Washington released John Patterson.  He was pretty good a couple of years back, and he's not that old.  Is he a better option than Litsch?

It's really easy to forget that Alomar only played 5 years in Toronto. Especially after The Incident, I pretty much put him out of my mind. It's a little odd to look back and see he played 12 years after that.

I really like the idea of Alomar being the first true Blue Jay in the HOF, because he started his career (in earnest) in Toronto. It's the closest we have to a home-grown HOF-caliber star.

Now that his career is over, and especially if he gets in to the Hall, we can finally forgive and forget. :)

I'd certainly think Patterson would be worth it on a minor league deal. The team could even include a condition that he'd have to be on the big league roster by June 1 or he can choose to become a free agent and seek a better opportunity elsewhere. However, if Washington's front office has concluded he's not throwing well enough to make their staff, which isn't exactly among the league's best, I'd be hesitant to give him any sort of guaranteed deal.

I imagine and would surely hope that people have gotten over any hard feelings for Alomar. He left, but has returned. He wants to be the first ever Jay to be represented in the Hall and we should embrace this 100 percent. He has shown the ability to move on and come back to the city he loves.

I can't think of a better way to kickoff the home schedule than a packed house giving Alomar a standing ovation.

Jay Bruce was sent down.  The Reds will start the season with Corey Patterson in centerfield.  For the Reds' sake, I hope that this was a service time decision, but with Dusty there, that might not be a reasonable assumption.

I'd certainly think Patterson would be worth it on a minor league deal. The team could even include a condition that he'd have to be on the big league roster by June 1 or he can choose to become a free agent and seek a better opportunity elsewhere. However, if Washington's front office has concluded he's not throwing well enough to make their staff, which isn't exactly among the league's best, I'd be hesitant to give him any sort of guaranteed deal.

He does not appear to be healthy. Hasn't been since 2006.

I suspect Hirschbeck would gladly take a lot more spitting if it would lead to what Alomar has done to make up for it.  I think, in the end, one has to give Alomar a lot of credit.  Many athletes today, when caught doing something wrong, tend to shrug it off or worse treat it as if it was nothing (think of the rapes and beating some girlfriends have received, or Tony LaRussa driving drunk).  Alomar did something that was gross but not horrid (a paper towel would clean it off) and then went on to spend a lot of time and money making amends. 

If Robbie acted like other players (Daryl Strawberry and his actions towards his wife, Gooden and his drugs, Albert Belle chasing kids with his car, Elijah Dukes and his assortment of stuff) who all pretended nothing happened for a long, long time if not forever...well...to me Alomar showed class after doing something classless.

As to his sit down in '95 after the team management quit on the season lets look closer...
First - Alomar wanted to negotiate an extension before the '95 season but Ash, in his amazing wisdom, decided that players would be making less after the strike thus figured he'd wait until after '95 - good way to treat your franchise player eh?  FYI: never ask Ash for investment advise :)

Second - the Jays started off thinking they were contenders despite losing Ward (closer) and having Lance Parrish (under 150 AB's the past two seasons combined) as their #1 catcher, and rookie Sandy Martinez as the backup catcher.  Didn't seem too crazy at the time with the rotation of Hentgen/Leiter/Guzman/Cone [all but Cone under 30] and a pen that was good outside of vet Danny Cox (64 ERA+).  The lineup still had Olerud/Alomar/Sprague/Carter/White/Molitor and two kids, Alex Gonzalez and Shawn Green.  Getting a solid catcher should've been the priority, but it looked decent here anyways.

Third - despite this the team was 14-18 at the end of May doing the odd thing of starting Danny Darwin (ERA+ 80 and under for two years before, then two good starts here but just 5 innings each before getting his butt handed to him for 3 starts and getting 6 more starts with just one being a quality start).  Woody Williams was left to rot  at the back end of the pen until July when he got hurt.  A trade for a starting pitcher would've been a really good idea especially given the minors were pretty weak on the pitching front.  The Jays were 6 1/2 behind Boston, 1/2 a game out of 2nd place at the end of May. 

Fourth - Team record and standing at the end of each month (April was too short to count)
May: 14-18 6 1/2 out
June: 23-34 10 out
July: 38-48 10 out but 5 1/2 from the wild card

Wow, totally forgot how close the Jays still were despite sucking when Cone was traded.  The Jays were 6 out of the playoffs the day Cone was traded (the 28th of July).

So, when Cone was traded the Jays were in eyeshot of the playoffs despite having issues with the catching and 5th starter.  The rotation had lots of issues with Guzman having his worst season as a Jay (75 ERA+ on the year, his ERA was 7.13 at the time of Cone's trade).  Guzman would miss most of August and come back with an ERA under 5 in his final 7 starts.  Hentgen had an ERA of 5.94 at the trade date, 4.10 after.  Cone had a solid year as did Leiter.  Thus the Jays were in eyeshot despite having Danny Darwin start 11 games and Guzman & Hentgen stinking up the joint.  If I was a player on that team I'd have been angry about giving up too.

Think about it, here you have a team with a solid looking offense and 2 aces (Leiter and Cone) plus two potential aces who were having horrible first halves.  It was reasonable to think Guzman and Hentgen, both fairly young, would recover in the 2nd half and that trading for a solid pitcher might push the Jays along enough to shift from also-rans to contenders as a 500 record looked good enough to make it.  Instead the Jays gave up and dumped Cone to one of the teams they were chasing (the Yankees).  For example, Jim Abbott was traded the day before the Cone trade for a package of go-nowhere minor leaguers with an ERA of 3.36 (went on to have one of 4.15 for the Angels 113 ERA+ before collapsing the next season).  As to comebacks, Seattle was 10 games out of the lead in the west on July 28th and would go on to win it.

In retrospect it made sense as Guzman went down for August, the club as a group slumped and Alomar left once that horrible season was over and use the high pick to take Billy Koch.  Sadly, the team was very, very poorly run at the time and we saw stupidity like signing Erik Hanson that offseason and many years of mediocrity to come.

Alomar's sit down hurt, but it reflected the mood of the players and fans.  If you are giving up then dump everyone.  If you are contending then sign your big players now and keep Cone.  Instead they went half way and we watched a lot of mediocre baseball while the fans left in droves.

I've heard talk that the great Jeff Kent, deemed expendable by the Jays largely because of Alomar, might end up with enough Hall support to get in.
Certainly helps his cause playing in LA rather than say, KC or Cincinnati or Milwaukee.

Speaking of Cincy, has good ol' Junior got zero chance at immortality by this point? Would he need to come up with a couple MVP-calibre seasons to become anything more than a footnote in baseball lore?

Griffey Junior? He is a HOF lock.
593 home runs (600 this year I'm sure)
2558 hits and a shot at 3000 still
1701 RBI so 2000 is in eyeshot
13 All-Star appearances
1 MVP award
10 times getting MVP votes, 5 times in the top 5
305/382/644 in the playoffs
10 Gold Gloves
4 home run titles
8 times with 100 RBI's
6 times over 100 runs scored

That is a HOF lock unless steroids/HGH get mixed in and he has yet to have any rumours about those (you would think he'd be a prime candidate to take HGH given the injury issues in Cincinnati). His 10 most similar after age 37 season includes 5 HOFers, Sosa, Palmeiro, Barry Bonds, Sheffield, and Bagwell.

His most similar by age for #1 has always been a HOFer, first Al Kaline then Mickey Mantle, then Frank Robinson, then Sammy Sosa (OK, probable HOF), and back to Frank Robinson.

Griffey is as locked in as it gets. His injuries put him in the Mickey Mantle class of 'what could have been' but still achieved a ton of stuff. When he left Seattle he was in contention for best ever. Instead he'll 'just' be one of the top 50 ever.

      Hey, where's the thread for the spring-training optimism?   No chatter about all the hints of good things going on in Florida?  The Jays just scored 6 runs in the first inning against the Yankees today.  Jesse Litsch struck out 5 batters in 6 innings yesterday.  AJ's fingernail is growing.  BJ Ryan threw a 30-pitch bullpen and is keen to get back into a game.  Scott Rolen is looking strong and healthy.  Aaron Hil is hitting .469.   Lyle Overbay is fully recovered from last year's injury.   Armando Benitez is hitting 94 on the radar gun in minor-league camp.   And even the catchers are looking good, says Jeff Blair:  "Rod Barajas, who signed a bargain-basement free-agent deal this spring, has impressed the Blue Jays with his defence and approach at the plate. Some with the team now believe he will get more playing time than was originally planned."

    Okay, that was my attempt to spark a little chatter.   Now let the skeptics take over.....

Okay, that was my attempt to spark a little chatter.

Ok, I'll bite.
Take a look at the data table in this article.
I'm thinking a whole lot more people will be writing about the bullpen this year, it is deep.

Good post, China fan. Before Chuck gets here, I'm going to point out that the Jays are astoundingly healthy right at the moment - unless of course they are keeping a large number of secrets. Here is a CBS list of current injuries and suspensions in baseball. The Rangers, Rays, Cards, Brewers, Yanks, Marlins, and Orioles all have at least seven guys dealing with injuries or suspensions. Only the Twins, White Sox, and Cubs appear to be in better shape than the Blue Jays!

One of the most annoying Jays previews I have ever read 

I am a little concerned with Wells still, but everything else seems to look good so far this spring.