Jose Bautista's contract, or not enough one beyond this holiday season, has garnered an abundance of attention since the Toronto Blue Jays make camp in Dunedin, Florida, but he is not the only slugger by having an uncertain future.

The Blue Jays opened talks with Edwin Encarnacion using a potential contract extension recently after the 33-year-old expressed a desire with remain while using franchise past this holiday season. He went so far as to tell reporters that they wanted to finish his MLB The Show 18 Stubs career with Toronto.

Encarnacion is from the final year of an pact that can pay him $10 million in 2016 within a club option. His deal projects being one on the most affordable inside Major Leagues this holiday season after he hit .277/.372/.557 with 39 home runs recently.

An extension for Encarnacion seemed very possible, even perhaps more so than one for Bautista, until an ESPN Deportes set of Tuesday said talks stalled within the length of an new contract.

The Dominican Republic native told Enrique Rojas that there were "nothing new" to report and expressed a pessimistic outlook for the possibility of a legal contract. The topic of money wasn't even broached in talks.

The Blue Jays have a very new regime constantly in place with president/CEO Mark Shapiro, who joined the club throughout the 2015 season, having hired Ross Atkins (general manager) and Tony LaCava (assistant general manager). The trio has quite a lot on their plate having a postseason run expected and also the looming free agencies of Bautista and Encarnacion.

Bautista is a couple of years older than Encarnacion plus the pair have nearly identical service time. The issue for Toronto is always that signing both to long-term deals could cripple the franchise within the not-so-distant future.

Barring injury or severe decline, neither player will discover it hard to land a four- or five-year deal worth nine figures next winter. It seems more inclined that Encarnacion would please take a discount to keep in Toronto, but obviously any good "hometown discount" is likely to pay him at the least $60 million over four years (Nelson Cruz, a designated hitter which has a performance-enhancing drug past, signed a four-year, $57 million deal together with the Seattle Mariners last offseason).

If the Blue Jays should give Bautista a deal inside the five-year, $150 million range, would they afford to supply Encarnacion even half much?

Over the very last four years Encarnacion has produced 17.4 WAR to Bautista's 18.8. That gap isn't huge and conventional wisdom points too Encarnacion has more from the tank, but as beloved as Encarnacion is, Bautista will be the face with the franchise.

There is a bitter taste pursuing the departure of long-time executive Alex Anthopoulos -- would Shapiro be capable of survive losing Bautista? He may not, especially since both Bautista and Encarnacion would most likely land through an American League club around the open market.

The need for retaining Bautista may prove to get a determent in order to keep Encarnacion.

Ultimately, that will not be a bad thing for your Blue Jays' future.

You could debate that Encarnacion is underpaid to now in his career, although the collective bargaining agreement is structured for players for making up that money about the back end of the careers, the Blue Jays aren't obligated for being the ones to do this.

It defintely won't be long before they are relegated to designated hitter duty, an area that could become available Bautista inside coming years.

The Blue Jays don't need to look far to discover an example of how your roster may become hamstrung after you sign middle-aged sluggers lengthy contracts. The New York Yankees use a lot of money occupied in players that could no longer field regularly (Alex Rodriguez) or can't stay over disabled list (Mark Teixeira).

With Josh Donaldson, 30, within his prime and coming off an MVP season with less wear on his tires, the Blue Jays can be wise to not simply avoid overspending on MLB 18 Stubs Encarnacion, but to allocate hardly any money they would've given him to boost the rest in the roster (namely, the rotation).

It may sting to determine him in another uniform and it also might even hurt the offense in 2017, however if the Blue Jays desire to contend sentiment can't come before practically which has a pair of linchpins hitting free agency concurrently.