August 4: Las Vegas 51s 3, Athletics 1

Remainder of Jays beats Oakland in extras; Romero forgiven

The Jays starting lineup featured regulars Encarnacion, Davis, Escobar and Kelly Johnson. Today featured the beginning of Hechavarria's career in the majors, a start for Gose in CF, Moises Sierra, Cooper at first, and Yan Gomes behind the plate.


With a struggling Romero at the mound, he would have to have a great outing to keep the Jays close.


As it turned out, he did have a great outing, pitching SEVEN innings of 3 hit, 3 walk, 1 run ball. Delabar and Janssen closed out the 8th and 9th innings, the Jays tied it in the 9th thanks to a home run to David Cooper at the hands of Cook (with his 4th blown save in his last five attempts) to tie the game.


The lone run for the As came at the bottom of the second due to a combination of a walk, wild pitch (that Gomes should have started), and double.


Jays bullpen reliever Chavez (who probably flew in from Vegas early this morning) made things interesting in the 10th inning, loading the bases with two outs but a called strikeout finished the frame. Then at the top of the 11th, Edwin hit a single and stole second. The next hitter in Davis drew a four pitch walk.With a 3-2 count with Mathis at the plate, the runners went on the pitch. Mathis (who pinch hit for Gomes in the 9th and was a defensive substiution) struck out, but Kottaras fired the ball into left field, plating Encarnacion. Then Moises Sierra doubled to plate Davis to give the Jays a 3-1 lead.


Darren Oliver came on, was his dependable self, and had a 1-2-3 drama-free eleventh to record his first save and win the game.


So, a sigh of relief for the Jays, as Romero does not fall apart and pitches very well. A better test will be against the Yankees on Friday.


The Jays won tonight because of a lucky break, but also kept in the game due to a very solid pitching effort. Sometimes you need the lucky breaks to win games. It was gutsy to pull a double steal on a 3-2 count, but I think trying to make something happen is the way to go. Otherwise the Yankees would be 162-0.


Tomorrow, we will see the Jays do the exact same routine that they did yesterday in order to not jinx themselves, whether it's wearing the socks up or down, using the same bat, taking the same BP, whatever. Aaron Laffey will take the mound and hopefully will find his fastball. Tommy Milone will start for the As and hopefully he can pitch as badly as his last home outing against Tampa and Toronto, giving up 10 ER in 13 IP.

Alex Anthopoulos: Jedi or Jabba?

Jedi knight, show us the force

With the Jays in their worst position in the season, the blame game has begun. Why aren't the Jays going to make the post-season this year? Why are they doing poorly? Some fans point at Alex Anthopoulos.

Is it Alex' fault that the Jays are not at the top of the wild card standings? Is Alex truly a Jedi knight, or is he Jabba the Hut?

The answer is kind of complex, having to do with grouping of poor individual performances, alot of injuries, and a couple of key pieces missing from the Jays puzzle that put the Jays behind the curve as the season began.

No one really stepped up to fill the left-field role. You can cry for the return of Eric Thames, but look at his stats for May when he bat .193. You can cry for the return of Travis Snider, but really, the Jays really never saw eye-to-eye with him, and the timing was off, and I think there were alot of issues with Travis and the Jays that we probably never found out about.

And Adam Lind failed to perform at 1B, forcing Edwin to play the position and leave the team short a DH, leaving 1B / DH short. Those two key positional players who are supposed to hit a ton were missing from the season. You can't blame AA for not using Lind at 1B -- he had a terrific spring training. And all of the fandom was pretty comfortable with Thames in left with Snider waiting in the wings, and Ben Francisco and the speedy Rajai Davis as backups. And the Jays scored Omar Visquel, a very strong hall of fame veteran presence. Jeff Mathis finished the bench as the backup catcher.

And finally, the starting pitching didn't hold out. Morrow and Romero started off looking decent. Romero never really was an ace this year, but Morrow started to really bring his best game starting in May. Drabek and Hutchinson were never very good, but Hutchinson was improving, and Alverez was doing as expeted. Cecil wasn't performing, Litsch got insured, and so did McGowan, so a promising pitching staff in spring training didn't pan out, at all. Then came the injuries that decimating the Jays pitching staff.

This year is supposed to be a development year for JP Arencibia and Brett Lawrie, and fans accepted that. And absolutely, it was supposed to be developmental years for Henderson Alvarez, Kyle Drabek, and Drew Hutchinson. The Jays tried to replace Rauch / Francisco with Cordero / Santos.

You can't get upset at AA's procurement of Cordero. His last year with Cincinnati was great, sporting a WHIP of 1.029 over 68 starts and an ERA of 2.45. And you really can't fault him for getting Santos either who had 30 saves (6 blown) for the White Sox last year. Only a crystal ball would tell you that Santos would end up hurt and Cordero would end up as a completely ineffetive closer. Since he was taken out of the closer role in early May, he did okay until the end of June with an ERA of 1.75 but a WHIP over 1.3. Still, not as advertised.

The Jays had a need for a centerfielder last year, and they got that with Colby Rasmus. An excellent defender, his bat has been pretty inconsistent. In the last half of July since the all star break, he hit a paltry .152 / .194 / .242 yet managed to hit 11 RBIs in that time (over 10 hits). The trade price for Rasmus was Octavio Dotel who is pitching well for Detroit and Mark Rzepczynski who is pitching not-so-well for St. Louis. We could have used Edwin Jackson.

The #2 for #2 (Hill for Johnson) trade in which the Jays also lost Johnny Mac I think turned out lousy. I think that Aaron Hill is just as good a defender as Johnson, and both Johnny Mac and Hill are hitting very well for Arizona this year. I guess if you have the question of whether you would rather have Johnny McDonald or Omar Visquel here, the sentimental choice is Johnny Mac every time.

Then you look at the Brett Wallace for Anthony Gose trade. Brett Wallace was more MLB ready than Gose, but Anthopoulos was looking for talent in center field, thinking that Lind would be the every day 1B or that Encarnacion or even Cooper could play 1st. Gose is lightning fast however, and probably Gose's value is higher than Wallace, as the positional demands of CF are much higher than 1B, and there was no room on the team for all three of Lind, Encarnacion and Wallace. The strategy was to let Gose brew in AAA for 2012 and have him come in as an outfielder in 2013, perhaps replacing Rajai Davis, perhaps moving Colby to left. But with Bautista hurt and the trade of Snider and Thames, Gose is playing in the outfield, but he isn't completely cooked yet, I think.

Finally, you look at the moves made this year to acquire JA Happ, Carpenter and Brandon Lyon trading away minor prospects, Cordero and Francisco. I think it was the right move to make to shore up a bullpen that is short Santos, Perez, and Villanueva. Cordero simply wasn't working out. Lyon is a good reliever and JA Happ is a candidate for a #5 starter (#5 only) should one of the starters really fail. And you look at the trade deadline to deal Snider and Thames for two more relievers, thus shoring up the bullpen and making it look significantly better and different than the rest of the season. Janssen is now the closer. You have a starting pitcher in Happ, who was not good this year but could be very good again.

The trades for Thames and Snider have been analyzed quite fully in the media. We saw Brad Lincoln last night throw four shutout frames, and if this is what we get from him in the bullpen (and according to him, that's where he wants to be), I think the fandom will be happy indeed. Delabar hasn't pitched very well yet, but most analysts think that Thames would be an average left-field, at best.

If you want to criticize Anthopoulos, then you gotta criticize the entire organization. Anthopoulos is forced to be smart and thrifty in his contracts and his trades because frankly, Rogers Communications doesn't want to deal with a contract like Vernon Wells or Alex Rios (though Rios is having a great year this year, he stunk last year). Anthopoulos can't go out and make 7 year $120 million dollar deals and that puts him at a disadvantage in the AL East (except Tampa). Bautista, who is a marquee player, is the most expensive player on the team with a 5 year, $65 million dollar contract that expires in 2015, and that is extremely cheap. Encarnacions 3 year $29 million deal -- also cheap.

One thing that we can fault Anthopoulos for is the gamble he made to not get a veteran starter in his rotation in the off season. One thing that we can probably guess on is that he tried. The gamble didn't pay off. Dustin McGowan, the club's projected #3 or #4 starter, never made a start. But still, most fans and analysts felt that the pitching staff was a gamble, too young, and not ready. If the Jays are not to make the post season this year, that choice can be pinned on Anthopoulos. But really, everything else he has done (under the conditions he could have done it) has been great. And you can't blame the Jays woes now on Anthopoulos -- that is purely a function of injuries.

So, I'm going to go with guru. When he gets players, the deal is never expected, really. The deals come literally at you from left field. The deals are thrifty and fulfills long term needs. Alex' failure to get a great starter is probably due to Rogers not wanting to pay the money for a long term contract that might turn out to be an albatross combined with him not wanting to rent a player who won't get the team into the post-season anyway.

August 3: Jays 4 Oakland 5

Brett Cecil serves home runs, Jays create drama in the 9th, keeps me awake

The Athletics of Oakland brought up their star AAA pitcher David Straily to make his major league debut against the struggling Blue Jays. The 23 year old from Springfield (home of the Simpsons), Oregon was a 24th round draft pick by the As back in 2009, and he made a name for himself, hailed as the pitcher with the most strike outs in all of baseball (he has 175 strikeouts in 138 innings). And given the Jays propensity to like to swing and their flailing offense as of late, it looked like another troublesome outing for the Jays.

There was hope that Cecil would be able to keep the ball in the yard tonight in pitching friendly Oakland but with three losses in a row and a complete lack of run support in his outings, things were not looking good on paper for the Jays. Then again, until the return of Bautista and Lind, things are not going to look good on paper for a while.

If I was betting, I'd take Oakland and the under.

Well, the game started off ominously enough, with Lawrie grabbing the bottom of his right rib cage in the top of the inning after fouling off a ball. He struck out, then took himself out of the game. The last thing the Jays need is another regular on the DL. Certainly, given his propensity to dive into television bays and be very intense, it isn't surprising (in fact, the hurt rib cage is due to his dive into same camera bay -- he is day to day).

Cecil looked promising enough in the 1st inning, facing the minimum. Then, Cecil gave up a single in the 2nd to Brandon Inge to score Cespedes from 3rd, but got out of the inning with a double play. Then in the third inning and fourth inning, Cecil gave up bases empty home runs to Johnny Gomes and Chris Carter. And in the the fifth, the As tacked an another through a sacrifice fly. Apparently, Gose didn't remember that Rasmus was the centerfielder that night and they ran into each other, both determined to attempt to throw out the runner at home (which at 320 feet out, isn't going to happen). Thankfully Rasmus caught the ball. The damage could have been much worse for Cecil, but three double plays were turned, two on the ground and one to finish the 5th as Mathis nailed Johnny Gomes trying to tag up on the throw. Cecil gave up 4 runs, all earned, over 5 innings. He gave up 9 hits, threw 66 pitches and struck out and walked one. I think Farrell gave up on Cecil after 5 despite his low pitch count so that they could keep the game close.

When Cecil leaves a fastball up, the As are all over it. That control problem is what kills Cecil. If he can keep the fastball down and away, he will be successful. It's that fastball left up over the zone that kills Cecil. Batters will tee that up every time because his fastball just isn't isn't fast enough to fool anyone.  

Straily looked very good, not great, but the Jays gave up when Mathis struck out (for the 2nd time) to finish the bottom of the fourth. Straily threw six innings, gave up 5 hits, struck out 5 and walked 1 over 102 pitches over six innings. The Jays strategy was to let him throw and see pitches, and Straily (understandably) was a little bit off, but he threw retired six in a row and struck out 4 of his last 7 outs. The Jays then went hitless in the 7th, 8th looking terrible against Balfour.

But then things fell apart for Oakland and closer Cook in the 9th. The Jays started the inning with two strikeouts and were clearly on the ropes. Then David Cooper and Rajai Davis singled, and it looked like things were over when the ump called back runners by calling a phantom foul ball when it was clearly a passed ball. This might have riled up Cook enough, as Mathis fought back from an 0-2 count and hit a home run just over the wall in left-center to tie the game. Wow. Cecil is off the hook for the loss.

Farrell put Oliver and Janssen on to pitch the perceived end of the game tonight to give them a little bit of work as they hadn't pitched in over a week. Janssen came on to pitch a 1-2-3 ninth, tossing a beautiful cutter to freeze Derek Norris in a full count to end the frame.

Brad Lincoln came on in the 10th and struck out the first hitter, with a nasty slider. But a single to Weeks and a walk with one out, followed by a wild pitch forced Lincoln to load the bases and hit to a dangerous Josh Reddick, who struck out. With two out, Brandon Moss grounded out to Escobar, who bounced the throw to first, making Yan Gomes (on for Cooper) make a terrific play to record the game-saving out.

The Jays did nothing hitting in the extra frames, except for the 12th with a one out single by Visquel followed by a double by Colby Rasmus, but Omar, running 270 feet, got thrown out at home despite the ball getting away from the the left fielder who normally plays first base. Johnson grounded out to end the inning in the 4-4 tie. Then, Colby was taken out of the game in the bottom of the 12th presumably for some type of injury, (the groin), forcing the pitcher to bat in Colby's batting position.

Lincoln pitched a flawless 11th, 12th, or 13th, perhaps making the Jays fandom feel a bit lighter about the trade, because you know a Cordero, Coello, Beck, or Frasor would have blown the game in the 10th or 11th. Very very nice.

But it was the 15th inning that did the Jays in. With Loup on the mound, Jamal Weeks hit a lead off triple to right, and Coco Crisp sac flied him home.

It was a very close call for the Jays, but I wonder if it is more demoralizing to lose a hard fought game in extras versus losing in regulation play.

The official injury report on Rasmus is that he is day-to-day with a strained groin. Lawrie's injury is related to his dive into the camera bay a couple of weeks ago -- ribcage pain, and he is day-to-day as well and not expected to be in the line-up.

The Jays need to bring in JA Happ to the rotation and send down one of the starters to long relief or back to AAA. Whether that is Cecil, Villanueva, or Laffey I am not sure. Happ has not been very good this year but should be the #5 starter. Many people point out that he was traded to be a starter, not a reliever, and Happ is needed to eat innings.

So, in the overnight, the Jays made a few calls to Vegas. Cecil indeed was moved down to Vegas to make room for Happ to enter the starting rotation, probably making a start on Thursday against Tampa. Andrew Carpenter, who wasn't being used, was also sent down to Vegas. Up came Chavez who will replace JA Happ in a long relief role.  I think it was a good move to move Cecil who just wasn't doing well and is the worst starter in the rotation right now. Don't expect Happ to be fantastic, though.

More exciting is the callup of Hechavarria who will replace Brett Lawrie at 3rd base. It was an interesting choice for the Jays but with only Visquel able to play the middle infield, the Jays wanted to get a look at his arm and his bat at the MLB level. Good luck, Adeiny! Anothopoulos calls his arm one of the best in baseball, and his hitting line in AAA for 2012 is .312 / .363 / .424 with 20 doubles, 6 triples, and 6 home runs -- not a power hitter. But with a full season of AAA experience, now is a good time to bring him up.

Well, today's lineup will look interesting. The only regulars left on the team are Yunel and Kelly Johnson. Likely the infield will consist of Hechavarria, Escobar, Johnson, and Cooper. Mathis will be behind the plate. It will be Gose, Davis, and Moises in the outfield. The bench is shortened to Gomes and Visquel, with Encarnacion DHing.

The key to the Jays winning now is to manufacturing a few runs and having a spectacular pitching performance. After the injuries to the pitching staff, the Jays needed an average of 6 runs a game to win. The Jays right now with the line up they have are highly unlikely to score many runs, so it is going to take spectacular pitching to win games.

Mike Wilner: Eternal Optimist

Rogers Shill, positive guy, or none of the above.

Let me say off the top that I like Mike Wilner. He is an essential piece of the radio broadcast for the Jays and connects the fans to the game. He hosts the pregame show on the Fan Radio network, and he hosts the Blue Jays talk after the game. Today, he writes daily blogs on the Jays. Up until the beginning of this year, you were able to comment on his blogs and he would usually respond if your opinions were thoughtful enough.

Wilner isn't a baseball guy, in that he wasn't a former major leaguer, but he brings great knowledge of the game which he uses to his advantage when arguing with the fans. And he's pretty smart. The knowledge, enthusiasm, his love for radio, and dedication will bring him a play-by-play job in the coming years, and I think he'll do well. What I like about him is that he is usually "rational and reasonable" and usually doesn't make statements that are completely unfactual.

Normally, on the Jays Talk, he instills calm to the Blue Jays fandom, assuring them that indeed the sky is not falling, and when the team is doing really well, reminding the fans that it's a long season.

Now, with his blog (found here), his Wilnerness no longer responds, and this leaves fans to leave comments at will without fear of reprisals. Comments on the blogs include a wide assortment of opinions such as this gem:

"Professor Wilmer's comments are hardly worth taking seriously.  I could provide a list of the crazy things he has said over the years.  But, we all need a job."

So the question is, is Mike a shill for Rogers Media, a positive guy, or a realist? Mike himself will argue that he's a realist.

Mike learned the hard way that improper behaviour will get you censured, as he was "suspended" for a weekend back in June 2010 for an exchange with Cito and perhaps the blog post he posted later was Rogers' breaking point. He was pretty openly critical of Cito, as were alot of fans.

But it seems lately that Wilner is really really positive about the Jays, to the point where there are alot of people commenting on the blog about it. When you listen to the Blue Jays talk, he points out (today) that they are "only 5.5 games out of a wild card" and comments today that the Jays are likely to win 3 of 4 in Oakland (yesterday) when that series starts tonight. He accuses fans (via Twitter) of getting off the bandwagon when people tell him that the team won't make the playoffs.  

You can be a realistic fan of the Blue Jays, but facts are facts. There are 57 games left, and the Jays have to win more games than four of Boston, Detroit, Baltimore, Tampa, Oakland, and California. Likely the Jays will need to win at least 37 of the last 57 games. The Jays are short three strong bats, and the starting pitching hasn't been fixed and won't be until Brandon Morrow and another free agent comes in to fill the top of the rotation.

In his homage to Travis Snider, Wilner wrote: "I'm going to miss Travis Snider a lot, and I hope he becomes the star so many Blue Jays fans hoped he would become. And I'm going to hope that Brad Lincoln - and Anthony Gose, who appears to have been given the keys to a full-time spot in the outfield from here on out - reward Anthopoulos' faith and become big parts of what's going to be a very, very good Blue Jays team very, very soon."

I wish that Wilner would tone down on the positive rhetoric and be more realistic. You can be a great fan of the Jays and be realistic on the fact that they probably won't make the playoffs. It seems that, especially this year, he is overly optimistic. I think that some of the optimism is just his personality but that some part of it too is Rogers' Media messaging.

And I think that's wrong. Jays fans are disappointed this year because the team is hovering within 3 games of the .500 mark, while the Orioles and Oakland are succeeding. They blame AA for not bolstering the starting pitching (for me, at the beginning of the season -- for others, at the trade deadline). I think that's a fair criticism. In my opinion, blaming AA for anything else is not right. Thames underperformed, especially in May. Snider was hurt, leaving a hole in LF. Adam Lind's nagging back injuries is another problem. Rasmus had a very slow start, as did Bautista and Arencibia. None of this could have been predicted from the preseason performance. Only in late June and July did the team experience a hitting resurgence based on Lind, Arencibia, and Bautista, only to have all three of them get injured. It's very difficult to recover when 3 of your starters go down in a week, as well as your closer and middle reliever. Add to that Romero's breakdown, and what can you do???

There just seems to be a disconnect between the fans and the message that Wilner is delivering which I think needs to be reconciled -- an acknowledgement from Wilner that things are not peachy-keen in Blue Jays land. A more realistic message and admission from Mike - that the Jays are very very unlikely to make the playoffs given the team makeup today and the teams that they need to pass, would reconnect Wilner with the fans. Otherwise, he just comes across as a Rogers shill, and I don't think Mike wants to be that.

August 2: Oakland 4, Jays 1

Jays can't score - tough outing against Colon

The Blue Jays are without Jose Bautista, JP Arencibia, and Adam Lind, and the walk came back to haunt the team.

It's difficult to win games when you walk people. Toronto leads the AL with 374, 90 more than league leading Texas. That's like giving up one more hit per game. And walks wear out the pitchers, forcing them to throw more pitches, not only to the player at bat, but at the next AB.

Alvarez walked 5 in 5 innings, but none of the walks that Alvarez threw resulted in runs. Alvarez's three earned runs happened in the bottom of the 3rd due to a single, wild pitch, single (to score 1) and a Josh Reddick home run.

Delabar came on in the 6th , and perhaps Oakland had seen alot of him in AL West play, but he looked shaky with two walks and a wild pitch, but got out of the innings without damage.

Happ came on in the 7th inning, and ran into trouble right away, giving up two walks and a single before giving up a bases loaded single to Brandon Inge. The ball was hit to short centre allowing Rasmus to preserve a second run from scoring.

As with most major league starters, the first inning is the 2nd hardest inning to pitch (the sixth is the hardest). JA Happ is no exception -- players OPS is .838 in the first inning, and he gives up .54 walks in the first inning pitched. It takes preparation to start, so when JA Happ is in the bullpen, he needs to prepare and be sharp for that relief appearance. But if JA Happ wants to win a place back in the rotation three things needs to happen: a starter must fail; Happ needs to be stretched out to be able to throw 80 or so pitches in a start; Happ needs to demonstrate that he's good enough to start a game. Well, Happ threw 51 pitches in yesterday's appearance over two innings and 49 pitches 10 days before that, and just hasn't been very good.

On the offensive side, the Jays couldn't put anything together against Colon, sprinking 7 singles over 8 very good innings pitched by the veteran. The Jays only got runners to scoring position in three innings, and their best hope before the 9th was in the 2nd inning when the Jays loaded the bases with two outs, but Rajai hit into a ground ball to end the rally.

The Jays did threaten in the 9th. Moises Sierra got his first RBI as he beat out a double play ball to score Cooper who hit a double into the gap in left to start the inning. Then Lawrie got a single to put the tying at bat in Colby Rasmus on board. Colby hit into a fielder's choice at 2nd to end the game.

With left-handed Doolittle (not their closer) on the mound with one out, I thought the Jays made an interesting choice in batting Moises for Gose. This forced the As to go to their closer righty Ryan Cook to get the final two outs. Now Moises bats right and Gose bats left, and the choice to bat Moises to get a righty-lefty matchup makes sense.

But when you look at the numbers, Doolittle's numbers against lefties are reversed: against lefties he's sporting an OPS of 1.006 while against righties, the OPS is .394. And, Doolittle is a rookie. So, why force the closer to come on who has a fairly equal OPS against righties and lefties at around .490. Sure, Cook walks people at a rate of .5 / inning but he's a far better pitcher.  

But why force the situation? By the numbers, the lefty in Gose should fare better against Doolittle, and Gose has speed. I just think this was the correct choice given the situation. You want to leave in Doolittle, who was struggling, as long as possible, and to force in your closer takes away the opportunity to win.

The Jays are at the lowest point of the season so far, at three games below .500 and 5 and a half out of the 2nd wild card. They are without three of their bigger bats, and they are playing in a pitcher's park. The Jays are a home run hitting team, but they have to manufacture runs on the west coast ballparks. To do that, the players need to relax and not feel so much pressure to perform (Lawrie says there is no pressure) with the injury outages. I think if they can put one win on the board tonight or tomrorrow in Oakland, they'll win the next game too.

Boo Jays - State of the Jaysdom

Injury and Insult?

When the Toronto Blue Jays came out of the preseason, they were looking hot. Brett Lawrie, at age 21, became the voice of the club, attracting young fans. Attendance is up over 20% (league attendance is up 5%). The preseason was great. Blue Jays fandom was looking for a good season, and the addition of the 2nd wild card represented great hope for the club. Your bench players were Visquel, Davis, and Mathis, which were upgrades over last year.

Rogers Media overhauled its messaging, stating that the the AL east was going to be closest in years, delivered some dramatic music, and off went the season, with a new closer in Sergio Santos and a very young rotation featuring Alvarez, Drabek, and Hutchinson in the back of the rotation.


This season is all about inconsistency. There was lacklustre hitting and blown saves in April. Lind, Bautista, Arencibia, and Yunel had poor starts. May was better but Thames and Lind were still awful. Walks were a problem. At the end of May, the Jays were 3 games over .500 and looking pretty good. Morrow was coming together. Hutchinson had adjusted and was starting to reimprove. Lind got demoted and up came Cooper or Gomes.


June started with optimism but then with the departures of Morrow, Drabek, and Hutchinson in the same week, it all started to unravel a bit. In came Cecil, Laffey, and Villanueva to pick up the slack, with only Carlos Del V doing excellent in the role. But despite the pitching outages, the Jays offense picked up the slack, and Bautista and Arencibia started hitting the cover off the ball to keep the ship afloat. Even Lind came back and was doing really well.


But then Bautista went down and alarm bells went off. The Yankees completed its sweep, and the Jays came back and completed the sweep against Boston, giving the fandom hope. Then Lind went down with back pain, and Arencibia suffered from a freak accident. Down were the #1, 5, and 6 hitters in the 2nd half (measured by OPS). Then Travis Snider got traded along with Thames and the #4 hitter was gone, leaving Rajai Davis and Edwin as the top two hitters on the team (2nd half).


So, what should Anthopolous have done? If you were the Jays upper management, what would you do.


First, realize that Anthopolous cannot simply go out and rent players, because alas (see previous post), AA reports to Rogers Media, which reports to Rogers Communications. The Blue Jays and Rogers Centre brought in 160 million in revenue last year. There will be increased revenue of about $12 million or so from increased ticket sales which AA will probably be able to use to purchase a pitcher in the off season.


And, really, even if AA went out and rented two batters (left field and 1st) and two starters (Garza, Dempster) where would hte Jays stand with 58 games to go. They have to pass 5 teams and win 5 more games then ALL of them, essentially having to win 2 of 3 to make the playoffs. Even the best team in baseball wins 3 of 5, so it would have taken luck and skill to pull them off. And the Jays would have given away its top prospects for a long shot possibility to have a 50/50 shot to make the post season. And Romero has fallen apart, going 1-8 since the Jays pitching debacle and an ERA approaching 9. So really, you can't blame AA for not going for broke at the deadline, and during the first three months of the season, you really can't pick up anyone.


No, not this year. Not this team. The team needed consistency and to perform better with the resources they had back in April. And now there are too many injuries and they are too far back.


In my opinion if AA can be criticized for anything, it's for not scoring a veteran starter in the last off-season. With Hutchinson, Alvarez, and Drabek being the back end of the starting rotation, everyone knew that there was a good chance that at least one of them would fail. And Drabek pretty much did, and the farm seemed to dry up. Carreno and Chavez didn't start well. Cecil is getting better, but has yet to perform, and while Villanueva is doing very well, the long reliever position suffered.


Snider and Thames' departure is a product of AA needing long term relievers, which is a result of Perez's season ending surgery, Villanueva's move to the starting rotation, and Santos' injury. I am sure that AA would have rather gotten a decent starter for both, but the market for starting pitching was just too expensive. The Jays will likely try to stretch out Lincoln again into a starter. Happ may also be a starter.


As for Snider (and Thames), the fans are sad to see him go, and most analysts are pretty critical of both the Jays and Snider of the inability to connect. The Jays didn't really give Snider a chance, and Snider really never proved himself at the major league level.


Once Bautista is back (hopefully at home by the end of next week), the Jays will send down Sierra and platoon Gose and Davis in left field or perhaps let Gose start in center and move Rasmus to left. The Jays will either go with six starters and seven relievers or five starters and eight relievers until the end of the year and leave a short bench for the rest of August (until the reinforcements can be added for September). Morrow will be back in three weeks, and perhaps we'll see Hutchinson in mid-September to take over for Alvarez who will be shut down.


In the end, the Jays will probably finish at .500 this year and the end result will be chalked up to injury and inconsistency. The fandom will argue about the effectiveness of Alex Anthopolous and John Farrell this year, but really, you gotta look at the injuries and the inconsistency, little of which are in Alex' control.

Rogers Media and the Boo Jays

Blue Jays and Rogers Media: a connection you can't ignore

Many years ago, media companies began merging into oligarchies. In the United States, for example, General Electric bought NBC. AOL became AOL Time Warner. MicroSoft teamed up with NBC to form MSNBC. Viacom, who owned CBS, bought Paramount, which owned Canada's Wonderland, and for a while, you would watch commercials for Viacom properties while you waited 45 minutes to get on the Bat. Alas, I digress.

Rogers Communications inc. started in the early 1960s as a radio company based in Toronto, starting with CHFI (98.1 FM) and CFTR (680 News). By the late 60s, they expanded to television, and in the early 80s they expanded to Wireless (remember Cantel?).

Then, in the 90s, Rogers bought MacLean-Hunter, and finally, in 2000, they bought the Toronto Blue Jays.

The Blue Jays haven't made the playoffs in the past 11 years.

Today, Rogers has really three divisions that are all tightly related: a wireless division (we all know Rogers Wireless and Fido), a cable division, and finally Rogers Media. Based on last year's results, Rogers Wireless is extremely profitable, with 3 billion in operating profits on 7.1 billion dollars of revenue based on 9.3 million subsctibers. Those of you who say your wireless bill is too expensive are right. The problem is that Bell and Telus won't lower their prices either (the oligarchy). Rogers Cable is pretty profitable too, with 1.6 billion of profit on 3.8 billion in revenue (of course, the competitors won't compete in Canada either) based on 3.75 million subscribers. And finally, there is the Media area, which has just 180 million dollars of operating profit on 1.6 billion dollars in revenue,

What is Rogers Media?

Well, they own and operate CityTV and OMNI (which is why you see commercials for CityTV while watching the Jays). They own 9 specialty channels (including SportsNet) and own pieces of four other TV stations. Television produces 41% of operating revenue in 2011. The Shopping Channel produces 16% of operating revenue as well.

They also produce 54 consumer, trade and professional publications including of course Chatelaine and MacLeans. Publications produced 17% of operating revenue in 2011.

And there's radio with 50+ radio stations across the country, including the beloved Fan590 and the rest of the Fan Radio network, but also 680 news in Toronto.

And finally, there is a division called Sports Entertainment, which are the Blue Jays and Rogers Centre which produced the final 10% of operating revenue.

So as a whole, the Blue Jays and Rogers Centre had about 160 million dollars of revenue of the total of 14.5 billion dollars of revenue, a little bit over 1% of the entire Rogers empire.

One point of all of this is that the Blue Jays operate as part of the great whole of Rogers, and the goal of Rogers, and therefore the Blue Jays, are to be profitable. The Jays are not going to operate at a loss. In fact, they are probably expected to have a profit margin similar to other divisions at Rogers Media. That precludes management from spending big bucks like the Yankees and Red Sox. In fact, the only other corporations that owns an MLB club is Nintendo's majority ownership of the Seattle Mariners and Lerner Enterprises' ownership of the Nationals. What this means is that the people responsible for the pursestrings of the Jays are not really connected to the Jays. The Jays report to Rogers Media. Rogers Media reports to Rogers Communications, and the Jays are really a small part (1%) of the entire picture.

The other point of this is the synergy that exists uniquely within the Blue Jays. The Jays broadcast on the Fan Radio network and on SportsNet exclusively, both Rogers properties. Opinions on the Jays are broadcast primarily on Jays owned media outlets. This stifles the independent voices of the club. Radio analyst Mike Wilner was censored for a weekend for criticizing Cito Gaston. For all other clubs, radio rights are given to a radio network who are free to make comments without fear of censure. The same is true for television rights with the exceptions of YES (Yankees). As a result, the Jays broadcasters are encouraged, whether directly or indirectly, to stay on message, and if they aren't, there is always the suspicion that they are. The Blue Jays radio network and SportsNet will prop up the Jays, as a positive outlook gets more customers, and more customers mean more advertising revenue for Rogers Media, which is the company's mission. Once again, the goal of the Toronto Blue Jays is not to win a World Series. It is to be profitable. Shi Davidi, Mike Wilner, and Scott Carson are paid shills of Rogers, as are the Blue Jays themselves. They're all part of the same club, with the same goal.

For myself, that means that I take everything that comes out of Sportsnet.ca, the Fan 590, or Sportsnet TV with a very critical eye.

Once you realize that the goal of the Blue Jays are to win profitably and that most of the opinions that you hear on radio and TV are just part of the Rogers empire messages, you might understand the workings of the Jays more. Alex Anthopoulos won't buy big talent because it isn't profitable in the short term to do so. The Jays will always sound better than they actually are because the television and radio outlets prop them up.

Welcome!

The Toronto Blue Jays

Welcome to my blog. I've been contributing to the Blue Jays talk through conversations on SportsNet and in blogs around the internet. I am known as "Tim in the Falls"

I've been a Jays fan now for over 25 years and live in Niagara Falls (on the better side). I will try to post some insight on the Jays after every game. Hopefully, alot of you will read and agree (or disagree) with my views and start some lively discussions. Of course, not many of you will realize that I exist for awhile, but hopefully that will change. Hopefully, I can just keep this blog running.

It's August now, and the Jays were just swept by the Mariners. The Jays are still working with their patchwork starting rotation and now are forced to have a patchwork starting lineup due to injuries to the great Jose Bautista, Adam Lind, and JP Arencibia. The Jays are facing a tough road trip, and their odds of making the post season are long, at best.

My Dad and I exchange email about the Blue Jays and my father always entitles his emails "boo jays", so in homage to him, I am using this as the handle here on blogspot.

Ok, Boo Jays... lets play ball.