Sadness prevails

The official word from on high has come down, and it is now official: Your faithful blogger will be in meetings on April 12th.

So, no home opener for me. FML.

(That is, unless I win the lottery tonight. In which case, I'm goin' and I'm taking all of you with me.)

Why is this man smiling?

Maybe because a certain slow-of-foot tweeter says that The Manager says that he's going to get full-time duty at first base this year.

If you've followed along for awhile, you likely know that we love us some Randy Ruiz and we loathe The Manager's managerialism. So what we're about to say might surprise you:

We kinda like this move. Sorta. Even if we don't actually believe it will come to pass.

Overbay, much like his fellow Washingtonian/sweet-swinging/first-sacker/doubles-machine John Olerud, will always disappoint those who are expecting a 300 lb gorilla at first base. But if you can get over the notion that a corner infielder's offensive production needs to be measured in home runs and runs batted in, you'll see that Overbay can still provide above average production. In 2009, his 122 OPS+ ranked behind only Adam Lind (144) and Scott Rolen's 1/2 season (124) amongst Jays hitters, and put him ahead of everybody's favorite poster-boy Aaron Hill (117).

The caveat, of course, is that Overbay was held back from facing too many lefties, and kinda sucked against them, posting a 53 OPS+. He only started eight games all year against lefties, and stood in the batters box against them just 86 times. And even in his best season (2006) with the Jays, Overbay didn't get a ton of looks at lefties (167 plate appearances), and he managed just a .305 OBP against them.

Even so, here's where we think it might make sense: There's a line that Overbay threw out at one point last season about how he found it difficult to get into a groove when his playing time was so irregular. Even if that is a load of horseshit, it's the load of horseshit that is in Overbay's head, and if getting him a few extra AB's against lefties to prove himself helps him keep his hitting stroke in order, then so be it.

But ultimately, we doubt that The Manager will be able to resist the urge to platoon Overbay and Ruiz. And frankly, that might be for the best. (Agreeing with The Manager? We must be feverish.)

Ruiz needs some sort of a role on the Jays if he is going to be on the roster, and he certainly wouldn't fit into the Johnny Mac pinch running role. Parking him on the bench to serve as an occasional pinch hitter won't really give the Jays a sense of who he could be as a major leaguer. If he were to get a turn a few times per week in the early going, and show himself to be unable to hang at this level, then that's one thing. But if he's languishing with a .750 OPS in less than 50 ABs somewhere in the middle of June, then the Jays would probably be better off letting Ruiz go elsewhere and bringing in a player with some positional flexibility.

Even if that would be a cryin' shame.

Goin' to Houston...Say wha?

Okay, so we've had just about enough of Spring Training. That's it. We're done.

As such, last night we started to check the schedule to see when we can finally put a cap on the Fake Games and get things revved up for the real deal. Which is when we noticed the Jays playing a two game series at Minute Maid Park in Houston on Friday and Saturday, April 2nd and 3rd.

What the what?

For a half-second, we were trying to figure out if the league was pulling some weird "Kick Off The Season With Interleague Non-Rivalries" promotion. Which, if you think about it, wouldn't be the strangest thing that they've suggested this off-season.

What makes this two-game tune-up series in an actual big league park even stranger is that both games that weekend will get the full TV broadcast treatment from Sportsnet and TSN2. Like as if they matter somehow.

We do remember the Dodgers coming to SkyDome for a pre-season game at one point years ago, so this isn't beyond the realm, and we're told that this is actually a bit of a tradition in Houston, and that they're just fine with it. So that's that, we suppose.

But it make us wonder why, precisely, MLB is waiting until the Sunday night to kick things off for the season. Frankly, why can't they just get stuff started this coming Monday? Most teams have their rosters pretty much set, and Spring Training has already dragged itself downwards into such a state of tedium that the highlight of this week will end up being a couple of MLBAM beat reporters having a footrace.

(Having said that, we'd pay good money to see some of the portly old inked-stained wretches stumble and wheeze their way around a track.)

We suppose that some baseball is better than no baseball, so we're not sure what our complaint is. Aside from wanting to get things started and moving so that we get through 2010 as quickly as possible, and on to 2011 in short order.

Speaking of 2011...
Where the hell is that announcement of the Aldeinis Hechavarria signing?

Don't Call It a Comeback - Your opening day starter

There are lots of ways that we could slice the discussion over the Jays' Opening Day starter in order to make it seem like bad news.

Whoever it was who was going to get named to that still-somewhat-anachronistically-prestigious role, he wasn't going to be Doc. And as it turns out, it's a player who has no major league track record from 2009 to parse through for argument's sake.

But we'll say this about Shaun Marcum: So long as he continues to stand his ground like a manly-man against wearing those insipid BP caps with the NASCAR pit crew piping on, he's all right by us.

(And the fact that he's still got a spotless ERA in five Fake Game innings makes this all the more easy to swallow.)

What about RR Cool Jay?
We like that there is actually a bit of room to argue about who deserves the role this year, if one were given to taking Ricky Romero's side of the argument. Romero had some brilliant stretches last year before he tired and started throwing everything that was supposed to be down in the zone into the dirt. His 1.93 ERA through four Fake starts seemingly augurs well for the forthcoming season, though the six walks in 14 innings (versus nine Ks) is still a bit worrisome.

(And as for the rest of the rotation? It kinda scares the shit out of us.)

Links!
It's a bit of a banner day out there for reading material about the Jays:

Firstly: Jeff Blair leaves his boyish crush on Melissa Hollingsworth aside and shows up for duty in Dunedin, leading off with a smart and fresh take on Vernon Wells. God bless Blair...With his Angry Man Tweeting routine and his long absences from the beat, we sometimes forget what a truly excellent baseball writer he is.

Next! Will Leitch, the man who somehow got us hooked on this whole "we/us" blogging voice, talks about The Manager on his blogma matter. (And gets stuff wrong, but who are we to quibble? We didn't even merit a link in his story! Screw him. We're gonna go comb back our emo bangs and start slagging him at every possible turn. Kill your idols!)

And then! Mop Up Duty has a roundtable of Blue Jays bloggers, which does not include us. (Which is mostly because we couldn't be arsed to answer an email in a timely fashion. But still.)

Stuff we learned in our fantasy drafts

We're not quite the type to keep and care for numerous fantasy baseball teams anymore, what with the added expectations at work (those carts don't make their way to the corral on their own, you know) and home (the Missus didn't realize we were serious when we added the bit about our roto teams into our marriage vows) and with the blog (infotaining you kids can be a full time job.)

And so, working our way through two fantasy drafts this weekend seems to us to be a bit of a monumental achievement. If only the outcome matched what we perceive as the efforts, then we wouldn't feel quite so bummed out looking at our teams in the cold grey dawn of a Monday morning.

Looking back, it all seemed to fly by so fast, with our preferred players flying off the board quicker than we could queue them up. It was like we were unprepared for what was happening, and never seemed to have the grace to fully pull the moment off. We were left in a puddle of flop sweat and diminished expectations...Hey, this is really starting to sound like the entirety of our dating life!

With all this yammering as prologue, indulge us for a moment as we offer up a few lessons learned from this weekend, if only so that you might avoid some of the same missteps.

Preparation is not optional
Somewhere along the line, we had decided that our problem in the past was that we spent too much time reading the fantasy previews and making up lists and setting our pre-rankings. This year, we decided to go into our drafts completely raw, without any preparation.

It didn't go so well. When you have 60 seconds to make a pick, it's disconcertingly panic-inducing when you're suddenly wracking your brain to remember the points of distinction between Yovani Gallardo and Ubaldo Jimenez, or why you feel so wrong about picking Ryan Franklin (even though you end up picking him twice, and have the same rotten feeling about those low strikeout numbers each time).

If you don't know who's hurtin', you don't know nuthin'
When you're going into the draft blind, you quickly realize that what you don't know is going to overtake your thought processes. If a player was sitting out there a round or two later than we thought they should, we started looking to find out why. Is he hurt? Is he out? Does he have competition for the closer role? With a finite amount of time each round, we ended up frantically attempt to check on the health and wellness of any number of picks, and spent a good deal of time afterwards checking to see who might be of concern.

While we haven't found anyone egregiously hurt, we're reasonably sure that our fellow owners wouldn't have taken them off our hands if we had. (Not that we wouldn't try. Everything we learned about managing trades, we learned from Kenny Williams.)

Old mancrushes die hard
We tell ourselves every year that we're not going back to the well to draft big shining star prospects who are well past their best before dates. We tell ourselves that those dudes who had one or maybe two good seasons earlier in the decade aren't worthy of a pick. We tell ourselves not to fall into that trap again.

And then we go ahead and draft Alex Gordon. And Carlos Guillen. And Stephen Drew and Rickie Weeks. Zach Duke and Paul Maholm and Manny Parra.

Somehow, we managed to avoid drafting either of the Chris Youngs, although at one point, we had the D-Backs centerfielder in our sights, only to have him snatched away one pick before ours.

If there's one thing we learned, it's that experience hasn't taught us a thing.

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.)

The Closer Carousel makes us dizzy!

The whole idea of the Capital-C Closer role is something that has left us feeling conflicted in recent years.

Sure, we love the iconography of it: The Gunslinger! The Fireman! The Hammer! Mr. Lock-That-Shit-Down! We love the idea of some big, burly guy swaggering out of the bullpen in the ninth with some AC/DC or nu-metal anthem blasting as he loads it up and gets ready to put a final exclamation mark on a Blue Jays win. It's high drama, and great fun. It's the Ghost of Tom Henke, and it haunts us still.

The other side is that we can't entirely understand the whole idea of holding your single best relief pitcher out of the game so that he can continue to accumulate numbers in a mostly meaningless counting stat. If you're about to lose the lead in the seventh inning, we can't quite understand why you'd want to send out some mid-level reliever to get you out of the inning while your best relief guy tilts back in his folding bullpen chair, wiping sunflower seed detritus from his warmup jacket.

It's with this in mind that we consider the whole discussion of the 2010 closer situation.

We read this piece in The Sun this morning, wherein Kevin Gregg asserts his confidence that we will once again reclaim his rightful post as Major League Closer. Such talk makes us think that he needs to get a few opportunities soon before his membership in the Closer's Club lapses, and he's left emasculated by Alec Baldwin when looking to fulfill his daily caffeine requirements.

"Coffee is for closers."

This is where we start feeling anxious about Kevin Gregg stepping to the mound with a one-run lead, and the idea that the Jays are going to hang their hopes on this National League retread makes us really worry about the state of the bullpen.

But then, we set emotion aside and approach this rationally. And we get thinking about it, and we wonder if the Jays aren't better off giving him the role he wants, thereby leaving them with the luxury and the freedom to run Jason Frasor (for our dough, the guy with the best arm/brain ratio in the Blue Jays bullpen) and Scott Downs (who runs like a girl but gets outs when he doesn't hurt himself running) out to the mound in any situation and in any inning.

In a close game, with men on and the Jays in need of an out, we're fine with the notion of leaving Gregg out in the bullpen to clean his goggles and cool his heels while the big boys take care of business.

Even with the lack of a prototypical closer type guy, we're feeling like the Jays' bullpen could be as strong as anyone's this year. At this point, we're at least brave and/or crazy enough to think that we'll trade a few nervous ninth innings for some stability through the rest of the games.

...and finally, a Friday Rock Out memorial
Our favorite Big Star song. Thank you, Alex Chilton.

What do you call a collection of questions microblogged?

TWEET BAG! Let's get it on.

@DHSpeedwagon (the inimitable Dany Heatley Speedwagon) asks:

Where do babies come from?

That depends. Ten years ago, we might have said that they come from broken rubbers and carelessness around the daily intake of progesterone pills. Now that we're older and fatter and greyer and of that age where many of our friends are indulging in having children on purpose, we can tell you that babies come from all angles. Many times, these babies are in strollers equipped with wheels that wouldn't look out of place on a monster truck, which their oblivious/entitled parents will run right over your feet, without apologies. Other times, babies will come from behind you with hands full of spittle and Arrowroot cookies that they can't wait to wipe on the back of a just-drycleaned pair of wool slacks.

It's just a good thing that babies are so cute and their heads smell like potential awesomeness. Otherwise, we'd have serious issues with them.

Moving on. @WillBeyer asks:

What catcher should I go after in my H2H draft?

Okay, we know that we invited fantasy baseball questions, but here's what you've gotta know about us: We haven't the foggiest clue about head-to-head leagues or auctions. So if you want advice in those areas, you'll have to suffice with one of the thousands of dudes who make a living doling out that sort of knowledge. We give this shit out for free.

And seeing as how we're in a giving mood, we'll offer you this: Victor Martinez is going to get a lot of at bats as a DH and 1B this season. And if we had the choice in a head-to-head league, we'd take the guy who is going to get six or seven starts per week versus the guy who might sit two or three times. And it's not just a volume play: V-Mart is probably going to give you pretty good production anyhow.

Also, keep in mind that catchers, as a general rule, will suck. You'll be all like: "Position scarcity! Must get Mauer/McCann/Martinez early!" But then they take a foul tip off the finger and suck for the rest of the season, and some dude has Miguel Montero hitting like the second coming of Johnny Bench. There's no effing justice to it. It's like that weird-looking nerdy dude from 500 Days of Summer ending up with Christina Hendricks. It'll just drive you crazy the more that you think of it.

Damn it all!

So basically, you can't win. We're drafting John Buck, just because we want to send that spirit of hope out into the Universe.

And the hits just keep on coming...@MassF last week asked:

Bottom of the 9th 2 outs bases loaded who do you want up T Gwynn K Puckett G Brett or W Boggs?

See, initially, we read this and figured that the scenario included us being tied to a post just behind the backstop, with a villainous eye-patched caricature getting ready to plug our brains full of lead from his vintage Ruger. We actually started to sweat it, and Fangraph this thing out, looking at advanced metrics and stuff. We were looking for splits on late inning tied or trailing, and situational hitting. We got frantic when we searched for Tony Gwynn, but kept getting pointed to Junior instead of Senior. "Damn it, man! Can't you see! Lives are at stake here! Get me the right numbers! I need to make the managerial decision that could COST ME MY LIFE!"

But then we re-read the question, and realized that you hadn't specified that this was a life or death consideration. What a letdown. In which case, we'll go with Gwynn. Because that tubby bastard could slap the ball into play, and his career .338 batting average was ten points better than Boggs'. And in this situation, you probably just need a bleeder through the infield to save you from the treachery of undefinably European villains. (Who says batting average is a useless stat?)

(SNIP! If you showed up here a little while ago, there was a whole long-winded thing about a certain Globe and Mail columnist's stupid column. So the first few comments probably look weird. We started to read the post over, and then we realized that it was angry in a really boring way, and a little bit sexist. And that's not in keeping with the True Spirit of Tweetbagging. Let's put this behind us, shall we?)

The man, the myth, the legend, @dpriest asks:

Will Alex Ant be the GM of a Jays playoff team?

While there's no way that we could ever divine such a thing, we have to believe. Or else we'd just put our blogging tools down and go pee our name in the snow instead.

Because if this blog is about anything, it's about hope. The hope that keeps us going, posting stuff in the dead of winter when we're scraping to try to even think of something to keep y'all entertained. The hope that, one night in October (or November), somewhere not too far down the road, the world will turn to our blog to read the reaction of a Jays diehard just moments after they've sealed the deal on their third title. (And they'd probably be greeted by something like: "Wooooo! Fuck yeah! Wooo! We did it!!!1")

We actually have these vivid visions of what that night would be like: There would be tears. And hugs. And champagne. And screaming into the phone. And staying up all night. And, eventually, blogging that moment out.

We're going to stick it out with this blog at least until then. (If we're allowed.)

More to come! Tune in tomorrow for a whole new batch of sage tweetery!

The last time The Manager saw the end of the road

(You see that picture above? That's what you get when you can't bring yourself to type the actual name of The Manager into a Google Image Search.)

Ideally, this year will mark the end of The Manager's second tenure in Toronto. (Or at the very least, the end of his tenure in a uniform and in the dugout. He'll never really leave the Jays.) With that in mind, we started to cast our thoughts back to The Manager's final season of his initial managerial stint.

With so much time having passed since that 1997 season, it's almost hard to recall just what a mess that season was. So we took a stroll through Baseball-Reference's archives for the team, and found some fuel to our irrational distaste for the man we once championed as an under-appreciated genius.

A team that was built to win. Sort of.
For anyone who wants to be the contrarian, and posit that the 1997 squad was a bad team that no manager could fix, think again. That year, the team underwent significant change, bringing in big time free agents Roger Clemens and Benito Santiago (fresh off a 30 homer season).

The team jettisoned John Olerud - never one of The Manager's favorites - in that offseason, sending he and his team-leading .854 OPS to the Mets for starter-closer-starter-closer-starter Robert Person. (And before you make the claim that this was to clear room for Carlos Delgado, you should know that Joe Carter was first baseman to start the season. Because The Manager loved Joe, even after he fell off the cliff. So there.)

Moreover, they also sent a number of prospects (who turned out to be nothing much) to Pittsburgh for Orlando Merced, Carlos Garcia and Dan Pleasac (who, aside from Pleasac, turned out to be nothing much). With the acquisition of the 30 year-old veteran Merced, The Manager could push the young Shawn Green back to the bench, in spite of his two respectable seasons as a 22 and 23 year-old (.835 OPS in '05, .790 OPS in '06).

This was truly a team built for The Manager. He could rely on a group of aging, rickety old sods whose reputations far outshone their performance. He could field a lineup with a 38 year-old Otis Nixon and his rapidly declining defense. He could continue to pencil the 37 year-old-and-declining Carter into the cleanup spot for most of the season (and the three-spot when he really struggled). He could push Delgado and Green into the sixth and eight spots in the lineup, or park them on the bench in favour of Juan Samuel or Rueben Sierra.

(And let's not forget what a massive clusterfuck that whole incident was. The Manager felt that two years worth of decent production wasn't enough proof of Green's worth, and he felt that Green still had to play his way into the lineup, even as veterans scuffled their way into playing time. Somehow, the rotted-out hull of Rivera, who had just been tossed to the scrap heap by the Reds, merited at bats while the future of the franchise languished...Nobody recount this story to Travis Snider, okay?)

As the year went on, and the Sierra experiment blew up, the Jays slipped to the back of the AL East. It took until June 23rd, when the team was already 14 1/2 games out of first, before The Manager would slide Delgado, by far the team's best hitter, into the cleanup role. King Carlos would eventually hit fourth in 40 games, which is exactly one more than the number of games that busted-out mediocrity Mariano Duncan (and his sub-McDonaldian .531 OPS) hit second.

Duncan had taken over the two-hole and second base duties from Carlos Garcia, who spent most of the season revealing himself to be Carlos Garcia: A below-average slap hitter with terrible plate discipline (.253 OBP, .309 SLG).

That 1997 season was a long arduous slog, made all the more so by the high expectations coming into the year. The light at the end of the tunnel came only after it was clear that the season was finished, and the team began moving towards its next generation. Shannon Stewart would step in for Nixon, Green would get a regular turn, and newly-acquired José Cruz Jr. would take Merced's spot in the lineup. The team that would go on to win 88 games the next season under Tim Johnson was beginning to finally take shape, while The Manager was setting the scene for an acrimonious and unapologetic exit.

In the midst of a late season slide that saw them lose 11 of 13 games, the team finally gave The Manager his walking papers on September 23rd. Joe Carter would switch his jersey number to 43 in memoriam. Pitching coach Mel Queen took over for the final five games of the season, and promptly moved Green into the two-hole, while relegating Duncan and Garcia to the bench.

The team went 4-1.

(And in case you are wondering: Yeah, there is totally a way that we could look at this and point the finger of blame at Gord Ash. Except that The Manager had a lot of sway in those days over the young GM through his close relationship with team President Paul Beeston. Umm...oh. Ruh roh.)

We'll hoist a Cuba Libre...as soon as we hear something official

We don't know about you, but in this day and age, we generally like to wait it out until we hear something absolutely, positively, officially officialized from the team before we break out the party hats and start planning the next World Series parade. So now, we wait for something official on Adeinis Hechavarria, the half-Cuban half-Martian supermensch who is supposed to be patrolling the middle infield turf as soon as next year.

Sure, we're going to end up being the last person to comment on this, but we'd rather that than go on at length about what this signing means. We'd rather not indulge in tossing out the names of every failed infield prospect that we could predictably belch out to dull the mood around the signing that isn't even official, and we're certainly not going create false dichotomies in trying to establish what sort of impact he may have. ("A Griffin or a Zosky", my ass.)

And in no way are we going to gloat about how some teams might be stuck with the ghost of Derek Jeter in a couple of years while we've got the rockin'est double-play combo in the AL East.

Nope. We're just gonna bide our time. Wait for something official. (Jay Stenhouse: Drop us a line when you get a chance, a'ight?)

And should it finally become official soon, we'll start daydreaming about the shortstop running to the mound to grab staff ace Henderson Alvarez in an on-field celebration in some late-October / early-November not to long from now.

Sorry. We kinda got ahead of ourselves for a moment.

The return of the Roto-Hoedown

You've demanded it, and we're happy to oblige.

(Okay, so it took us about a month to get off our ass and take the two minutes to set up the league on ESPN. These things happen. I'm only one man, in spite of all this "we" business.)

The 2010 edition of the Roto-Hoedown has been set up, and we eagerly await those of you who wish to take part. This season, we'll only be setting up the one league, because getting our ass kicked twice over was more than a little demoralizing.

Here's the lowdown on the Hoedown: We can take up to 20 teams, although we'll probably cut it off before that number. (UPDATE: Actually, we lied. It's 15 teams. So don't dilly-dally.)

It is, as the name suggests, roto scoring, and it is a 6 X 6 set up with the following categories :

Hitting - Home Runs, Runs Scored, RsBI, SLG, OBP, and Net Stolen Bases. (Yeah, you heard right.)

Pitching - Wins (groan, we know), Saves (double groan, but still), ERA, WHIP, Ks, and On Base Against Home Runs Allowed.

So there you have it. That's the league. The draft takes place online this coming Saturday, March 20 at high noon Eastern Time. If you're interested, and you can absolutely be there at that time to draft, then drop us a line (taoofstieb at gmail dot com, yo, or direct message us on the Twitter). Chances are that if we know you and like you, you jump the queue and get in right away. If we don't know you, then make your case in a compelling fashion, and we'll pull back the velvet rope and let you through.

We'll only be contacting the people that get in, so apologies in advance if you don't hear back. You're all still cool in our book, babies.

It's not that bad

(....but seriously - a Tweet Bag? What the fuck? How am I supposed to follow that? Genius. I'm assuming that gratuitous salty language can only help.)

A funny thing happened to me today. Like, literally today (but maybe not literally "funny". Anyway...). A realization washed over me as I snapped from my pre-season doldrums:

I read too much.

No, it's not like that. I wish I could tell you I've been immersed in the KLaw 100. Sadly, that's not the case: I've been reading too many pre-season forecasts spelling out how the Jays org has gone to shit and a 5th place/90 loss season is in the cards.

Well, fuck all that.

What did anyone expect?

Does nobody remember that the Jays lost 87 last year? That the front office has completely turned over (but not the manager) and payroll stripped down? Oh, and the little matter of (possibly) the best player in franchise history being dealt in the offseason? So why act all surprised and put on fake airs about how disgusted you are with the state of the team? (I'm talking to you - no, at you - fickle Jays fan.)

I'm here to tell you, right now, that it's not that bad. The organization is not in a bad spot. Temporarily, yeah, the Jays might be in line to take some lumps at the hands of the A.L. East Superpowers (makes me feel sick).

That front office shakeup? Bodes well for the future. Yes, the proof is in the proverbial pudding, time will tell, all that cliched bullshit. But so far, it's promising.

Existing stars? We've got a few. Adam Lind and Aaron Hill are cornerstones.

Potential future stars? More than we had a year ago, with Travis Snider, Kyle Drabek, and Brett Wallace either arriving or waiting in the wings.

Shaun Marcum has had an amazing spring of fake games. We couldn't have hoped for better progress from Dustin McGowan. Brandon Morrow and Marc Rzepczynski are showing they want to be rotation stalwarts.

Vernon Wells might even bounce back. Maybe Jose Bautista becomes the new Scutaro. What if J.P. Arencibia plays his way onto the big league club and mashes in Toronto by June? What if some of the other prospects like Stewart, Jenkins, and Sierra blow the goddamned doors off and rocket through the system this year?

Lots could go right. Lots could go wrong. Isn't that why we watch (obsessively)?

Playoffs, baby.

Someday, anyhow. I've got time.

Tweet Bag! Your questions answered!

In a fit of boredom, and unable to think of anything to write about the Jays and their rainout this afternoon, we came up with this idea: You tweet your questions on the Jays, baseball, life, love, snack foods, movies, music, style, relationships or what have you to us, and we'll give it at least a cursory thought before answering flippantly.

A Tweet Bag! Get on in!

From the inimitable @dlbrows:

If only one of Marcum, McGowan, Litsch was able to return to form and you had the choice of which who would you pick?

Maybe this is a sign that we've given up a little bit on Dusty Lampchops, but we'd have to go with Shaun Marcum. Marcum isn't a big body with scary velocity, but he's got (or at least, had) great movement on his pitches and could excel with guile.

Marcum, for his career, has a 3.95 ERA and a 1.28 WHIP in 396.2 IPs, whereas McGowan has posted a 4.71 ERA and 1.37 ERA in 353.2 IPs. While the former wasn't the top prospect type, he's certainly zoomed past McGowan once the reached the big leagues. (Which probably tells you something about Top Prospects lists, doesn't it?)

And as for Jesse: He's got Litsch tits.

From @Koomdogg :

Garth Iorg: Great name or the greatest name?

Frankly, we don't even think he's got the greatest name in his family. That honour would go to Dane Iorg, which has the benefit of sounding both regal and like an endtable from Ikea.

In terms of great baseball names, we've got to go with Kiko Calero as our current favorite. In any baseball video game we play, we always go get him, because we just love to hear the name over and over again. Kiko Calero. Kiko Calero.

We probably have a bit of a fixation on latin names in general. Like Yovanni Gallardo or Jair Jurrjens. And when it comes to hockey, we can't get enough of Finnish names. Our all time favorite name ever is that of former Ottawa Senators head scout and director of player personnel Jarmo Kekäläinen. How awesome is that name? Two times awesomer than you think! (And no wonder the Sens have drafted like a bunch of drunk monkeys lately...no Kekäläinen!)

And of course, there's the unmatchable majesty of the name Marc Rzepczynski, which we only just then wrote for the first time without having to look it up.

So the answer is, unfortunately, no. Not the greatest name. And we're not just saying that because he's the one who feebly made the last out against the Tigers in 1987.

Which brings us to this, from @Spankadia:

In light of the weather in Dunedin, how about the top 5 Jays games you wish had been rained out?

Maybe we would have just been delaying the inevitable, but that last game of the 1987 season for sure, as well as the one a week or so earlier when Bill Madlock broke Tony Fernandez on a take out slide, costing the Jays a key part of their offensive and defensive strength that year.

We'd probably also rain out the game in Texas where Roy Halladay took a Kevin Mench liner off the leg in his start before the All-Star Game, which he was also likely to start.

Nothing aside from that comes to mind. Given the alternative, we'd rather see them play on, regardless of the weather. Anyone else got a thought?

One more for now. @stillJRM asks:

It's summer 2011, who is the more valuable bat? snider, wallace, ruiz.

Ooh! Prognosticating! We like it. First off, we'd like to say that in the Summer of 2011, there will be a song that you hate but that everyone else loves and plays non-stop throughout those months. Take that to the bank.

As for the hitters: We've got too much invested in Snider at this point not to go with him. We actually have a feeling that Wallace could be a 30 homer, .900 OPS guy, but maybe not for a few years. (Supposing the fake Mayans weren't right about 2012, in which case, we'd trade the entire system for Albert Pujols and Hanley Ramirez, and make one last run for it then.)

As for Ruiz: We love him, and we want to see him blow the roof off the dump. But we'll need to see it before we completely totally believe it.

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.

The unstoppable Arencibia

Considering how high and how low people have gone on J.P. Arencibia, it's hard to believe that it will only be three years this June since he was drafted into the Blue Jays organization. Catchers of the Future are always a tricky thing, and a great deal of them only emerge as legitimate Major Leaguers after abandoning the Tools of Ignorance and stepping out from behind the plate. (Like this guy.)

Still, there is some reason for optimism as Arencibia plays well through the Fake Game portion of the season. After hitting his third dinger of the Spring yesterday, we're wondering (almost certainly entirely prematurely) if Arencibia isn't playing his way into the conversation of which catcher joins the team when they head north.

Look, we know this is stupid. But this is the stupid, overly optimistic time of year. You wouldn't crap all over someone for being especially merry or jolly through the last weeks of December, would you? At that time of year, people see holly and winterberries and tinsel and lose their minds. We see Arencibia wearing number 9 (an especially auspicious number, if you ask us), and we start to have visions of his emergence as a stellar backstop. Or at least as an option.

We appreciate that one of the catch-and-throw guys will in all likelihood be the guy who gets the call at the end of this month. And we also realize that a couple of good at bats in March don't offset the step backwards that Arencibia took last year in Las Vegas. But we're hopeful that with a clean bill of health, Arencibia might emerge at some point this season as a viable backstop in the short term, and a middle of the order bat in the longer term.