George Springer turns 36 today.

Springer is in year five of a six-year $150 million contract. And it is likely his best year of the five. Last year, I thought he was playing his way out of baseball.

He’s moving up the Blue Jays leaderboards:

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23rd in bWAR for position players.

17th in home runs (tied with Josh Donaldson.

And likely first in huge smiles.

Happy Birthday, George.

Danny Valencia turns 41 today.

Valencia played parts of two seasons with the Jays, in the middle of a nine-year MLB career. The Jays traded Liam Hendriks and Erik Kratz to the Royals to get him near the deadline in 2014. He hit .240/273/.364 down the stretch for the Jays, playing primarily third base.

He started the 2015 season hitting .296/.331/.506 with 7 home runs in 58 games, but the team put him on waivers, and he was picked up by the A’s. The team put him on waivers because they decided that Ben Revere should play every day. Revere would hit .319/.354/.381 down the stretch and help the Jays make the playoffs.

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Valencia would play through the 2016 season with the A’s, then go on to play with the Mariners and the Orioles. In nine seasons, he hit .268/.317/.426 with 96 home runs in 864 games.

Happy Birthday, Danny.

Robinzon Diaz turns 42 today.

Diaz was one of the several catchers of the future who didn’t turn out to be catchers of the future.

(But, the reason we remember him is because we traded him to the Pirates for Jose Bautista, one of the best trades in team history. Jose would play ten seasons for the Jays and hit 288 home runs (and six in the playoffs, including the ‘bat flip home run).

Diaz played 43 games with the Pirates, hitting .289/.315/.363 with 1 home run.

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Happy Birthday, Robinson.

Randy Myers turns 63 today.

Myers was a big free agent signing in 1998. A few years ago, I wrote:

Jays signed lefty reliever Randy Myers to a 3-year, $18 million contract. It was a curious signing (a nice way of saying it was a mistake). In 1997, the Jays were 76-86, finishing in 5th place in the AL East, 22 games back from the Orioles. A high-priced closer wasn’t the thing that might push them over the top.

Randy wasn’t good. He had a 4.46 ERA in 41 games, with 28 saves and 5 blown saves.

This is where the story gets interesting. The Jays suddenly realized they were paying a ton of money for a reliever who wasn’t going to get them to the playoffs, who was 35 years old and who we would be paying for two more seasons. So Gord Ash put him on waivers. His going on waivers wasn’t surprising. Back in those days, most players ended up on waivers in August.

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The Padres claimed him. They didn’t want him, but they didn’t want the Braves to get him. So they figured if they claimed him, the Blue Jays would pull him back, and they would have stopped him from getting to the Braves.

But Ash fooled them. He let the Padres have him and saved the team roughly $14 million over the next two seasons and two months.

Myers had a rough time over the last two months of the 1998 season, putting up a 6.28 ERA (with no saves) in 21 games. He wouldn’t pinch in the majors again, and the Padres would pay him for the next two years.

Randy played 14 years in the MLB, had 347 saves and a 3.19 ERA in 728 games.

Happy Birthday, Randy.