Lansing and Auburn were also extended until 2010.
Since Toronto owns the affiliates in Dunedin and the Gulf Coast League, they are locked in to all their affiliates for the foreseeable future - except Syracuse, which I believe expires after 2008. It's nice to see since the Jays don't have any clubs with parks that significantly skew stats, like Lancaster, High Desert, etc. Lansing, though, is in the Midwest League which limits home runs.
The downside to Toronto owning Dunedin and the GCL is that they do not promote and market the clubs as aggressively as the independently-owned affiliates so it is always harder to get information of the club and players.
The downside to Toronto owning Dunedin and the GCL is that they do not promote and market the clubs as aggressively as the independently-owned affiliates so it is always harder to get information of the club and players.
This is good for us as it makes it a lot easier to follow the minors if the teams stay stable for awhile. I still think 'Knoxville' when thinking of AA and 'Myrtle Beach' for full-season A (still have a t-shirt from that teams first season). I also miss having a team in Medicine Hat just because I thought it was cool that a team played there.
Jays sign Barajas. A year late but nonetheless a good backup option.
http://tsn.ca/mlb/news_story/?ID=228127&hubname=mlb
http://tsn.ca/mlb/news_story/?ID=228127&hubname=mlb
Shocked that the Jays signed him. When I read on Rotoworld earlier today that he was still looking for a job, my initial thought was, "Well, I know one team that won't be contacting him."
The Jays placed three prospects on Baseball Americas' 31st Team. The team consists of the best players that didn't get into the 2008 Handbook. MG's fave Joel Collins, southpaw Luis Perez and eleventh rounder Brad Emaus get write-ups.
Larry Milson has an organizational update at Baseball America, in whcih he focuses on Brett Cecil. It's nothing earth-shattering, but is intriguing because Cecil is once again described as having a splitter as his third pitch:
Cecil, 21, mixes a 92 mph fastball with an 86 mph slider that he uses as his out pitch, and he also throws a split-finger pitch.
Because Millson has a quote from Cecil (albeit not about his pitch arsenal), I wonder if it indicates that this is Cecil's description of his stuff. It's more likely that Millson hurried together a piece on Cecil and pulled a quote from him out of archives.
In BA's review of the top 10 prospects, there's no mention of the Splitter. But in their review of Romero, they talk about his "Vulcan Change", which sounds a lot like a split finger pitch. So maybe Romero throws a similar change that grips and moves like a splitter.
My only previous clue to Cecil having a splitter was also from BA, via Pistol's draft review.
The only thing I can add, is that the person who wrote the Top 10 write-ups (Matt Eddy), was not covering Cecil at college or in the NYPL. That was Aaron Fitt, who's likely responsible for the writeup that Pistol cited.