TDotttt2005

While you're probably just trying to illicit a reaction here, there are many elements of truth to this. When Asst Gm Stewart wasnt hired as Jays GM when Ash was fired, he claimed it had to do with race, and blasted the whole 'must interview a minority' hiring process. La Russa was part of Selig's inner circle the past few years in the commissioners office before taking over the Dbacks job. You have to believe that there was pressure to get a minority hired. It is similar to when Minaya was hired as Expos GM as soon as MLB took them over. No one knows if Stewart was the top candidate really, but he does have good pedigree, and was definitely qualified. That being said, Race probably did have something to do with it as well.

I'd like to know what happened to the whole 'Because we cant necessarily compete on payroll with the Yankees/Bosox/Dodgers, we're going to be creative to add high end players' mantra that AA had when he was given the GM job. While the dollar amounts are still high, Cuban players like Cespedes, Abreu, hell even Hech etc. have been bargains at their dollar figure, and its the type of high risk/high reward moves he said he'd pursue to get us to compete. Has he abandoned that just like Ricciardi did when Rogers opened the purse strings? How many times has he said in interviews when asked about payroll "Well, we have room to be creative to do something". Playing Waiver Wire Roulette with the likes of Nolan Reimold, Cole Gillespie, and Darin fing Mastrionni doesnt count as being creative. As a Jays fan, we shouldn't waste our time reading the scouting reports on guys like Rusney Castillo, Tomas, Olivera, since, like all the other Cuban prospects and MLB top tier free agents, the Blue Jays cannot have these nice things.

Says Beeston. Take from that what you may.

If this is the case, and payroll will go down, then Melky isn't coming back for sure. I'd rather just trade Bautista and EE, get prospects back, and line up the position player prospects with the pitching prospects, in terms of ages and primes, and start over. Theres no point in having a 105million dollar payroll, and winning 80 games for the next few years.

Jeff Blair is talking about trading Buerhle + Money + Prospect (Norris) for a younger stud position player. I think Buehrle will be traded, possibly just for the salary relief with very little coming back, and that would be fine if we used that money to re-sign Melky and another mid-tier free agent or two. I wouldn't mind the Blair scenario, but my worst case scenario here is that they do not re-sign Melky because they say "we didn't match up on term" or whatever AA/Beestons excuse is, and then use Buerhle + Norris to replace him in LF, which would be a huge waste of assets.

Back to the OP's question 1. Bullpen underperformance 2. Lack of a second baseman and middle infield depth 3. Injury to Lawrie (2 and 3 go together, I suppose)

I understand that everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and there are many valid ones out there, but seeing the amount of support for management of this failure of a team makes me believe that a lot of us have been bamboozled, particularly by the Toronto sports media, which is significantly controlled by Rogers. Those who support the current management have, in essence, become zombies, preaching what they've been brainwashed to preach. Case study examples: Heard on these boards from Apologists who are following the sect of Rogers Media. 1. Gibbons is a good manager, he places his players in a great position to win. He plays the percentages, he hasn't made boneheaded moves like Ausmus and Yost. He shouldn't be held accountable for the failure. 2. AA is a good GM, one of the best and brightest in the game. He's a Ninja. He didn't make moves at the deadline because he maybe or maybe not was constrained by payroll limits set by Rogers. Even if he wouldn't, did you want to trade Sanchez, Stroman, Norris, Pompey??? He shouldn't be held accountable for the failure. 3. Rogers, the go-to whipping boy, gave AA $130million+ payroll this year, top-8 to 10 in MLB. Management should have had more than enough to compete. They shouldn't be held accountable for the failure. Back to 2. Back to 1. Rinse, Repeat. Bamboozling ensues. No one is held accountable. 21 Seasons go by. Fat f***ing Nothing.

Fair enough. I honestly don't know what another manager couldve done with this team, and I don't buy the tactician stuff because in this day and age, it comes from a bench coach holding a binder with numbers. Whats obvious is that Gibbons hasn't won with this team despite the payroll. I agree that Beeston and AA should go, and if they do, Gibbons is gone.

Sandy Sr. as bench coach.

Who are you, Wilner? No one is ever to blame. Its this logic that lets management and ownership get a pass year after year, which leads to this godforsaken draught the team is on. You cant blame the manager because hes not on the field. Who then? Gibbons plays the percentages, so he is a good tactician (A computer could do this). So you cant blame him. Who then? You have to blame the players? AA is responsible for getting the players. But when he got them, they had good track records. So you cant blame him. Who then? The players who have underperformed their track records? But according to posters on this board, the players have not underperformed, and the team has not underperformed. So you cant blame them. Who then? The injuries? Baltimore has lost Wieters, Machado, and now Davis (suspension not injury, granted). Yankees tied with us have been without Teixera, Tanaka, Pineda, Sabathia, Nova, etc etc. and these teams are better, and tied with us, respectively. So Injuries arent to blame. Question remains WHO IS TO BLAME? Its obvious that these players playing together on this team in this year with this manager in this stadium on this astroturf all are contributing to the failure. Whats the answer? Seems to many posters on this board that the answer is that we keep doing the same things, and expect different result. That is the definition of insanity.

Sandy Alomar Jr.

I voted to fire him, and I think they should clean house. I admittedly don't have a lot of in-game issues with Gibbons. By the measure 'does he put his players in the best position to win', in accordance with RH/LH splits for batters and pitchers, in accordance with stats vs a specific batter or pitcher, in accordance with who has been hitting/pitching well of late, Gibbons does very well. That said, despite what the 'Manager doesnt mean anything' sabrmetrics bros want to tell you , managing has to be more than this, because in this day and age, the batboy could sit in the dugout with a laptop and a stats database and make those moves. The problem is that no fans, and despite what the media (especially rogers-run / Gibby fanboy media) admit, we have no clue what this 'more than this' is, so its hard to explain why players consistently underperform for Gibbons. All i know is that they do. And that hasn't changed despite his two tenures, two totally different teams, top 10 payrolls, etc. I do think Gibbons will be back, because I think AA will be back, and there wont be one without the other at this point. AA won't be allowed to choose another manager, and I dont believe Beeston will fire AA. It will be more of the status quo, excuses excuses excuses.

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2014/09/rays-neil-wagner-agree-to-two-year-minor-league-deal.html Signed with the Rays. He'll be a shutdown closer in 2016. Book it. After the jays cutting his salary 6k out of spite, as mentioned in the article above, not surprised he bolted.

Over or under - Morrow will be on the DL before this thread reaches 6 pages. ** Thread must reach 6 pages for action.

Do Sportsnet.ca videos not play in the US? I never get them to play. Herp, can you give me a bit of a synopsis on what was said?

Tendered a contract I believe he meant. But they couldve kept him on the roster until the end of the season, then just not tender him a contract for next year. This doesnt make any sense to me with the rosters expanding in 5 days.

Not to mention that Danny Valencia is f***ing Babe Ruth to Wilner.

But Wilner said getting Reimold was better than the Yankees getting Drew, Prado, Headley, and McCarthy?

But...But.... Wilner says they wanted Stroman, Sanchez, and Hutchison for McCarthy.

http://jaysjournal.com/2014/08/21/open-letter-alex-anthopoulos-rusney-castillo-mlb-rumors/ Nothing that we haven't thought about, in terms of the Jays signing Rusney. What was sad reading this is that we all know that the Jays wont sign the guy. We cant have nice things.

3 Reasons not to trust the media : 1) Listening to talking heads tell us that for every player AA asked about, the other GM wanted Stroman AND Sanchez AND Hutchison 2) Listening to talking heads talk solely about teams like the A's and Tigers who did make good additions at the deadline, but have struggled in the past few weeks 3) Reading things like this I am much more comfortable with these guys making millions than most bank CEOs who have mostly kissed ass their way to the top and at least baseball players can't really do much in terms of crashing the economy. from people who most likely do not know anything more about banking beyond how to take money out of an ATM.

What you have to realize is that these guys don't look at things as we do, that they're millionaires playing a kid's game, so they should just shut up and play and be happy doing it. Players see things on a relative basis. Relative to other millionaires playing a kid's game on teams like the Yankees, RedSox, etc. who's employers did spend the money, and stepped up to make the deals to attempt to make their teams better. Its a despairing Why Me? I think if you see it that way, its more understandable why the Jays players feel that way. That said, and while I do agree with it, they need to stop using the deadline as a crutch, and go out and play the hand they were dealt.

What do you mean? This worked amazingly with Goins this year. o wait.

Would he be, though? He's 33, first chance at a big money long-term deal. He'd be leaving a lot of money on the table over the years by accepting the 1-yr QO. The difference between age 33 and 34 is not a small one either, especially for someone who has been on the DL this year. I really think he would decline it.

Seems that AA would be in the new wave of GM's who are not willing to pay big money for an established closer like Janssen. I think on the open market, Casey will get around 4 and 44mil, or in the vicinity (Papelbon's 14M being the ceiling). Given that price point and the fact that Beeston says payroll will go up next year (so I believe the opposite that it will in fact, go down), looks like he wont be returning to the Jays. We know that AA loves to collect compensation picks. My question is do we risk giving Casey a QO, which should be around $14mil? Do we think he would accept that on a 1-year deal? Would it seriously kill the Jays' payroll if he did?