Halladay MD

"New case. You have Mark Teixiera at the plate, one and two, and you've just thrown a sinker away that missed for a ball. There's a man on second with some decent speed. Romaro?"

"Could throw a slider away, see if he'll chase?"

"You're now two and two on him. Litsch?"

"Come inside with a two seamer?"

"Double to right field, with Alex Rodriguez coming to the plate. Ray?"

"Breaking ball, low and inside."

"The game is 3-2 with Teixiera's eight home run. You throw that, the Yankees owe you a check from their front office. Tallet?"

"Come in high on his hands, see about getting a bad swing, and back him off the plate a bit for a slider low on the corner at two and two if he doesn't bite."

"You're a lefty, so that one might work. Teixiera's got good bat speed though, so if you miss even a little, he's doubling it down the line. Cecil?"

"Same as Brian, but I throw the change two and two, get him out front on it."

"Nope. The change gets slapped into right for a single, Damon comes around to score unless Rios hits Barajas exactly. Richmond?"

"I'd backdoor the slider, because if he swings, unless he can dig it out, it's on the ground for Rolen or Scutaro to field. But you wouldn't do that."

"No? Why?"

"Because you want to know what you should throw, which is the cutter that Teixiera won't be able to pull the trigger on."

"Very good."

Roy Halladay very obviously outduelled AJ Burnett in front of a huge and raucous crowd in Toronto. The Doc needed only 103 pitches to hold the Yankees to five hits and a single run, fanning five along the way in what almost seemed to be another day at the office for him. Burnett was very good in the early innings, his curveball vicious, biting the corners. However, a couple of walks in between two doubles buried him, and Hill hammered a long home run in the eighth to decide the outcome of the much-anticipated matchup.

Obviously, Halladay is still the master.

The Yankees Are Coming

The showdown is finally happening. I don’t speak of the impending Halladay/Burnett matchup, or the first game against the New York Yankees this year. The matchup is between the Jays claims to legitimacy as a contenting team and their first game against a division opponent that the press takes seriously. Despite that only Tampa Bay has a lopsided record against the Blue Jays, the general opinion by the fans and the press is that Boston, Tampa Bay and New York represent truly legitimate contenders in the AL East, and Toronto will sink down into its tradition mire of slow starts to be scrabbling to stay above .500 at the All-Star Break.

Of course, there are those who believe that maybe this isn’t as cut and dried as one might think, and this series against New York will instead show baseball that Toronto isn’t going to be dragged behind the pack this year. Granted, it is us who will likely be disappointed at the end of the year, but to hell with it. Burying the Yankees with a sweep will cause blood to run from the eyes of New York fans, shredding the veneer of hope that their collection of mercenaries, prima donnas, douchebags and overhyped prospects will be a factor in September.

The Yankees will be trotting out their marquee lineup of pitchers for the series, whose combined salaries exceed the GNP of most African nations. A.J Burnett, Andy Pettitte and CC Sabathia may only have one full first name between them, but they represent the only stable part of the Yankees rotation. Burnett started strong and has been waning recently, while Sabathia is the exact opposite, seemingly finding his groove with a four hit shut out of Baltimore last time up. Pettitte, their fifth starter, has been consistently mediocre, which has been considered a blessing in the wake of injuries and inconsistencies with Joba, Hughes and Wang.

The Jays will counter with the ever-intimidating Halladay, and if you believe the New York blogs, a pair of former hotel employees stuffed into uniforms and wheeled out to be crushed under the billion dollar bats of the Yankees. That works for me, since dismissing Richmond and Tallet is a wonderful way to set up a nastier fall. The Jays should handle Burnett well. They have a dangerous lineup against right handers with a ton of power, and the team knows AJ inside and out. Attempting to blast a fastball past Lind just because you’re pissed about the umpire’s last call is a good way to deposit it into the second deck.

While the return of A-Rod to the lineup will bolster the Yankees offense, Richmond has been death on righties this year, and his slider keeps the ball on the ground for his defense. The Yankees are a long ball team, a lot of free swingers which will hopefully play to Richmond’s strengths. Pettitte was 1-2 against the Jays last year, with an ERA of 5.13 and a WHIP of 1.29. As Wilner pointed out, if you subtract Tallet’s one bad start verses Kansas City, his line is 2-0, with an ERA of 1.80 and a WHIP of 0.92.

Now, you might say that subtracting that start is fiddling with the numbers for a positive result to make him look better matched against one of the mostly highed regarded pitchers in the game. Very true, but the point that has been made is that the Jays have been playing against weak teams. Thus, Tallet’s one loss to one of the worst offenses in the Majors should be considered an outlier, since it directly goes against the established wisdom of the season. Fun with numbers time, kids!

Ultimately, if the Jays are a fluke this year, it won’t be proved by getting crushed by the AL East. It will come from our tradition of matching up very well against our division rivals, and then getting killed in godawful roadtrips to Oakland, Kansas City, Minnesota, Chicago and Cleveland. Simply put, contending teams find ways to win series and avoiding stacking up losing streaks. Non-contending teams have good months, good roadtrips, and give the gains back the very next series against a team they should be overmatching. Right now, the latter describes the New York Yankees.

Come Back Down To Earth

With the Jays off to a torrid start, kicking the hell out of the AL Central and West, winning our franchise high six straight series, most of the pundits and nay-sayers have been quick to point out that this is all just meaningless because the Blue Jays have yet to face the Beasts of the East in their own league, and that will quickly return the Jays to the expected preseason predicted performance.

There’s already been a lot of discussion in the Jays blogosphere about the fact that the Jays are a fundamentally sound ball club, and that a regression like 2008 is very unlikely. But that’s about applying logic to looking at a ball club, as opposed to fantasy style statistical minutiae. I’m surprised that no one has considered another big reason why the Blue Jays aren’t likely to simply flameout against their Eastern rivals; their previous season records.

In the last three years, the Toronto Blue Jays record against the East is:

2008: 37 – 35
2007: 36 – 36
2006: 43 – 31

What has killed the Blue Jays every year has not been the big matchups against Boston and New York, although Tampa Bay even when weak proved a troublesome competitor. It was the weak teams in the Central and West like the A’s, the Rangers and the Royals that we’d be swept by, ultimately costing us that margin of victory for the Wild Card or first place.

If the Jays can bring a winning record against the AL East in May, historically, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t stand. Even just looking at the teams, none of the East have rotations that they should feel comfortable with, and are dealing with key injuries and troubles.

So enjoy the ride. There’s every reason to believe that it’s not going to end as abruptly as the pundits may think.

Tallet Magnums the Sox

Brian Tallet has called on the power of his Magnum PI styled facial hair, digging down deep into the hairy machismo mojo to dominate a powerful Chicago lineup by giving up only four hits and no runs over 5.2 innings pitched. Tallet was sharp on the mound, getting out of several tight situations with strikeouts, and having some defensive excellence from Snider and Rolen to back him up.

Tallet's WHIP of 1.03 shows a lot of confidence in challenging hitters, and using both location and changing speeds to throw them off balance and get key outs. Not that anyone needs to be all that good when spotted with 14 runs.

Tallet was also helped by the fact that Chicago's defense was essentially a sieve tonight, capped by Alexei Ramirez utter inability to make any kind of effective play from short. Ramirez' imitation of a puppet with his strings cut helped the Jays to three runs in the first, and several other key opportunities to act as the Jays tenth man in the lineup against Gavin Floyd.

Considering the state of the Jays rotation, the ability of the Jays young pitchers to get outs and eat up innings is beyond what could have been expected. Even with Litsch and Purcey's first two starts being so weak, the Jays have still battled back and made their record as an all over effort by the team.

And Tom Selleck's mustache.

Two Weeks Of Hope

To the amazement of all, the Toronto Blue Jays have come out of the gates with a big club swinging, and have ground up the elite collection of shitballers that the Tigers, Indians, and Twins call their starting rotations. Granted that they aren't exactly facing a cast of Cy Young contenders (except for Cliff Lee, who is doing everything possible to prove right the nay-sayers from last year who pointed out that his numbers were inflated by playing the bulk of his games against crappy hitting lineups), it is still nice to watch the kind of offense that was expected last year from the Jays finally catch up with them.

The Jays offense ranks first or second in the AL in seven offensive categories, powered by efforts up and down the lineup. Aaron Hill has come back from his shortened 2008 season to monster his way through the first ten games, while his Bosox counterpart and AL MVP Dustin Pedoria is hitting a ferocious OPS+ of 36. Lind came out of the gate with a big showing, racking up 12 RBIs and tying a Jays record, while Travis Snider, Scott Rolan, and Vernon Wells have been playing long ball against the AL Central.

Our pitching hasn't exactly been as stellar, now losing Jesse Litsch for at least four to six weeks. However, Ricky Romaro has put forward two excellent outings, Richmond made up for a walk filled disaster against the Indians by shutting the Twins down in his second start, only giving up a single earned run. Halladay is classically Halladay, save for one bad inning during Opening Day. Purcey has been touched, and has struggled with his control, but has also been punching out batters at the clip he's been expected to make. While the bullpen will certainly regress some this year, it has been relatively stable, and taking advantage of the offensive riches to work out the kinks.

After ten games, the Jays sit in first in the AL East. Hardly likely that they'll stay there, but cracks have been appearing the monsters of the East that may give us some hope. The Yankees are watching age finally start to cripple their favourite stars, and Nady is likely out for the season. It's sad when Nick Swisher is the reason to hope for a win for your ballclub. The Bosox have been similarly struck, with Mike Lowell and David Ortiz starting very slowly at the plate.

The general theme around Toronto is that this is unsustainable. Well, sure, an .800 winning percentage isn't likely to be carried into September, but I think people are missing the point when they are assuming that unsustainable means the Jays will regress back to 2008. As virtually every Jays blog has pointed out, and Mike Wilner seems ready to tattoo on the forehead of the next hockey douche that calls in with some ignorant rant, the Jays in 2008, even following Gaston's return, still hugely underperformed offensively from what should have been even average production. The Jays were so far below their career averages from virtually the entire team that you had to expect them to be stronger offensively just out of basic numbers. Unless the team as a whole went sharply into decline, we were due better hitting.

So certainly the Jays won't sustain this streak, but that doesn't mean they are going to suddenly start dropping series after series on the road. If anything has been proven in the first two weeks, it's that the celebrated big teams of the AL East are mortal, and that rather than looking at the Jays lineup in terms of talent, everyone who consigned them to 5th place focused on their performance in 2008 alone. As shaky as the Jays rotation is, most of their competition isn't looking particularly stable either. With our average offense, we should still be able to stay in games, even if it involves working the bullpen more. That will be what decides all those one run games that we lost last year in the future.

Reasons to Support Cito

“Well, I wouldn’t doubt that,” Gaston said. “He’s an asshole himself. A complete asshole. I will say that out loud, right in his face. It’s all about him. Nobody else but him. I wouldn’t doubt that at all.”

***

Gaston heard of Clemens’ complaint about Hentgen second-hand. Had Clemens voiced his complaint directly, Gaston vows “one of us would have had a whooping that day. It might have been me, but he would have known I was there.”

I would like to point out that I would pay good money to watch Cito fuck up Clemens fat, out of shape, douchebag body at a Flashback Friday. I'd even come early for the bobblehead of it happening.

Spring Training Fortune Telling

I have to be honest. The trouble with Spring Training is essentially that all it can be is a hazy vague idea of what a team might have. It would be hard to imagine Russ Adams, Jason Lane, and Brad Emaus are ready to translate being offensive juggernauts into the regular season, after all. So the best you can do is try to watch, follow along, and look for some indicators that largely reinforce your own conclusions before the regular season makes them look ridiculously naive and stupid.

Spring does make me cheery.

However, now that we're starting to get closer to the season, and the teams in spring are looking less like the results of a 'play with a Major Leaguer' contest, some things are finally shaping up, including the big questions about the bench and the rotation.

Michael Barrett seems to have finally gotten enough at bats in to find his swing, and the veteran catcher seems to be coming around at the plate. In his last five games, he's gone 5 for 12, hitting .416 with three doubles and 4 RBIs. While his slow start gave Chavez the chance for a serious look, he's never hit for power or for average in his career. Considering the push on getting Arencibia and Jeroloman at least a taste of AAA and major league pitching, the Jays will likely take a chance that Barrett can bring some of his former power to the plate in the fifty odd games they'll need, and in the event of Barajas going down, provide the same kind of veteran support if one of the prospects comes up at the backup. Worst case scenario is that Barrett fizzles completely, and Thigpen gets a couple dozen starts behind the dish before bringing up either prospects.

The rest of the bench is a little more fluid. Like many people in the Jays Blogosphere, I've been wondering about the reason for paying 2.5mil for Jose Bautista. While the Jays certainly love his versatility, being able to play a half dozen positions not terribly well, he's hardly an offensive upgrade anywhere. He does have some power, but not enough to justify having power hitter like metrics in strikeouts and average. His price tag as a utility player is difficult to justify, and while he's hitting the ball well in spring, I don't really see his numbers making a stronger case for him in the regular season than, say, Lane or Emaus. Also, he's shown little of the power that in theory justifies him as a first off the bench option.

Fortunately, arbitration might end up having made sense, since the Astros are reportedly looking at Bautista. Moving some of his salary will give the Jays some financial flexibility, and maybe finding a decent hidden gem in a trade as always a possibility. (Hillenbrand for Accardo, for example)

Based on comments by the front office and Cito, it looks like for right now, they are comfortable with a bench of McDonald, Millar, Bautista, and Barrett. If they move Bautista, Voodoo Joe Inglett would seem to be the next in line. However, Lane and even, god help us, Adams aren't entirely out of the mix. Adams looks a little like Bautista this spring, hitting the hell out of the ball, and switching between mediocre to terrible in the field. Lane's biggest challenge is trying to convince people he's finally figured how to hit and they should ignore the last three years of his career. However, if Millar goes into the tank and Lane continues his hot streak to the end of the spring, the Jays could decide to take a gamble.

The rotation is where all the focus has been of late, and for now, it looks like the picture is getting clearer. With Janssen likely to either not break camp with the time, or start in the bullpen for now, Richmond and Mills look like the likely contenders for the two remaining spots. Clement pitched an absolutely terrible game against the Twins, getting shelled but more importantly, walking seven batters over four innings. In just over ten innings pitched, Clement has walked 12 batters, and only struck out 5, showing real difficulty finding the edges of the plate, and being unwilling to commit to throwing strikes and trying to induce contact. I personally think that he'd be wise to spend time in AAA, since I'd be amazed if Mills success this spring translates into the majors yet. However, more likely he'll try and find another team rather than start in the minors.

A rotation of Halladay-Litsch-Purcey-Richmond-Mills isn't completely terrifying, but it has an awful lots of 'ifs' attached to it, especially if Janssen isn't available as a starter, and if McGowan isn't going to be seen until July or so. Fortunately, the Jays once again appear to have an excess of strong arms in the bullpen, and some unlikely hurlers like Camp and Hayhurst have shown impressive work in limited innings this spring.

In all though, this is still basically dressing up knowing fuck all into rationales and waiting for opening day to arrive and determine the real outcomes. That is what I hate about Spring Training.