After 5-year contract extension, what's next on Atkins' agenda?

TORONTO -- Baseball doesn’t allow you to sit with one feeling for long.

Just a couple of days after the Blue Jays lost Game 7 of the World Series to the Dodgers, Ross Atkins was calling John Schneider to talk about what was next. His job is to live three or steps down the road, even in times of celebration.

Monday, at 9 a.m. ET, Atkins met with the media to discuss his recent five-year contract extension. Ten minutes later, he was surely back in his office, down another rabbit hole, picking apart every conceivable angle for the last bullpen spot.

This is a job of constantly asking “what’s next?” and if Atkins allows himself to look back, he always ends up looking forward by the end of the same sentence.

“We certainly bolstered our pitching,” Atkins said Monday, “so I think ... that's not over. We've got to continue to think about how the work that happens in the offseason, whether that be players, preparation or the additions that we've made, that's never over.”

So, what’s next? This front office has built a World Series contender. The Blue Jays have their team president, general manager, manager and face of the franchise -- Vladimir Guerrero Jr. -- locked up with new deals, all within the last year. All that’s left is winning.

Looking down the road in 2026 and beyond, this is what’s coming for the Blue Jays’ front office.

Daulton Varsho and the outfield

This front office has shown a willingness to work with players on extensions, and why wouldn’t they? Guerrero’s $500 million extension is the ultimate outlier, but Alejandro Kirk’s five-year, $58 million extension signed last spring is a useful extension here. At the time, it was a sensible deal for both sides, full of upside. One year later, it looks like one of the best catching contracts in baseball.

Varsho, fresh off a spectacular camp, is a pending free agent. This group already showed us how much they valued Varsho when they traded No. 1 prospect Gabriel Moreno for him, and since then, Varsho has become an integral part of this organization’s identity.

• Varsho enters pivotal walk year with new goal as a hitter

There are so many variables here. With Varsho’s age (turning 30) and all-out playing style, how will clubs project his health into his mid-30s? Will he hit 19 home runs with elite defense this season, or break out with 32? How much does a weak free-agent class help him? All of these questions make it awfully hard to find common ground on an extension, so this feels likely to stretch into free agency.

The broader issue, then? The Blue Jays need a star outfielder, a long-term core piece. George Springer is a pending free agent, too, and while the Blue Jays have done well to develop depth outfielders, we’d have to stretch back to Vernon Wells for the last time this organization has developed a long-term, star-caliber outfielder. Keep all of this in mind at the Trade Deadline with a front office that loves doing work a year early.

The starting rotation in 2027 and beyond

Speaking of doing work one year early … Kevin Gausman, Max Scherzer, Shane Bieber and Eric Lauer will all be free agents following this season. A short-term extension for Gausman -- or even Bieber -- would solve a lot of problems, but for the time being, the Blue Jays are likely headed into '27 with one or two spots open in their rotation and we’ve seen this spring that they prefer to overload on depth.

Can the Blue Jays develop No. 6 prospect Gage Stanifer into a legitimate big leaguer? Many in the organization are bullish on that.

This is a good time to remember that the great Tarik Skubal is a pending free agent. Doesn’t that situation just have the Blue Jays written all over it?

Spotlight on player development

Great organizations are balanced. Now that the Blue Jays are spending at record levels, player development is more important than ever.

For every discovery of an Ernie Clement or Nathan Lukes, this front office saves $8 million chasing a fringe veteran in free agency. For every Mason Fluharty or Brendon Little, there’s another $9 million not spent on a reliever who may or may not work out. These development stories make it all work.

The buzz around No. 2 prospect JoJo Parker can’t be overstated. If the Blue Jays can develop another legitimate young star hitter internally, that is the ticket to making this new era of Blue Jays baseball sustainable.