presence the Blue Jays fanbase has been clamouring for, but a repeat of 2024 total offensive ineptitude seems unlikely.
Even if he falls below his career averages and projections, producing something more like his 2023 season (96 wRC+) that’s a solid outcome for Toronto. The 3.8 fWAR he put up that campaign would rank third among all seasons by Blue Jays position players over the past two years, behind just Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s 2024 and Bo Bichette’s 2023.
There’s no getting around the fact that Giménez is a glove-first player, but as long as he doesn’t regress into a pure defensive specialist, the Blue Jays are likely to be happy with the acquisition.
For the trade to be a steal, there would need to be a little magic tucked away in his bat that hasn’t seen the light of day recently — and if it’s in there, it’s pretty well hidden.
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