What will Blue Jays do at Deadline with crowded AL playoff picture?

SAN DIEGO -- Other than Rays fans, who can look at the American League standings without gritting their teeth a bit?

It’s a mess. The Blue Jays are stuck in that crowded, tangled Wild Card picture, making the next few weeks leading up to the Aug. 3 Trade Deadline crucial. These teams have less than four weeks to decide who they want to be in 2026.

For a team with World Series aspirations -- and a World Series budget -- the fact that everyone else is stuck in the middle can’t be the source of hope here. The Blue Jays should have been making another run at the American League East, not the third Wild Card spot, but here we are. At 44-49 going into their three-game set against the Padres before the All-Star break, the Blue Jays are trying to sneak into the party through the side door.

This is what’s at stake in July:

Buy or Sell: Where’s the line?

There’s a big difference between declaring the Blue Jays buyers and saying … Well, they might as well buy.

Entering Thursday, the Blue Jays are 2 1/2 games back of the final Wild Card spot going into this series against the Padres, tangled up with the Guardians, Twins, Rangers, Astros and Red Sox all within a few games. One good week could jump the Orioles, Tigers or A’s into this fun, too. The pessimist can say that the Blue Jays have no business being here, but the optimist can look around and see a beatable field.

Let’s work with real numbers, though. How many games back from the final Wild Card spot would the Blue Jays really need to be to really be sellers on Aug. 3? Even five or six games feels like it could be erased through August and September in such a suppressed field. Is seven the right number?

There’s an element of “feel” to this, too, but this keeps coming back to one place, which is that the Blue Jays would still need to take a major step back -- even from this disappointing season -- to truly “sell.” If the American League is this wide open, go for it, even if you’ve got a flat tire and the ‘check engine’ light is flashing.

What would buying look like?

This team needs a starter. If that starter has some control beyond 2026, even better. The Blue Jays should have the financial freedom that other clubs won’t, which can be a major advantage in this market.

Think of the José Berríos and Shane Bieber acquisitions, which both worked well in the immediate aftermath of the deals. The Blue Jays can’t go into the stretch run with only Dylan Cease, Kevin Gausman and Trey Yesavage as locks in their rotation. Bieber has been shaky, Max Scherzer is very difficult to project and Spencer Miles is likely to remain in this flexible swingman role.

Offensively, the Blue Jays need their answers to come from inside the clubhouse. No trade addition will do for this club what Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s renaissance can, but is that coming? Will George Springer, Alejandro Kirk and Daulton Varsho get hot? Will Addison Barger be a factor at all? If there’s any spot that could be upgraded, it’s a right-handed-hitting outfielder. Again, if there’s team control beyond 2026, that’s a bonus.

One last thing: This front office is painted too conservatively by many fans. Over and over again, they’ve dealt top-10 prospects and former No. 1 picks. More often than not, they’ve nailed their big swings. There’s nothing shy about how this group operates on the trade market.

What would selling look like?

It wouldn’t quite look like 2024, when the Blue Jays traded eight veterans: Yimi García, Nate Pearson, Danny Jansen, Justin Turner, Yusei Kikuchi, Trevor Richards, Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Kevin Kiermaier.

Most of them were flipped for Minor League talent that was close to being big league depth, which has turned into Yohendrick Piñango, Jonatan Clase, RJ Schreck, Jake Bloss, Charles McAdoo and Jay Harry. This wasn’t a “rebuild” style of selling.

If the sky truly falls on this season, expect a light version of this approach. The Blue Jays are trying to be perennial contenders, so unless the value is spectacular, they have no use for a 17-year-old prospect who might show up in 2031.

Gausman, Varsho, Springer and Bieber are on expiring deals while Jeff Hoffman has one year remaining in 2027. There isn’t an eye-popping opportunity to cash in as sellers here, so unless these coming weeks contain some true horrors, the Blue Jays should avoid this entirely.