Blue Jays acquire Bieber from Guardians, catching prospect from Padres

TORONTO -- The Blue Jays made a pair of deals earlier Thursday before their Trade Deadline buzzer-beater with the Twins, acquiring former Cy Young Award winner Shane Bieber from the Cleveland Guardians and catching prospect Brandon Valenzuela from the Padres.

Bieber, 30, has been working his way back from Tommy John surgery and has made four rehab starts already, most recently a four-inning outing in Double-A on Tuesday. The Blue Jays will still need to work Bieber through the final stages of that rehab, but the upside here is absolutely significant.

“Obviously, the guy has been elite and performed really well on really big stages,” said GM Ross Atkins. “He has been the best pitcher in the game at certain points. That was important to us, raising our potential and raising our bar.”

The price reflects that, too, as the Blue Jays have sent their No. 5 prospect, Khal Stephen, to the Guardians in the deal, one of their breakout pitchers in 2025. To acquire Valenzuela -- ranked by MLB Pipeline as the Padres' No. 26 prospect -- Toronto sent infielder Will Wagner to San Diego.

TRADE DETAILS
Blue Jays get: RHP Shane Bieber
Guardians get: RHP Khal Stephen (No. 5 prospect, set to become CLE No. 7)

TRADE DETAILS
Blue Jays get: C Brandon Valenzuela (Padres' No. 26 prospect)
Padres get: INF Will Wagner

When Bieber’s been healthy, he has been one of the best starters in Major League Baseball and picked up that Cy Young Award in the shortened 2020 season with a 1.63 ERA over 77 1/3 innings. He’s done it over full seasons, too, including a spectacular ‘22 in which he gave the Guardians a 2.88 ERA over an even 200 innings.

This is what the Blue Jays are hoping to capture here, and it only gets more interesting when you consider Bieber’s player option for 2026 is worth $16 million. A strong finish could make free agency awfully attractive for Bieber, but if there’s a way for the Blue Jays to keep him around, either via that player option or with an extension -- similar to what happened after they dealt for José Berríos in 2021 -- then this deal really gets exciting.

In the moment, though, the immediate upside is obvious. If the Blue Jays were to deal for a starting pitcher, the only logical moves were ones that landed them an arm who has the potential to start legitimate postseason games. The Blue Jays have solid depth through their current starting five, but this Trade Deadline has been all about raising their ceiling and Bieber represents that in every way. Reports out of his rehab starts have been encouraging, too, and he should only need a couple more before returning to the big leagues.

“It will be hard to surpass his ceiling and what he has accomplished, so just getting him back to his potential would be doing exceptionally well for us,” Atkins said. “That’s what we’ll focus on with him and we’re really, really glad that he’s here.”

This could eventually lead to a logjam in the rotation, but that’s a great problem to have. The Blue Jays could also entertain some spots where they shift to a six-man rotation down the stretch -- even if it’s only for one or two turns -- but nothing about this is prohibitive for John Schneider, Pete Walker and the staff.

Bieber will join the Blue Jays on Friday in Toronto to meet the staff and chart out a plan, but he may need only one or two more rehab starts before making his Blue Jays debut. All eyes are on October, though, when Bieber could be starting one of the Blue Jays’ early games in a potential American League Division Series.

Kevin Gausman has looked like his old self lately, flashing the talent that could make him the Blue Jays’ Game 1 starter in the postseason, but beyond that, the order of Toronto’s rotation still feels murky. The coming two months will help with that, of course, and the Blue Jays will ride the hot hand from their deep group of Chris Bassitt, Max Scherzer, Berríos and Eric Lauer, but Bieber adds another element altogether.

In a smaller deal that followed soon after Bieber, the Blue Jays flipped Will Wagner, who was acquired as part of the package for Yusei Kikuchi at this time last year, to the Padres for 24-year-old catching prospect Valenzuela.

“We added depth to an area that we felt was important to have. He’ll go to Triple-A for us and support us there,” Atkins said. “He’s a switch-hitting catcher who we feel can help us on both sides of the ball. [This is] not just an area where we feel it protects us, we also feel he is a very good prospect.”

Wagner’s now-open roster spot should help to simplify what will still be a flurry of roster moves ahead of Friday’s series opener against the Royals.