Blue Jays (Yesavage) vs Tigers (Hanifee): 5/15/26, 6:45pm

[Spanky__99]

IDGAF!!!

[Stangstag]

1 hour ago, Spanky__99 said:

Is this real talk? You and Brownie being f***-sticks and all, but that can't be real?

Yeah i think Springer is toast tbh

[Spanky__99]

58 minutes ago, Stangstag said:

Yeah i think Springer is toast tbh

Why?

 

[Spanky__99]

Sheeeeeeeeeeiiit...

 

[Stangstag]

Hoffman running close to a .500 BABIP 6 weeks into the season now lol, I don’t get what’s going on here.

[Landry_25]

Love springer but he’s gotta be put down in the order at the moment for sure. Helped him turn up the heat last year, not sure why they’re so hesitant to do it this year. Hope they go on a big hot streak  soon 

[Eat My Shatkins]

Its been noted now many times, the Jays offensive stats and league rankings right now are all very similar to what they were at this point last season. 

Hopefully they start to heat up with the bats soon and go on a nice summer tear.

Sucks to be this far back in the division, but only two games back of a wild card, this team is not even close to being buried here.

It'd be really nice to get Kirk and Bieber back though.

[Olerud363.354]

4 hours ago, Spanky__99 said:

Why?

36 turning 37

It happened to Bautista at about the same age.  Springer is weirder because he went down to Bautista 2017 level, then back to elite now back down there again.  

Weird thing is people saw the situation with the 2017 Blue Jays clarely, but can't see it with this team.  World Series clouded people's vision. 

[Olerud363.354]

3 minutes ago, Eat My Shatkins said:

Its been noted now many times, the Jays offensive stats and league rankings right now are all very similar to what they were at this point last season. 

This logic is just recency bias.  Jays are in a s***** situation, and 1 out of 10 times you get out of it.  Offense rebounds, go on a 20-5 run, whatever...  Just because it happened last year and 2015, means it's still 1 in 10, been in this s***** situation 20 times and got out of it 3 times maybe if go back 1989.

In terms of the offence I believe the batted ball stats were good last year.  Guerrero is injured, Springer is old.  Exit velocities are way down.   If they regress to their exit velocities they'll be just as s*****.  Wow 88 mph fly ball.  That will fall in next time.  No it won't.  

And the wild card.  2 games back of 1 good team, is a lot different then 2 games back in the mix of 8 s***** teams.  The first is a 50/50 proposition, the second 1 in 8.   One of the teams will pull away.  Which one?  Not saying it's not the Blue Jays, just it's 1 chance in 8 it's them.   Not 50/50. 

[Laika]

Yeah the only saving grace is that the entire AL is trash 

[jaysblue]

As much as I love Springer, expecting him to repeat his 2025 offensive season was probably unrealistic. It was completely reasonable to temper expectations for him in 2026.

That said, I still think he can be a valuable bat. The Jays don’t need 5-WAR, 166 wRC+ Springer again - they just need him to be solid and help stabilize the lineup. If he can be a 2–3 WAR player with something around a 120 wRC+, that would still be a very useful piece.
 

[jaysblue]

1 hour ago, Eat My Shatkins said:

It'd be really nice to get Kirk and Bieber back though.

When Kirk comes back, I’d probably still keep Valenzuela around given the team’s overall offensive struggles. I think there’s a way to work both him and Kirk into the lineup regularly and even play them together on occasion, with one catching and the other DHing, even if that means moving Springer to the outfield once in a while.

At this point, they need to squeeze every ounce of offense out of this lineup, and keeping Valenzuela up helps accomplish that. It just requires some creativity with lineup construction and matchups.

Rotation-wise, the Jays should be fine, especially once Bieber gets back. They just need to avoid any significant injuries to the big guys.

A rotation of Cease, Gausman, Yesavage, Bieber, and Corbin looks pretty solid, especially if they also have someone like Spencer Miles available as a bulk innings option or even Yariel if they decide to stretch him back out.

The bigger concern is probably staying healthy, especially since they’ve already burned through a lot of their depth with guys like Berrios, Ponce, and Scherzer all out now. If the main arms hold up, the rotation should be fine but there isn’t much margin for another significant injury in the rotation.
 

[Olerud363.354]

43 minutes ago, Laika said:

Yeah the only saving grace is that the entire AL is trash 

1 in 8 chance of being the team that escapes from the 8 team trash pile to reach 84 wins for a weak WC3 is a lot different than 2 in 3 chance of being the team that gets to 89 wins in a three team race for 2 WC spots. 

 

[Olerud363.354]

12 minutes ago, Olerud363.354 said:

1 in 8 chance of being the team that escapes from the 8 team trash pile to reach 84 wins for a weak WC3 is a lot different than 2 in 3 chance of being the team that gets to 89 wins in a three team race for 2 WC spots. 

 

What Blue Jays Message Board thinks will happen (1 in 8 chance this happens):

Vladimir Guerrero Jr.  a soft liner to right (88 mph) and that is down, Springer scores!!!!  Jays win their 83rd and have clinched WC3.  What a moment. 

Announcer: An amazing team.  Springer hitting .200.  Guerrero .260 with 9 homeruns, but somehow those two do it.  Inspirational!!!!   John Schneider will tell you these guys have been playing through things we don't know about (cough Guerrero small fracture in forearm, April 28th when hit by pitch, never healed) 

What will likely happen (7 in 8 chance this happens)

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. with a soft fly ball to right, caught, and that is the 90th loss.

Announcer: 90 losses after a World Series appearance just a year ago.  And I will tell you there are things we don't know about and the team was never really healthy.  Guerrero with a disappointing season for sure, but was never healthy if you ask John Schneider to tell you the truth.  Long winter ahead and some tough decisions to be made.

 

[leaffie]

9 hours ago, Spanky__99 said:

This is false, leaffie.

Our offense was top shelf last season, it's the RISP, same thing that plagued them last season through the first 6 weeks. I think and believe you're wrong, are we forgetting injuries, regression should be Imminent, hope I'm right. 😜

Whether you call it risp or offense, it is the same problem that has plagued them for years.  They went after Schwarber and Soto to no avail.  We have a large payroll , but the powers that be decided they were going to make this team into a defensive juggernaut.  But they have mostly ignored the offensive side.

 I know this team has been decimated by injuries,  but they have lost 8 games by one run.  How many times have the bases been loaded with no one out and scored nothing.  You can only play with the players you have, but try changing the line up.  At this point I would rather have Valenzuela or Panango up trying to drive in runs, than Vladdy.    
I like Vladdy, but  if anyone else was 0/19 they would have been moved down.

Springer is injured and I doubt anyone here thought he was going to produce like last year.  He just shouldnt be batting leadoff right now.   Who should be, I dont know.  But you cannot keep doing the same thing and exoecting different results.

 

[jaysblue]

31 minutes ago, leaffie said:

Whether you call it risp or offense, it is the same problem that has plagued them for years.  They went after Schwarber and Soto to no avail.  We have a large payroll , but the powers that be decided they were going to make this team into a defensive juggernaut.  But they have mostly ignored the offensive side.

 I know this team has been decimated by injuries,  but they have lost 8 games by one run.  How many times have the bases been loaded with no one out and scored nothing.  You can only play with the players you have, but try changing the line up.  At this point I would rather have Valenzuela or Panango up trying to drive in runs, than Vladdy.    
I like Vladdy, but  if anyone else was 0/19 they would have been moved down.

Springer is injured and I doubt anyone here thought he was going to produce like last year.  He just shouldnt be batting leadoff right now.   Who should be, I dont know.  But you cannot keep doing the same thing and exoecting different results.

 

Last season, the Blue Jays got a lot of helpful and in some cases unforeseen offensive contributions from guys like Nathan Lukes, Ernie Clement, Myles Straw, and Tyler Heineman. Schneider was actually solid, too. Barger was a call-up who stepped right into the lineup after guys like Roden and Wagner didn’t really work out.

Springer had a huge bounce-back season, Bichette stayed healthy, Varsho provided power when he was in the lineup, and Kirk basically reverted back to his 2022 offensive form. Vladdy raised his level in the Postseason. A lot went right with the bats starting in mid-to-late May, and the Jays rode that into a big run. Pair that with strong defense, healthy and durable pitching, and a lineup that put the ball in play a ton, and it’s easy to see how they got rolling.

This season, though, a lot of that has gone the other way. Springer has regressed, which I think most of us realistically saw coming (but not this bad). Kirk being hurt is a massive loss on both sides of the ball, although Valenzuela has actually held his own and been a positive. Losing Bichette as an impact bat and not really replacing him with someone similar has hurt, too. The front office clearly tried with Kyle Tucker, so I don’t fully blame them there - there’s only so much you can do in free agency or trades when it takes two sides to make a deal.

Okamoto has been a solid power addition, but he’s not really an impact bat in the same way Bichette or Tucker would have been. He feels more like a Matt Chapman-type offensive profile. Gimenez is Gimenez - he’ll have the odd stretch where he’s driving balls out of the park, and then he’ll look completely lost at the plate for weeks at a time.

Clement has been about what he is offensively, but the defense hasn’t looked quite as sharp. Lukes and Heineman have looked more like DFA candidates, which was always a risk given that they’re both in their 30s and have mostly been career minor-league types. Schneider has been awful. Barger getting hurt really stings because they lost a potential 25–30 HR bat. Straw has actually been solid again, but he’s not someone you want to rely on as an everyday starter.

They also haven’t really been able to catch lightning in a bottle with guys like Sosa or Jimenez. Jesus Sanchez is useful when deployed properly against right-handed pitching, but he’s still more of a platoon bat than anything else. Pinango, to his credit, has been a nice surprise.
 

[Brownie19]

13 hours ago, Omar said:

Last year we had TWO more wins at this same time.   I think there was a lot less panicking on the board.  Wonder what changed?

Expectations.  Most expected us to suck last year coming off an abysmal 2024.

[Jays24]

2 minutes ago, Brownie19 said:

Expectations.  Most expected us to suck last year coming off an abysmal 2024.

Exactly and its those same expectations that is allowing Rogers to charge the prices they are this season.  Obviously still a lot of baseball left but the issues some of us were highlighting into the season are plaguing themselves. 

Now what most of weren't expecting is the fall off defensively.  I realize the metrics you were showing previously had us 1st/2nd but there were too many other areas where we ranked near the bottom.  

[Stangstag]

3 hours ago, jaysblue said:

As much as I love Springer, expecting him to repeat his 2025 offensive season was probably unrealistic. It was completely reasonable to temper expectations for him in 2026.

That said, I still think he can be a valuable bat. The Jays don’t need 5-WAR, 166 wRC+ Springer again - they just need him to be solid and help stabilize the lineup. If he can be a 2–3 WAR player with something around a 120 wRC+, that would still be a very useful piece.
 

Im honestly not sure he ever comes close to 120 wRC+ again. Honestly think there’s a scenario where he’s a bench piece by July