Fact or Faked: Position Battles

I'm a fan of spring training.  I really am.  It may not seem like it based on how infrequently I've turned up for my weekend blogging duties since the annual pre-season ritual has gotten underway (sorry 'bout that), but I've been enjoying the fact that there's even the most meaningless of baseball games being played in Florida and Arizona.  You can't get to the real games until you play the fake ones.

Before spring training got underway, I wrote hereabouts that there really was surprisingly little left to settle with respect to the roster that would head north for the Toronto Blue Jays.  There was the backup catcher situation to sort out, and the question of choosing between Emilio Bonifacio and Maicer Izturis as the predominant second base option.  These position battles, such as they are, have actually unfolded pretty quietly:  looks like Henry Blanco will get the nod to try and track R.A. Dickey's knuckleball every fifth day, while John Gibbons may have chosen not to answer the second base question definitively one way or the other.  Which is well within his rights, and might be the wisest course of action anyway.

There's a pertinent question to ask, though, about to what extent these position battles were ever a real thing at all.  It's entirely possible the team knew exactly what the answers to these questions would be long before the beat writers and broadcasters gathered in Dunedin started to pose them in the media.

I was listening to the second edition of "Behind the Dish", Keith Law's excellent new podcast from ESPN.com, in which he interviewed former Washington Nationals and Cleveland Indians manager Manny Acta.  Acta had some very interesting things to say about the number of roster decisions most organizations have basically predetermined prior to spring, if not carved in stone, then at least written out in permanent Magic Marker.

The truth is there are very few real competitions in spring training, to hear Acta tell it.  He wasn't revealing some earth-shattering behind-the-scenes truth, but his discussion of organizational expectations of players coming into camp went beyond the standard "spring stats don't mean shit" that we all understand intuitively already.

Acta also talked a bit about the difference between coaches making mechanical changes with a player who is more certain to be on the Opening Day roster, as opposed to one who is legitimately fighting for a spot on the team.  In short, if teams want a clear picture of what a player can do against various qualities of competition in camp -- from major league talent to A-ball fodder -- they tend to leave his mechanics alone.  This gives the organizations a sense of where he truly is in his development, and it's fairer to the player, since he's not struggling with consistency due to tweaks to his batting stance or pitching stride.

Bearing all of this in mind, even if most players in major league camp can't really do anything to play themselves into the opening day roster, can they do enough to play their way off of it?  Or, to make it more applicable to the media narrative du jour, what's it all mean for Ricky Romero vs. J.A. Happ for that fifth rotation spot?

Romero has struggled badly in spring, after a horrible 2012 season.  Yet if you follow the Acta logic -- which actually makes some sense to me -- if Romero were really in a battle for his big-league spot, most organizations wouldn't start monkeying around with his delivery.  In fact, the logic would say the exact opposite:  it's because Romero's spot is relatively safe that the organization isn't worried about the results he's putting up while he works through his mechanical adjustments against minor leaguers on the back fields.

Now, granted, the mechanical intervention with Romero is coming awfully late in camp.  And while the question of whether there's a fifth starter battle might not have generated an actual fire yet, there's a helluva lot of smoke.  In any case, I found Acta's insights interesting if you're really looking for another way to analyze this from a distance (or over-analyze, if you like).

Even as an anonymous blogger literally writing this in his basement, I don't have the guts to make a solid prediction one way or the other, but gun to my head, I still think Ricky Romero is going to get some rope at the back end of the rotation.  While it may look to the outside world like he's put his rotation spot in jeopardy and he's got a week to put a stranglehold back on it, it's just as likely that the decision to bring him north has already been made. 

Spring Depth

This is happening.  Actual baseball players are playing actual baseball on actual baseball diamonds.  Now, those players may be major leaguers half-assing it in the early spring, or minor league scrubs whole-assing it with no hope of making an Opening Day roster.  But it's baseball all the same, and it's a glorious thing.

Besides, there are at least a few things are already in mid-season form, like Prince Fielder's bat-flip, for instance.  Is it important that one of the premier sluggers in the game zeroed in on a Brandon Morrow offering and lit him up like a senior citizen's birthday cake?  Of course not.  To me, little tidbits of entertainment like these are the things that makes the otherwise tedious spring training experience more fun.  Even in the earliest games, we get a glimpse of the kind of best-on-best match-ups that keep us watching through the dog days.

Of course, we also get to see some of the kinds of plays that will eventually get real prospects into the majors one day, like Anthony Gose robbing Austin Jackson of at least one extra base, if not two or three.  Seeing Gose zoom straight back off the crack of the bat and track that fly ball perfectly got me thinking about depth on the Blue Jays roster for 2013.

While it's a given that Gose is slated for AAA Buffalo to start the year -- I mean, they aren't even pretending otherwise -- it bears repeating that he racked up a surprising 189 above-replacement-level plate appearances in the big leagues in 2012.  Even the most optimistic Colby Rasmus boosters (and I count myself among them) have to feel more comfortable knowing such a capable defender is available in case he struggles or takes a step backward.  With what should be a more potent lineup in place for 2013, even if Gose brings a bat that... um, let's say "needs maturing", he provides enviable depth in the outfield.

Add to Gose the fairly canny signing of Ryan Langerhans (despite his apparent maiming of Mike McCoy in an outfield collision on Saturday), bringing Adam Loewen back into the fold as a 1B/OF, and hell, maybe even Lance Zawadzki , and you have the makings of a respectable set of AAA outfielders who could be called on in a pinch as a fourth outfielder for -- picking a number out the blue here -- 15 days.

(EDIT: only took me a day or so after posting to realize Zawadzki is actually an infielder, but the broader point about depth in Buffalo stands.  Plus, Moises Sierra is still a thing that exists, so I guess you could throw him into the AAA mix of outfielders.)

Speaking of depth, I might be overreacting to a pretty minor feature of the defensive lineup John Gibbons fielded on Saturday at Joker Marchant Stadium, but I was intrigued by his decision to start the game with Emilio Bonifacio at shortstop and Maicer Izturis at second base, and even more intrigued when he flip-flopped the two of them a few innings in.

We're not quite in Tampa Bay's shortstop-at-every-position territory just yet, but it speaks well of the potential versatility of the infielders available that least three of them can play passably at the toughest spot.  If the withered corpse of Mark DeRosa can log a few innings a week at third, second or a corner outfield spot, there should be more than enough defensive options for Gibbons to spell Brett Lawrie, Jose Bautista, and Jose Reyes, maybe give them a half-day off as the DH, and keep them fresh over the 162-game grind.

What To Expect When You're Expecting Spring Training To Start

You all know me as a person who steers clear of hyperbole, so you know I'm serious when I tell you there's 23 feet of snow in my yard and the idea that baseball is starting soon is the only thing keeping me from an irrevocable descent, Jack Torrance-like, into despondency and madness.

Alright, so maybe it's not as bad as all that.  Regardless, with Spring Training opening this week as pitchers and catchers report over the next several days, it's a bit dispiriting that without the means to jet off to South Florida and catch a few games, the rest of February and March are likely to be only slightly less baseball-free than the last few months have been.

That's not to say I'm not at least mildly excited.  There's plenty of time in May and June to fret about what the real world brings us, but in the meantime, Jays fans haven't had this much to look forward to in many years.  And one of the best things about spring is that it's not a time for tempered expectations or appeals to reason and realism -- even if the entire exercise is usually considerably less interesting once it starts than it felt like it was going to be in the period prior.  

One of the big differences in Dunedin this year as compared to years past is the fact that when it comes to competing for space on the plane going north, there aren't many open questions.  For instance, last season, John Farrell (bah! *spits*) was forced to piece together a starting rotation nobody truly expected to see when camp got underway, including a start from Joel Carreno in the third game of the season when Brett Cecil didn't make the Opening Day roster.  In 2013, if there are any questions about who will comprise the Jays' five-man rotation as the calendar turns to April, something will have gone dreadfully, horribly wrong.

Similarly, on the offensive side, any remaining areas of uncertainty relate more to the style of the roster than the substance.   The infield and outfield are largely set, save for sorting out the backup catcher battle and the Bonifacizturis situation at second base.  And as much as I'd have liked to see it, a right-handed DH platoon partner for Adam Lind is not walking through that door, so the approach to assembling the starting nine against left-handers still remains to be seen.  I've been keen on the notion of cycling some of the more capable right-handed bats -- Jose Bautista, Brett Lawrie, Rajai Davis -- through the DH spot on those occasions as a half-day off.  The more flexible makeup of the bench would allow for it defensively, and I think it makes sense.

With all these questions mostly answered, though, and the prospect pipeline not gushing with as much must-see talent in the big league camp this year, it could make for -- dare I say it? -- a boring Spring Training this year.  But boring works.  Boring is good.  Embrace the boring, I say.

Besides, even a boring Spring Training is better than nothing.  The snow and the cold are starting to get to me.

The Snider Thing

Photo via the Las Vegas Sun
I had intended to write up another off-field preview for the 30 Jays in 30 Days series this weekend.

(And really: before I go any further, can we all give a tip of the cap to the Tao for having taken this endeavour on? As it reaches its conclusion, and Opening Day gets ever closer, I think it’s been a fun, insightful exercise to take stock of the roster the way this series has. It’s been a lot of work, though, and Tao deserves our thanks for it. Even if he didn’t take me to Florida with him.)

But instead of adding a preview of Dwayne Murphy or Pete Walker or the guys who tape ankles in the clubhouse, I felt like this time would be better spent discussing the outcome, which we learned today, of the “Battle for Left Field” that had unfolded during Spring Training. Travis Snider was optioned to AAA Las Vegas earlier today, making Eric Thames your starting left fielder for the Toronto Blue Jays. At least for now.

In fact, there wasn’t really a battle at all, in any official sense of the word. When Alex Anthopoulos comes out and says something to the media, even if it sometimes sounds less than definitive or leaves him all kinds of wiggle room, he generally means it. In retrospect, Anthopoulos, along with pretty much every other person in the organization, couldn’t have signalled louder that Thames was getting the left field job unless they walked around Dunedin carrying #TeamThames bullhorns.

It’s not that they were leading the fans on with a false display of real competition for the job; it’s that a lot of us (me included) projected our own desire to see a real competition onto the otherwise mundane preseason preparation in Florida. It was easy to get caught up in a spring training position battle, even a contrived one, because spring training would be as exciting as Uno night at your grandma’s place without some storylines like this.

I love Travis Snider, and I’m sad about this. But I don’t think Travis Snider is getting a raw deal, or getting jerked around by the organization, or being developed improperly, or that he should (SHUT YO MOUTH) be traded. In fact, quite the opposite: this might be the first time in four years that anyone in the organization is being 100% honest with the guy. He knew going into camp that he was probably going to be on the outside looking in on Opening Day. Then he came in and had a pretty damn good camp. And OF COURSE he did. He’s a very talented hitter; he was facing weaker competition than he would during a big-league regular season; and he had (I would think) some degree of certainty about what the end result of this whole exercise was going to be, so he had a chance to just go out and play some baseball.

In “Moneyball”, Michael Lewis looked back at Billy Beane’s ignominious big-league career and contrasted it to the likes of Lenny Dykstra. The picture was of a tightly-wound perfectionist with the highest of expectations wrapped up in him; as opposed to a loose cannon who never understood why anyone would doubt he could play in the bigs, because all you had to do was go out there and play the bloody game the way you know how. Sometimes I wonder if there’s a little bit of that Billy Beane conundrum going on with Travis Snider. The skills and the tools are there. But that absolute certainty is elusive. That faith in his own abilities; that confidence that he can just let it all hang out on the diamond and the inevitable result will be elite-level success; that I’m-good-at-this-and-I-don’t-give-a-shit-what-you-think attitude. With a ticket to Vegas in hand and almost nothing to lose, it’s entirely possible we saw some of that attitude begin to emerge this spring in Dunedin with Travis Snider, and I suspect the organization wants to see if he can build on it now.

You can look just down the dugout at a 21-year-old Brett Lawrie and see that whole package ready to explode onto the Major League scene. It’s the kind of supernova arrival that we fans of Snider have been hoping for – expecting, even – for about three years.

But Travis Snider isn’t Brett Lawrie. He’s also not Billy Beane, or Lenny Dykstra, or anyone else. There’s no template for success in the major leagues. There’s just thousands and thousands of prospects and non-prospects trying to find a way to put it all together. We probably shouldn’t forget that Snider is still – still, after all the false starts and dashed hopes – closer than most are to doing so.

Making something out of numbers that mean nothing

(I've never actually seen the show above. Though both of those guys seems like real mensches.)

Indulge us, if you will, the latitude to contradict¹ ourselves.²

If years of reading this blog hasn't led you to the notion that we don't put much stock into Spring Training, then perhaps you've missed the past few years where we refer to this part of the schedule as "fake games".

And yet...tilt your head in just the right way, and there's something to be gleaned from the collected output of 21 exhibition matches. Not that we think that they are overly predictive, but some of the whatnot and wherefore makes for amusing chatter. So here are a few curios that we've plucked out of the pile.

Iron Men: Both Jonathan Diaz and David Cooper have played in 20 games thus far in the spring, most of any of the Dunedin denizens. Though most of those appearances have come off the bench, allowing their big league brethren to peel out of the parking lot before the last pitch is thrown, we suspect that the brain trust have chosen to take a longer look at them in the pre-season. Same goes for Eric Thames, whose 46 ABs (in 18 games) are most this spring for the Jays.

Why the lingering gaze? In the case of Thames and Cooper, we get the sense that a decision has to be made within the next 12 months on where they fit in the plans for the future, and this spring is a crucial piece of their evaluations. Neither player is heading north any time soon, but the 2012-2013 rosters are beginning to take shape. And as well as they've performed so far, we suspect that neither will have any sort of profound impact on those future contenders.

As for Diaz, he sounds as though he's in possession of a magnificent glove, though his acumen with the bat makes Mike McCoy seem like the Splendid Splinter. Our guess is that he's a body who can fill in at enough positions to get the Jays through the overly long tune-up period.

Ratios! We heard ESPN fantasy dude Nate Ravitz make mention on his podcast this week that the only stat he observes through the spring are K-to-walk ratios for pitchers. Which seems about right to us, especially with his proviso that the ratio has to be really impressive or really bad to catch his attention. So here's what we found upon a brief review of the Jays' hurlers:

Jesse Litsch - 17Ks/3 BBs. Woah. If we had any reservation about his spot in the rotation, it's probably gone. For now.

Brandon Morrow - 16Ks/3 BBs. Okay, we're not going to put too much stock into this...But Jesse Litsch's K/BB ratio is slightly better than Brandon Morrow's so far. Roll that around your noggin for a while.

Kyle Drabek - 9Ks/1 BB. Still under a strikeout per inning pitched, but you at least have a sense that he's ready to step in as the fourth/fifth guy and work his way up the ladder.

Bret Cecil - 10Ks/4BBs. Sounds about right.

Ricky Romero - 10Ks/9BBs. Aside from Aaron Hill's spotty attendance record so far, this is the March development that concerns us most. When we watched him a few weekends ago, he looked as though he had great control over all his pitches...so we'll chalk this up to spring experimentation.

David Purcey - 5Ks/7BBs. That's how you pitch your way out of town. Or pitch Marc Rzepczynski (9/6) into contention for your spot in the bullpen.

Other fun numbers of note: The Jays are taking a lot of walks so far, with J.P. Arencibia leading the way with six (tied with Thames). For all of the talk about his bad start at the plate, we'll gladly take the walks...Rajai Davis is slugging .639, with three homers and five doubles so far. Now that's our kind of slap-hitter...Yunel Escobar has 16 hits and five walks so far, which gives us a modicum of hope that he'll be back to a 3ish WAR.

So that's about it. We could really parse these numb3rs and try to figure out who the killer is before the third commercial break, but that would just make us look silly, wouldn't it?

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1. Walt Whitman wrote: Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.) So there.

2. Amongst the hazards of my continuing insistence on using this "we" voice is getting stuck with this awkward quandry: "ourself" or "ourselves"? Either way sounds wrong. Comes off simultaneously as oafish and poofy . No small feat, that.

So, where we at?

(....other than in deep shit with the Tao when he see the grammatical construction of the post title....)

Although nothing is ever certain, there were a few areas of this year's Blue Jays squad that, heading into camp, seemed fairly easy to predict. Funny how that works. Turns out those areas of "certainty" are drawing more questions than answers as the preseason crawls on. But maybe that's just me. Probably just me. But let's discuss, shall we? I mean, we're here anyway.... let's just.

The Rotation
Ricky Romero, Brandon Morrow, Brett Cecil, Kyle Drabek, Marc Rzepczynski. Bingo bango bongo. Done. Maybe three weeks ago.....

The new "big 3" are certainly set. But the 4/5 spots in the rotation? Wiiiiide open, it seems. Nothing but a personal vibe here, but all of a sudden, it seems like the phenom Drabek is no longer a lock to "head north" with the big club, and Rzepczynski seems more likely to be on the outside looking in with regards to the rotation. And why? New skip John Farrell seems enamored with Jesse Litsch (which, for this guy anyway, isn't the worst thing... LET HIM PLAY! LET HIM PLAY!), and out-of-options (and Tao fave) Jo Jo Reyes is pitching well enough that the "option play" might give him an edge.

Keeping in mind..... come June 1 (or whenever the magical arb cutoff date is), the spring battle will likely be long forgotten as Drabek (for sure) and Zach Stewart (for maybe?) will lay claim to the jobs if they haven't already.

All of this to say.... depth is good.

Brett Lawrie
Now, this is going to come across as an endorsement for Lawrie to skip AAA altogether and start the season in the homeland.....and it's not, necessarily..... but at what point does the usual spring hype give way to "maybe this kid really is ready" conversation?

Oh, I know all the usual caveats apply. Gabe Gross. Simon Pond. Chuckle chuckle snicker snicker. But wasn't the primary concern with Lawrie his conversion to 3rd base and questions on his defensive ability in general? And haven't all those actually there been saying how remarkably strong he's looked fielding the position? And if this club really is gearing towards actually trying to contend in 2012.... wouldn't it be better to get the kid a year of experience leading up?

Of course, it's not that simple. There's the service clock issue (don't you wish we didn't ever have to take "service clock" into consideration? Because I know I'm sick to death of it. But that's another post...). There's the fact he's probably not really ready to handle the grind of a full major league season. There's probably a multitude of additional reasons that space restrictions just will not allow me to flush out (nothing at all to do with being lazy, friends).

So how about this. How about we all agree - you too, AA - that Lawrie starts the season in Vegas under the guise of "seasoning", and once the arb date passes, and assuming Lawrie is indeed raking and not butchering the position defensively, he's recalled and handed the keys to the hot corner indefinitely. Seems obvious and logical, right? Right. Done and done.

Juan Rivera
Serious question: is he really part of the team? And if he is, why can't I fathom that? And if the club is really in need of left-handed thunder, can't we just give the job to Eric Thames and see where that takes us? If we can't have the Stewart bone, and if we have to wait out Lawrie, can't we have this?

OK, not really.

(But would you be against it necessarily? In a platoon at least? C'mon.)

The Bullpen
Oh boy. I'm not ready to even attempt to sort this one out yet. Maybe next weekend. Until then.....

The Chairman of the Bored

It shouldn't surprise us that Drew at Ghostrunner on First struck a nerve with us this week when he declared his boredom at the fake news coming out of the fake games at Spring Training. We are, after all, part of the Same Guy Baseball Blogging Borg Collective, and try as we might to underscore the differences between our worldviews, we generally wind up in the same place.

And that place, right about now, is bored out of our skull.

That likely makes us sound like the worst ingrate ever, given the long winter and the exciting changes to the on-field and off-field make up of our favorite team. Still, as we listen in to games or check out the stories and tweets coming out of Dunedin, our eyes glaze over like Ban Roll-On dispensers as we wait jam our knives and forks into the real meat of the season.

(A parenthetical note here in lieu of a footnote¹: We were so determined to drive away the March blahs yesterday that we spent an hour trying to track down a flight to Tampa so that we could go to the actual Spring Training facility this weekend and smell the sweet odor of the Toronto Nine and hear the crack of the bat and fill our empty soul with real baseball activity. Alas, last minute decisions seem not to be the most effective manner of getting yourself a plane ticket at a reasonable price.)

There's probably two points here: Firstly, we've clearly become too engrossed with all of this Blue Jays tomfoolery. (No fucking kidding.) While podcasters and beat writers and the like took the winter off to write about fantasy football or curling or hockey or the Olympics-One-Glorious-Year-Later-Oh-My-God-Look-At-Melissa-Hollingsworth's-Powerful-Limbs, we spent our fall and winter up to now ears-deep into each story, non-story, whim/notion/idea/what-have-you leading into the coming season. Which is a bit like eating crème brulé three meals per day for three months. Eventually, you need something different.

Secondly, we fear that such a level of engrossment has led us to become exactly the thing that we loathed the most: Jaded. And cynical. And self-important. We've talked to a few bloggers over the years, and while most of us are embarassed to say this outside of that circle, this shit starts to feel like work at a certain point.

We shouldn't feel that way, of course. We started this blog for the love of the game and we've learned so much about the game over the past four seasons, in large part thanks to those of you who've shared your thoughts and a multitude of links through the comments and Twitter. But that knowledge can be stultifying at times, as one begins to be incapable of feeling something as a baseball fan.

This will all pass, certainly. The smell of Rogers Centre turf and the sound of many of us joined together for the season opener will almost certainly reawaken the visceral joy that the game provides us. We'll probably even snap out of this funk by the time Sunday rolls around, and the Jays are actually playing the Pirates right there on the TV. Just bear with us if we seem a little detached from the daily stories of this guy's tweak and that guy's chances and the other one's options.

April 1st can't get here quickly enough.

Hey! Music!

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1. Because footnotes apparently drive some folks batshit crazy. Heyo!

Things are coming together (even as they fall apart)

As much as we'd all like to see every spring story be a positive one....that'll never be the case. Seems one player's good fortune is always tied to another's, um... misfortune. Case in point: Brandon Morrow looks ready to resume throwing after taking a break to quiet his barking shoulder. This is huge for the Jays, in that the team (and fans) are counting on the flamethrower to be a big mid-rotation presence for the club during the Building! (TM).

Meanwhile....hard-luck Dustin McGowan has been shut down for another two weeks as his barking shoulder doesn't seem to want to come around (just yet). The club is loathe to call it a "setback", but let's be honest....the news fucking sucks. Dunno about you, but I've latched onto ol' Dusty as a guy who I'd love to see succeed. So much talent, yet so many injuries sapping all momentum from his career. Here's to hoping....

Sticking with pitchers, Brett Cecil (who should be - at the very least - in the running for the 5th spot in the rotation...yet isn't at the behest of Clarence) tossed five scoreless against the Red Sox. Much like Morrow, the Jays need Cecil to emerge as the horse he's projected to be, even if it involves opening the year in Vegas. Tallet may have the job locked down, but there's no way a healthy Cecil doesn't claim that job in a few months time...right?

Meanwhile....opening day ace Shaun Marcum got knocked around in his last start (9 runs in his 5 IP), but both pitcher and manager don't appear concerned. Spring stats are bullshit, right? .....which makes the preceding statement about Cecil meaningless, I suppose. If you want to be a cynical prick, that is.

Blair weighs in on Snider...

...and fucking nails it. Question: why is it that everyone is so ready to "write-off" (wrong choice of words, but you get the drift) Travis Snider as a one-dimensional slugger, slow afoot and a butcher in the field? He's a 22 year old kid still learning the craft, and while he'll never be Ken Griffey Jr. in the outfield, who's to say he can't work towards being average - or a tick above? Jeff Blair illustrates what Snider's doing to make himself a more rounded player, and I for one will give The Future the benefit of the doubt.

Also, let's not overlook the improved footspeed shown by the kid. You paying attention, Bastian? (heyo!)

Bump(s) in the road

Considering the majority of the expert prognosticators have our beloved Blue Jays comfortably entrenched in the basement of the AL East this season (fucking bullshit!), Spring Training has gone about as well as any of us could have expected.

Until today, maybe. There's nothing like a pair of shoulder injuries to stop the warm & fuzzies.....on the surface, anyway. Since pissing and moaning will do nothing but quicken the onset of Jays-related depression (I'm giving myself until mid-June), let's look at this optimistically - or perhaps, realistically.

None of us should have expected Dustin McGowan to return to his first game action throwing 95 and wiping out hitters with sick breaking stuff. The drop in velo to 88 is potentially concerning, but the Internet tells me that a dead-arm period coming out of rehab after such a long time away from the mound is quite normal. And the Internet never, ever lies. All this does is guarantee that McG opens the season on the DL - where he should be. No point in rushing him back when he clearly isn't ready.

Brandon Morrow's shoulder soreness also seems to be "just one of those things" the young righty goes through every spring. By his account, a few days off to ease the barking has been a past cure-all for his arm, and he expects this minor setback to be no different. Let's just go with the notion that he's still set to be our next AJ Burnett (minus the bullshit).

Or he could be on the verge of going under the knife and becoming the next, er, Dustin McGowan.

(Let's pretend that I didn't just say that, OK? OK.)

Whatever happened to....
..Lyle Overbay? Seriously, anyone heard from Lyle? I'm not even kidding. I'd like to think that I follow the spring coverage fairly closely, and the only time I hear his name mentioned is when Brett Wallace is talking about picking his brain for 1B defensive tips. I mean, he is still going to stand in there against RHP, yes?

Or has Clarence identified him as the lone remaining malcontent responsible for last season's locker room revolt, completely thrown him under the bus, backed the fucker up, and rolled over again for good measure?

(Get it? "Bumps in the road"? Ah, nevermind.)

Behold the awesomeness of Jo-Bau

Assume all of the standard caveats about these being fake games, and the Ghosts of Jason Lane and Simon Pond, and what have you. And also assume the caveats about how it doesn't matter if you are crushing fastballs that are slow and straight (like Adam Carolla fans!) in March. Or April. Or September. And possibly May. Maybe August too.

But set all that aside for a brief moment, and let's drink this in. Let's savour the sweet spring of José Bautista. Let's swish it around in our mouths, and let it just sit there for a moment or two.

Here's what the man has done in five Fake Games so far: He's got 22 total bases in 14 at bats. He sports a 2.214 OPS (.643 OBP, 1.571 SLG). He's got nine hits, of which seven are for extra bases (four doubles and three homers). He's scored six and driven in six. And he's played third base while certain other Jays tend to the health of their fat, injured wrists.

Sure, we know it's totally wrong to fall in love with something so young and as-yet-unformed-and-immature. But if the Spring of Jo-Bau is Lolita, then we're the fumbling, bumbling Humbert Humbert, tripping over our own better sense to fall for it.

Don't tell me the Jays are doing well in the Fake Games

La la la la la! We can't hear you!

When you say that José Bautista is hitting home runs, and so is Vernon Wells, and so is Randy Ruiz, we can't hear you. And don't even bother trying to tell us that Shaun Marcum pitched well in his first outing, or that Dustin McGowan looked like he might be showing some progress and may be on his way back. We're not going to hear you.

We're blocking out any such good news in the early going because we wouldn't want such news to find purchase in our mind, and start to grow visions of success. We would prefer to look at this all as a fluke, and to pretend that the Jays are playing bantam-level players in out-sized big league uniforms.

We should know better than to get enthusiastic in March. This is a lesson that should have been driven home by last year's squad, which was still sitting in first in May before completely falling apart and playing like the worst team in the Majors for the final three months of the season.

Still, the hopeless romantic in us wants to believe that there is something to the things that we're hearing out of Dunedin.

Marginalia - Notes on how we make editorial choices
We'd initially written something here about "don't let us look at the Fake Games results". Then we went looking for a photo of someone with a blindfold on. And that's when we realized that there are a lot of effed-up pictures of blindfolded people on the internet, and we didn't want to parse through those pictures anymore.

A weekend in The Show
So we picked up our copy of MLB 10 The Show this weekend, which was a very new and interesting experience after having played the MLB 2K games on the Wii for the past several years. If there is one thing that a uniform nerd like myself could fully appreciate, it was playing my first game and seeing Jo-Bau in his new number 19, and Randy Ruiz wearing his new number 21. The rosters hadn't quite been updated to the point of having Kevin Gregg in the bullpen, although we'll take that as a positive at this point. At least we didn't have to see last year's staff ace still on the roster, taunting us with his digital presence.

Now if we can only get the hang of this whole pitching meter thing. Because that shit is driving us nuts.

Let the Fake Games begin

They don't really count, or matter much. They produce goofy boxscores, and feature dudes running around willy-nilly in the outfield. They are overanalyzed, and make heroes out of guys like Simon Pond and Jason Lane.

In just about three hours from when we're typing this, the Spring Training Fake Games begin.
And even as we denigrate these games, and mock their worth, we know that we'll spend at least ten minutes out of our busy day today going over the results and parsing through the most microscopic of sample sizes.

There is something about this moment of the year that is positively sublime. It's like hearing the spine crack as you open a new book for the first time. Or like that moment when you pull the plastic off a new CD. Your mind races at the possibilities, and you can't wait to dig in and absorb every new moment, and every new thought and emotion that lies ahead. There's even something great about the feeling of trepidation that you might have leading into the season, with so many questions left to be answered, and so much uncertainty.

After a long winter and a long offseason, it's a moment like this that reawakens the soul of a baseball fan. Come what may in this truly transitional season for the Blue Jays, we're so happy to get things started. This is going to be fun.

Fake Games on TV! For reals!
Last night, we looked ahead on our interactive programming guide to see if, perchance, there may be a ball game on some time this week. What we weren't prepared for was just how many games will be on over the weekend. Between Sportsnet picking up the games from other team-owned networks (what a concept!), the Mets games on WPIX and the Cubs and White Sox games on WGN, there will be lots of opportunities to catch the start of the preseason.

Now, if only we could fluke our way into seeing a Jays game at some point...that would be cool.

A whole lotta thoughts

As spring progresses, I plan on bringing my "A" game....which is, you know, still several notches below "adequate". Honest. Fucking honest! But for now, with the players settling in and the roster storylines still developing.....I got nothin' but quick thoughts.

.....I'm all over Travis Snider this spring. All over the dude. You'll recall me recently bringin' the hyperbole over the phenom's attitude heading into camp, but actions do indeed speak louder than words. Well, The Future strolled into camp in (apparently) great shape, and has tweaked his batting stance - something suggested last season but ignored. Opposite field fury, now coachable too!

.....This can't be overstated: Shaun Marcum's refusal to don the new BP cap for spring workouts is the stuff of legend. Never mind the bullshit and debate - that's your opening day starter.

.....So what's all this about the Jays interest in Cuban defector Jose Julio Ruiz anyway? A left handed hitting first baseman with gap power? Sound familiar? I suppose if he can be shifted to left field, a signing might makes sense. Consider me "intrigued".

.....Rumored interest in fellow Cuban SS Adeiny Hechevarria might make more sense. Of course, I know nothing of the talent either of these fellas possess, so there you go. But hey, I'm willing to buy into any and all hype around a potential "shortstop of the future".

.....via Drunk Jays Fans, I like the cut of Alan Ashby's jib. Seems the team's radio colour guy, like many of us, cannot for the life of him understand (or get behind) another year of The Manager. Last season, I happened to be listening to the radio broadcast (which is a miracle in & of itself, since radio coverage "out here" sucks) the day news broke of the clubhouse dissent. Still in a state of shock (where the fuck did that come from?), I was even more surprised to hear Alan & Jerry talking about the situation....of which they seemed anything but surprised. We'll know Ashby's true feelings if we hear him referring to "Clarence Gaston" at any point this season. Boo-ya.

.....At least Brian Dopirak's name is getting a token mention of being involved in a spring battle. Of course, it's a competition for a spot with fellow underdog and blogger fave Randy Ruiz for about 150 AB's. It's true what they say about backup quarterbacks, but when you've experienced Kevin Millar as your starter, it's an understandable position to take.

.....Baseball Prospectus goodness: "Youkilis isn't much fun to watch for non-Red Sox fans. he's an ugly, sweaty, man-beast with a pale, bald pate and a fondness for overgrown facial hair, he's got one of the game's most irritating batting stances, and he's a grade-A red-ass who takes particular exception to being pitched inside while standing on top of home plate (most recently trying to Oddjob Rick Porcello with his batting helmet following an HBP)."

Truth! I'll skip the next few sentences of the profile which go on to describe him as essentially one of the most valuable players in the game (also true). Why would I transcribe that?

It's a good time to be a Blue Jay

(full credit for the above photo to intrepid reporter Jordan Bastian. If you're not following @MLBastian on Twitter....well, you oughta' be. You can't pay for this type of spring training coverage.)

"It's a good time to be a Blue Jay"

....and with that, we're off and running.

Before we get started, let's get one thing out of the way....if you think that I'm above a hackneyed, cliche-riddled blog post on the beauty of spring training, well.....you obviously haven't been following along.

Seriously, is there anything better than the start of camp? New faces trying to show they belong. Old faces battling to maintain their spots. Players in their prime establishing leadership position. Which brings us back to the quote above.

If fans of the team were worried about a leadership void after the trade of the Jays heart and soul, Aaron Hill is showing he's ready to be The Man inside the clubhouse. That's big. At the ripe old age of 27, Hill spent his first day in camp setting the bar for all current and future Jays:

"I hope these guys know what kind of opportunity they have," Hill said. "If I'm seeing it, I just hope that they see it. I love seeing guys really get after it and fight for it. I hate seeing young guys, or anybody, that just expects to be given something. You should always work for whatever it is -- not just baseball. I want to see the edge, the fire in these guys' eyes, to get out there and just kick some butt."

Hill has a unique perspective in that he's had to battle hard to get back on the field after the knockout blow by that goon Eckstein (heyo!). Realistically, I don't think anyone should expect the second baseman to belt 36 home runs again this season, but Hill is already showing his value to the club lies far beyond that.

Catching up with Doc (already)
I can't wait for the time that I can read a Halladay-related article without my heart sinking. Here, Griff (who's a monster in the spring, by the way) finds ol' Roy still saying all the right things and doing nothing to ease the pain.

Do a quick google news search, if you're brave enough, and you'll find a boatload of the requisite articles detailing how the Phillies youngsters are soaking it all up, getting into camp earlier than ever, sponging up the knowledge, etc. Ugh.

....and getting to know Drabek
It's not all sad times. Now that spring has arrived, we'll get a chance to learn more about the future of the club, starting with this quick piece on key rotation piece Kyle Drabek.

Nothing groundbreaking here, except for the money quote:

"I kind of like blue."

The Beej is not a hampy camper

So B.J. Ryan is not totally thrilled with all the talk about the possibility of being supplanted in the closer role. "It's an uncomfortable question with a lot of uncomfortable answers" Ryan told the Globe's Rob MacLeod.

After another subpar outing yesterday, Ryan sports a 9.00 ERA in seven Grapefruit innings, walking seven and striking out six. His velocity, if it matters, topped out at 87 MPH yesterday.

Without papering over the concerns over Ryan's performance in the Spring, we don't mind the Jays' high-intensity closer being a bit pissed when talk arises about someone taking his job. That's the gunslinger mindset that many of the great closers have, and without getting too hokey about this, that sort of swagger counts for something.

Perhaps more troubling is the fact that Ryan isn't alone in his struggles. If there was an obvious candidate to step in and assume the closer role, we might understand the public speculation about Ryan's capacity to lock down the ninth. But a glance through at the other closer candidates shows some pretty spotty performances in the fake games:

• Scott Downs - 6.75 ERA in four innings, two walks and two K's
• Jeremy Accardo - 8.71 ERA in 10.1 innings, 18 hits, three walks and five K's
  
• Brandon League - 9.00 ERA in four innings, six hits, two walks and six K's
• Jason Frasor - 5.71 ERA in four innings, seven hits, a walk and four K's
  

Really, the only "standout" so far in the exhibition season has been Jesse Carlson, who hasn't allow a run yet, but three innings of work is a pretty microscopic sample size. We could make an argument for the recently dispatched Dirk Hayhurst, although we're not sure that he has the mythical "closer stuff" that we seem to be buying into lock, stock and barrel.

Look who snuck into the Super Duper Roundtable
Mop Up Duty has posted part two of its blogger roundtable, and we've managed to sneak in our views on the Jays' prospects for the coming year.

Monday morning, running on fumes

Running a motor vehicle indoors is not such a super idea for those who aren't suicidal
The motorcross jamboree held on Saturday night under the Rogers Centre dome forced an evacuation of the hotel rooms and restaurants overlooking the stadium. Isn't this yet another argument for turning the former SkyDome into a baseball-only venue?

So long to all of our spring mancrushes
Jason Lane and Brad Emaus - the Mantle and Maris of Dunedin in 2009 - both got their walking papers and will make their way to the Jays' minor league camp for reassignment. Also taking the walk of shame is Dirk Hayhurst, whose sterling 13-to-0 strikeout-to-walk ratio in eight Spring innings was not enough to make up for the massive number of earned runs - one - that he gave up in those appearances.

Let's talk about Alex Rios to the Giants again, shall we?
Bleacher Report ponders who got the better of last spring's non-trade of Alex Rios to the Giants, although they weigh out the relative benefits of the swap with Matt Cain as the pitcher coming back to the Jays instead of Tim Lincecum. And while we have a certain roto-league weakness for Cain, we think we can speak for the majority of the Jays' fanbase when we say "thank god that trade never happened."

And while we smugly dump on starting pitchers we don't have...
Let us ponder the fact that Ricky Romero has become the front-runner for the fourth spot in the rotation, and that Dustin McGowan's return to good health may be delayed long enough that he'll have grey in his lambchops by the time he pitches again. Crap.

It's a blogger roundtable!
Mopup Duty has a Blue Jays Bloggers Roundtable of Death, featuring the best and brightest of the northern baseball blogosphere. There are some interesting thoughts in there, and the quality of the commenting is much improved by the fact that we didn't interject our weak-ass third-person piety into the mix. At least not this time.

The Ack will return once he is done parting the waters
For those of you who missed the inimitable weekend stylings of the Ack, know that he will be back just as soon as he turns back the Red River flood waters. No, seriously: he really spent the weekend helping to sandbag and secure the safety of his neighbours, and for that, he deserves our praise and adulation.

It's funny, though, that when the Ack takes a weekend off, people get up in arms, but we could blow off an entire week and no one would care. Suffice to say, we're not walking down any stairwells in front of the Ack any time soon...we saw Showgirls, and we're not about to make the same mistake as Cristal Connors.

First day of spring means baseball, baby

I'm going to go on record right now and say that this has been one of the worst fucking winters of my life. Top five, for sure, and that's really saying something when you live in a city where -30 degrees is commonplace and simply means you need to zip your jacket up. -40 to -50? That shit is cold, man, and only an outrageous (and potentially baldfaced) liar will tell you that you "get used to it". You don't. Things freeze. It's painful. Not cool.

But that's all over for another year, my friends. Spring is in the air. Can you feel it? Can you? I can. Weather aside, the first day of spring means we are on the verge of some real baseball. What? Canada got eliminated good and early? You're dead to me, World Baseball Classic.

Spring training isn't just for the players - it's for the fans too, if my opinion counts for anything (that's rhetorical, smart guy). I keep up a ridiculous intensity for a 162 game season, and I need a good month of idle speculation and foaming at the mouth over stud prospects to ease me into this thing.

Projected 75 to 80 win season be damned (PENNANT!), I'm getting stoked. Come on April 6th - let's go.

Speaking of foaming at the mouth over stud prospects
Brad Mills is making this team, and I think we need to check our expectations. We're talking about a 24 year old arm who has never, in "the scouts'" estimation, projected to be anything more than a back-end starter, who is on the verge of making the bigs after one and a half seasons of pro baseball.

I think, in time, Mills can exceed those expectations - he's got a pretty good arm, Cito loves his makeup, he doesn't get rattled, he's apparently a pretty intelligent dude, etc - but even if he doesn't, that's still OK, right? I mean, come the World Series Season of 2010 (leave me alone), we're looking at a rotation consisting of some combination of Halladay, McGowan, Marcum, Litsch, Cecil, and Mills, right?

And yes, I know Doc is entering that tenuous "extend or trade" portion of his contract, Marcum is coming off TJ, and McGowan's surgically repaired shoulder is already barking. I know these things, but I'm wilfully choosing to ignore them. Besides, that's what big Dave Purcey is for, right? RIGHT??

Roy Halladay throws us a bone
That was cute of Doc to pretend he was human. I'm not fooled. Come on now Roy, you don't expect us to believe that you are anything more than a robotic pitching cyborg sent from the future to destroy opposing bats, do you? Because that shit is just ridiculous.

You know, it's a good thing that Jays management will find a way to extend his contract and ensure he never wears another team's jersey, because any other scenario would just be too much to bear.

Friday Rock Out - Keith Richards and the X-Pensive Winos

Not to come off as an ingrate, but hasn't this whole spring training been going on a little too long? We get that after a long and cold winter of waiting for baseball's return, we should be happy that we're just two weeks away from the start of real baseball. But at this point, we're getting so tired of talking about disingenuous spring mancrushes, and who's going to make the team and who's not. Just get on with it already.

Random Tidbittery

-Lloyd (as always) pretty much nails it when he looks at the rather provincial response to Chipper Jones' distaste for Toronto. If he doesn't care for Toronto, then fine, but it is probably a little bit much to view Chipper's take as the character flaw of a redneck yahoo.

-Bastian notes that Travis Snider will get down on his hands and knees to receive Doc's benediction. Brett Cecil will wake up early in the morning for the same approval. We can't even tell you what we'd do.

-If you're A.J. Burnett (or a vase, or a thin pane of glass), and you're going to get hit with a line drive off the bat of a Blue Jay, you'd probably want that bat to belong to John McDonald. Because that shit will not break you.

-Former Jays AGM Bart Given's started a blog at insidethemajors.com. And though he has some problems with misplaced apostrophes, it's worth a read here and there. There's some interesting insight into the dates of note for MLB front offices, which is especially relevant at this time of year.

And with that, we leave you with Keef and his band of musical assassins singing one of our favourite Stones songs. The Ack is back for the weekend, and we walk off for the week before they make us run.

Springtime mancrushes: Dirk Hayhurst

The standard caveats about the relative value of statistics in springtime fake games apply, but go with us here for a second as we get lost in the dreamy spring training numbers being put up by Dirk Hayhurst.

When the Jays plucked the aging minor leaguer off the scrap heap, the move elicited more than a few snorts and giggles along with the requisite hand-wringing. The Yankees were getting ready to load up on every arm in sight, and the Jays were scoping out guys with ERAs over 9? Fourth place! Fire J.P.! Contract the team! All is lost!

But a funny thing has happened in Florida over the past few weeks: Dirk Hayhurst has pitched his ass off. In seven innings so far, he has struck out 12 batters and has yet to give up a run or a walk. Hayhurst has been so dominant that one imagines that the only offensive force strong enough to face him may be Jason Lane.

Even with this otherworldly performance, Hayhurst will still be in tough to make the big league team come April. It seems unlikely that he could slide into the back end of the rotation after a couple of years coming primarily out of the bullpen, and the Jays have more than enough relief arms who are assured of a trip north.

(Which brings up a whole other question about whether the Jays could consider a start-by-committee scenario for the fifth starter slot, but that's another post altogether.)

Incidentally, if you want to get a better sense of the Jays new bullpen ubermensch, Hayhurst penned the "Non-Prospect Diary" column on Baseball America's over the past few years. These occasional entries offer some interesting insights into the life of a player hanging on to the last vestiges of his baseball dream, and make you root for Hayhurst that much more.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves

In this, the Spring of Diminished Expectations, we Blue Jays fans may have been getting a bit too revved up about the possibilities presented by the dynamic southpaw duo of Brett Cecil and Brad Mills.

Could they step into the decimated rotation and help salvage what seems to be a bit of a lost 2009 season? Would they turn a seeming weakness into a strength? Would they blow away not only the opposition, but also all of the naysayers and prophets of doom?

The news this weekend tossed a needed bucket of icy-cold water onto some of these rather lofty expectations. Cecil was given his ticket to the minor league camp (in the dubious company of a certain Mr. Maroth), while Mills gave up four hits and five walks to the Reds in Sunday's 5-4 extra-inning win. (Curtis Thigpen! Still the catcher of the future?!)

It's not to say that they won't be with the big club sooner rather than later. It's just that we should maybe temper our expectations of what they'll be able to offer at this early point of their development.

Hell, at 23, Jimmy Key spent his first season coming out of the bullpen and posting a 4.65 ERA and 1.65 WHIP. If either of those two young lefties were able to replicate the performances that Key put in over his subsequent eight years with the Blue Jays, we'd be thrilled. But, as Axl Rose said so many years ago, all we need is just a little patience.

Other notable notey notebook notes

Item number 1! Nadir Mohamed will be the next CEO of Rogers. It's hard to guess what this will mean for the RCI side of the equation, including the Blue Jays. Mohamed comes from the wireless side of things, so he may be willing to defer to CEOs of Rogers Media (Tony Viner) and the Blue Jays (Paul Beeston or his *cough snort cough* replacement)...but ultimately, we're left a bit uneasy by this. Wireless has always been a huge money maker for Rogers (system access fee my ass), and the media side of things scraped by, even before the advertising market went into the toilet. What will Mohamed think of the "red ink" in the other divisions when he is ultimately responsible for them?

Item number 2! We've avoided reading too many J.P. quotes this spring, if only because we don't put a ton of stock into them at this point. However, we were a bit disappointed to see the GM mention that Matt Clement is likely on the "outside looking in right now". It's not that Clement has blown anyone away as of yet, but we had started to get a bit optimistic that maybe he could rehabilitate his game and contribute in the short term.

In spite of the fact that we'd previously stated our belief that Clement wouldn't throw a pitch for the Jays, we find ourselves somehow rooting for him. Maybe it's the fact that he shaved that stupid facial hair off, thus making him more human to us.

Final item! We came to a stark realization this Sunday, about halfway through our second fantasy draft of the day: We kinda suck at fantasy baseball. Nobody should think of themselves as a roto authority when they take Kaz Matsui that early in a draft.