That nose.
Andy Martino of the NY Daily News reports that the Jays could have had Jon Niese for the same price they paid for RA Dickey. I don't find that incredibly hard to believe, given how much better Dickey has been over the last three years, which may as well be Niese's whole career. Naturally, Niese is a good twelve years younger than Dickey, and is signed through the 2016 season, with two club options (Dickey had one year left on his deal at the time of the trade).
Ricky Romero, Clay Buchholz, Jon Lester, Yovanni Gallardo, and now Chris Sale (among others), are signed to 5-year deals, worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $30MM; the Mets got a nice price on Niese, locking him up for $25.5MM over 5 years. I don't think I'd give up quite the same package for Niese as the Jays did for Dickey (the catchers coming back would probably be unnecessary, too), but I don't think it would be too far off.
Elsewhere, it looks as though Brett Lawrie is going to skip the WBC, thanks to an oblique issue. It's the left side, which isn't the side that he injured last year, causing him to miss two months of the season. He told reporters that he's more worried about being ready for the season. This is obviously a pretty huge blow to Team Canada and their already-slim chances of moving forward in the tournament, but Lawrie says that his main priorities lie with being healthy for the Jays to start the season.
Lawrie is likely to miss 2-3 weeks, which should give him a final week or so of spring training to get sharp.
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