3 former Blue Jays Ross Atkins can sign this winter to save the clubhouse

The Toronto Blue Jays have to make some serious moves this offseason if the front office wants to win over the clubhouse. The team is still trying to extend Bo Bichette and Vlad Guerrero Jr. before their contracts expire in 2025.

They need to put a competitive team together while also winning back the clubhouse. The best way to do this is to swoop up a few former Blue Jays in free agency. Adding a few of these top talents would win over the clubhouse and give the team a chance to succeed.

Luckily for Ross Atkins, there are a ton of talented former Blue Jays who are hitting the open market in a few months. He has the opportunity to add these players back to his roster in order to push for a playoff appearance in 2025.

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3. SP Yusei Kikuchi

At the trade deadline, the Blue Jays had a very clear plan. They were going to trade any of their expiring contracts to help rebuild their roster for next year. They would hold onto any player that had more than a year on their contracts, as they could be contributors to their playoff push in 2025.

One of the players that they traded away was starting pitcher Yusei Kikuchi, who was sent to the Houston Astros. Kikuchi has been great as an Astro, going 5-0 with a 3.00 ERA and a sub 1.00 WHIP in nine starts. He's going to be a big piece of their postseason rotation and he has the opportunity to play a hand in their 2024 World Series push.

But Kikuchi is still set to enter unrestricted free agency at the end of the season. The Blue Jays have the money that it takes to give him a multi-year contract to bring him back to Toronto as well. There's familiarity there, making it more likely that Kikuchi would consider a reunion.

The Blue Jays are going to need to go out and get a pitcher or two. If Atkins wants to win over the clubhouse, reuniting with a likable player like Kikuchi would be quite a good start.

2. SP Robbie Ray

The second player on this list is very similar to the first. Both are left-handed pitchers that have flashed brilliance in their MLB careers. The only difference is that this player has won a Cy Young award while a member of the Blue Jays.

Of course, I'm speaking of the 2021 AL Cy Young winner, Robbie Ray.

Ray has since left Toronto and undergone the daunting Tommy John surgery, successfully recovering and coming back from the surgery this season with the San Francisco Giants. While Ray hasn't looked exactly like the Cy Young winner from 2021, he's flashed that level of brilliance. He's walking batters at a slightly higher rate, but he's also not getting hit very often or very well.

The Blue Jays could reunite with Ray just a few short years after he won the Cy Young award with the team. If Atkins is interested in trying to win the clubhouse over, bringing back a leader like Ray would be a good start. He was one of the bigger leaders from the Blue Jays that won 90 games a few seasons ago.

1. OF Teoscar Hernandez

Many around baseball believed that the Blue Jays were making a mistake when they parted ways with outfielder Teoscar Hernandez. Hernandez ended up with the Los Angeles Dodgers, where he would put up one of the best offensive seasons of his entire career. This year, Hernandez is slashing .267/.335/.494 with 31 home runs, 31 doubles and 11 stolen bases. He has nearly 100 RBIs and an OPS+ well above league average. It's the kind of production that Toronto certainly could have used behind Guerrero this season.

But Hernandez is set to enter free agency this offseason and the Blue Jays have the perfect opportunity to bring him back for their playoff push next season.

The Blue Jays are likely to take a shot at Juan Soto in free agency, but if they come up short, which they're expected to, they will certainly have enough money to lure Hernandez back to Toronto. It would be one of the better reunion stories in the game.

Toronto is looking to make a 2025 postseason push. Adding Hernandez to the roster would certainly do that. They're also looking to win back the clubhouse and establish a better culture. Hernandez would help do both of these things, as well as exciting the fans again with the perfect reunion story.