Well, I guess somebody's gotta start this thread...

The Blue Jays are flying high this spring with lots of optimism. The team seems to be healthy, and the acquisitions of Scot Rolen and David Eckstein are promising a spark from the left side of the infield. Talk is of the Jays challenging for a post-season spot. That's the party line.

Personally, I'm down on the Jays. I'm tired of their B.S., false promises, and never-ending excuses. Admittedly, the team looks decent this spring. But I'll believe it when I see it. Their recent record does not instill much confidence. My prediction is an up-and-down season, finishing at best 5-10 games over .500, well out of the playoff picture. If there are major injuries, then the record will be worse. In the past 5 seasons the Jays have a .498 winning percentage. [Edit to add on 3/15: Just read in the paper that Las Vegas is predicting the Jays to finish third in the East, with the betting line at 85 1/2 wins. Very similar to my predictions.]

2008 record: ????
2007 record: 83-79
2006 record: 87-75
2005 record: 80-82
2004 record: 67-94
2003 record: 86-76

Frank Thomas contemplating the season ahead.

The Jays sign the (former?) flamethrower Armando Benitez to a minor league deal. Last year between the Giants and the Marlins, Benitez was 2-8 with a 5.37 ERA and 17 saves over 54 games. The 35 year old has a career 937 SO over 772 IP and 289 SV.

Gustavo Chacin out of the running for the fifth starters job. Current rotation is: Roy Halladay, A.J. Burnett, Dustin McGowan, Shaun Marcum and Jesse Litsch.

The man. Roy Halladay.

Casey Janssen out for the season.

Jays release Reed Johnson. WTF?! Sorry to see you go, buddy.

And Scott Rolen has a non-displaced fracture in his right middle finger and might not be ready by Opening Day. It might well mean he'll miss his chance to be booed this weekend at Citizens Bank Park. Oh well, he'll get it during Interleague Play.

Reed Johnson has signed a 1-year $1.3 million deal with the Cubs.

The Jays are reportedly offering a 6-year $65 million deal to Alex Rios.

Now they're saying he may be out 4-6 weeks.

Well, he needs to be back by May 16th-18th to take his "medicine."

The Jays finished up Spring Training this year with a 5-3 over the Phillies, and a 13-16 record overall.

Opening day is Monday at Yankee Stadium. Scheduled starters: Roy Halladay vs. Chien-Ming Wang.

I've been a Blue Jays fan since '82. Also a Marlins fan.
Why the hell does Benitez keep haunting me? He needs to sat the hell away. He did absolutely nothing with the Marllins.
But can't believe the Jays got Rolen. At least he won't be a thorn in the Marlins side anymore. As far as Eckstein...Not so sure he can do what he did with the Cards. He may have been a one hit wonder. Still cute as a button though.

While channel surfing this morning, I happened to catch part of an exhibition game between the Blue Jays and Phillies. I usually don't pay a lot of attention to the pre-season, so I was surprised the game was even televised. Anyway, an interesting trivia tidbit came up: Toronto isn't the first MLB team to be called the Blue Jays. The Phillies apparently had that name too, just for a season or two back in the 1940s according to the announcer. Also...welcome back, Shannon Stewart; I hadn't heard that he re-signed with Toronto.

It's true, but it was unofficial according to baseball-almanac.com. According to Wikipedia the owner tried to change the name after a fan vote. "Phillies" was still on the front of the jersey but they added a blue jay logo on the sleeve. (Students at Johns Hopkins, whose sports teams are known as the Blue Jays, were very upset.) After a couple of years he gave up.

Marc...you've inadvertently given me a blog item topic from this! Thank you!

The Philadelphia Blue Jay. On the site where I found this logo it says (when you mouse over the blue jay): "A Blue Jay bending over with its mouth open." Perhaps it was due to the suggestive posture of the bird that they decided to go back to "Phillies."

The Toronto Blue Jay logo has changed variously from a somewhat benign-looking to a meaner-looking bird. This season they plan to revert to the retro logo as an alternate jersey.

Off-topic, but look at the Phillies' logo history over the years and then compare it to the Flyers' history. Quite a difference!

And maybe Toronto's next logo could show a blue jay (of the human kind) doing just that!





Go for it Joe, blog away!

JiP, one sees that logo in Toronto every now and then.... because of the Don Mills Flyers, who use the same logo (a Philly-Toronto connection?) (I read somewhere that my uncle, now dead, was a past president of the Don Mills Flyers hockey organization.)

That's interesting. They took the name and logo in 1968 -- well before the Flyers took on the "Broad Street Bullies" notoriety and won their Stanley Cups. I wonder how they came to that decision.



Already did! I even mentioned you.

The Jays season opener at Yankee Stadium.... is rained out. Nothing more to say.

At the final season opener at (old) Yankee Stadium it was all Melky all the time. If he wasn't making diving catches in the outfield, robbing the Jays of extra bases, he was smacking a home run down the first base line. Yankees over Jays 3-2.

I watched about five innings before I had to switch over to Sportsnet for a rather important hockey game but I enjoyed what I saw. I didn't know the Jays had acquired Marco Scutaro from the A's, and I see he stole two bases last night (as many as he did all of last season, according to the stats). Hopefully David Eckstein will have better games ahead!

Hey, I'm now an Outsports celebrity, getting mentioned in Joe's blog about the Philadelphia Blue Jays; thanks guy!

Jays sign two of their young rising stars to long-term deals. Alex Rios gets 6-years $64 million, and Aaron Hill gets 4-years $12 million.

At the home opener (6-3 victory over Boston), the Jays wore their powder blue throwback jerseys (which they will wear on Friday night home games), and honored Roberto Alomar and former team president Paul Beeston.

Although only 2-2, Blue Jay pitching has been impressive to start the season. Facing the vaunted line-ups of the Yankees and Red Sox, the Jays have a team ERA of 2.91 and BAA of .211.

The arms: Scott Downs, A.J. Burnett, Roy Halladay, Dustin McGowan.

Buffalo News beat writer Mike Harrington's opening day report got rave reviews down here and basically urged folks to make the ride up to Toronto for the Sunday Beckett v Halladay showdown. And darn I should have walked out of there with one of those retro jerseys.

So I did. Halladay pitched well enough to win if not stellar, the Jays only got five hits but made the most of them getting two homers for six runs. Only one batter of the four on base for those two reached on a hit and the Jays won 7-4.

Oh yeah, the four errors by the Sox was of no help either.

Well - after winning their first 3 home games against the Red Sox - the Jays have now lost their next 6 home games - their biggest home losing streak in 4 years. Doesn't bode well for this season. I was at the game last night and even though the rookie call-up Purcey struggled badly with control - at least he only allowed one run to the Tigers through 4+ innings. The bullpen allowed the Tigers 6 runs in the next 3 innings and the Jays offence was non-existent for the second straight game - all night long.

I've heard they've benched the struggling Frank Thomas today in Game 2 against the Tigers. Very disappointing April thus far for the Jays.

Thomas isn't happy about being benched.



Being angry? Fine. Not talking to reporters? Stupid, but there's no law against it. Not shaking hands with his teammates? Selfish.

Jays release Frank Thomas.

When the Jays signed Thomas I had my doubts, as he was an aging veteran and a 2+1 deal seemed a little much. Last year after a slow start he finished with a .277 BA, 26 HR and 95 RBI, which was pretty darn good, although much of that production came later in the season when the Jays were out of contention. But, the reason the Jays are releasing him now is more of a money-saving move. Although they'll pay him $8 million to go bye-bye, he was guarranteed a third year (at $10 mil.) if he made a certain number of at-bats... and this eliminates that possibility.

Not too surprised by his rant...
Although he was the best player to ever wear the pinstripes, that was one of the big issues with him in Chicago...He was always thinking about himself first...

I put the blame on J.P. Ricciardi, who likes to sign guys who are passed their prime (ie. Edgardo Alfonzo, Royce Clayton) and then is surprised when they underperform. One exception to that I'll say is Matt Stairs, who produced more than I would have expected last year (.289, 21 HR, 64 RBI in 357 AB). I'm wondering about Shannon Stewart. I loved him as a Jay before, but I see him as being on the decline (and injury prone). I wish the Big Hurt well, and hope he can finish his career strongly with another team.

Big Hurt is now an Oakland A again. And as an A's fan I say "be still my heart".

The very disappointing season continues for the now last place Jays - losing the first two games to Tampa - in Orlando. Weird watching a regular season game from an 8,000 seat park. At least it is full though instead of 8,000 people sitting inside a 40,000 seat dome as would be the case were the games played in Tampa. I guess the Rays are pulling a Buffalo Bills type movehoping to increase their popularity to an expanded regional area by playing some of their home games in Orlando. The NFL's Buffalo Bills are doing the same up here playing one exhibition and one regular season game in Toronto this year.

If the poor play continues you've got wonder how long it will be for JP to pull the plug on Gibbons as manager. He said they pulled the plug as fast as they did on thomas - because they could not afford to wait for him to come around. That does not bode well for the maager if the Jays' struggles contimue.

Something like that, except it won't lead to a permanent move to Orlando the way the Bills' actions might.

The Devil Rays are now 6-0 at Disney World.

OK - so two heartbreaking bottom of the 9th losses to the Bosox at Fenway, inspite of outstanding pitching, end a very disappointing 11-17 April for the Jays. But at least May started off with a win. And the great pitching continued with AJ Burnett scattering 3 hits into the 8th as the Jays win their first game of May 3 - 0.
At least this year even with that brutal month they are only 4.5 games out of a playoff spot. In the last few years bad Aprils had the Jays close to 10 games out with no chance of recovering.

Their strong pitching still gives me hope if some bats warm up a bit. They are home for the next 7 - time to start stringing some wins together to show that the bad April is not going to be what the entire season is going to be like. A bad homestand and I suspect John Gibbons will be gone.

As I said at the beginning of this thread, I am down on the Jays. All that talk--and I heard people on the Jays' broadcast talking about the team going to the World Series--was just that: talk. The team is not walking the walk. That said, despite their 12-17 record, they've actually scored more runs (119) than they've given up (112). The strong pitching is going to be the key if they are to regain respectability. I don't think any (sensible) person expects them to win the pennant, but they are currently last in the AL East and second last in the entire AL.

And lets look at some of their recent changes. Reed Johnson is released prior to the start of the season, and is now hitting .286 and 10 RBI for the 17-11 Cubs (in 84 ABs). Shannon Stewart, who was supposed to provide "more offence" (but less defence) is hitting .203 with 4 RBI (in 59 ABs). Frank Thomas, who had hit .187 and 11 RBI for the Jays before being released, is hitting .259 and 5 RBI (in 27 ABs) for the As (18-12). Note that the last place Jays' discards were picked up by winning teams.

So the Jays have just put starting shortstop David Eckstein and backup shortstop John Macdonald on the DL... and then they promptly acquire 2 outfielders, Brad Wilkerson and Kevin Mench. Huh? Yet another mind-boggling desperation move by Ricciardi (remember Royce Clayton and Edgardo Alfonso?) in acquiring guys off the scrap heap (Wilkerson had been sent down by the Mariners and Mench was playing in triple A) in the hopes of bolstering the Jays' woeful offence. Thank goodness for the pitching--second best ERA in the AL. But so far the result is 17-19, good for last in the AL East.

Richard Griffin in the Toronto Star has echoed my sentiments in today's column, Blue Jay game plan somewhere out in left field



Wilkerson and Mench were in the starting lineup last night. Same result: the Jays score all of 1 run, and lose 6-1 to Cleveland. Jays now 17-20, last in AL East.

Adding injury to insult, Vernon Wells is now out 6 to 8 weeks with a broken wrists after making a diving cast in last night's game.

==============

Now the Jays have added their 4th player in 3 days to the DL: Jeremy Accardo. 35 year old Armando Benitez is called up from Syracuse.

Jays are now 2nd last in runs scored in the AL, but have the 4th best team ERA.

So the Jays go 31 straight innings without scoring a run (the team record is 33, set in 1981), but finally score 3 in the 10th inning to salvage a win in Cleveland. Oh, and during that win they hit into only the 14th unassisted triple play in Major League history.

On a side note, when I logged onto Outsports this morning, the banner ad at the top of the page said "The Boys of Summer are Here/Sign Up for Jays Breaking News Alerts." It was an ad for Rogers Sportsnet. That was impressive, a real mainstream sports ad on Outsports--and without any shirtless guys! (Not that there's anything wrong with shirtless guys. )

The best Blue Jays rotation ever?

Former Blue Jay Jayson Werth clubbed 3 home runs (for 8 RBI) in a Phillies uniform against the Jays last night.

On a mini 3-game win streak (2 of which were courtesy of the offensively woeful KC Royals), the Jays are now 3rd in the AL East and 1 game over .500.

#5 starter Jesse Litch leads the team in wins with 6 (#1 and #2, Halladay and Burnett both have 5). Shaun Marcum leads starters with a 2.80 ERA. Roy Halladay leads the majors in IP with 81.0.

Offense continues to struggle: Jays are 3rd last in AL in runs scored.

I went to yesterday afternoon's Jays-Orioles game. Little over a week ago there was much optimism, with the Jays 5 games over .500. For the second time this season (I could have told you so), after a strong run the Jays came crashing down to earth. The 9-5 loss to Baltimore (thanks to A.J. Burnett coughing up 8 runs over 4 1/3) dropped them to 32-32 and tied for last in the AL East. Burnett (5-6), booed off the field by his own fans, mockingly tipped his hat as he walked off. Well, at least I got a bit of a sun tan.

The blue throwback uniforms the Blue Jays are wearing on Fridays -- isn't that the road uniform? Why are they wearing it at home too?

Well, Reed Johnson got his revenge on J.P. Ricciardi, clubbing a 3-run home run off Roy Halladay, as the Cubs beat the Jays at home 6-2. Ricciardi released defensively superior Johnson in favour of Shannon Stewart. A comparison of their offensive stats:

Johnson: 171 ab, .263 avg., .340 obp., 3 hr, 31 rbi, 4 sb
Stewart: 175 ab, .240 avg., .325 obp., 1 hr, 17 rbi, 3 sb

The Jays are now last in the AL East, with a 35-35 record. They have the 3rd fewest runs scored in the entire American League, but the 3rd best team ERA (3.47).

They wear the retro uniforms on all Friday home games, dubbed "Flashback Fridays." A former player is in attendence at the game. I guess the powder blue was considered more stylin' than the home whites.

Here's a further explanation I love those powder blue uniforms. Also, regarding Reed Johnson, I noticed the fans at Rogers Centre gave him a standing ovation late in the game on Friday, obviously showing he is still well-liked in Toronto. I didn't see today's game, but heard about Johnson's three-run homer for the Cubs, so I doubt if the fans were cheering quite so loudly.
By the way, can someone clarify the current 'system' for interleague match-ups? I think at one time each team played all the teams from one particular division in the other league. But that changed at some point in the last few years. For example, I see that in 2008, Toronto plays interleague games against four teams in the NL Central (Chicago, Milwaukee, Cincinnati & Pittsburgh) but also plays two series against NL East teams (Philadelphia & Atlanta). I know that some teams always play traditional or regional opponents in the other league (eg Yankees-Mets, San Fran-Oakland, St Louis-KC, etc) although with the Expos gone, the Blue Jays have no such rival.

I think they're making it up as they go along. They had been doing it on a rotation (e.g. NL East vs. AL East one year, NL East vs. AL Central the next) but that changed when they decided teams like the Mets and Yankees should play every single year, thus completely sucking out everything that was special about it to begin with. So they came up with this "natural rival" concept. Some of the "natural" rivals are fixed -- for example Mets-Yankees. They're playing each other 6 times no matter what. Others seem to be flexible.

In the past they said Baltimore was the Phils' "natural" rival but that changed when the Expos moved to DC. Then they said it was Boston, but now I'm not sure.

This is the Phils' interleague opposition going back to 2002 (as far back as ESPN's page lists their schedules):

2002: at Detroit, at Cleveland, Baltimore, Chi. White Sox, Minnesota, at Baltimore
2003: Seattle, Oakland, at LA Angels (they were Anaheim then ), Boston, at Baltimore
2004: at White Sox, at Minnesota, Detroit, Kansas City, at Boston, Baltimore
2005: at Baltimore, Texas, at Seattle, at Oakland, Boston
2006: Boston, Tampa Bay, NY Yankees, at Boston, at Baltimore, at Toronto
2007: Toronto, at Kansas City, White Sox, Detroit, at Cleveland
2008: Toronto, Boston, LA Angels, at Oakland, at Texas

So it was AL Central, West, Central again, West again, East, Central again, West again, but with some East teams mixed in during all the other years.

The Jays suck!

OK - I feel better now that I've said that. Truly this is about as disappointed as I have been with this team in years. It is one thing when you expect them to be about a 500 team and they end up being close to a 500 team - but they should be much better than that this season - especially with the pitching they have.

I had read somewhere earlier this season that Dan Shulman (from ESPN - formerly on the Jays broadcast team) that he had predicted the Jays demise when they got rid of Reed Johnson - because in his opinion without Johnson the Jays would be lacking the type of player that always played full out - which would have a positive impact on others on the rest of the team. Well the Jays on way too many nights look like a team just going through the motions - with few if any of the displays of extra effort Reed is known for as he exhibited earlier this year with this AMAZING catch for the Cubs.
http://www.bleedcubbieblue.com/2008/4/25/4...n-s-brilliant-c

I was at the game on Friday night and I was on my feet joining the LOUD and enthusiastic standing ovation that Reed received as he came up to bat in the 9th with the Cubs down by a run. Fortunately for the Jays that night - he grounded out - but he made them pay the rest of the weekend.

Oh well - at least TFC our soccer team is still winning.

It certainly seems that way! And as far as these 'natural rivals' are concerned, it looks like most states which have two or more MLB teams (California, New York, Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, Texas, Florida) have their teams playing in opposite leagues, thus being tailor-made for 'special' interleague games. But Pennsylvania is the exception to this, as both the Phillies and Pirates already play in the same league under the same rules, and thus face each other every year anyway.




Agreed, although if it's any consolation (which I'm sure it isn't) their current last-place AL East record would be good enough for second place in the AL Central and NL West. And record-wise, the Jays are really no worse than they were at this time in 2007, although they were probably in third-place at the time. The upstart Devil Rays have disrupted the 'natural divine order' of the AL East this year!

It developed into such a great rivalry in the 70s when the Phils and Pirates were both in the NL East. They took that away when the divisions realigned with the 90s expansion. It's sad now.

Yes, well I refer you to my comments when I started this thread on March 10th: "I'm tired of their B.S., false promises, and never-ending excuses." I could have told you so. Meanwhile, the Jays continue to sink. Tonight they were shutout 7-0 by Milwaukee. One sportswriter was speculating about the Jays trading A.J. Burnett, but saying that to trade him for prospects would send a signal that Jays have thrown in the towel. Well, hello, they're last in the AL East. Who on earth thinks they have a chance of winning the division? To flog this dying horse is just cruelty to the fans. We need to clean house, starting with the front office. Grrrrr.

I just hope they don't fire John Gibbons until after Scott Rolen gets mad at him.