TORONTO -- As we await baseball’s potential return and look ahead to the 2020 MLB Draft in two weeks, Blue Jays fans are still as eager as they’ve ever been to talk about their team.

Here are your latest questions:

Would a shortened season increase or decrease the chances of the Blue Jays signing Ken Giles to a long-term deal? Is he seen as part of the core moving forward?
-- @flexableroster

It’s difficult to consider a closer as part of a club’s core, given the unpredictable nature of the position, but Giles’ ceiling is matched by few others in his role in baseball. His 1.87 ERA last season with 83 strikeouts over 53 innings is the elite-level back-end pitching that every team in the league is trying to find.

Giles could have been one of the Trade Deadline’s biggest pieces, but there should be an impressive free-agent market waiting for him, too. A shortened season of any length shouldn’t impact his value much, as long as he stays healthy. There are plenty of possibilities that see Giles continuing his career elsewhere, but it’s worth considering two factors on the other side.

In the offseason leading into 2019, something changed for Giles mentally. Instead of the “lone wolf” mentality that he’d carried through much of his career, Giles opened himself up to help, which has had a positive impact on his career and lines up with him emerging as a clubhouse leader. Comfort is valued differently by different players, but he’s spoken openly about feeling at home in Toronto. The second factor is that if Giles goes, the Blue Jays will need a replacement. Those don’t come cheap, and there isn’t an obvious candidate in waiting.

What does this all mean for Alejandro Kirk? I was hoping I’d get to go see him in Triple-A Buffalo this summer. Would this hurt a catcher’s timeline as much as a pitcher’s?
-- Jeremy J., Newmarket, Ontario

Kirk was one of Spring Training’s biggest stories for the Blue Jays. The 5-foot-9, 220-pound catcher went 4-for-8 with four walks and one homer, leaving a real impression on Toronto’s front office and coaching staff over that brief time.

Now ranked by MLB Pipeline as the club’s No. 5 prospect, Kirk has played 71 games at the Class A Advanced level (Dunedin). The big leagues would be too far a jump in 2020, even with a potentially shortened season, but Kirk's stock is still trending up. There’s room for a bat like that in the Majors, perhaps as early as some point in '21. Kirk's a natural, so this shouldn't disrupt him.

Now that the season is shortened, will Nate Pearson start right away in the big leagues?
-- @jaysandheat13

How the Blue Jays handle Pearson would depend, to some extent, on the details of baseball’s potential return, particularly around service time. The more interesting part of the Pearson conversation from an on-field standpoint is workload and development.

Pearson was expected to build back up towards a full workload this season, which will now be difficult even under the best of circumstances, but there’s more that goes into this than just hard inning totals. How clubs handle their top pitching prospects -- especially the ones capable of throwing 101-mph gas -- will be a fascinating wrinkle under the current circumstances.

Whenever baseball does return, it is likely there will be expanded rosters from 26 to 30. Which Blue Jay will benefit the most from the roster expansion and will start the conversation of “so-and-so would have made the 26-man roster choices difficult with his play”?
-- Jim T., Mitchell, Ontario

There’s still much to be decided about how rosters will look for the 2020 season, but clubs are certainly preparing for the possibility of expanded rosters.

The Blue Jays already have plenty of versatility. Let’s use Vladimir Guerrero Jr. as an example. Travis Shaw has the ability to play third, while Cavan Biggio could fill in, too. That means the Blue Jays wouldn’t necessarily need to stock a “true backup” third baseman. Instead, their versatility gives them a bit of a luxury, which is to focus on specialty players or talents that are complementary to their roster.

The crowded outfield group could expand beyond the starters to include any combination of Derek Fisher, Anthony Alford, Jonathan Davis or Billy McKinney. Joe Panik is another name to keep in mind, too, along with Brandon Drury and Rubén Tejada, who were on the bubble in Spring Training. Caleb Joseph made a strong impression in camp as a potential third catcher, which teams nearly always carry when rosters have expanded in the past.