To start the key word is change and to the good more than to the bad lets start with the club house changes out are Vernon Wells and Lyle Overbay who showed little to no interest to get the job done on the field as they both looked like guys just picking up pay checks with Vernon being hot and cold year to year. This is because he would not hit the ball @ home and then go on the road hit the cover off the ball and when he grounded out he would not hustle to first-base while Overbay never was a good hitter and had lost most of his power and we were being feed the line "O' Overbay is a great fielding first-baseman and he saves runs which is OK if he was getting paid 2 Mil but instead he was getting 7-8 Mil. This could very easily rub off on the younger players and in their place we have Jose Bautista who is a very vocal leader and works will with players from Dominican Republic and has already set a good example as Yunel Escobar played a ball with his head not in the game behind his head and it went down the line and after the game Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion (also from the Dominican Republic) sat down with Escobar and told him this is not the way we play here and Escobar went to John farrell and said "I'm sorry and it won't happen again" and then Escobar went out and hit 400 for the spring and played solid D.
The Infield
Arron Hill is a solid second-baseman and Yunel Escobar can be a suitable shortstop if he keeps his head in the game while Edwin Encarnacion is a big question mark with his throwing arm not as good as it needs to be to get the ball across the diamond to first base but Brett Lawrie maybe at third before the end of the season. Then there is Adam Lind who has picked up a first- basemen's glove and will be playing first and trying to keep the ball in front of him and not making errors and then there is J.P. Arencibia as the leader of the pitching staff also known as the catcher and he can be good but it will be the first long stretch as the No.1 catcher and more importantly Jose Molina is the back-up and is a question mark as he is a lazy back-up so the times he gets in he is slappy. The best thing about J.P. Arencibia is that he has worked with most of pitchers in the minors and has basically come up with them so he should know their way of getting the job done.
The Outfield
Rajai Davis is fast so he will be able to cover the outfield and that is what you want from center field and if he can judge the ball of the bat and make the right decisions he could be a lesser version of Devon White. Right field is Jose Bautista and he was there last summer so he should be comfortable in right field and Travis Snider will get more time in Left field as Cito is no longer able to keep him on the bench so Travis should be more comfortable playing everyday in the outfield.
Pitchers
Ricky Romero is a solid pitcher who can keep batters of the bases as they were hitting 2.42 against him last season with 174 strikeouts to 82 walks. Kyle Drabek is going to be interesting as it will be his first real test at the major league level because September ball is much different than April or May baseball. Brett Cecil is lacking a little on his fast ball coming into the regular season and will need to get his era down a little with a era over 4 last season while having 117 strikeouts in 172.1 innings compared to 54 walks while having given up 175 hits. Jessie Litsch has the most seasons with the Blue Jays and is a couple of years removed from a 13-9 season where he had 99 strikeouts and 39 walks with 178 hits given up in 176 innings pitched so it maybe a little bit of a make or break season for Jessie. Jo Jo Reyes who has had 1 season as a every 5 day starter and it was not pretty with a 3 and 11 record in 22 starts with 134 hits given up in 113 innings pitched with 52 walks and 78 strikeouts and then there is Brandon Morrow who hopefully will only miss a couple of starts and then him and his fast ball takes control of the betters and make them look silly especially if he can find his control because when he is on he is on and when he is off the defense will be kept busy as batters will be jugging down to first base as he can give up a lot of walks.
The bullpen
David Purcey and Marc Rzepczynski will be the guys looking to eat up innings if starters get lite up early along with Casey Jenssen and Casey maybe the first to go into the rotation as he was strong at times especially before his arm got tired so if it is a two or three game start he should be fine but if he gets up to like 10 straight starts the Jays maybe in trouble. While Shawn Camp, Jason Frasor, and Charlie Villanueva will be asked to bridge the gap between the 7th and 9 inning and Camp and Frasor will be able to do this as it is a lot less pressure for Frasor from being the closer last year and maybe asked to set-up for Jon Rauch who will be the closer early on this season.
The Batting Line-up
The big questions will be if Arron Hill and Adam Lind can get a good start to this season as they had a bad beginning to the season last year even though they still hit homers but everybody hit homers last year. Then Will Travis Snider be better at the plate as he will be playing everyday and be more comfortable as he knows he will not be taken out if he strikes out and how much of a deep of will Bautista have this season coming off a career season. Can Davis start the Blue Jays off on the right foot by getting on base and getting into scoring with a hit and run or a stolen base and how will Juan Rivera react to be a cold hitter as a DH after being an outfielder for a number of seasons and hopefully he can hit closer to 300 than to his 252 batting average of last season.
I think the Blue Jays can be in that 84-88 win range and lets hope the fans show up after opening day unlike the Expos before they left
Tom Mehegan
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