Jays Feeling Blue In Toronto
Hockey season has been and gone, so making the most of Alex Watson: Toronto Correspondent, here's a question about the Blue Jays, Canada's only representatives in the MLB:
"The Blue Jays haven't seen World Series success since the heady days of the early 90s, does the team have the potential to challenge again? Or is it destined to wallow in mediocrity, surviving on being the only MLB franchise in the county?"
Alex's Answer
The city of Toronto still casts its mind back to the night of October 23, 1993 when Joe Carter's three run homer at the bottom of the ninth inning sealed back to back world series titles for the Blue Jays! As the fireworks exploded over the Toronto SkyDome, the city could finally consider itself among the elite of baseball. But since then the Jays have suffered a 20 year playoff drought and have not placed higher than second in the American League East Division since then. Despite some fine individual players such as multiple Cy Young winning pitcher Roger Clemens and franchise record holder Carlos Delgado, success has been scarce in Ontario.
This season initially threatened to be different as the Blue Jays as they glorious topped their division ahead of the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox following a fantastic month of May which brought 21 wins and only 9 losses. This also included memorable series sweeps over the Oakland A's, Tampa Bay Rays and most impressively the Red Sox away at Fenway Park. 1st baseman slugger Edwin Encarnacion hit a franchise record 16 home runs during this month alone, which tied Mickey Mantle's American League record from 1953. New Signing Melky Cabrera and Jose Reyes also looked strong and along with the consistent pitching of R A Dickey and hot young sensation Marcus Stroman, it appeared as if the dry Canadian season was about to end.
But the following months haven't been so kind and the losses have been racking up and as a result of this the Jays have now slipped to third in the AL East behind Baltimore and the Yankees and our chances of making the American League Division Series are looking increasingly slim. So are they destined to wallow in mediocrity? This season has shown that there is hope for this franchise and with some right moves they could well become a force once more. Offensively they have been found, but defensively there has been a gap that has been gradually have widening. Second Base is one area that needs filling as we have do not seem to have a permanent fixture there. This needs to be tightened for the remaining two months and with some clever trades or tweaks, we could still make the playoffs.
Marcus Stroman has been a pleasant surprise in his rookie year and in our 8-0 victory over Boston yesterday he allowed only one hit. The Bullpen has some diversity with Mark Buerhle, J A Happ and Casey Janssen, but these guys don't seem to be getting the job done when required. Happ though has also been a surprise this year after an inconsistent time before.
The Blue Jays will still serve as Canada's sole baseball hope (unless the Montreal Expo's reform) but it might be a few years yet until we see a third world series banner hanging over the Rogers Centre
Alex's Answer
The city of Toronto still casts its mind back to the night of October 23, 1993 when Joe Carter's three run homer at the bottom of the ninth inning sealed back to back world series titles for the Blue Jays! As the fireworks exploded over the Toronto SkyDome, the city could finally consider itself among the elite of baseball. But since then the Jays have suffered a 20 year playoff drought and have not placed higher than second in the American League East Division since then. Despite some fine individual players such as multiple Cy Young winning pitcher Roger Clemens and franchise record holder Carlos Delgado, success has been scarce in Ontario.
This season initially threatened to be different as the Blue Jays as they glorious topped their division ahead of the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox following a fantastic month of May which brought 21 wins and only 9 losses. This also included memorable series sweeps over the Oakland A's, Tampa Bay Rays and most impressively the Red Sox away at Fenway Park. 1st baseman slugger Edwin Encarnacion hit a franchise record 16 home runs during this month alone, which tied Mickey Mantle's American League record from 1953. New Signing Melky Cabrera and Jose Reyes also looked strong and along with the consistent pitching of R A Dickey and hot young sensation Marcus Stroman, it appeared as if the dry Canadian season was about to end.
But the following months haven't been so kind and the losses have been racking up and as a result of this the Jays have now slipped to third in the AL East behind Baltimore and the Yankees and our chances of making the American League Division Series are looking increasingly slim. So are they destined to wallow in mediocrity? This season has shown that there is hope for this franchise and with some right moves they could well become a force once more. Offensively they have been found, but defensively there has been a gap that has been gradually have widening. Second Base is one area that needs filling as we have do not seem to have a permanent fixture there. This needs to be tightened for the remaining two months and with some clever trades or tweaks, we could still make the playoffs.
Marcus Stroman has been a pleasant surprise in his rookie year and in our 8-0 victory over Boston yesterday he allowed only one hit. The Bullpen has some diversity with Mark Buerhle, J A Happ and Casey Janssen, but these guys don't seem to be getting the job done when required. Happ though has also been a surprise this year after an inconsistent time before.
The Blue Jays will still serve as Canada's sole baseball hope (unless the Montreal Expo's reform) but it might be a few years yet until we see a third world series banner hanging over the Rogers Centre
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