The 2016 Toronto Blue Jays Thread

[Frequitude]

Sox lose! Jays still up by 1.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Red Sox lose. Silver lining in the Jays day.

[Erick Estrada]

I feel bad for Dickey. He's one of those guys you like to cheer for but he hasn't had his best stuff most of this season and simply doesn't have a heater to hide behind when he's struggling with accuracy.

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Ever since his first presser after being acquired by the Jays and reading his book shortly thereafter I really love his character. Just seems like an unreal guy.

But I am looking forward to putting someone new in his spot next season. In part because that means Thole will be long gone as well.

The knuckler is either on or off. Today it looked 'off' early, so part of my blames today goes to Gibbons not reacting to that. Even down by only a run or two they should have yanked him. And that's not just hindsight talking, if the knuckler isn't dancing you have to yank him before the game gets out of hand.

[JiriHrdina]

The thing is though - the hitting lost the game, not the pitching.
They had way too many opportunities to drive runs in and just didn't get it done.
I agree, Dickey isn't great - and I wish he would stay away from trying to work that meatball fastball in there - but I think the real failure today was on the sticks.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Originally Posted by KootenayFlamesFan

Ever since his first presser after being acquired by the Jays and reading his book shortly thereafter I really love his character. Just seems like an unreal guy.

But I am looking forward to putting someone new in his spot next season. In part because that means Thole will be long gone as well.

The knuckler is either on or off. Today it looked 'off' early, so part of my blames today goes to Gibbons not reacting to that. Even down by only a run or two they should have yanked him. And that's not just hindsight talking, if the knuckler isn't dancing you have to yank him before the game gets out of hand.

Dickey should have been removed when it was 3-1 and they had Tepera up in the pen. There's days when his knuckleball is off but he can still fight with it, and than there's days when it's simply not moving and everyone is squaring it up. As soon as they start squaring Dickey's knuckleball up its over and it was evident from the first batter that's what was going to happen today.

I wonder if humidity has anything to do with it? I bet it was humid as hell with that hurricane just off the coast.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Originally Posted by JiriHrdina

The thing is though - the hitting lost the game, not the pitching.
They had way too many opportunities to drive runs in and just didn't get it done.
I agree, Dickey isn't great - and I wish he would stay away from trying to work that meatball fastball in there - but I think the real failure today was on the sticks.

I really think this team plays poorly when he's on the mound and have so for a couple of years. It's like thy have no confidence in him and try to over compensate. There's was some pretty poor base running today from guys who don't always take those risks.

The offence did fail for sure, but Dickey and Thole really mess with the mojo of this team on my opinion.

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Originally Posted by JiriHrdina

The thing is though - the hitting lost the game, not the pitching.
They had way too many opportunities to drive runs in and just didn't get it done.
I agree, Dickey isn't great - and I wish he would stay away from trying to work that meatball fastball in there - but I think the real failure today was on the sticks.

Yeah I'm not excusing the bats. Just something that bugs me about the knuckler and when it's not jumping. It's hard to watch and they need to get him out quicker, imo.

[JiriHrdina]

Originally Posted by TheAlpineOracle

I really think this team plays poorly when he's on the mound and have so for a couple of years. It's like thy have no confidence in him and try to over compensate. There's was some pretty poor base running today from guys who don't always take those risks.

The offence did fail for sure, but Dickey and Thole really mess with the mojo of this team on my opinion.

I can buy into that - it is probably not too unlike how the Flames played so bad in front of cruddy tending.
Certainly it seemed like they were pushing to generate runs, knowing they may needed them - leading to base running errors.
Though I thought the Upton CS was just a case of a great throw.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Originally Posted by JiriHrdina

I can buy into that - it is probably not too unlike how the Flames played so bad in front of cruddy tending.
Certainly it seemed like they were pushing to generate runs, knowing they may needed them - leading to base running errors.
Though I thought the Upton CS was just a case of a great throw.

Yeah that was a great throw as Upton got a good Jump, but you have to bunt with Thole there. Good chance he hits into a double play or k's there. Pretty poor coaching by Gibbons on that, who I think has really improved over last year. I used to feel like ripping into him every game last year, and he very rarely has me scratching my head this year.

[JiriHrdina]

"popped up by Thole".
Yeah. Tired of hearing those words.
Dude pretty much takes a big cut at every pitch, even though if he actually happens to run into one - it'll be a fly out to the warning track.
We can bond over our mutual dislike of Thole.

[dash_pinched]

Can we call Dickey's dad a sack of you know what?

[JiriHrdina]

I don't know if Dickey's dad is a sack of sh** - just was a very deeply troubled man probably full of regret.
There were other people in Dickey's life though that certainly deserve that label - which is probably one of the reasons I react so strongly to it. Given what he's been through, and what he does to help others today - he is the furthest away from that, regardless of what he does on the mound. He is a very admirable man - and a true rare role model in sports.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Both the Yankees and The Red Sox are going to be absolute beasts for years to come. The fact that they have unlimited resources to augment around these young guys is downright scary. The Jays window is expiring even without consideration of the age of their current roster.

It must be nice to hold on to all of your prospects because you can spend endless money to fill holes through free agency.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by JiriHrdina

The thing is though - the hitting lost the game, not the pitching.
They had way too many opportunities to drive runs in and just didn't get it done.
I agree, Dickey isn't great - and I wish he would stay away from trying to work that meatball fastball in there - but I think the real failure today was on the sticks.

If Navaro's ball goes a few more feet we might be talking about a win as opposed to a disappointing loss. It's not so much the hitting but not getting the key hits when we need it the most that hurts.

[ben voyonsdonc]

I know that Thole can (sort of) catch the knuckleball but he is a big reason for why Dickey gets such little run support. He is basically a guaranteed out and an unproductive one as well. He doesn't seem capable of even the most basic fundamentals at the plate.

Dickey is a good guy. His pitching frustrates me - it isn't just the number of runs that he gives up; it's the timing of the runs. If the Jays score to take the lead, it seems almost a certainty that Dickey will give up a run or two to allow the opponent to tie or take the lead in the very next inning.

[Machiavelli]

I'm sure Dickey is swell, but I'm really tired of him. His knuckler has seen better days, and his trusty sidekick is barely major league caliber. Please, no more

[jayswin]

As a total aside I'd like to commend theAplineOricale and JiriHrdina for that exchange. Started out heated and one participant could have easily used mod powers to end the exchange but instead chose to hash it out with the poster on the same level, and it turned out great in the end.

[Roof-Daddy]

All this fiddling around at .500 lately has really let the pack catch up. Jays are only 2 games up on the 2nd wild card now.

Time to string some wins together.

13-12 finish would leave the Jays with a 90-72 record. Would be crazy to not even secure a wild card with 90 wins, but it's possible.

[mrkajz44]

I have my doubts that the Orioles will be able to catch-up, so I'm only really worried about Boston. If they can take care of business this weekend against Boston, that'll go a long way to cement themselves at the top of the AL East.

In any event, I'm pretty sure it'll come down to the last series of the year in Fenway, but it would be great if we could get to that point with the division locked up.