The final installment of the roundtable takes a look at the team going forward:
Coach: The only thing that will stop the negativity is winning. Increasing the payroll and signing a marquee free agent (Delgado or equivalent) won't silence the people who went seamlessly from "Tosca must go" to "Tosca was a scapegoat" without pausing for breath. Or the ones who decried Gibby as a poor choice but now complain that he got only a one-year deal.
Anyone who truly believes that the 2004 standings are an accurate portrayal of the Jays' talent level or management acumen has his own agenda and isn't going to listen to reason. Those who demand a quick fix and a contender in 2005 are almost certainly going to be disappointed. Some of us, gifted with more vision or at least a bit of patience, are prepared to enjoy the continued improvement and wait for 2006, 2007 or whenever the stars align in the opposite pattern to this year.
Gerry: JP has $12 or $13 million to spend this winter, are you confident he will bring in the right guys? I don't know myself.
I think the plexiglass principal had a lot to do with 2004, I know I was doubting KC's chances this year because of their big jump last year, but I did not put the Jays in the same category, I should have.
With Delgado's departure how many above average players do you see in the Jays lineup next year?
Zaun is likely to regress to his mean.
Hudson is good, but only average offensively
Adams, as a young guy, is hard to assume him to be above average
Hinske has settled into "averageness"
Cat/Reed could be above average
Wells should be above average, but until he controls his aggressiveness his upside is limited
Rios should improve but might still just be average
1B and DH are unknown
For the Jays offense to take off next year we need Hudson and Hinske to raise their games and Rios to blossom. Hinske just turned 27 and Husdon will turn 27 in December so maybe JP is counting on the career year at 27 principal.
The Pitching should be better next year, Halliday, Lilly and Bush give the Jays a solid 1-2-3. Towers and a free agent fill out the list. The bullpen should be better, I look for Speier and Ligtenberg to bounce back and for the young guys to be better with experience.
Unless the Jays spend a lot on a fifth starter the rotation will be two starters short of the foundation for the future. The farm depth is still not there, McGowan, Rosario, Chacin and Banks need one more year each, but 2006 should be interesting with those bargaining chips.
Expectations for 2005 should be set at a .500 team, with possible career years moving the team up.
The rotation for 2006 should be full of home grown talent, setting the base for contention for the next few years (the Minnesota, Oakland plan).
Mike Green: I agree with Gerry about the expectations for the ballclub in 05-07. The team is likely to be pitching-heavy, with the cream rising in late 05. If the team plays well in early 05, and is within sniffing distance in July, mid-season promotions could make it interesting. More likely though is a .500 ballclub in 2005, with improvement in 06.
Pistol: As with any team in the bottom third of payroll success is only going to come from the acquisition and development of minor leaguers into productive major league players. The Jays are clearly headed on this course, but there have been bumps in the road that have slowed this course down. Contending in 2005 is probably unrealistic at this point, unless just about everything breaks right in Toronto.
But after that time there’s a real good chance that Toronto could develop one of the dominant staffs in baseball. Halladay obviously leads the way and is a #1 starter when healthy, and Bush looks like he’ll be a mainstay in the rotation for several years. Following them are a number of pitchers, all of who could be at least middle of the rotation quality starters, and a few that could be potential aces: League, McGowan, Rosario, Chacin, Banks, Marcum, Purcey, and Z Jackson. Even if only 2 of those 8 work into good starters that still gives you 4 reliable starters. If 3 of those 8 work out you’re going to be paying your 5 starters about $15 million in 2007.
As an aside, given the pitching working its way through the farm system, I’d be very receptive to listening to trade offers for Ted Lilly this offseason. His value is pretty high right now and he’s under contract for next year at a very reasonable $3.1 million. After next year I believe he’s in his final arbitration year which, if he pitches like he did this season, will likely cost at least twice next year’s contract. Toronto isn’t likely going to be keeping Lilly at that price, and he won’t have as much value then in a trade as he does now. If ever there’s a time to trade a player it’s trading Lilly now. The pitching would probably suffer next year as a result, but if taking a step back next year means two steps forward in 2006 shouldn’t you do it?
While the minor leagues don’t have nearly the amount of positional prospects as pitchers, there are less holes to fill. I would figure that Wells, Rios, Hudson, and Adams are locked in for several years, and it looks like Aaron Hill is well on his way to joining that group as well. Hopefully Quiroz can be a productive catcher, but catchers are unpredictable. That leaves a corner OF, 1B and DH to fill. In the short term it looks like Johnson and Cat will split one of those spots. Ideally, the remaining two spots are filled by above average players which the Jays will need to acquire in one form or another, assuming Delgado doesn’t re-sign (FWIW, I’d be willing to pay Delgado $10 million for the next 3 years).
So my outlook for next year is a team at or slightly over .500. After that I can see the team exploding into a serious contender at any point between 2006-2008.
Mike D: Assuming Toronto loses Delgado and doesn't replace him with a splashy slugger, something's gotta give. How can you run a walks-and-power offence with no walks and no power?
The question is, which of the following three things is more likely to happen?
1. The Jays loosen their purse strings, since power is always expensive and walks are no longer undervalued;
2. The Jays tweak their offensive philosophy, adding emphasis on speed and batting average (i.e., ability to make contact against tough pitching) to the lineup while hopefully continuing to preach selectivity and patience at the plate;
3. The Jays pull an Oakland and throw all their resources into constructing a club that pitches and defends well enough to compete. (Can this work at SkyDome?)
I have a terrible fear that the Jays will lose Delgado and choose none of the above three options clearly. When Delgado was hurt, the Jays had a slow, strikeout-prone, punchless team that didn't defend well. Needless to say, that's no recipe for success.
Jordan: I think that going the pitching and defense route would be not a bad idea at all, especially for the long term. Assuming no more injury disasters (an admittedly sizable assumption), the Jays have one ace (Doc), a strong #2 candidate (Bush), and a solid #3 guy who could still break out (Lilly), all locked in for '05. In the wings, they have exciting young arms like League, Rosario, Banks, and hopefully McGowan. Lock up Orlando Hudson and his gold glove at second, and keep an improving Russ Adams at shortstop; with a maturing Guillermo Quiroz behind the plate, you're solid up the middle. A Gross-Wells-Rios outfield would also be a huge defensive plus.
Accordingly, would it be worth the post-Delgado Jays investing in a Matt Clement or a Carl Pavano, to work on assembling a truly superior pitching staff, to support an opportunistic yet still only average offence? Maybe not in 2005 would that pay off, but by 2006, would anyone in the league be able to compete with that pitching and defence combo? It's worth thinking about.
Thomas: The potential pitching riches of the Jays have been addressed well in the above comments. However, the focus has tended to be on the starting staff, so what can we expect from the bullpen moving forwards? If we are looking more to the 2006 or 2007 timeframe, I think the only name that we can assume will be in the bullpen with any degree of certainty (obviously injuries or other very unforseen situations might interfere) is Brandon League, who looks like he'll be a very good releiver. Before this year Adam Peterson would have been on the list, but after the Syracuse meltdown he experienced after his short stint in the majors, he can no longer be counted as a sure thing. I'd still lay my money on him to turn into an above-average arm out of the bullpen, but it's not the near-sure thing it used to be.
If we count those two arms that gives the Jays two hard-throwing righthanders. Other potential names that come to mind are Fransisco Rosario, Jason Frasor, Miguel Batista or a pitcher like Shuan Marcum or "Nasty" Tom Mastny whose stuff ends up being better suited to the bullpen. Even though he'll still be relatively cheap I'm not convinced Frasor will be a Jay in two years and I don't think Batista will be in the bullpen in 2006, either. However, we can say the Jays can maybe count on one or two more arms coming up internally, either a name listed above or perhaps a suprise that the Jays weren't expecting to become a starter.
It's still clear that the Jays will have to search externally to round off the bullpen. It's premature to speculate on who they might seee to sign or trade for heading into the 2006 or 2007 season, but hopefully with the rise of young talent some of the free money could be directed towards signing a proven reliever, if it looks like we'll need someone to help put us over the top.
Finally, I'll have an article up shortly on the best relievers in Japan (hopefully this weekend). Based on the prices fetched by releivers last year, I believe the NPB is still not being properly utilised as a source of talent, and thus Japanese relievers are still undervalued. This could change for this year based on the performances of Otsuka and Takatsu, but as of now it's still an avenue the Jays should explore, in my opinion. If one of the better relievers is posted, assuming the Blue Jays consider character and do a careful scouting job of the player, I think a multi-year contract would be advisable. These pitchers still aren't fetching their market value in most cases, and to lock up a good pitcher for several years (two plus an option maybe) would ensure that come 2006/7 the Jays still have him at a reasonable price. Yes, it could backfire and leave the Jays stuck on a bad contract for two or three years, but I'd rather go that route than sign Buddy Groom to be our LOOGY for 2005. The potential payoff is very high, as we've seen this year, and in my mind it's a gamble well-worth taking.
Mike Green: I'd add Chulk to the middle inning relief list. Like Moffatt, I favour a 5 or 6 man bullpen, and it's better if there is also a spot in the bullpen reserved for up-and-coming young starters (Chacin, Banks, Rosario, Purcey...) for a period.
No more than 1 reliever should be committed to past 2005, in my view, and even that is questionable. With the amount of pitching talent on the way, it would be reasonable to avoid spending significant cash on the bullpen.
Jonny German: Gerry referred to Orlando Hudson as "only average offensively". That's true compared to an average AL hitter, but compared to an average AL second baseman his 2004 performance was superior by 20 points of OBP and 40 points of SLG.
Let's run through all the 2004 American League positional averages:
AVG OBP SLG
C .264 .326 .410
1B .266 .346 .447
2B .259 .320 .397
3B .269 .343 .449
SS .274 .327 .420
LF .281 .347 .448
CF .280 .339 .430
RF .275 .344 .436
DH .263 .345 .439
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=20041111104656999