Your 2008-2009 Toronto Blue Jays
One look at my predictions should tell you I’m not very optimistic about the Jays’ chances this year. Why not?
The largest problem is a lack of depth. Lyle Overbay is already a mediocre 1B, but who’s the back-up? Matt Stairs would be a bad defender and his bat likely wouldn’t carry very well at 1B playing against both RHP and LHP. Adam Lind has never played a professional game at 1B, and he needs time to develop in LF. There is no desirable option there.
In the MIF, the primary back-up is John McDonald. Now, I love John McDonald’s defense and I even think it’s good enough that he should be the starter over David Eckstein; however, that’s more of an indictment of Eckstein than a praise of McDonald. This is a guy who hit .251/.279/.333 last year. I don’t care if you’re the best defensive shortstop who ever lived, that’s not quality depth.
The other IF back-up, and the primary 3B back-up, is Marco Scutaro. Scutaro is a career .700 OPSer with mediocre defense, especially on the left side of the infield. When (not if) Scott Rolen is injured, as he is right now, that means you have a terrible offensive 3B who’s also below average defensively.
Even at designated hitter, who is a capable back-up? I’ve heard that Frank Thomas has had his occasional trouble with injuries. Again, you run into the Lind/Stairs concerns; Lind needs to develop in the OF, while Stairs’ bat can not hope to produce at an average designated hitter level if he is called in to play every day.
I have no problem with catcher or outfield depth, but the infield is an implosion waiting to happen.
The pitching depth is the most worrisome of all. In the rotation, you have three injury cases in Roy Halladay, Dustin McGowan and AJ Burnett. The loss of Casey Janssen was one of the the worst things that could possibly happen to this staff. Not only does this push Jesse Litsch into the rotation before he is ready, in my opinion, but it completely empties the team of any depth. An average rotation will likely use eight starters; with these pitchers, you’ll be looking at a little too much Gustavo Chacin, Josh Banks and David Purcey for my taste.
The bullpen is not much better. BJ Ryan’s health can’t be counted on, and Brandon League is just a very strange question mark. With the injury to Janssen, that means the team will be counting on Brian Wolfe and Brian Tallet to repeat their career years, a bet I would not be willing to take. With Accardo, Downs and Frasor the pen will still be solid without Ryan, but it will not be the saving grace it was last year.
Even if the team stays remarkably healthy, there isn’ t much to see here. At no position can you count on well above average production. Rios will be a good right-fielder, especially defensively, but he is not the offensive superstar that he is sometimes portrayed as. Aaron Hill’s tremendous glove will carry most of his production, and Frank Thomas still has some juice in his bat. At no other position do I expect even above average production.
This may make it seem like I have no hope for the Jays’ future. That is not true. I think it is very possible for the Jays to be competitive in 2009, and those hopes rest on one potential player acquisition: Rafael Furcal.
Furcal is scheduled to be a free agent at the end of the year, and he is unlikely to be re-signed. The Dodgers have shortstop Chin-Lung Hu, #34 on my top 100 prospects, who will be more than ready to step into a 2009 starting role. While Colletti has his phobias about young players, not even he can screw this up. Furcal is 30, will be expensive to sign, will be worth draft picks, and you have a cheap prospect who could match Furcal’s production both offensively and defensively. This is an easy decision.
Regarding upside for the Jays, when healthy, Rafael Furcal is arguably the best defensive shortstop in baseball. This is even more of an asset on a team like the Blue Jays, since they will likely have the most groundball-heavy staff in baseball, so he will have more opportunities to save runs. Offensively, while he may not return to his 2006 level, league-average offense would be a drastic improvement over this year’s shortstop crop. The addition of Rafael Furcal could realistically add 6-8 wins by itself.
The Jays’ pitching staff could be replenished. The possible return of a healthy Janssen, the development of Litsch into a good starter and the hopeful development of Purcey, Romero and Cecil into solid depth could build a rotation that can last a full season, even with the departure of Burnett.
In addition, Travis Snider will be starting this year in AA. If he has a good year, then you can expect him to see the majors at some point in 2009. This, combined with the addition of solid back-ups at shallow positions could erase the depth problems of this year.
If the above three conditions are met, the addition of Furcal, the development of the pitching staff, and the restoration of offensive depth, the Jays could be true contenders in 2009.
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I don’t see as big of a problem with depth as you do. No team has 4 starting players on the bench..except maybe the Yankees, who spend millions on it.
Look at the red sox bench..Varitek has had his injury problems in the past, and they have Kevin Cash along with a couple of catching prospects no further along than Curtis Thigpen. I’ll certainly take Rod Barajas over Cash.
The infield is no better. Sean Casey had a .740 OPS last year and isn’t getting any younger. Nobody expects Stairs to repeat, but he beats that OPS with his eyes closed as he has his whole career. I don’t see Stairs getting much time at first anyways. Overbay hasn’t really had any injury problems other than the fluke variety.
Alex Cora’s .650 career OPS is not much better than John McDonald’s mark. Our bench doesn’t look so bad now does it?
Like you mentioned, the pitching depth is going to be the real problem. I agree with pretty much everything and the loss of Janssen could kill us. Brian Tallet didn’t really have a career year though. I expect him to stay around career averages. JP is going to have to build up some depth somehow.
The Furcal idea seemed nice back before we got Scutaro, but now I’m not sure it’s a good idea to have 4 shortstops on the team making multi-millions.
Good article overall, I just think you’re way off on the standings predictions.
Yeah, i really dont like the Scutaro signing on so many levels. This is just one more.
All the problems you pointed out are real. However, many other teams have similar issues too.
I like the idea of adding Furcal though. I noticed you didn’t mention Lind in your views of 2009. Whats your opinion about him?
I disagree about the Red Sox bench. If a MIF gets injured, Alex Cora will not take their place, it will be Jed Lowrie. I’d take him over our guys any day. Also, in case of an injury to 1B, the replacement might be Sean Casey. However, I would hope that it’s Chris Carter (the other one), 24 years old and a career .310/.390/.519 in the minors with almost as many walks as Ks. He’s not a tremendous talent, but in case of an injury to at 1B or 3B (Youk would move to 3B), I’d be happier with Carter than Stairs.
Depth isn’t just the bench, it’s also major-league ready talent in the upper minors, and that’s why our depth is so weak. Apart from Lind, we really don’t have anything in the upper minors. That’s also one reason why I think we look better next year… Snider and Cecil will be ready to debut at some point, and although it’s unlikely you can hold out hope that Purcey or Romero develops into a solid starter.
Eck is signed to a one-year deal, we’d only have 3 SSs if we get Furcal.
Yeah, I like Lind, and he’ll be an improvement over the LF situation we have this year. I don’t think he’ll be a star, but there’s nothing wrong with a consistent .850-.875 OPS.
No, we’d have 4 shortstops. McDonald, Scutaro, Eckstein and Furcal. Then in 2009, we would be back to McDonald and Scutaro.
I haven’t see Carter play, but Lowrie doesn’t impress me at all. He has below average power, average at best speed and a fairly decent walk rate for a shortstop. He makes a boatload of errors in Pawfucket as well.
I saw a few games with Lowrie in the AFL and he was god awful. He has very poor swing mechanics and lacks the strong arm needed for shortstop. I believe he hit about .150, almost all singles, in well over 100 PA’s.
I really don’t think they have much more depth in the high minors than the Jays do. An OF/1B and a couple young catchers is all either team really has.
When I say to acquire Furcal, I mean in free agency.
I wouldn’t say Lowrie has below average power. He doesn’t hit many home runs, but he hits enough XBH besides that he still slugged .500 last year. And a .298 BA/.393 OBP is better than a ‘fairly decent’ walk rate.
I shouldn’t need to say that 100 PA’s is NOT a sample size.
He’s not a good defensive shortstop, but he’s better than Scutaro.
Nice article, but I think you’ve made too much of an issue of depth. Rolen’s hurt, sure but Scutaro is about replacement level for what he give you. JP has put together a team that will live or die on the contribution that the pitching staff puts up. I’m not even that concerned with the pitching depth as Purcey/Banks are at least as promising as McGowan/Marcum/Litsch were last year… the may or may not come through, but even without a big contribution from them, this team should be able to out perform the Rays without hardly trying.
In short: Pythagoras had this team at 87 wins last year, even with the terrible offense. The pitching this year might regress, but even a small increase in production (which one would expect, Scutaro’s better than the scrubs that were being used, Barajas is better than Phillips, Stewart is better than Johnson and I’m sure we’ll see Lind in 2008 out performing the Lind of 2007 — even without bounce-back years from Overbay, Wells, this offense will be better).
Lastly I think you’re wrong about who the Sox will use as replacement players… I don’t particularly understand the bias against using young players but it is there. Cora/Casey will get the first chance to fail… and they’ll be given significant ABs before the younger options are turned to.
This is a team that should do .500 easily… I’m not so wild about them as some, but to project anything less thing 84 wins seems foolhardy (we can have a nice discussion why PECOTA is so wrong on the Jays - it starts with variance, it is projecting seasons for three players on offense like they’ve never had… Wells/Rolen/Overbay have better chances of hitting their 90 or 10 percentile seasons than their 50 percentile seasons… this year’s Jays are a study in the ways PECOTA fails).
Anyway, nice read… and I guess we’ll see, I just think you’re off-base on the depth. It is better (on offense) or at least as good (pitching) than last season and look how much it hurt last year… and well, this team can’t be than unlucky with long-term injuries as in 2007, can it?