OBPlover

I have no problem with giving Sancheaz a try but... This makes the offseason, as per their approach to pitching rather awkward. They traded a good middle reliever for a decent enough starter with upside, as in th Chavez for Hendriks trade. They pick up the option on Dickey, sign Happ, sign Estrada and sign Gavin Floyd. If that's the plan why trade Hendriks for Chavez? Why not just go Stroman-Dickey-Happ-Estrada-Sanchez?

In an interview, he said he was willing to listen. However, no offer was even made. It's not really a massive assumption since he did begin his career as a minor league starting pitcher. No, I actually said "stretch the budget a little", Jays can't add 6 million in payroll? We aren't talking 60 million.

Here's what would have been better: Pay David Price (or Maybe Greinke, if he's willing) the 30-35 M per year they command. Make the trade for Chavez. (what's the point of trading a middle reliever for CHavez if he's just going to be another middle reliever?). Then convert Sanchez to be a starter. There's still a little bit of money left over, stretch the budget a little and grab ONE of Dickey, Estrada or Happ. So your rotation looks like Price Stroman Dickey Chavez Sanchez

I think the time has come to proclaim him the everyday DH. I know his K/BB is abysmal. But a guy with an .886 OPS doesn't grow on trees. He's earned some trust. People said after a hot start, he would collapse by June. he didn't. People said he would collapse in the last few months of the season. He didnt. People said he wouldn't hit in the playoffs. He did fine. I just think he earned the everyday DH job and relegated Smoak to a bench player.

So let's say the Jays make it to the playoffs and the Jays' starters perform as well as everyone suspects. Who would you want for the ALDS. Stroman, Dickey, Estrada? Stroman Happ, Chavez? I am a firm believer that in a best of 5, you need 2 reliable names. There are no guarantees of course. But with a great offense, it's ok if your n#4 and N#5 kind of suck as long as you find 3 top starters solid as hell. That's modern baseball.

The Jays are falling into the Mediocrity trap with their pitchers. Too good not to take a chance on, yet highly unreliable. For the Dickey-Estrada-Happ Money, I would have rather seen the Jays get a true #1 starter like Price or Greinke. Then the rotation would be something like: Greinke Stroman Chavez For starters 4-5, well there are options, move Sanchez from the pen to the rotation or bring up someone from AAA. Having a couple of high risk young prospects really isn't the end of the world, when the rest of the team is awesome.

I'm going to make a bold prediction.... I predict that Chavez wins the SP5 job and emerges as the 1st or 2nd best pitcher for the Jays in 2016. I watched every single one of Chavez's starts in 2015, due to having him on my fantasy team. This guy was the very definition of unlucky. Not only concerning FIP being lower than his ERA. But do you know how many borderline pitches did NOT go his way? Than it seems like he just got frustrated and lost focus. Give him plenty of run support to bolster his confidence, good defense which the Jays should have and an excellent pitch framer to get those borderline calls. Assuming he stays healthy, I don't think he falls off a truck like in the second half last year. I think he maintains an ERA under 3.50.

But its rare that a former SP finds himself in a dominant closer's role and moves back into a SP.

a) you need to seriously calm down. Take a chill pill. Count to 10. There's really no need to get stressed out over this. What's the worst that can happen? The Jays believe they can't win the playoffs with bad pitching so they go out and spend the money on David Price? Oh the horror. If you recall, in 1993, offense was way up across the league. The Jays had a team ERA of 4.22 which was actually good for 5th in the league, just a few pips back of 4th place Seattle at 4.20. The Jays were not a pitching poor team. c) Nobody has ever said that good pitching will win out 100% of the time. In a short series, anything can happen. You and other posters are using small sample sizes like "the 1993 Jays" to prove your point, it's no difference than using the 2015 Mets to prove a point. You would have to go over many years' worth of data and crunch out the numbers to make wide sweeping conclusions.

I think you're just being stubborn. If not Volquez, then look at any other time the Blue Jays got beat by a good pitcher this year. Most hits, especially extra base hits, come against mistakes. The hanging curveball, the fastball in the middle of the plate or the pitch thrown in a hitter's known hot zone. The better pitchers make these kinds of mistakes less frequently. Plus, when they do make mistakes with location, they can sometimes get away with it as long as they have "Plus stuff"(speed, movement etc). Whether it's Ryan goins or Josh Donaldson, hitters do not have the ability to turn a plus pitch, with good location into hits with any frequency. The difference between JD and RG is that when there is a mistake, JD will rarely miss it. This is why good pitching beats good hitting.

You don't even need an article. You can see the evidence with your own eyes. You did see Volquez just shut down our Blue Jays, did you not? (The very epitome of a good hitting team). What do you think hitters can do against pitchers capable of throwing 95-99 MPH fastballs and hitting corners? Now the trick is, why do some pitchers capable of great stuff/control in the regular season falter in the playoffs. But that is not a question that can be answered with statistics.

I couldn't care a less.

I don't mean literally "nothing". You can understand an expression, can you not? They have significantly worse OPS vs hall of fame pitchers than against avg pitchers of their respective eras. For example, Bob gibson vs Hank Aaron, Aaron only had a career .700 ish OPS against gibson vs .950 or so OPS for his entire career. You also completely ignored the article I posted evaluating the effects of great pitching in the playoffs.

How can you use one Baseball's all time greatest cheaters as your sole example? http://www.hardballtimes.com/does-good-pitching-beat-good-hitting-in-october/

Not quite true. Good pitching *does* beat good hitting. It's one of the few old-fashioned baseball cliches that is actually true. Or perhaps a better saying is good pitching and defense will beat good hitting. This kind of thing was actually studied, way back. Someone dug up the research of all time greatest hitters vs the great pitchers of their day. They found that the Babe Ruths and Mickey Mantles absolutely destroyed any average or below average pitchers. But against Hall of Fame pitchers? nothing. They were very close in batting average (old fashioned study, used batting average) with any the pitchers overall batting avg against (which was always feeble). Good pitching really does shut down good hitting. Of course, in a short series anything can happen. A bad pitcher can have an off day just like at any point in time during the regular season. Early in the season for example, Kershaw went through a rough patch. But your odds are against you if you can't put 3 above average starters in the playoffs.