The Toronto Blue Jays/MLB Thread

rocking23nf wrote: ↑I dont know why you say Escobar isnt a true leadoff man, his on base percentage is around .400, one of the tops in the majors.

Other then hes not a base stealer, but the Jays arent base stealers either.

to be exact, his OBP as of today is .371 which puts him 30th in the majors

skyblue12 wrote: ↑to be exact, his OBP as of today is .371 which puts him 30th in the majors

this stat is true that he is 30th in the majors... BUT, his OBP is #1 for all leadoff men in the majors...so I dunno why ppl are saying we need a better leadoff hitter..

grappos13 wrote: ↑this stat is true that he is 30th in the majors... BUT, his OBP is #1 for all leadoff men in the majors...so I dunno why ppl are saying we need a better leadoff hitter..

+1

AND

I think he likes the fact that he gets some kind of spotlight leading off the game.

I'll be very interested to see how he reacts if and when he's asked to switch from SS to 2B for Hech.
I just get this sneaky feeling that he thinks he should be more of a STAR than he is. I think he wants to be #1 on the team, or at the very least, #2 behind Jose.
Even all the fawning over Brett Lawrie must be making his skin crawl.
Watch how he reacts when he gets the signal to sacrifice and then how well he executes, almost like he thinks it's beneath a player of his stature.
He still does a lot of immature, diva stuff, even though (I know) he's come a long way since coming to T.O.

I hope he proves me wrong, I really do, but it wouldn't surprise me if he turns on the team as more young guns get into the lineup.........

grappos13 wrote: ↑this stat is true that he is 30th in the majors... BUT, his OBP is #1 for all leadoff men in the majors...so I dunno why ppl are saying we need a better leadoff hitter..

Exactly. Escobar is as good of a leadoff hitter (meaningless title to me anyways) as the Jays have had in years. Stealing bases doesn't mean much unless you are doing it at a high rate and getting on base a lot. That's why Rajai Davis blows as an overall player. Getting on base is the entire point of hitting. Escobar is doing that a very good rate and is exactly the type of player you want hitting in front of your power hitters. He's also by far the 2nd best player on the team this year. What a great trade that was.

Watch how he reacts when he gets the signal to sacrifice

Not that I've actually seen it happen and I think you're making A LOT of assumptions but I'd be pissed off too. When you have as good of a hitter as Escobar and you are asking him to basically intentionally make an out, it's completely silly to me. Unless it's a tie game in the botttom of the 9th or extra innings. Sacrifice with junk players like McDonald or Davis, not Escobar or Rasmus (I still can't believe they asked him to bunt). I'm glad the Jays seem to be moving away from all the "small ball" nonsense that was going on earlier in the season.

Alright, so how about Carreno as an eventual closer or set-up man?


He's 24, averages about 1 strikeout per inning, gives up very, very few walks, and almost no home runs. He only has a few pitches (a disgustingly nasty slider and a fast ball, & an average change up). He was one of the two pitchers that dominated in the DSL in 06; the other pitcher was Luis Perez.

The only issue is he gives up about 1 hit per inning as well. But his WHIP is still only 1.17. On paper he's still a huge plus over Rauch/Francisco.

cecil throwing 86-88 in the first inning.

gonna be a long night in oakland.

Cecil has a lot of "Rauch" in him. Flyballs and not many strikeouts. I don't trust him as anything more than a #4/#5 guy in the AL East.

rocking23nf wrote: ↑cecil throwing 86-88 in the first inning.

gonna be a long night in oakland.

Short of the 5 walks, it was a respectable line for Cecil...

People shouldn't get so hung up on the speed. Cecil can spend the off-season working on pitch location, rather than worrying about the radar gun. There are plenty of guys out there that throw at similar speeds, if Cecil can spot his pitches consistently, he'll be alright...

MrWizard wrote: ↑Short of the 5 walks, it was a respectable line for Cecil...

People shouldn't get so hung up on the speed. Cecil can spend the off-season working on pitch location, rather than worrying about the radar gun. There are plenty of guys out there that throw at similar speeds, if Cecil can spot his pitches consistently, he'll be alright...

he got real lucky tonite, that could have easily been a 10-0 game.

He was struggling and got a some very timely double plays when it looked like a big inning was about to happen.

rocking23nf wrote: ↑he got real lucky tonite, that could have easily been a 10-0 game.

He was struggling and got a some very timely double plays when it looked like a big inning was about to happen.

Lind screwed up the first one which would've gotten them out of the inning and avoided the 2-run homer which was the only scoring. Cecil with another good outing but faced Harden again who pitched another shutout.

Lind's OBP is now approaching .300. His season has taken a complete nosedive and he now might be having a 2nd below average season. This is not encouragning from a 1B/DH. You must have better offense from those spots.

LSZ wrote: ↑Lind's OBP is now approaching .300. His season has taken a complete nosedive and he now might be having a 2nd below average season. This is not encouragning from a 1B/DH. You must have better offense from those spots.

Overbay got released by Pittsburgh.

rocking23nf wrote: ↑he got real lucky tonite, that could have easily been a 10-0 game.

He was struggling and got a some very timely double plays when it looked like a big inning was about to happen.

There's no luck ... You could make the exaxt same argument that it could have been 0-0 going into the 9th

Cecil may have not had the speed (he now needs 4 Tommy Johns by your weirdo math), but he battled and kept the team in the game

In the last month, Cecil has an ERA under 2.75 and a WHIP under 1 ... Not good enough???

You have a bug in your ass about Cecil, but he's been preety good since changing his delivery. You can rag on speed, but he's getting results

Psubs wrote: ↑Overbay got released by Pittsburgh.

overpaid is now on the D-back and hit the game winning double off Doc Halladay last week in the bottom of the 9th..

[QUOTE]but he's getting results [/QUOTE]
He has been. But when you look at more predictive metrics like FIP/xFIP and BABIP, it shows that it's very likely that Cecil is overachieving right now. He's a flyball pitcher who has been pitching up in the zone and doesn't get too many strikeouts. That's not someone I'd generally want to be relying on too much going forward.

Those same metrics also say that Hill should be doing much better than he has for the past two years. How many times have we heard the Hill has just been unlunky that his hits are not find holes and gaps?

At the end of that day, Cecil gave up one HR and was able to pitch his way out of jams ... The Jays scored no runs and struck out a ton of times because they couldn't figure out how to hit a change up

Here's a crazy stat (backed by every metric on the planet), when you score zero runs, you always lose

mdc wrote: ↑There's no luck ... You could make the exaxt same argument that it could have been 0-0 going into the 9th

Cecil may have not had the speed (he now needs 4 Tommy Johns by your weirdo math), but he battled and kept the team in the game

In the last month, Cecil has an ERA under 2.75 and a WHIP under 1 ... Not good enough???

You have a bug in your ass about Cecil, but he's been preety good since changing his delivery. You can rag on speed, but he's getting results

I really liked 2010 cecil.
I really dont like 2011 cecil.

Its 2 different pitchers, and you cant see that.

I don't understand how Alvarez wasn't/isn't getting more strikeouts with his stuff. Sure not having a 3rd pitch at all hurts but you'd think he could miss more bats with his fastball movement mixed with some changeups in there. I guess he's still young and was kinda rushed to the Majors.

I've read that the issue is that the fastball is fast, but doesn't move a lot ... he also throws the off speed stuff using a different arm slot so good batters know that the pitch isn't the fastball (so fooling batters isn't happening)

Those are problems a lot of young pitchers have, so there is no doubt he can correct the issue

I like what I see at this point. The kid has a ton of potential. At 21 he is showing a lot of maturity. He seems fairly calm and very willing to learn. That's always a great sign

LSZ wrote: ↑I don't understand how Alvarez wasn't/isn't getting more strikeouts with his stuff. Sure not having a 3rd pitch at all hurts but you'd think he could miss more bats with his fastball movement mixed with some changeups in there. I guess he's still young and was kinda rushed to the Majors.

I think alvarez is just getting a taste of the bigs to reward him for his play thus far.


As much as I like Hill, and would like to see him back next year for less money, I think it is time he moved on. I think a change of scenery, coaches, city may help him out tremendously. He might be able to regain his old form again.

Hopefully, for his career, he walks. Then the Jays will get a stop gap 2nd basemen for the year until Hech is ready. I can live with that.