glory

Francona would be good but I can't see him leaving Cleveland unless he really hates it there. That team is in much better shape long term than the Jays are.

Jays and O's tied for the WC with 3 teams within 2.5 games (NYY/DET 2 games back and SEA 2.5). Man, I thought the WC was the worst case, but not making it at all is a distinct possibility with the way these guys are playing. On one hand, anything that makes firing Gibbons more likely is fine with me, but damn let's not waste JB and EE's last seasons here (assuming they don't come back).

And Goins started in a must win game against Boston because of "dem career numbers".

It's baffling. The front office had the perfect opportunity to get rid of him in the winter. The fans already hated them so how much worse could it have been PR-wise? Gibbons is never going to manage another MLB team again (unless AA finds a GM job somewhere else) so getting rid of him coming of an ALCS appearance may have actually done him a favor. Now he's been exposed as the s***** manager that he is, and the Jays have suffered because of it during their final season with Edwin/Bautista on cheapo contracts. If the Jays happen to fall into a wild card spot now, anything can happen in one game, but this offense is bad. Donaldson has to come back like a mad man to save them, and even that may not be enough with the hole that they've dug.

Gibbons still has a job because he's easy to scapegoat. That's the only reason I can think of that he's still around. If the Jays tank the rest of the way, Gibbons has no chance of coming back. It sucks that they wasted what could be the Jays last great chance at a WS for a while with that Goober managing.

Pillar, Carrera, and Goins due up in the 9th. Knowing Gibbons, no one will pinch hit. We got this.

The Rays will score in 3 minutes now, while the Jays will have 15 minute inning where they score nothing.

Carrera following by Fatty. Oh joy.

Hey Gibby, thanks for putting rewarding Carrera for last night ahead of trying to put the best batter in that spot.

Other teams make scoring runs look easy, while the Jays make it seem like brain surgery.

Biagini picking the wrong time to give up home runs.

Why is Travis so bad against LHP this season?

Ball game.

Man the Jays offense is straight up ass lately. I miss when it was just inconsistent but still good. Now it's consistently awful.

A better question is how do you keep this team competitive after 2016? That seems like a tall order given how good Boston projects to be, and the Yankees potentially showing some signs of long term growth already. Jays are old with a farm system that is a few years away from developing big league talent. It's going to be hard. Not impossible, but hard.

I'd be fine with JB back on a two year deal. Anything more than that and I pass. Will a team give up a pick and give him 3-4 years at $20m per year? Coming off a season where he had two different injuries, can't field/run, and isn't hitting to his standards? That's a tough call.

Odorizzi usually does well against the Jays so I'm glad they got a win out of this. Hell, any time they beat the Rays is an accomplishment.

One of the best players in baseball has had a bad week. Panic time.

I can't believe we are only 3 more weeks and less than a handful of starts away from never having to see Dickey start for the Jays again. It's like Christmas.

You pointed out why Escobar was traded when it had nothing to do with the point being made. That's what an apologist does. If you don't think the franchise is in bad shape, that's fine. I never said it was in bad shape, just stating reality. When you build for 1 or 2 years, that's all you're ever going to get. This is the final year of that window. Shapkins can extend the window by having a great off season but it won't be easy, especially with Boston and New York being so well run. Also, I don't know how I am angry. My post before this one was exactly what I've been saying since the Tulo/Price trades. You can choose to be optimistic and cover your eyes to what usually happens next when teams try to build this way. Luckily, Shapiro was hired when he was.

So one s*** year (2013), one middling year (2014), two great months and a playoff appearance (2015), and one good season that looks like it may lead to a WC game at best with the way the team is currently playing (2016). Hey, then we get to start the whole f***ing process all over again when the team loses two of their best players next season and get to watch Tulo and Martin decline even further while making $40M combined into their mid-30's! And that farm system that's so easy to fix has exactly one prospect above AA that looks like he can contribute in 2017, and that player had a .083 ISO in AAA this season. Dude, I know you're an AA apologist and all, but come on. Unless you're on your f***ing deathbed, how can you possibly justify a year and a half of competitive ball and then what might be either a massive retool (if they make the playoffs) or possibly a quasi-rebuild (if they collapse the rest of the way)? AA was supposed to turn this team into a consistent, long-term, sustainable winner, remember? All the s*** we heard when he tried to justify trading Halladay for magic beans? Shapiro and Atkins can fix this org. I have faith in them. But the attendance spike will cease to exist if the team falters again, and when you build for one year, that's all you're going to get most of the time.

Agreed.

Were they also forced to trade Escobar for Reyes? No one forced AA to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on players who provided an incremental improvement at best.

The only reason people were having an outcry is because the Marlins were selling a year after they signed all those guys. Most people knew the Marlins were going to benefit from that trade eventually. Any time you trade expensive vets in their 30's with backloaded deals, it's usually going to work out in the end. The Jays and their fanbase were tricked by big names. Seriously, they traded a SS making $5m a year and another young SS prospect with six years of control left just so they could pay Jose Reyes $100m until he was 35. It doesn't take a genius to see the flawed logic there. It would be like the Jays trading Martin after this season (when he has 3/60 left on his deal) and getting two catchers making peanuts, one of whom with history of 3 WAR seasons. It would be a fleecing for the Jays. AA's delusional team building got better in 2015 since he seemed to smarten up about player value, but that 2013 off season killed the long-term future of this team, and only doubling down 2 years later was able to save it temporarily.

Career numbers vs. Buchholz. Gibby gon Gibby.