Mid-Season!

Well I debated this weekend about whether I should make the drive down to Toronto for the games or go to a cottage...the races made me decide to skip Toronto and instead I spent two days in the rain without access to watching what I knew would be a great series. This Jays team made a statement throughout the weekend of what they have in them and the run to the playoffs that is not yet impossible. The tone was set in the ninth inning of Game 1 with Reed Johnson's game saving balls-out catch, continued with Johnnie Mac's web gems through the weekend and finished with the gutsy strike out in the 9th inning yesterday.

Watch for some mid-season reviews in the next couple days...we're going to look at things with a Jays eye as well as some of the moves made in the off-season.

NHL Free Agency

As previously stated, the past four days have been madness in Canada as everyone is following the big moves being made during the first few days of NHL free agency. The money being spent is stupid...and the terms being given are franchise killers. That being said, I've written a short article looking at the teams that have gone and shopped the much in the early going. It can be accessed here.

Jays beat themselves

Well, not a good effort by the Blue Jays last night, as they failed their young starter with defensive mishaps and unearned runs. The fun started with the bench not warning Zaun that Stewart was swiping second, and allowing a steal that should have just not been counted as a steal (of course I don't mind since I have him on my fantasy team). Zaun then threw the ball into CF to allow Stewart to go to third and eventually score. Then in the second inning, Glaus makes an error that leads to another Oakland run.

Glaus had a terrible night, he went 1-4, left 3 runners on base (as did Thomas, which is fantastic on a night where you get 4 hits and one walk) and made miscues that cost the team, such as trying to tag up on a pop out from first to second base. Twice he had Rios in scoring position with less than two outs and was unable to score him or move him over.

Litsch was impressive as he got himself out of trouble early on and seemed to settle down. He allowed 7 hits and walked 3 batters but he managed to not allow an earned run. Not much to be said about this game...oi...

The weekend that was

Canada Day and NHL Free Agent talk took over the weekend in the Ottawa area. Leaf fans are surprised their hapless GM was able to acquire a winger to help Sundin after picking up a goalie, Habs fans are pissed that their GM threw money around but none of it would stick to any free agents until Monday and Sens fans are anxiously awaiting something, anything.

In the end, two of those three teams didn't make the playoffs and didn't do much to improve their chances while the Senators will attempt to take a maturing group back to the Stanley Cup Finals without much fiddling. I'll actually write a report on NHL Free Agency later as I was doing some side work this weekend on the subject.

But, back to why we're here, what happened to the hot Jays? This team hit .500, was slowly going to get three players off of DL and things were looking optimistic...until this weekend. A loss on Thursday against the Twins that split the series was quickly followed by a three game sweep at the hands of Seattle. Vernon Wells helped the team recover last night and allow Towers to win his second straight start. But the bad news came as Burnett was placed back on the DL for what looks like three to four weeks with more arm problems. Halladay just doesn't look like Doc and wouldn't even get my vote for the All-Star game's last AL player at this point. The team needs the three day All-Star break to heal some bumps and bruises, and Roy would be well served not throwing for a couple days.

To get to the All Star game, there are two more games against the Athletics followed by 3 against the Cleveland Indians. The Jays will send Litsch agains Blanton tonight, followed by McGowan vs Kennedy. Halladay is slated to start Friday against the AL Central leading Indians (and Cliff Lee) and would therefore be ready for the series opener vs Boston on next Thursday. The Jays have a couple more weeks to prove they're contenders or some of these veterans could be traded...remember after the 4 game series against the Sox, there are only 6 games left between the current 1st and 2nd places in the AL East.

How good has Marcum been for this team? He now leads the team in VORP and has 7 win shares, good enough to be tied for 5th on the Jays with Doc, tied for first amongst pitchers. He faces Fausto Carmona on Saturday according to the probables at the Rogers Centre.

Most dysfunctional clubhouse: The Padres!

Reports are coming out that San Diego has acquired Milton Bradley. Bradley is extremely talented but known to be emotional and sometimes troublesome and was designated for assignment by the Athletics for unknown reasons although it was said to create room for players such as Travis Buck. Milton "The game" has had 5 consecutive season of an OPS+ over 100, he's not quite a home run threat and not quite a good base stealer but he does a lot of things well. It seems as though the Royals had completed a deal for Bradley but then reneged on the deal.

This comes not long after their acquisition of Michael Barrett, the ex-Cubs catcher who had been in a couple altercations with his own starting pitchers and one with friend AJ Pierzynski last season. Should be interesting to see how Bradley and Barrett co-exist, but it's for sure that they're adding a lot of offense to a team currently tied for first in their division even though they are in the bottom tier of the National League for runs.

June 28th Live Blog During The Game

End of first inning: Is anything more maddening than AJ Burnett?
Single
-Hit By Pitch
-Ks one of the best young hitters in the game on three pitches
-rbi single
-Ks last year's MVP on four pitches
-Enduces Ground Out.
He doesn't even look dominant for full games anymore, just against a couple batters an inning. Glad he got out of that jam without giving back more than one run though.

And congratulations Frank Thomas, his 500th home run is a 3 run shot that gives us a big first inning lead. Prediction: This guy will be a monster now that is off his mind.

Gotta love Carlos Silva...one inning, one pitching coach visit.

End of Second Inning:
Nothing to talk about on the Jays end... except why is Jason Phillips starting? After everyone being mad that Clayton made an error in his return to the lineup yesterday, McDonald makes only his third error of the year to make Royce feel better, what a teammate. AJ mows two of them down and has now thrown 75% of pitches for strikes.

End of Third Inning:
Good prediction on the Big Hurt, RBI Double in the third inning. Before the season, had I said that you had Matt Stairs and Howie Clark as the number two and four hitters in the lineup, would you ever think this team would be up 5-1 over the Twins after three innings? Stairs looks like he needs a break, hopefully one of the 1b/LF comes back and puts him back in a more part time situation.

How? HOW does Burnett do it? How do you give up a home run to Jason Bartlett when you're looking so filthy and dominating against better batters? Oh look...makes Mauer ground out, striked out Cuddyer, strikes out Morneau. Maddening...

End of Fourth Inning:
1-2-3...gosh I want to get rid of Phillips....

Another home run given up by AJ, at least it's against a legitimate power threat this time...and Lind gets all the action with three pop outs. What's wrong with Lind right now? Is he simply over-matched, is there now a confidence issue there too? Hopefully he finds himself in AAA when Johnson comes back...

End of Fifth Inning:
It seems like Silva has quite calmed down...another 1-2-3 inning...think Twins fans get as frustrated with him as Jays fans sometimes get with Burnett.

Single-Single...and AJ is done for the day. Must have been a 75-80 pitch count for the comeback. Frasor coming in to try to get him out of this....and this may not be the best game to blog. Frasor blows it open by allowing a Hunter home run and the Twins now lead 7-5. Welcome back AJ...

End of Sixth Inning:
Stairs tries to prove me wrong with a single...followed by a Big Hurt strike out and Aaron Hill double play. Hill now has 15 double plays on the year, matching last season's total...and he's not a slow guy. Might want to start taking bigger swings with guys on base...

And Jordan de Jong makes what could be his last appearence with League looking ready in AAA. Helped by a double play, he only allows one run...joyous day. De Jong came up with so much promise when we struck out the side but he just doesn't seem ready either.

End of Seventh Inning:
Blue Jays fail to manufacture a run, the bottom of the order is 0 for 8 today, at least Lind has drawn a walk...with Cleveland winning and Detroit leading, this may be a tough day for the Jays. Someone asked of me, do you think the Jays should sell now? My answer is heck no, not when the team is looking better, wait until mid July when you'll have added a Johnson, Overbay and Chacin trio then see where things stand. With the injured players coming back it will be like if this team added three players by July trades and that should give them a boost. The Johnson/Lind swap alone should be worth a couple wins to this team.

Jordan De Jong gets the double play to end the inning after a K then BB to the first two batters. At least someone could stop Torri today.

End of Eight Inning:
I know the Jays are down by 3 and not only one but why let Clark have another AB instead of Troy Glaus? Oh gee...1-2-3 inning...if they lose, they lost this one ugly...almost as ugly as these jerseys.

De Jong ends up with three inning and one unearned run with one hit and 2 walks. We'll see if he sticks with team with league coming off the DL.

End of Game:
Well the Jays finally showed some more first in the ninth...Gibby and the Big Hurt got ejected. 2 more errors today for the defense, and I'm hoping...hoping that Stairs doesn't have to play the field for too many games anymore, this game was painful but at least it wasn't long...

And they're a game over .500

Unfortunately, I could not catch the game last night but I did get a chance to watch it in about half an hour this morning. The team is a game above five hundred and actually has a 4 game winning streak! Marcum goes tonight against Scott Baker, who is fighting for his job in the rotation.

• Wells really seems to be getting comfortable in the lead off spot, he'll get less RBI opps but he's bringing it. A home run, a double and a single last night plus 3 RBIs, maybe he's getting out of that slump!
• Rios continues his claim as the offensive MVP with a 3-4 night, 7 TBs and a SF along with 2 runs and 2 RBIs. Stairs is challenging with less at bats but a big go ahead shot last night!
• Doc just isn't Doc right now but the team is playing well behind him, he gave them 7 good innings yesterday but gave up 5 earned runs with only 9 base runners even though he did not give up a home run.
• Jays cast-away John Thomson pitched a good game in his first start this season with the Royals. He gave up 2 earned runs on 6 hits and no walks to get the W. Interestingly, he did not strike out one batter.

From Goat to Hero?

• Frank Thomas had a fabulous weekend and it showed when looking at VORP, his Value went up 3.6 from Friday morning to Monday morning. One away from 500, let's see if he can get that and get on a roll, came close tonight against Minnesota
• Biggest VORP gain this weekend? Matt Stairs jumped 7.2 to go up to 15.7 value. Is anyone (non-arbitration) a better bargain in MLB than this guy? If so, I'd like to see him! This from a guy that was penciled in as a be a bench player!
  

Why the Jays aren't in first...the offensive part

Welcome back...after a busy NHL playoff season working sales for a Stanley Cup finalist followed by relaxing over at Lynx Stadium and actually catching Jays, and so many other teams', games on TV. Great game to catch on Sunday, I actually turned to my friend during the 2nd or 3rd inning and stated "McGowan looks filthy today"...good call...too bad my opponent in the pool had him.

So as of Thursday, these stats were compiled in trying to see why the Jays aren't better than they should have been. In taking a look at the offense (the problem spot as per expectations, it doesn't take long to figure out why). There are four positions where the Jays vastly under performing as per the expectations and even last season's performances.

• Catcher: With the injury to Zaun, the Jays have sent Jason Phillips ( -4.8 VORP) for the bulk of at bats. When Zaun has played, his numbers have been disappointing as he has only managed a VORP of -2.4. Last season both Molina and Zaun had VORPs over 15, hopefully Zaun regains his form as he comes back from the injury but the lack of a capable backup has hurt the team offensively.
  
• Left Field: The Jays lost half of their platoon in LF this off-season and the injury to Reed Johnson has not helped things. While they managed a combined VORP over 20 in LF last season, this season it is under 0! Adam Lind has had the majority of at bats and is a -4.1, in his limited ABs Johnson provided 1.1 VORP and Matt Stairs has over performed offensively in his at bats at LF and 1B. When is Reed back? The spark he brings to the top of the lineup is missed and Lind just needs more seasoning in AAA.
  
• Centre Field: Vernon Wells has been a bust since receiving his big contract, last season he had a VORP of 58.5, this season it's a VORP of 5...meaning by the end of the year he'll be approximately 45 VORP lower than he was last year...he needs to pick up his game, let's hope a move to the leadoff spot will help.
  
• Designated Hitter: Frank Thomas was expected to bring a spark to the lineup but has instead managed to get a VORP of only 5...not quite the improvement the team was looking for. Here's the good news, at this time last year the Big Hurt was not playing and his numbers were .239/.356/.522. His numbers after June 21st? .228/.375/.395, obviously he needs to start slugging (which he has with 2 home runs in his last 3 games) but he's still drawing a lot of walks and at least getting on base.
  

What's interesting will be to see how much their stats improved after a great weekend that pushed the team into second place in the division, can they get a 4 game winning streak tonight?

Big update SOON!

BVTN is coming back...big update coming up, you'll notice the stats are already updated!

The New Style of the Draft

Major League Baseball took a huge step in the growth of the popularity of the draft and in the exposure to top prospects. The first ever televised draft was a big deal for MLB and it should lead to positive growth for baseball as a whole. The lead-up to the draft had more mock drafts than I have ever seen available on the internet, and the draft itself provided a good look into the different prospects being drafted by each team along with organizational needs.

The impact this will have on baseball as a whole cannot yet be measured but there are several ways that it will positively impact the world of baseball:

First of all, the draft being broadcast brings attention to baseball in a fashion that the other sports do for their drafts. Fans tune in to see what players their teams draft, receive instant analysis on these players and this allows fans to formulate opinions about low level prospects they would otherwise not have. It also allows baseball fans to follow every team’s moves and see the different draft strategies.

This also boosts interest from fans to both high school and college baseball along with minor league baseball. The College World Series is immediately after the draft and being able to recognize which team a new drafted player is on allows fans to follow new prospects before they even reach the minor leagues. Once they are playing in the Minors, there is more name recognition with players and therefore more interest in Minor League games.

Having said this, there is some work to be done. Not allowing draft picks to be traded (or prospects to be traded until a year after they are signed) is a big step to keeping competitive balance and restricting teams from trading away their future. However, to make the draft more exciting, MLB should allow the trading of draft picks for other draft picks. Per example, if a team really wants a player, allow them to trade a later pick to move up in the first round or to bundle picks for a higher pick. This would bring more excitement to the draft, everyone loves a trade, and would also allow fans to truly recognize how wanted some player were.

Draft Day One

Day one of the MLB draft is complete and the Blue Jays organization added 10 new players in the first five rounds. The players were varied in both positional and their level of experience. Here's the top 5 picks from the first round and supplemental:

• 16th pick: High School Shortstop Kevin Ahrens: 6'2, 180 pound Texan switch hitter who played shortstop while in high school but will probably end up as a third baseman. Has a great accurate arm and has added power from his right side.
• 21st pick: College Catcher JP Arencibia: 6'1, 195 pounds from Tennesse U who may not stay as a catcher but has great power although he was slowed down by a back injury.
• 38th pick: College LHP Brett Cecil: 6'2, 225 pound University of Maryland product was mostly a reliever but may start in the majors with a repertoire of four pitches. His slider is a big plus and some believe he will quickly be in the Majors as a set-up man and later closer.
• 45th pick: High School shortstop Justin Jackson: North Carolina product who stands at 6'2, 175 pounds who is a great defensive shortstop but may lack the bat.
• 56th pick: College RHP Trystan Magnuson: 6'7 giant from the University of Louisville used a slider and fastball to mow down the opposition coming out of the bullpen. Another one of these picks who may be on the fast track to the majors as a reliever.
  
  The Jays then followed this up by choosing a 2bman who is purely a hitter but lacks a defensive position, an incredibly athletic outfielder who dropped because of a football commitment along with two lefties and one righty. The draft was very much oriented towards the difficult fielding positions and mixing up players who could help quickly along with players who will need a lot of work to be rounded players. More analysis later on!
  

Heartbreak...and movin on

Well...after two long months of working 12 hour days and having your emotions fully invested into something, I shall have some spare time to get back to working on this great site after last night's dissapointing loss. We will be back on board A.S.A.P. and with a lot of content so stay tuned! A great day to be back on board also as the draft is on at 2pm, stay tuned...lots of different names being projected to the Jays in the first round.

Both Baseball Prospectus and Baseball America have JP and co. locking into catcher J.P. Arencibia from Tennessee in the first round. Matt Dominguez is still a top priority to the team but may not fall to them, although both BA and MLB.Com have him going to Toronto with their first pick.

Stay tuned...oh and a word from our sponsor...my friend Nicholas Burton is doing a study for his thesis right now and needs your help.

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The survey can be found HERE

Phewwwwwww.....wait....darn!

Well first the Good news...

• stud closer B.J. Ryan will only miss 4-6 weeks with an elbow strain, much better than the worse case scenario.
  
• Then the bad news...Troy Glaus is going on the D.L. Tuesday with his heel problem. This puts a severe hole in the Jays lineup and will mean Lind/Hill batting second a lot and Overbay staying at the fifth spot.
• Ryan Roberts gets the call up from Syracuse and will be the backup infielder. Roberts has been playing some 3B down there and has some good versatility.

It will be a tough few weeks for the Jays and they don't get to take a breath as they host the Red Sox and Dice-K tomorrow night at the Rogers Centre.

Injuries, Injuries, Injuries

So I didn't want to post when I hadn't had a chance to watch a full game except Friday night...things are a little crazy as the Senators make their way through the playoffs. But what a horrible week it was for the Jays aside from the standings where they are currently tied for first...

• Closer B.J. Ryan is gone...and we should find out today for how long. The bullpen had been great early on this year but now everyone has to take a step forward on the bullpen chart. It does not look great for Ryan either, when the name Tommy John is being tossed around...Jamie Vermilyea is up in his place and Davis Romero's season is done. Jason Frasor is the new closer.
• Outfielder and spark plug Reed Johnson is "deciding whether to have surgery that could sideline him for two months". Good news is we get to look at Adam Lind a bit earlier than scheduled, and Aaron Hill gets to bat in the number two hole once in a while. Bad news is we might see a lot of Stairs in LF.
• Who knows about Glaus? They need him in the lineup to re-align things but they don't want to risk a longer injury to him too...
• Was that Josh Towers edition 2007 on the mound yesterday? Can we hope? With A.J. and Ohka struggling...this could be great. He has a better ERA than Doc this morning and a better K/BB ratio

So...still excited for this season, this team is too good to be held down even with injuries, but there's going to have be some depth additions if those three injuries are in any way serious...What does everyone think?

McGowan Watch '07

Dusty had his second start of the season with Syracuse and impressed again last night. He allowed his first ER of the season with a home run by Ryan Sweeney (2 spots behind Travis Snyder on the Baseball America Top Prospects list at 55). In ten innings this year, McGowan has struck out 17 batters and walked only 3. With Towers so-so performance, as previously discussed with no help from the defense, last night is McGowan far away from the MLB rotation. Will they need to keep stretching his arm out? Or is one of their current bullpen men looking at a rotation spot? It looks like McGowan may finally be comfortable in a set position, this time as a starter...

April 10th, 2007...questioning the manager

Sometimes you don’t even have to look deeper into the boxscore. You just look at who is listed in the boxscore and it makes you realize all you need to know about the game. Matt Stairs in left field is something meant to make you cringe, certainly with the knowledge that the starting pitcher needs all the confidence he can get after a horrible season last year. Having Jason Smith at SS and Jason Phillips at C on the same night also raises the eyebrow, why bench three starters when the man on the mound could benefit from all the help he can get? This was a badly played game by the team on the field, led by two miscues by Matt Stairs and 4 errors by the defense including Gold Glover Vernon Wells. Did Towers deserve better? Probably…but it was a decent outing for a man who greatly struggled last season, allowing 10 hits, but no walks and striking out six. Two of those hits could be erased by Stairs miscues…Downs’ arm was finally stretched to more than one batter and he mowed through his 1.1 innings, only allowing one hit and striking out two. Marcum outdid him, throwing 2 innings with 1 hit and the two strike outs.

Offensively, the star was the pinch hitter Gregg Zaun who came on in the 7^th inning and hit a 2 run shot to bring the Jays closer. But there were no bright lights on this night, only head shakes and raised eyebrows…

Inside the Box Score - April 9th 2007

What a long...long game it was tonight. First thing to look at on that boxscore is the time of play: 3 hours and 8 minutes, although it seemed much longer at times.
As I write this, Orlando Hudson just caused his team a run with his 'great defense' as we sometimes saw with the Blue Jays, check the box score for a sacrifice fly to the hitter by Cody Ross. Hudson backed up to right field to make a routine right fielder's catch, Griffey was on third and saw that Hudson could not cock a throw to home plate in time to get him tagging up.

Back to the Jays game:

• Troy Glaus made his comeback and was fantastic: 2 for 3, with one run and walk.
• Royce Clayton finds ways to impress every game. His second inning walk was a great at-bat totalling 9 pitches including 5 foul balls, he never let a strike go by him, nor did he swing through one. The pitch tracker also shows that all 5 pitches fouled off were in the strike zone. Oh yeh, he also had a basehit and a run.
• Aaron Hill is finding his stroke much faster than last year, his 3 for 3 night gives him a .348 AVG and he also walked. At this time last year he had a .273 AVG but he quickly plumetted and would stay under .200 from April 26th to May 18th. He already has a home run, soemthing he didn't do until May 24 last year. Let's hope for him that he keeps it up
• A. J. Burnett threw 102 pitches, 60 for strikes and found his stride after the first few innings where he could not find the plate. Doing so lowered his ERA under 8 and gave him a 100 pitch game 3 months quicker than last season, although that only covers 3 less starts. He wasn't dominating (5 strikeouts), he wasn't always accurate (40% balls, 3 walks) but he found a way to get things done, somehow it really seems like he allowed more than 3 walks and 3 hits.
• There are still four Blue Jays reliever who have yet to allow a run with Casey Janssen leading the way, not having done so during 5.2 innings. Jeremy Accardo and Scott Downs have 3 innings and 2 thirds of an inning respectively after appearing in this game.

So today's Top Performer Award goes to Aaron Hill for his great performance with the bat and no errors today. The team is a game ahead of the Red Sox for first place in the division. More to come...any thoughts on tonight's game? How different were the anthems? How nice is A.J.'s hair?

Inside the Boxscore 04/02

This is a new thing that I've always wanted to do because sometimes, a boxscore can tell a great story...hopefully this will become a recurring thing. But first of all, check out the official boxscore on MLB.COM.

-Reed Johnson had an 0 for 4 day at the plate but he did draw 20 pitches and walked once. He stole second after this walk and scored. Even with his speed, last season he only had 8 stolen bases
-Vernon Wells had a great at bat in the tenth, wearing down Rodney with a nine pitch sequence including 5 foul balls until Rodney relented and walked him. The reliever had to throw 31 pitches during that inning and Wells at-bat was a big part of that.
-He also stole a base, of which he only had 17 last year...The Jays as a team only had 65, not sure if this a new aggressive approach or just being able to read the pitcher/catcher combo. But Pudge is not an easy catcher to steal from, last season, he had an 0.21 Stolen Bases Allowed per 9 innings and caught 51% of all would-be base stealers.
-Gibbons showed that he would utilize his bench this season, using a pinch runner and pinch hitter and then making 2 defensive changes to make up for this and in effect used every player.
-As well as Doc pitched, the bullpen was fantastic, throwing 4 shut out innings including a great performance by Casey Janssen. The youngster did not allow a hit or walk in his 2.1 innings and threw 18 of 25 pitches for strikes. Ryan made the fans nervous in the ninth but two strikeouts helped him get the save.

What did you think, what were the stories that needed to be told? 1:05 start today, A.J. takes the mound.

Still kicking...

Well I'm back...not better than ever, actually much different than I was. I want to apologize to all the readers for being gone, I was literally spending almost every waking minute working and then when I got some time off, I had some big family issues that are still on-going. But I want to keep this site going, I will figure out how, but first I'll need some help. So if there's anyone out there that wants to help out, e-mail me, let me know. I'm happy about Opening Day, it's a great distraction and I missed the sport. Huge win by the team...alright so there you have it, this site will make a slow comeback...