AMS528

It just isn't particularly fair for the Jays. The US and Canada have the same rules for people entering. If any Jays were unvaxxed they couldn't play a single game in the US. Right now Djokovic can't get into the States to play the US open and try to tie Nadal. But it doesn't matter cause the Jays are the only Canadian team. So everytime there's an unvaxxed player they'll be out.

He cut them up with scissors. Also it was insane because if he was that mad what he could have done is just cut his own, but because he's a dumbass he cut up every single other players jerseys as well. Can you imagine the kind of person that just sits there and does that? Like some kind of weird psycho arts and crafts project.

It would be really fun to watch Ohtani pitch and hit in the playoffs. Too bad we will never see that happen.

It would be easier to do this if we had a reasonable depth piece to plug in but basically no one we hoped would develop into a back end depth starter has managed it. Kay/Francis/Hatch/Pearson. Horrible track record there. Lawrence is basically just hoping to eat some innings. Maybe we get really lucky and Castillo can manage a few reasonable starts.

I posted this at some point during the offseason, but there were a decent number of things that were just not replicable from last years team. You had four guys (Vlad, Semien, Bo, Teo) put up 4+ WAR seasons. Two of them played like actual MVP candidates. I had a feeling Vlad wouldn't repeat. Guys don't necessarily put up peak numbers year after year even if they still perform well. The Semien to Chapman performance is a huge downgrade (I also thought Semien was having a much worse season this year, but after a horrific April, he's actually pretty easily outperforming Chapman). It's hard to replicate those kinds of performances, so it sucks when you have a season like last year and miss out on the playoffs. Now we get OK performances from a bunch of guys, but a decent amount of disappointment relative to expectation. Jays best hope for the rest of the year is really Berrios, Bichette and Teo performing like they did last year. If that happens, there's a some winning streaks in there, otherwise it'll be more of this.

He is either fat Buster Posey, or fat Joe Mauer and either way that's amazing. I can't wait for his HOF induction ceremony.

No I'd agree with that, Ray isn't really a reasonable precedent when it comes to fixing pitchers, you almost never get a result like that, and more than that Ray had a track record that already showed he was capable of high performance. I just think the term was indicative of the team believing strongly that there was a good floor, and potentially good upside. The 350 innings he had pitched before this in my opinion, weren't really deserving of 3 years of steady job security otherwise (or just financial security if can't turn it around at all and we give up on him).

I think that reasoning is a bit disingenuous. You don't give a guy you think has a high chance of sucking three years and 36 million dollars. The front office obviously thought they were getting someone who had a floor of a #5 with a chance to pitch more like a #3/#4 because he has good stuff. They gave him the term because if he did pitch like that they had him locked in for an additional two years at a cheaper rate if he was really good. It seems to me like that was their probable reasoning internally. And it hasn't worked out clearly. It was a gamble and for now they lost.

Bogaerts definitely seems like a very good player who has put up a number of solid seasons, but he's almost 30 and hasn't had those two or three 6-8 WAR seasons that really give you the runway to make the hall of fame. He would need to come close to replicating the first 8 years of his career from 30-37 to have a real shot, and that's probably super tough. Devers is too early to say anything about, but he has one of those 6-8 WAR seasons under his belt, and looks like he's well on his way to that this year as well, so when looking at young guys who may have a shot, I'd consider him in the ones with a genuine chance.

8 innings of shutout baseball and 13ks for Ohtani. Also 1/3 with a couple of walks. Between today and yesterday's 2 HR 8 RBI game, I'd say that's one of the best two day runs any player has ever had.

Well that f***ing sucks. Hopefully it's nothing too major. Somehow, even though we're doing ok and should make the playoffs this season feels disappointing. Between the Yankees being ridiculous, injuries, and drop offs in play for a few guys it just feels like things are not very good relative to expectations at the start of the season. And of course the bullpen being mediocre for yet another season adds to the frustration.

I basically do agree that we have better roster construction, especially when you factor in remaining prospect depth relative to those 2015/2016/2017 teams. But Goins was still somehow better than Zimmer and Tapia. He was worth a scintillating 1 WAR over those three seasons. Zimmer and Tapia have managed -1 WAR over their combined 100 games.

Yeah I don't think it's a stretch to say that some of those pitches would have made guys in the majors look silly never mind the level he's at now.

Nicolino

Yes absolutely thought he was going to be great and was disappointed when we traded him (which turned out to be right move). His 2011 season was ridiculous. 130 innings, 148 Ks and only 16 walks through A+ and AA. A bit strange how he suddenly couldn't strike out anyone a year later. There's always a chance of that with those super control based pitchers I guess. Their strikeout numbers should get taken with a grain of salt until the higher levels. Justin Nicolino looked great in 2011/2012 as well.

Damn your friends nephew is Brandon Sutter? Does your friend work for the NHL or an NHL team in any capacity. Seems like every Sutter in existence is involved in the league in some way.

He's 20, so he's pretty young for AA, and even with the K's he's still hitting for great power in the small sample so far. He'll be fine I think.

Random aside on Hinske, I thought we traded him to the Sox for someone, but I looked it up and they just purchased his contract? In the midst of a season where he was hitting 264/353/513/865? That seems weird.

Manoah is just steady and solid. There were a couple of people who threw him out there as a possible Cy Young candidate this year, and I think he's gonna be right up there.

Well you might as well write off a good chunk of the season for Pearson now. He's going to have to regain strength after as well. I mean it's kind of absurd now, he's just picking up any injury or disease possible, and it doesn't have to do with pitching even.

Well I'm convinced by the data already. Espinal is going to have a breakout season, and I am ready for it.

It's always amazing to me when people who have enough money to afford an uber at any time decide to drive drunk. It's such a simple decision to not do something stupid, that gets you in trouble and raises the risk of you causing harm to a bystander.

I think you're probably underplaying their popularity a bit. And I feel like if those things are going to turn a person off from following the team, they probably want to cheer for a nice white bread college team and the NBA was never going to appeal anyways, regardless of marketing but because of the players. Too "urban" I imagine for that kind of person. At any rate its worked out for them. https://www.forbes.com/nba-valuations/list/#tab:overall https://www.forbes.com/mlb-valuations/list/#tab:overall They're the 10th most valuable NBA team (Jays are 15th), and valued at about 800 million dollars more which is very substantial. They are literally the most valuable sports franchise in Canada.

Outstanding.

This may be the single most unexpected free agent deal I've seen. Literally out of nowhere.