Alex Rios Gone - Direction?

Sorry for the lack of posts -- I have been on "vacation" the last week or so... and what a week it was in Jays land.

Obviously first and foremost the Jays dumped the chosen one by sending Alex Rios to the White Sox for a ball of bags (actually less then that!). Perhaps JP and the rest of the Jays upper management have been reading my blog. Is this an indicator that the Jays may actually be looking to rebuild properly? I am likely just dreaming, eh? This more realistically means that Jays ownership is trying to restructure payroll (aka - lowering it) moving forward.

I haven't given up all hope in Rogers Corp. quite yet. I mean they have increased payroll in the past, and have previously allowed JP to go out and buy players. I guess only time will tell.

For what it's worth Rios has gone 3 for 15 with an error since joining the White Sox. Personally I was never huge fan of Rios, so I will go on record and say I agree with this move. In my opinion his career .785OPS is not worth $60 million. Also rumour has it that some Jays players are starting to speak out and implying that Rios doesn't put in 100% effort day in and day out.

Secondly every-ones favorite cowboy Kevin Millar has decided to back to his old number 15. Rios was wearing that number...

Go Jays.

Time for a new direction... or a direction... or something that isn't annoying

Time to get negative.... or "confused" may be better word.

Although I didn't watch the entire game last night, I for some reason still decided to look at my blackberry every 10 minutes for game updates. Each time I looked I got more and more pissed off. I hate our lineup so much it is actually getting hard for me to justify why the Jays should peak my interest more then a outlet with nothing plugged into it.

Look I understand Cito has no ability to adapt (make change) and JP is desperately trying to look like he kinda knows what he is doing, but why in the hell is Kevin Millar receiving so many at-bats? Look, Millar's a good clubhouse and dugout guy, but let's get serious here, at this point in his career that's where he should be at ALL times. He has become a left hander masher who can't hit lefties anymore. Why Cito, didn't you pinch hit Overbay for him in the 8th inning? Why Cito, is he hitting 4th in the lineup? Why Cito, is he in the lineup in the first place??? Like what the F...

I just don't understand where this team is going anymore, and I think the Kevin Millar situation is a perfect microcosm of how this has no plan, no direction, and no hope in hell for improvement in the short to mid-term future. People tell me were going to complete in 2010, but how? Are Marcum and Litsch all off a sudden going to make us better then 2 of Tampa, New York, and Boston? Is Snider going to be the trump card agains the superstars our main rivals field? Come on...

Ok, I know this team was supposed to suck, but I was not expecting them to be the 3rd worst team in the majors since May 19th even though 3 guys in our starting lineup are having career years. Ok, I admit I didn't expect Wells and Rios to all of a sudden be mediocre at best baseball players, but wouldn't this ultimately give us a chance to figure out what the plan should be moving forward? Yet, instead, outside of a demanded trade, we decided to maintain the status quo at the trade deadline, and to piss fans off even more start to give the wrong players more playing time. Why doesn't Bautista play more then Millar? At least he makes contact sometimes, and has a killer arm? But no, let's go with what used to work 7 years ago(surrounded by superstars) just because he is a vet.

What the hell is going on here? What is the direction of this team? Are we going with the same group of guys who always finish 3rd and 4th in the division? Are we increasing payroll, or are we going to rebuild properly?

Something needs to happen and fast. 15 years is not a short time period.

The thing that really pisses me off is that I used to be able to answer questions about the Blue Jays, but know I have no f%^%&* clue whatsoever what is going on with this team.

Scott Rolen dealt to the Reds for Encarnacion and Two Prospects

Rolen will be missed. He was having a very solid season. However, Alonso included or not this is a good trade for the Jays. The Jays were not going to compete while Rolen was under contract with them, so it made sense to try to move him. The bonus is that we got a major leaguer and two solid prospects.

http://toronto.bluejays.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090731&content_id=6169044&vkey=news_tor&fext=.jsp&c_id=tor

"The Blue Jays dealt third baseman Scott Rolen to the Reds at Friday's non-waiver Trade Deadline, receiving third baseman Edwin Encarnacion, right-handed reliever Josh Roenicke and Minor League righty Zach Stewart in exchange for the veteran. Rolen waived his no-trade clause in order to approve the deal."

In other news - The Toronto Mammoth Burger has filed for bankruptcy

Just over 24 hours left to go and all is quiet in Jays land - Status Quo Moving forward?

Well folks here we are - Just over 24 hours until the trade deadline.

The Jays are currently 4 games under .500 and have played a wicked awesome 17 games under .500 since their hot start. Maybe I am straying away from my own advice and not thinking rationally right now, but I am getting a little nervous that upper management might think that this is the team we should have moving forward.

In other words, is the Jays brass considering remaining status quo?

Can they really believe that staying with the same team that finished 4th last year, will finish 4th again this year, and likely 4th again next year is the right thing to do? I sure hope not.

We have so many moveable pieces right now, led by of course Roy Halladay. If done properly we can expedite a true rebuild if we move some (if not most) of the players we have on the current Major League team. I already listed the group that can be moved, but as we get closer to the deadline I am really starting to get worried.

I expected some moves by now. What is going on here?

Time for a TRUE re-build

We will NOT compete with this core. We haven't even been a top 3 team in the East with this core going on two years now.

Upper management has resisted a true re-build for a good 15 seasons. We currently have some chips that could speed up the TRUE rebuilding process from 6 or 7 years to only 3 or 4.

The following players should all be shopped:

Halladay (he is the key player who will speed up the re-build), Rolen, Scutaro, Millar, Overbay, Wells (tough to trade obviously), Barajas, Downs, Camp, Frasor, Tallet, Bautista, Inglett, League, Richmond, and McDonald.

Of the players who have seen major league baseball this season on the Jays I would only hang onto Lind, Hill, Marcum, Rios (yes Rios), Snider, Litsch, Rze, Romero, and Cecil.

The time is now. There is a real chance to fix this team in just 3 or 4 years. But we need a TRUE re-build. A re-build that has a low team payroll and a team that isn't mediocre, but truly does suck. Enough with these 80-88 win 3rd and 4th place finishes!

**I just hate the JP is the man to do this.

Halladay trade deadline date set by Riccardi

I don't normally paste links to websites, but for this I will.

If you ask me, Halladay is not going to be traded this year.

“If you ask me today if we’re going to trade Roy Halladay, I’d say no,” Ricciardi, the Toronto Blue Jays’ general manager, said Tuesday morning. “Something could happen between now and the trade deadline, but this isn’t something that’s suddenly going to happen with someone on the 30th.

”While the non-waiver trading deadline is July 31, Ricciardi said that the Jays would most likely enforce an internal deadline of July 28 to make a deal. Since Ricciardi said the Jays “have to be knocked off our feet” to trade Halladay, he said trade talks with prospective suitors will need to have accelerated several days before the deadline. An 11th-hour deal sounds unlikely.

“There are too many pieces that have to be in play with this,” Ricciardi said.Ricciardi noted that Halladay is scheduled to start on July 29 and added that he did not want Halladay to have to make that start with the possibility of a trade still lingering over the pitcher. By then, Ricciardi hopes that the Jays have traded Halladay for a pile of prospects or have decided to keep him.

source : http://bats.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/plenty-of-suitors-for-halladay-but-deal-remains-elusive/

After 81 Games - Mid Season Thoughts

We were told by upper management that this was going top be a long season. We were told by upper management that we were going to suck. We were told by upper management to be patient.

Well here we are - halfway done the season and own a winning record, who would have thought that eh?

How have we been doing this? I am confused myself. Our can't miss rookie was sent to the minors in May. Our entire starting rotation has been on the DL or sent to the minors at one point this season. We have had two pitchers that we're drafted in 2007 make starts. Our elite closer hasn't been able to through a fastball over 88mph, and his replacement went down with a foot injury. Our two projected main offensive threats have been complete busts this season. Attendance is down about 6%, but SOMEHOW we have a winning record at the midway point. Baseball is a great game.

It is pretty simple to see that Scutaro, Lind, Hill, Rolen, Halladay, and Romero have carried this team on their collective backs. With special thanks to Frasor, Downs (before his injury), and Richmond.

The combo of Scutaro and Hill have been more then solid all season long. Hill has always been a potential guy, but has dropped that tag with his tremendous offensive first half. Scutaro, who has always been a part-time player has become one of the best shortstops in the entire majors. Nothing short of a major surprise there.

Rolen has adjusted his game to the point where you are shocked when he hits a homerun. However his .330ish batting average and near .900OPS more then balances out his diminished power. I am extremely happy with Scott this year (understatement).

Doc has been Doc.

Adam Lind in my opinion has been our best and most consistent hitter all season. He is the only hitter who hasn't gone through a prolonged slump, and is showing no signs of slowing down.

We have arguablely been a 5 or 6 player team all season long, but nonetheless have shutup the critics for the time being. Did we do it with smoke and mirrors? Perhaps, considering we have played 13 games under .500 since the hot start, but let's all be happy here. It was nothing but negative propaganda spewed out by our team management at the start off the season. The positives moving forward far out-weigh the negatives.