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Just curious who isn't serious enough for you. You state "many" players need to go, who in your estimation fits into this group? Given that a huge portion of the team appears to be not very "serious" in the dugout during games, and many of these players are part of the core group, you make it sound as though the team essentially needs to be blown up.

I didn't say Tapia could play those positions well, but he is at least familiar enough with them to cover some innings out there. In a perfect world I would see Tapia non-tendered and a much more capable defender be brought aboard from outside the organization to man the 4th outfielder spot. I'd actually like to see the club give Gurriel a shot at picking up some right field innings in the spring to see if he can learn the position. It took him a lot of years to finally resemble a competent left fielder though so it's not a given that he could learn the position without a great degree of difficulty.

I'm not sold on Gurriel's bat being good enough to receive regular DH at bats. This would take away from the chance for Kirk, Springer and Vladdy to get these at bats. I'm definitely on board with a Conforto signing, he is a great fit for the Jays roster.

I guess this depends on what you expect out of your 4th outfielder. I expect a player who can fill in at multiple positions as required. Until a better player is acquired Gurriel is the defacto starter in left field, and not a bench player.

Tapia has the distinction of at least being able to cover innings in all 3 outfield positions. His numbers in center field are actually perfectly acceptable, however oddly enough he struggles in the corners. I'd guess this is likely due to inability to gauge spin/slice on the ball off of the bat which is amplified in the corner outfield positions.

Gurriel is a terrible choice for a 4th outfielder given that he can only play one outfield position, and is average in that position at best.

Schneider is on record as being a fun loving guy who embraces having fun while playing baseball. He is the guy who implored the players to celebrate clinching a wild card berth, and the same guy who has done things like bring in clubhouse DJ's to keep the players loose. If you expect some sort of seismic clubhouse shift under his rein I suspect you are in for some disappointment. He has made it obvious that on-field blunders due to lack of hustle/head not being in the game will not be tolerated, but there is no indication whatsoever that he intends to change the overall culture of how the team operates off of the filed whether in the dugout or in the clubhouse.

I finally was settled enough after the crushing defeat and went back and checked out the replay from the play in question. I see that Springer actually had a very good shot at catching this ball and had to change course due to Bo being in the way. Given the volume in the building it's highly unlikely that Bo could have heard Springer calling for it. I just have a hard time being terribly upset with Bo for the way this play turned out, given the circumstances at play.

This isn't anywhere close to the play in New York. That one was an easy catch for Teoscar compared to this play where it was a next to impossible play for both Bo and Springer. Are you really suggesting that you want your starting short stop giving up on a pop fly just past the infield in an elimination game with the bases loaded? Bo deserves plenty of flak for how inconsistent his defensive play has been at short stop, but it's nowhere close to reasonable to assign blame to Bo for this play as it was one of those no-man's land pop-ups that was perfectly placed between the infield and outfield.

I think Gausman earned the right to face Santana as he had largely been cruising in the game aside from some unlucky seeing eye singles in the 6th. Choosing to bring in a lefty who doesn't generate many strikeouts with the bases loaded and struggles vs righties instead of sticking with your $100 million ace level starter who was on top of his game? Simply inexcusable. The rest of the pen didn't get the job done either (Romano was also super unlucky) but this terrible move opened to floodgates.

I thought that it hurt last season when the Jays missed the playoffs by a single game. But that paled in comparison compared to what we just watched today. I've generally been very positive so far with Schneider as manager, but he simply has to take a huge amount of the blame for this loss. There is simply no way whatsoever to justify bringing in Tim Mayza to face Santana with the bases loaded. Mayza has really struggled against right handed pitchers this season, allowing a .347 WOBA against, vs a .221 WOBA vs lefties. What's even more baffling is the fact that Santana crushes lefties while struggling against right handed hitters. Against left handed pitching he raked to a 134 WRC+, vs righties only an 89 WRC+. Gausman had really settled in after allowing the bases loaded, and was only a single out from getting out of the jam that he was unlucky to be facing in the first place as the Mariners picked up several lucky hits to load the bases. In what conceivable scenario was it viewed as preferable to bring in a left handed pitcher who struggles against right handed hitters to turn a switch hitter around to his strongest side?

Kikuchi definitely is nowhere close to stretched out enough at this point to handle 100+ pitches, that would be potentially inviting an unnecessary injury. The team will have an extra spot available to bring in another pitcher from the minor leagues, so no need to kill White and/or Kikuchi to cover the innings.

Charlie would be jealous at the shear mediocrity of that lineup.

Kikuchi has been surrendering a lot of hard contact during this stretch also so it's not all bubblegum and rainbows. His average exit velocity is 90.8 MPH with a 48% hard hit rate, so the .440 BABIP isn't all just bad luck.

You can track the baseball's coefficient of drag pretty easily. This season's baseballs look to be significantly more consistent compared to the previously data that is available. Nothing here suggests any kind of tomfoolery from MLB beyond excessively deadening this year's baseballs in the first place. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/drag-dashboard#:~:text=The%20distributions%20of%20drag%20coefficient,2020%20and%200.02584%20in%202021).

That hardly seems very damning on it's own giving up a minimum of 1 earned run in each appearance for a starter. If Berrios had given up something like 3 or 4 earned runs in every appearance this stat on it's own would be cause for concern.

That's completely untrue, this season's MLB baseballs are dramatically deadened compared to the previous 5 seasons. We don't have available data for the baseballs during the steroid era, but there's simply no way to conclude that this year's baseball is providing some kind of advantage for Judge. Furthermore this season has seen the implementation of humidors league wide for the first time, and this had a direct effect on further suppressing offence during the colder months earlier in the season.

No f***ing way man. Think back to the ridicule Buck Showalter faced for not using his best reliever in the wild card game, it would be that times a million if the Jays didn't use Manoah in the wild card series and ended up losing the series.

It reminds me a lot of Ohtani's swing.

Hudgens certainly has the track record of success given that he was hitting coach for a world series winning team. It's a little odd that Hudgens accepted what is likely a demotion from bench coach to hitting strategist, but has Martinez really done anything that would necessitate him being removed from the job so that Hudgens could take over? At any rate having multiple coaches available to work with players allows different players to mesh with different coaches, coaches can really collaborate, etc.

That's exactly the guy you would expect to see a hitter talking with in the middle of a game, particularly if the opposition were to bring in a new pitcher.

Only other alternative is a bullpen game followed by a Mitch White start. I'll gladly take your option instead.

Digging deeper into the numbers Jays are 110-103 vs the Rays in Toronto. Thank f*** this series isn't being played at the Trop.

Are the Rays even really that healthy yet? I see them still missing key contributors such as Baz, Glasnow, Zunino and others, and it's still up in the air whether McClananhan will be ready to return in time for this series. This isn't exactly a full strength Rays squad that the Jays are about to face despite your doomposting.

Yay, another person who is the type to tear a strip out of the Jays when they lose a few games, but then will also automatically do their best to discount when the team plays very well and wins the vast majority of their games. If the Jays win then it's because they are playing s***** opponents and they deserve no credit because in MLB the better team on paper should always win. If the Jays lose then it's time to panic for the exact same reason, the better team is always supposed to win. There is a reason they actually still play the games, as anybody can win on any given day in the sport. The Tampa Bay Rays and Toronto Blue Jays have nearly the exact same record heading into this series, have nearly the exactly same run differential, and each team is playing well heading into this series. The Jays are 8-2 in their last 10, and the Rays are 7-3 in their last 10. These are two extremely well matched teams, as accordingly each team has a good shot at winning this series if they play well and limit mistakes. Since Schneider took over the Jays have been winning a ton of games, and are 32-19 over this 51 game stretch. Right now the Jays are basically a very tough matchup for everyone they are playing, and it's just as easy to argue that it very well may be the Rays who are in trouble heading into this series.