Blue Jays Trade 3 Pitchers for Steven Matz

The Toronto Blue Jays have traded Josh Winckowski, Sean Reid-Foley, and Yennsy Diaz to the New York Mets for Starting Pitcher Steven Matz.

Matz, who is 29, is yet another player the Jays are betting on to have a bounce-back season in 2021. In just nine games in 2020 (six of which were starts), the numbers were not good. He went 0-5 with a 9.68 ERA.

That’s not the pitcher the Jays are expecting to have in 2021. In 2019, Matz went 11-10 and had a 4.21 ERA. He was able to eat up 160 innings that season, something the Jays would be beyond thrilled if he could do this upcoming season.

The key to Matz’s success is the ability to throw strikes. He had 153 strikeouts in 2019 and 152 in 2018. He is one of the best strike throwers in MLB and will have to be aggressive and get hitters behind in counts to be most effective.

The Jays didn’t give up a ton in this trade, as all three prospects were not high on the Jays prospect rankings.

Matz only has one year left on his contract, making a very reasonable $5,200,000 this season. This is a low-risk deal that could have landed the Jays a useful starter at the back-end of their rotation.