NO DEAL: Guerrero headed for free agency after Blue Jays contract deadline passes

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It was the summer of 2018 when the “We want Vladdy” signs first started appearing at Rogers Centre, an early welcome to the then-teenager expected to be the future of the franchise.

Now just short of seven years, six seasons and 160 big-league home runs later, Vlad Guerrero Jr. is destined to wave goodbye. The face-of-the-franchise all-star made that clear on Tuesday morning when he announced that he has cut off negotiations on a multi-year extension with the Blue Jays and is thus on the path toward free agency following the 2025 season.

As inevitable as this result seemed, it’s still a stunning blow to a fan base that felt Guerrero would be the centrepiece of a team that would eventually be a World Series contender. Instead, the turmoil around the last-place Jays has accelerated, both among fans and the players on a team looking to contend.

As beholden as the front office is to its precious in-house valuations, the dithering that has turned to potential disaster on the Guerrero front may go down as one of the greatest bungles in the history of Toronto professional sports franchises.

Worse, the situation has shown borderline disdain for a fan base that has remained loyal to the tune of more than 2.6 million visitors to the Rogers Centre to watch a 74-win season in 2024. It has been a while since that licence-to-print-money constituency has been so riled.

While Guerrero won’t technically reach free agency until November, he made it clear to Jays management that he would not discuss a contract extension beyond Tuesday’s opening of full-squad spring training workouts at the team’s base in Dunedin, Fla. That was the deadline he set following last season’s final game.

And when he met reporters in Dunedin on Tuesday morning, the fan-favourite all-star didn’t pull any punches at a front office that fell well short of what he was demanding — infuriated the fan base in the process. More than once, Guerrero mentioned that 29 other teams will be under consideration for his services as he moves into the prime years of his career in 2026. And then he delivered a zinger when asked what he would be looking for in free agency: “A winner.”

Of course, the team he appears to be leaving hasn’t won a playoff game since 2016, a clear shot fired at a front office that has already had difficulty landing players considered to be among the top tier of free agents.

General manager Ross Atkins told reporters in Dunedin that he wasn’t “comfortable” talking about numbers, but that the team wasn’t close enough — before offering a baffling description of what close means. He didn’t exactly inspire confidence when he told reporters that “you have to stay disciplined to the fact that we are running a business.” This is the same front office, remember, that reportedly offered more than $1 billion (in Canadian currency) to Shohei Ohtani and Juan Soto.

Atkins defended the Jays position by saying the money they offered Guerrero would have been record-setting — later clarifying that it would be the most money ever paid to a Jays player. The GM was at his befuddling best (or worst) on Tuesday, a performance that isn’t exactly playing well.

The list of potential suitors for Guerrero in free agency will be long and include some heavyweights. Already, the division rival Boston Red Sox have been listed as a front-runner — and what a kick to the gut that would be to have Jays fans watch Guerrero belt home runs out of Fenway Park.

Guerrero told reporters that money was at the root of their inability to reach an agreement, adding that it’s part of the business. He said his last discussion with the team came Monday at about 10:30 p.m. and when asked if the Jays offered close to what he wanted, the answer was a flat-out “no.”

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As for the deadline he set, Guerrero told reporters he didn’t want negotiations to be a distraction for his teammates as the season unfolds. And now Guerrero has to put aside the distraction and begin preparing for what could be his final 162 games with an organization that signed him as a 16-year-old.

He told reporters that the prospect of reaching free agency is a significant motivation for him heading into this season. No doubt, the desire to prove his current employers wrong is up there as well.

Barring a change of heart — plus a huge influx of Rogers Communications cash and Guerrero’s willingness to listen to future offers — the development threatens to turn the long-term future of the team into turmoil. It certainly further undermines the work of Atkins and team president Mark Shapiro. The seeming indifference to keeping Guerrero around has been a dominant story since the team took him to arbitration (and lost) a little more than a year ago.

From his teenage years, to his rapid rise through the Jays’ farm system, to his mammoth 48-homer season in 2021, being a Blue Jay for life always seemed to be in the script for Guerrero. Now it has turned into a saga, which is not surprising given the front office has steamed toward this inevitability for a while now.

rlongley@postmedia.com