Well, a month in and it's been an interesting one.
Have to say, after a rough couple of games to start the year, Donaldson has been exactly as advertised. Travis has been phenomenal over the first month, though even he says he has no idea where the power is coming from. Have to assume it'll dry up at some point in the season and he'll hit a rough patch.
On the optimistic side, it's nice to see the Jays right around .500 despite some incredible struggles from the rotation, some serious hiccups from the unproven bullpen, and next-to-nothing from EE and little from Jose. Not on the "trade Bautista" bandwagon yet, but we're going to need more from those two.
I think it's important to temper expectations on Pillar. He's never been a guy who walked much (OBP not significantly higher than BA), so the hope has to be that he has learned to take longer ABs. As mentioned by Stoeten on his blog, can't see him as much more than a 4th outfielder type.
All-in-all, not a ruinous month, but it definitely could have been better. Hopefully they can get some momentum going in the next while.
Last edited by Antithesis; 05-01-2015 at 04:55 PM.
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Well, a month in and it's been an interesting one.
Have to say, after a rough couple of games to start the year, Donaldson has been exactly as advertised. Travis has been phenomenal over the first month, though even he says he has no idea where the power is coming from. Have to assume it'll dry up at some point in the season and he'll hit a rough patch.
On the optimistic side, it's nice to see the Jays right around .500 despite some incredible struggles from the rotation, some serious hiccups from the unproven bullpen, and next-to-nothing from EE and little from Jose. Not on the "trade Bautista" bandwagon yet, but we're going to need more from those two.
I think it's important to temper expectations on Pillar. He's never been a guy who walked much (OBP not significantly higher than BA), so the hope has to be that he has learned to take longer ABs. As mentioned by Stoeten on his blog, can't see him as much more than a 4th outfielder type.
All-in-all, not a ruinous month, but it definitely could have been better. Hopefully they can get some momentum going in the next while.
It hasn't been a disaster and if they can get going on a roll they could easily win 8-10 games in a row. Unfortunately when 3 of your big 5 (Martin, EE, and Bautista) are hitting around .200, you're not going to be having a good time.
I am hoping they fire Gibbons though. They need a better manager.
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It hasn't been a disaster and if they can get going on a roll they could easily win 8-10 games in a row. Unfortunately when 3 of your big 5 (Martin, EE, and Bautista) are hitting around .200, you're not going to be having a good time.
I am hoping they fire Gibbons though. They need a better manager.
Coming into the season, if you said that Daniel Norris would lead their rotation in ERA on May 1 and already be sent to the AAA I think 99% of fans would be freaking.
Then consider that 4 of 5 starters have ERA's over 5.
Then consider Martin, Jose and EE have all started slowly (as CG stated)
I'll take 11-13 given all that. It's looking doubtful for a playoff run but in this division, anything can happen. Hopefully they can stick around and at least make things interesting throughout the summer.
Sanchez working on a really great start this afternoon and getting some great support from the offense. Nice to see the Jays up 10-2 with only one of those runs coming from the long ball! Hopefully Sanchez is able to go on a bit of a run here.
I've been quite impressed by Sanchez today. He's been sub-par for sure in his first few starts. I love the guy and hope he kills it for the rest of the season. Pompey has been brutal at the plate for the last while, hopefully he can go down and get in a groove in Buffalo. Norris will hopefully do the same sort of thing that Stroman did last year and make a couple starts in AAA and start to figure things out. Considering the above w. Martin, Jose, EE etc., and the fact that our "ace" in Stroman isn't even in the rotation I'm fairly impressed. I think the big bats will turn a corner and get hot here soon. Even 2/3 getting things going would mean big things. My only concern is the bullpen where it seems like theres some constancy issues. Overall I think that we have a chance to win the division, but all the above is going to have to fall into place for a shot at it. Go Blue Jays!!
And it came after one if the worst fielding innings I've seen in a while. None of them go down as errors, but Santana had a massive brainfart on a sure double play ball that should have ended the inning! I have no idea why he decided to chase Pillar back to third. About the only explanation I can come up with is that he must have thought there were no outs. Bauer then figures he has a chance to get the runner at home on a chopper hit off the plate a mile high. Good to see Travis make them pay.
... and Hutchison is staked to a 6-1 lead, out of the game in the 5th with the score 6-4 and Cleveland on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out. What a disappointing season for Hutchison so far.
How can you really fix these problems at this point... for this season anyway? The pitching is either too young or just terrible. We're a month into the season now, I don't see AA making magic moves to turn this around. Going into the season, it was plainly obvious that the pitching would be average at best and the jays would have to hit their way out of trouble. Unfortunately, the worst case scenario has occurred and it turns out the pitching is atrocious. Now there is little to do but ride out another disappointing season and wait for AA to get fired. Hopefully the next guy puts more emphasis into pitching as that's what wins championships. This team should re-build around Donaldson and Travis and their young pitchers. Trade JB and EE, re-stock the farm. The current build of this team is going nowhere, it's time to hit the reset button before their trade assets get old and lose value.
