April 9, 2003

IMPROVED BLUE JAYS WILL NOT MOVE UP IN STATIC EAST DIVISION

      There are very few things that are guaranteed in life, but one of life’s certainties is that the American League East Division will finish in the same order it has for the past several years.  The Yankees will win the division with the Red Sox giving chase until the last couple of weeks of the season when their failings will ensure a second place result.  The Blue Jays and the Orioles will play nip and tuck for third place until the final month when the Jays will pull away.  And the Tampa Bay Devil Rays will once again be left in the dust trying valiantly to avoid another 100-loss season.  If you are a fan that embraces routine, then this is the division for you.

       Since J.P. Ricciardi arrived onto the scene the Jays have been getting younger and cheaper.  Gone are many of the overpaid players from the Gord Ash years—only Carlos Delgado the most overpaid of the overpaid remains, and only because his contract is so huge that nobody is willing to even take a piece of it.  In their place are youngsters like Hudson and Wells and Hinske and Phelps.  Gone is the running National League style of baseball preferred by previous manager Buck Martinez and in its place comes the slow deliberate pace of the Earl Weaver style of baseball—patience at the plate and the three run homer.  The Jays have an enviable supply of young talent—many of whom were drafted by the since deposed and ridiculed Ash who while unable to put a competitive club on the field was still able to fill the minor league teams with quality talent.  Ash would have been better as a Director of Player Development than as a General Manager.

       The pool of young talent invigorates Jay management and allows them to promote these players as the future of the club.  The long term signing of Hinske and Wells ensures that they will be part of this club as it grows into a contender, and with the emergence of Phelps as a right handed power hitter capable of 40 home runs the line-up looks solid.  The acknowledged weakness of this team—as it is with most teams—is the pitching staff.  Behind Halladay the starting rotation is filled with question marks and one year stop gaps.  Lidle and Sturtze are here for one year, unless they show well enough and prove capable enough of being signed to longer-term deals that fit into the team’s salary structure.  Hendrickson is expected to develop into a quality number three starter and the club’s top lefthander, but beyond these players there is nothing else on the horizon.  Jason Arnold was acquired in the Felipe Lopez trade and he is expected to be part of the rotation next year, but until he shows that he can get major league hitters out—he’ll get his opportunity later this summer—his contribution is still unknown.  If the Jays could find a way to unload Delgado’s hefty stipend then they could sign a couple of quality starters.  Perhaps with only one year left after this season the Jays might be able to pull a Mondesi type trade and move Delgado later this summer or in the off-season while picking up half of the contract.  It’s not like first base is a difficult position to fill—though Delgado’s powerful bat and experience would be missed.  Maybe Carlos will rework his contract just to be part of the new Jays and push some of that money to the back end of a multi-year extension.  Otherwise Phelps will take over at first and a veteran will be brought in to DH.

       The salary level the club is at right now—a little more than $50 million—will be the territory Ricciardi will have to work in for the next few seasons.  Unless the club begins to contend and the fans swarm back to the Sky dome the Jays GM will have to find quality pitchers that fit into that salary level.  This will be extremely difficult, especially since Halladay will command an annual salary in the $7 million range after this year.  Unfortunately solid players like Shannon Stewart and Kelvim Escobar will likely be traded before the season is out.  The combination of Stewart and Catalanotto at the top of the order will prove to be devastating this season as both are experienced and quality hitters that are adept at getting on base for the thumpers behind them.  It will make it extremely difficult for Ricciardi to trade Stewart, especially since there aren’t any quality outfielders in the system ready to play in the bigs.  Youngsters like Gabe Gross, Alexis Rios and John Ford Griffin look to be a couple of years away and Jayson Werth is still unproven.  It is likely, however, that Stewart will be moved—hopefully for a quality pitcher—and Werth will take over in right, with Catalanotto moving to left.

       Catcher is another pressing issue for the club.  At present it has three catchers, none of whom can be counted on to produce much either offensively or defensively.  Ken Huckaby is the best receiver of the three but he can’t hit enough to be a regular, and Greg Myers and Tom Wilson are average at best behind the plate.  The club seems to be staking its future on Kevin Cash but he does not have a stellar history of offensive ability.  There aren’t many quality receivers on the market either so it may be a position that the club decides to continue filling with quantity rather than quality.

       The Jays certainly look like a better club than the one that left spring training a year ago.  They have a solid line-up that should be able to score enough runs to compensate for an iffy pitching staff, and the bullpen is stacked—like catching—with numbers rather than ability.  If Escobar is moved then that will further weaken an already questionable area, unless Ricciardi is able to pull off another Plesac for Politte deal, and the lack of a quality lefthander in the pen—Doug Creek is a reject from many clubs and will not hold up for long—will hurt.  But the club is still a work in progress.  Jay management knows that this club is not ready for prime time yet.  They know that this pitching staff still has too many holes and the line-up, while imposing, is still young and fairly unproven. 

       The club is on its way up, though, and it has been some time since a Toronto outfit created as much anticipation as this one does.  Comparisons to the 1983 Jay club that sprouted suddenly and grew into contender are frequent—that club won a division title in two years; about the same amount of time it is expected to take for this club to contend.  If Jay fans need to look elsewhere for how fortunate they are they only need look below.  The Orioles have been mediocre for years and the Devil Rays have been stalled at horrible since they entered the league.  But while the Rays seem to have a plan together, finally, and with Lou Piniella look as if they will move up in years to come the Orioles continue to stagnate. 

       The static nature of the East Division may end soon as the Jays and the Rays improve and the Orioles fall, but the Yanks and the Sox will always be at the top, simply because they have the money to fill hole immediately.  If the Jays continue their ascent though then the division could have three teams battling for the top spot instead of two.   

      That would be a nice change.