Thursday, December 30, 2010

Temper Expectations for Blue Jays Prospects

The Blue Jays and managment are doing all the right things, beefing up the scouting department, hoarding draft picks, signing international free agents, trading for young talent, etc.  The common belief is that because of this the Jays have all the prospects they need to build a core that will take the Jays team back to glory years dominance.  I for one don't buy this, and don't really see many can't miss prospects in the Jays minor league system.

Let's take a look at Baseball America's  ranking of the Blue Jays Top prospects.  Adding Brett Lawrie to this list as their number 1 or 2 best prospect we are left with the following:

1) Brett Lawrie - Honestly I can't say enough about this kid, I've liked him for a long time and believe he will be a very good ball player.  It might not be at second base, but we could be looking at the Jays 3rd baseman for the next decade.  If you look at Baseball Think Factory's Zips projections for 2011, Lawrie could even hold his own in the majors this year at the young age of 21.

2) Kyle Drabek - Another guy that I really like, especially after seeing him pitch in his limited appearances with the Jays in 2010.  The ball just dances out of his hands.  Between Lawrie and Drabek the Jays have two legit high end prospects right here.

3) Deck McGuire - This is where it falls off the map in my opinion, McGuire has the potential to be a nice innings eater 3rd or 4th starter pitcher, say in the mold of Joe Blanton.  While I do think innings eaters are under rated, I don't think this guy will cut it on a contender in the AL East.

4) Anthony Gose - He's a tools guy, unless there is more development, which to be fair many project, he is not currently a major leaguer.  This guy strikes out a ton, has very little power, has a low on base percentage and his best skill is his speed, but he was caught stealing 32 times last year if you can believe it.

5) Travis D'Arnauld - I just don't see this guy hitting well enough to ever be an above average catcher.  The on base percentage could be nice, but that is about it.

6) Zach Stewart - Too many smart people are telling me that he is a future reliever.  Good thing for the Jays is that they need a closer to replace Dotel

7) Asher Wojciechowski - Wild Card here, can you imagine if this guy and Rzepczynski end up in the same rotation, I may quit blogging just to avoid typing their names

8) JP Arencibia - Sorry folks, I see this guys potential as a poor defending Rod Barajas, a very replaceable commodity.

9) Carlos Perez and Aaron Sanchez - there is potential here, but they are young and a long way from a sure thing.

11) Jake Marisnick - Could be the next Reed Johnson, which should make the fans happy.  But you wouldn't want to count on this guy winning you many games.

First, lets remember that it's early in the building (not re-building) process, Anthopoulos has only been working his magic for just over a year and we can't expect him to be able to turn this team around over night.  If he continues acquiring talent in the same fashion, once this team becomes a serious competitor, it should stay that way for a long time.

As it stands now I see the Jays having two nice prospects in Drabek and Lawrie, a bunch of wild cards and a bunch of low ceiling guys.  If it were up to me, and it should be, I'd hold on to the former and try to dangle the rest in offers for player I like better.  Specifically, I'd target a young 1st baseman.

This is not meant to be a message of doom for the Blue Jays, in fact, I believe that the current players on the Blue Jays (Snider, Lind, Cecil, Romero, Bautista, and Morrow) could be that core that takes the team to the promise land.  If Drabek and Lawrie develop as I expect, and the Jays acquire a power hitting, high on-base percentage 1st basemen, the Jays era of dominance could begin as early as 2012.

Monday, December 27, 2010

The Jays New Closer?

I remember after the 2003 season thinking that Octavio Dotel is the best relief pitcher in baseball and it is a shame that he wasn't someone's closer.  In fact Dotel was so good, he was actually drafted in the 4th round of my 16 team 5x5 roto league, now that's a pretty good set up guy. 

For some reason Dotel was never quite the same pitcher after 2003, most likely the result of the pressure to perform after getting drafted so high in my fantasy league.  While his strike out to inning numbers continued to be impressive, the rest of his numbers varied between awful and mediocre and rarely did he ever look good as a closer.  Now it looks as if Dotel will be the Jays 2011 closer!  Before I go on and on about what a terrible closer he will be, and point out details like that he has a 7.56 career ERA against Boston and 6.46 ERA against Tampa, let's take a step back and think about why the Jays may have signed him to be their closer?

The obvious reason the Jays signed Dotel is that they didn't want to spend a lot of money on a closer and their options were limited at this time, but let's look beyond that reason.  I think the Jays signed Dotel hoping that he would show some success, continue striking out batters at a high rate, and then hopefully have value come the trade deadline.  Dotel is just one of those pitchers that despite his mediocre past every team seems to covet, I'm thinking it's because of his K to inning ratio. Just like chicks dig the long ball, GM's dig pitchers who strike out a lot of batters and we only have to look back to last year to prove this as the Pirates got both Andrew Lambo (rated #49th best prospect in baseball pre 2009) and James McDonald (arguably now the Pirates ace) for Dotel.  Let's hope AA can pull off some of this magic as well and we should not be too concerned about whether Dotel should or should not be the closer.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

The Truth about Waiver Claims

Every year, usually in spring, fans get all excited about players their GM 'stole' from another team via a waiver claim.  To those people I have always preached that these players are most likely not even worth discussing and if they end up getting regular playing time it is not by design and fans should temper their enthusiasm.  

Well thanks to MLBtraderumors.com's transaction tracker we can now go back and look at the all the fabulous waiver claims made since 1990.  So to save you the trouble I've gone ahead and did a search on all Blue Jays waiver claims and listed the results below.  Now I'm not sure how complete this list is because I seem to remember other players such as Mike McCoy being acquired through a waiver claim, but I could be confusing it with a free agent signing.

To say the least, this list of players isn't all that inspiring and either verifies my belief that we shouldn't pay much attention to waiver claim players, or that Toronto has had a horrendous record with waiver claims.  I'm thinking it is the former because when I did searches for other teams, their lists weren't all the better.


Player Claimed
Team
General Manager
Date
Efrain Valdez
TOR
Pat Gillick
7/3/1991
TOR
Pat Gillick
4/3/1992
Roberto Duran
TOR
Gord Ash
3/14/1996
Ken Robinson
TOR
Gord Ash
5/7/1996
Omar Daal
TOR
Gord Ash
7/25/1997
Dane Johnson
TOR
Gord Ash
10/29/1997
Ben VanRyn
TOR
Gord Ash
5/29/1998
Jacob Brumfield
TOR
Gord Ash
5/7/1999
TOR
Gord Ash
5/28/1999
TOR
Gord Ash
8/6/1999
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
5/3/2002
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
8/30/2002
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
3/28/2003
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
4/30/2003
Scott Service
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
6/16/2003
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
3/31/2004
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
4/9/2004
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
12/6/2004
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
1/19/2007
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
8/3/2007
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
9/15/2007
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
10/26/2007
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
10/26/2007
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
3/17/2008
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
10/6/2008
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
10/24/2008
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
11/3/2008
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
11/3/2008
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
11/4/2008
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
2/4/2009
TOR
J.P. Ricciardi
2/5/2009
TOR
Alex Anthopoulos
10/29/2009
TOR
Alex Anthopoulos
11/3/2009
TOR
Alex Anthopoulos
1/7/2010
TOR
Alex Anthopoulos
3/4/2010
TOR
Alex Anthopoulos
4/14/2010
TOR
Alex Anthopoulos
9/9/2010

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Blue Jays Christmas Wish List





To many Blue Jays fans this off-season has been a bit of a disappointment, most likely because they have unrealistic expectations of how competitive this team actually is, or they just want to see a big shiny red name under the Blue Jays Christmas tree.  So what is actually on the Blue Jays Christmas wish list?  Well if you are already disappointed in this off-season the truth probably won't offer you much to get excited about.

1. A 9th Inning Guy

Sorry folks the Jays aren't targeting your Rafael Soriano type of closer, look for the Jays to sign an affordable closer to a one year plus option, similar to what they did with Kevin Gregg last season.  Some of the most likely names include; Octavio Dotel, Chad Qualls, John Rauch, etc.  Personally I don't see this as much of an improvement over Jason Frasor, but the bullpen needs another experienced arm and this type of signing will make the team better and potentially land some more coveted draft picks at the end of the year.  

However, you never know what closer might be left standing without a chair as the season approaches, and become willing to take a one year incentive laden contract in order to build on his value and go on the market again next year.

2. Your Future 1st Baseman

The team still has some concerns about the viability of Adam Lind becoming the Jays future first baseman, and anyone else (Encarnacion) is just a stop gap player for this year.  Therefore, if Anthopoulos can make a Brett Lawrie type deal for their 1st baseman of the future, he will do it.  I'm personally hoping this person ends up to be the currently blocked Reds prospect Yonder Alonso.

3. Another Starting Pitcher

The Jays aren't entirely comfortable with the rotation as it currently stands, yes the team has depth, but they would feel a lot better if they had some more experience in the starting rotation.  Look for the Jays ask Santa for a buy low opportunity starting pitcher with a lot of upside, preferably signed to one of Anthopoulos' famous one or two year option contracts. Someone like Jeff Francis or Chris Young may be intriguing to the team. 

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

First Thought

If you are reading this it is because I've said something that interests you or offended you in another blog so you wanted to learn more about the things I have to say.  Unfortunately it isn't a whole lot at the moment, but if I do decide to give this blogging thing a decent effort, my focus will be on what I know best, and that is baseball with a focus on the Toronto Blue Jays.  

And thanks for the visit, or screw you I meant every word that offended you!