Wait. What is the proposed trade?
The Pittsburgh Penguins directly for the Toronto Blue Jays?
Sorry Toronto. You will have to do better than that. Maybe if you still had Kawhi Leonard in the Raptors, we could talk. But for now, don’t you think you should at least throw out AHL marlies as a sweetener?
What about the CFL argonauts? They may be willing to sign Antonio Brown before he retires and bring him back to Pittsburgh! That would be … never mind.
No. Sending the five-time Stanley Cup Penguins champion to Toronto for the NHL playoffs “hockey at the center” is not ideal.
It’s also not ideal for Major League Baseball to have a Canadian team that Canada doesn’t want at the moment. But I guess that’s where this little exchange of sports boundaries comes into play in the covid-19 era.
The United States is not fit to host postseason hockey. So the Penguin Eastern Conference and NHL teams will be “bubbled” in Toronto for the playoffs. The Western Conference teams will be in Edmonton.
Meanwhile, Canada is not comfortable with a group of American baseball teams jumping across the border to play in Toronto. So the Blue Jays need a place to play. And, apparently, the Pirates are willing to lend PNC Park as a temporary home for the Blue Jays.
What about for Pirates other than being good neighbors and friendly partners within MLB circles? Who knows. Maybe nothing. But PNC Park may be home to two teams during a season’s 60-game sprint.
Unfortunately, neither of those teams broke the 70-win barrier last season. In fact, the Blue Jays finished with an even worse record (67-95) than the Pirates (69-93).
Oh! Could PNC Park host two last-place teams at once?
Rob Longley of the Toronto Sun doesn’t think so. He joined me for Wednesday’s “Breakfast With Benz” podcast, and he actually thinks the Blue Jays can improve significantly.
“The young core of position players on this team has a huge advantage,” Longley told me. “Bo Bichette, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Cavan Biggio. They showed some good signs as rookies last year. ”
Toronto also joined its pitching team with players like Hyun-Jin Ryu, Tanner Roark, and Chase Anderson.
Plus, with the Jays playing in the hybrid East Division, that means Baltimore and Miami will be in that group. So Toronto probably won’t be in the basement.
Longley also talks about how this potential partnership grew. Initially, most assumed that the Blue Jays would host games at their Dunedin spring training venue or at the minor league stadium in Buffalo. But apparently the players and management were pushing for a major league stadium due to the size of the park, the amenities, and the training space.
“Developing players in a minor league environment was not how they wanted to do it,” Longley said. “The players implored management to find an MLB stadium. They didn’t want to work in an environment where there were lower batting cages and weight and lighting rooms. If they were going to suffer from being displaced, they wanted to do it in a major league stadium. At that point, management took the ball and went to places that made sense geographically. And Pittsburgh made sense.
According to Longley, there are a few other factors besides geography that could make this goal happen.
• There are only seven conflicts in the schedule, and Longley says that four or five can be easily deleted.
• Longley says the Pirates general manager Ben Cherington, formerly vice president of Toronto baseball operations, has helped move the discussions forward. He has a close relationship with Blue Jays President and CEO Mark Shapiro.
• Longley even suggested that “images” of the PNC Park scenic background may be an added benefit from the broadcast perspective.
“What a delight it would be for fans in Canada to watch the games,” Longley said. “Anyone who has been to that stadium knows that it is one of the most spectacular parks in the entire MLB. As a ‘television studio’ for Blue Jays fans in Canada, I think it would work quite well. ”
You can listen to our entire conversation by clicking on the podcast link below. We go into other options that the Blue Jays may have besides Pittsburgh, the development of the former Pirates first-round pick Reese McGuire with his new franchise and how Toronto fans are reacting to this prospect.
Listen: Tim Benz and Rob Longley of the Toronto Sun talk about the possibility of the Blue Jays playing in Pittsburgh
Tim Benz is a writer for the Tribune-Review. You can contact Tim at [email protected] or via Twitter. All tweets can be republished. All emails are subject to publication unless otherwise specified.
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Pirates / MLB | Sports | Breakfast With Benz
