When a contending MLB team makes a deal for an impactful player at the trade deadline, their intention is for that player to not only help out the club down the stretch, but to come up huge in the biggest moments of the playoffs. For Shane Bieber, he just did that for the Toronto Blue Jays this past Wednesday with perhaps their entire 2025 season on the line.
Needing a big win to avoid going down 3-0 in the ALCS, Bieber delivered perhaps his best start in a Jays uniform. Other than the one blemish in the first inning that led to Julio Rodríguez’s two-run home run, the former Cy Young winner was in total control of the Mariners’ lineup all night.
Bieber held Seattle to just three measly hits the rest of the way while striking out eight in his six impressive innings of work. With such a clutch performance when the Jays needed it the most, did the 30-year-old star right-hander cement himself as one of the best trade deadline acquisitions in recent team history?
Seven strikeouts for Shane Bieber! 💪
📺: FS1 pic.twitter.com/B2BvZ2NP2q
— FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) October 16, 2025
Did Shane Bieber cement himself as one of the Blue Jays best trade deadline acquisitions in franchise history?
Just taking a look back at some of the recent trade deadline deals made in the Ross Atkins era in which the Blue Jays were contenders, the Bieber move certainly ranks right up there in terms of the significant impact they have had in the postseason.
In 2023, Toronto had an underwhelming deadline that brought in the likes of Genesis Cabrera, Jordan Hicks and of course the infamous Paul DeJong addition as Bo Bichette’s temporary replacement while he was out with an injury. Hicks helped stabilize the back end of the bullpen down the stretch, but never really, factored in the postseason with the Blue Jays knocked out early by the Minnesota Twins in the AL Wild Card Series.
In 2022, Toronto actually had a surprise addition with veteran Whit Merrifield at the deadline, along with Mitch White, Zach Pop and Anthony Bass. Each had their moments with the Jays, but none that left a lasting impression during the MLB Playoffs while with Toronto.
In 2020, the Jays brought in Taijuan Walker, Jonathan Villar, Ross Stripling and Robbie Ray to beef up their roster for the stretch run during the COVID-shortened season. Of course Stripling and Ray would go on to be productive during a future season with Toronto, including Ray ultimately winning the AL Cy Young in 2021.
However, in terms of impact during the playoffs, Ray would take the loss in Game 1 of the AL Wild Card Series against the Tampa Bay Rays while Stripling would have a so-so outing in his 1.1 innings of work in his lone playoff appearance in Game 2 of the series.
Dating all the way back to 2016 at the beginning of the Atkins era, the Blue Jays nabbed a plethora of players in Joaquin Benoit, Melvin Upton Jr., Scott Feldman, Mike Bolsinger, Francisco Liriano and Reese McGuire to name a few at the trade deadline. The bulk of them never really became relevant during the postseason that year, other than Liriano being an adequate lefty specialist out of the bullpen.
Moreover, to further justify Bieber’s performance, he has done something that not even perhaps the franchise’s best trade deadline acquisition of all time in Cy Young winner David Price could accomplish back in 2015, which was come up big with a key postseason victory when the team needed it most.
Back then, despite Price’s heroics in going 9-1 with a 2.30 ERA down the stretch for the Jays to help them make the MLB Playoffs for the first time in over 22 years, he came up a bit short in the postseason as he failed to post a win in any of the three starts that he made in the playoffs.
His lone win came in relief in Game 4 of the ALDS with the Jays up already 7-1 when he entered the game because starter R.A. Dickey didn’t manage to go five innings, handing Price the victory despite giving up three runs in relief.
As a result, Bieber not only showed that Toronto made a brilliant move at the trade deadline to acquire his services where he went 4-2 with a 3.57 ERA in the stretch run to get the team into the postseason, he also proved them right to put the ball in his hands with everything on the line in the ALCS. Just that in itself makes his deadline deal one of the best in the history of the franchise.
