Brett Lawrie. Credit: stamfordadvocate.com
Last night the Major League Baseball regular season started with a bang with Seattle defeating Oakland 3-1 in extra innings, overseas in Tokyo, Japan. The Blue Jays will get their season started next Thursday, April 5th, playing their first game against the Indians across the lake in Cleveland, and return home on Monday, April 9th for their sold out home opener against the Red Sox (thanks again @Markkristofer for getting tickets when I was too hungover to wake up and buy them). After disappointing seasons from the Raptors and the Leafs, will the Jays be able to provide Toronto sports’ fans with a team to get excited about? They just may.
As you must have heard by now, the 2012 MLB season will see the addition of an extra playoff spot in each of the leagues. Immediately the Toronto fan conjures images of ’93, picturing the Blue Jays back in the postseason for the first time in 18 years. However, as good as I think the Jays will be this year, it’s going to be tough to make the playoffs and end the drought. Once again relegated to a division where they will have to play 18 games each against the Red Sox, the Yankees, and the Devil Rays, the Jays will likely have a hard time placing 3rd in the AL East, enough to earn the spot, and even if they do it might not be enough.
With the moves the Angels have made this past offseason, signing Pujols and C.J. Wilson, it’s hard to argue that they will likely be the most improved team in 2012. Coming off an 86 win season in 2011, five more victories that the Jays, it is completely possible that this LA team will push for over 90 wins this year (of course they do still have Vernon Wells on their team). Now while I think C.J. is overrated, the fact that Michael Nargi of the Bleacher Report is saying that the “Angels are the favorites to land Oswalt at this point” has me a little scared. Sure they may have overpayed for Wilson, but if their pitching lineup consists of Weaver, Haren, Wilson, Santana (Ervin), AND Oswalt, they’re going to make some waves in the AL West. The issue is, I still think Texas will win that division, relegating the Angels to a wild card spot, and taking one away from the teams in the AL East.
How I see it is that the playoff teams in the American League this year will likely be the same as last year, with the addition of the Angel; the Yankees, Tigers, Rangers and Angels will likely all make it in. The one spot in flux is the new wildcard, which will probably go to the 2nd place team in the AL East, most likely either the Red Sox, looking to avenge their bad beat of all bad beats last year, or the Devil Rays. So another season without the Jays in the playoffs is likely in our future, but I still have reason to be optimistic about this year and I think you should too.
I’m not sure how close you’ve been paying attention to the Grapefruit League this year, but right now the Blue Jays are the best team in baseball (with the exception of course of the 1-0 Seattle Mariners). Sure, it’s only spring training and it doesn’t count for anything, but the Jays have accumulated a 20-4 record heading into today’s game against the Orioles, a sign of good things to come in 2012 and down the road. The Jays didn’t really make a splash in the free agent market this offseason, but I think they spent another year maturing their young talent and building for the future, and that’s what makes me hopeful.
One of the shining spots of last year was Brett Lawrie, and judging from spring training, he doesn’t seem to be slowing down. The 22-year old posted fantastic numbers the end of last season in just 150 at bats, having analysts like Jayson Stark of ESPN gushing over the kid. So far this spring he is batting a ridiculous .571 with 8 RBIs and 5 stolen bases, in 28 at bats; not bad for the young third baseman and I’m looking forward to seeing him on the field on opening day this year. Of course, offense wasn’t really the problem with the Jays last year, and I think we may have some similar issues at the other side of the inning again this year.
While the Jays were apparently in the hunt for veteran Wilson (gone to the Angels as mentioned earlier) and the Japanese phenom Yu Darvish (snagged by the Texas Rangers), they will enter the season with the same starting three as 2011: Ricky Romero, Brandon Morrow, and Brett Cecil. I like Romero and I think Morrow will have a bounce back year in 2012 (especially if he can improve the cutter he told Twitter he was working on at the end of last season) but even if the Jays do make the playoffs, having Cecil as the third man in the rotation is just kind of scary. Albeit the Jays did make some moves to their shaky bullpen over the summer, adding closer Sergio Santos from the White Sox in a move few saw coming (but were pleasantly surprised about) as well as veteran relievers Darren Oliver and Francisco Cordero, but they’re going to have to get through a solid six to seven innings of pitching before reaching that point.
All things considered, the Jays will probably be on their way to a slightly better than .500 season, let’s say, 87 wins. That may be a little optimistic, but that will be enough to keep fans on the edge of their seat the entire season hoping that maybe we can pull of another usurp of the Red Sox like the Rays did in 2011. If not, at least we can look forward to seeing catching prospect Travis D’Arnaud get called up in June, just another great young player we have waiting in the wings of a farm system most other teams would be jealous of. We might not see a World Series back in Toronto this year, but at least we’ll have a decent team to watch and more importantly, hope for the future.
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Nick McIsaac is Toronto Standard’s sports writer. Follow him on Twitter (for everything sports related) at @nickclass.
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