The Blue Jays have one of the more settled bullpens in baseball, but that doesn’t mean they should stop looking for another late-inning arm. Emilio Pagán fits the bill as well as almost anyone available this winter. The catch is that Toronto may not be able to offer him the role he wants.
Pagán declined his $10 million option for 2027 after a strong second half with the Reds, and he’s headed for free agency with a real chance to land a multi-year deal. For a Blue Jays club that already brings back each of its five most-used relievers from 2026, that creates an interesting question: do you add to a strength, even when the current group is already deep?
There’s a case for it. Toronto’s bullpen ranked 10th in relief pitcher fWAR, and the logic is simple enough - you can never really have too many trustworthy arms when games tighten up in October. The Brewers just showed how far a stacked relief group can carry a team, leaning on Aaron Ashby, Abner Uribe, and Trevor Megill all the way to a title.
Pagán would give John Schneider another high-leverage option, and the numbers back up the appeal. Over the past two seasons in Cincinnati, the 35-year-old has piled up 57 saves in 115 games while posting a 3.07 ERA and 3.2 bWAR. His 2026 season had a rough first half because of a hamstring injury - he was sitting on a 6.06 ERA - but he flipped the script after the All-Star break.
That turnaround was loud. Pagán went 3-0 with a 1.71 ERA, 29 SO in 26.1 IP and 18 SV in the second half, and sources said he finished with a strong chance of landing a multi-year contract. He also held hitters to a .189 batting average and posted a 28.7% strikeout rate after the break.
The price tag, at least according to MLB Trade Rumors, could be manageable: a projected two-year, $20 million deal. That’s the kind of number Toronto can work with. The bigger issue is the role.
Pagán is tied for eighth in saves over the last two years, and at this stage of his career there’s little reason to think he’d sign up for a lesser job unless he truly wanted to. Some team will almost certainly give him the ninth inning.
The Blue Jays already have Louis Varland locked into that lane after his heroic 35-save season, a performance that should put him in line for the AL’s Reliever of the Year award. If anything were to happen there, Tyler Rogers is the next man up, with 23 career saves of his own.
So the fit is obvious on paper and trickier in practice. Pagán looks like the right arm for Toronto. The real question is whether he’d accept a setup role for a contender, because that decision may be what determines whether the Blue Jays are actually in the mix.
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Blue Jays Prospects Could Shape Torontos Next Big Winter Move
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Among the players in that mix are Sean Keys and Nolan Perry, two prospects whose recent progress has put them squarely on the radar for different reasons. Some of the group could still carve out roles in Toronto, while others may be viewed more as trade pieces if the Jays decide the best path to improvement is to deal from their system again. [Read more 🡒]