This time it's for real.
As always, the grades (and the justifications thereof) are extracted from my nether parts.
A - Outstanding
B - Good
C - Average
D - Below Average (Replacement Level, more or less)
E - Fail
F - Epic Fail
John Gibbons A
Held it all together in the first half, when he found himself managing a team that had just one effective relief pitcher and just one outfielder. You have to like that. I've long thought that decisions work better when you commit yourself to them. Men like Bobby Cox and Dick Williams always had an unshakeable belief in their own judgement - once they made a decision, they stuck with it. (In other words, they weren't like Jimy Williams.) When Dick Williams believed a rookie was ready to take a job, Williams would get rid of the rookie's competition - say, the veteran who'd held the job before - so the kid wouldn't have to be looking over his shoulder. That's not the Gibbons way - by the end of April Gibbons had bailed on his rookie closer and rookie centrefielder and was trying other options. But the Williams approach only works if you have Dick Williams' well-nigh infallible skills as an evaluator of talent. If John Gibbons were to act that way... he'd just be a stubborn fool. And he's not. A man's gotta know his limitations.
Alex Anthopoulos B+
My problem is with the small stuff. The sunny optimism that said let's try a rookie centre fielder, a rookie starting pitcher, and two 20 year olds in the bullpen might have been pushing it just a little. When most of that didn't work out, the team was left scrambling for solutions by the end of April. The fact that John Gibbons was obliged to give more than 300 outfield plate appearances to guys who weren't even outfielders suggests a lack of foresight somewhere along the way. But his big moves worked out great. We won't know, unless he writes his memoirs someday, why Anthopoulos went for the marbles in 2015 instead of 2014. The fact that he was on the last year of his contract is the obvious explanation (in which case, it didn't really do him any good.) But he stepped up, and delivered.
Rogers Communications B
You're off the hook. That wasn't so hard, was it? All you really had to do was step up and pay for two months of David Price. From a public relations standpoint, the Anthopoulos situation was pretty badly bungled. C'est la vie. The corporation knew they had to replace Beeston, they found their guy in mid-season, and he had conditions. The team was below .500 at the time, so if the new guy wanted to run the baseball operation and maybe bring in his own GM.- these were hardly going to be sticking points. It makes sense to commit to the president before the GM, especially when you figure that you need a new GM anyway. I'm just not keen on importing any traditions from Cleveland.
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Josh Donaldson A+
Obviously the team's best player. This might have been the greatest season ever by a Blue Jays player - I like it better than Olerud's 1993 season or Delgado's 2003 season, which only leaves Bautista's performance in 2011. His season reminds me a little of when Molitor came here in 1993. We all knew that coming from County Stadium to the Dome would goose Molitor's offensive numbers, but we were still taken aback by just how great he turned out to be once liberated from his old home field. Similarly, I think we all expected Donaldson to post much better numbers moving from Oakland to Toronto. But I don't think anyone quite expected this.
David Price A
Now with Boston. It sure was fun while it lasted. I don't blame the team for not matching the Boston offer, but it does irritate me a little that they apparently didn't even kick the tires on bringing him back. At least show up for the game, would you?
Jose Bautista A
He's surely slowing down just a little, and for a while there it looked like his arm might never come back (he did put those concerns to rest late in the year.) I think his future home is in left field. But he can still get out in front of a 99 mph fastball, and punish the thing. He's heading into the final year of his contract, and he just turned 35. That alone will probably be enough to discourage people from trying to re-sign him when he goes on the market, and I'll be shocked if he doesn't go on the market. In fact, if the 2016 squad is sitting around .500 at the deadline, the new management will most likely trade him for prospects. Anyway, it wouldn't discourage me. Yes, the majority of players develop, peak and decline in fairly predictable ways. But there are always exceptions to these patterns, and certainly neither Jose Bautista nor David Ortiz has taken that road most travelled. In his last six seasons, age 29-34, Bautista hit .268/.390/.555 - in his age 29-34 seasons, Ortiz hit .283/.390/.564, and it's fair to say Ortiz has earned his money in the five seasons since (.292/.382/.556). There's security in great players, that you don't get from the other ones, and Jose Bautista is a great player. Encarnacion is two years younger, and he'll certainly be cheaper. But Jose Bautista is better than Edwin Encarnacion - and I'll bet all the money in my pockets that five years from Bautista will still be better. What the hell. We'll always have Game Five.
Edwin Encarnacion A
Encarnacion was forced to play a lot of first base early on because of Bautista's shoulder injury - he started 39 games at 1b in April and May, just 20 afterwards. As always, he was a much more dangerous hitter as the DH (.301/.397/.595) than when he had to play the field (.239/.329/.486). As you'll recall, I did some number-crunching and came to the conclusion that this past August was easily the best performance by the team in franchise history. I haven't crunched these numbers (but I am thinking about it!), but it seems possible to me that Encarnacion's work that same month (.407/.460/.919) was the best performance ever by a Blue Jays player in a calendar month.
Marcus Stroman A
It was only four starts. But still... And the fact that he was even there to make them is probably even more impressive.
Marco Estrada B+
There's a kind of fetish around the game in favour of groundball pitchers these days, which is one reason Estrada has always been somewhat lightly regarded. Which is something I find a little weird. After all, the majority of great pitchers are flyball pitchers. They always have been and they always will be. It's true that the minscule BABiP against Estrada was more than a little flukey, but flyball pitchers will always have a better BABiP than you would expect. Flyballs don't find holes between the infielders. They hang up in the air, and outfielders run underneath them and catch them.
Russell Martin B+
He's not quite Buster Posey or Yadier Molina, but he's certainly the best catcher in franchise history, and by far the most complete. His few Blue Jay predecessors who could match his offensive production (Whitt and Fletcher, mainly) couldn't carry his glove, and none of the franchise's defense-first catchers (Borders, O'Brien, Molina) had anything close to Martin's bat.
Chris Colabello B+
Toronto, that mysterious land where RH sluggers finally figure it out as they're turning 30. This is getting weird.
Brett Cecil B+
You can not pitch better than he did in the second half. You just can't.
Roberto Osuna B+
What's the plan here? Another year working short relief (maybe not quite as short as last year) and try to get him ready to try the rotation in 2017? Whatever, just as long as they don't repeat the back-and-forth, back-and-forth Kelvim Escobar experience.
Danny Valencia B+
Now with Oakland. Here we have "Toronto, that mysterious land..." part the umpteenth. He hit .296/.331/.506 as a Blue Jay and went to Oakland and did even better. He had 18 HRs and 66 RBI in less than 400 at bats. It remains a mystery why they cut him loose. Maybe they thought he was too good for the job.
Devon Travis B+
Will spend a good chunk of next year on the DL, and there are obviously two huge questions about him: a) is he anywhere near as good as he looked in his abbreviated rookie year? and 2) did this surgery solve his shoulder issues?
Mark Buehrle B
Once again, he pitched as well as he ever has for half a season and then faded badly over the final two months. Over the last two years, Buehrle has gone 20-11, 2.98 before the All Star Break, and 8-7 4.59 in the second half. This strongly suggests that while he's still a quality major league starter, his days as a workhorse are behind him. If he decides to play in 2016 - as of this writing, the gossip says it will only be for St. Louis, and he hasn't yet decided - he needs to find a situation where he won't be expected to make 32 starts and work 200 innings. Modern rotation management is seldom that flexible. But if he sits out the first month or two and then looks to sign on with someone for the second half.... I'd sure be interested. It's probably more likely that he discovers that "retirement is so much fun!" as Sean Connery said, when he turned down playing Gandalf. (Well, he also said he didn't understand the script...)
Aaron Sanchez B-
Don't quite know what he is, beyond "major league pitcher." Let's find out. He wants to start, and I think you have to give him a chance to try it.
R.A. Dickey B-
More than 200 better than average innings remains enormously valuable. It'll be interesting to see if the repair to his knee makes a difference.
Kevin Pillar B-
As always, his bat drives me absolutely nuts. So
often, he just doesn't seem to have a clue up there. It's why he's not
getting the most out of his talent. And the talent is there. That's what gives one hope that he can figure a few things out
and get better. But in the meantime, a .314 on-base and .399 slugging is not someone who's going to go to any All-Star games unless he can play shortstop like Andrelton Simmons. It can not - no way, no how - be described as "good." That aside, everything else about his game - absolutely everything - is yummy delicious.
Another guy who plays really hard - not always really smart, but still
on the side of the angels. But what's especially nice is that he seems able to play really hard without
hurting himself. That's a real gift. Just try not to hurt the other
players this time. Hey, Mike! I'm coming around!
Liam Hendriks B-
Now with Oakland. Cheering for pitchers named Liam
is part of my DNA, so I'm sad to see him gone. That said, Jesse Chavez
has a real chance to be more useful than Hendriks in 2016. He also has a
chance to be not as good, Youneverknow.
Ben Revere B-
Played just a little better than his established level,
and was a very good fit. It's got to be a nice situation for a LH slap-the-ball-and-run-like-hell type of guy when the other team has to first of all address all
the right-handed power the Jays were throwing on the field.
Troy Tulowitzki C+
Better than Reyes. On this team, he's just a complementary bat. It's his defense that had, and will continue to have, the biggest impact.
Justin Smoak C+
He's a decent defensive first baseman (mind you, after years of Lind and Encarnacion, Smoak looked like a Gold Glover out there) and his power and walks let him chip in with the bat. Nevertheless, I don't really want him back. I think Colabello has earned a chance to take the job, and I don't think you can carry a guy on the bench whose only position is first base. Someone like... oh, Danny Valencia would be much more useful.
Ryan Goins C+
This was a huge year for Goins. No manager in the history of the game ever wanted to make John MacDonald a regular. No manager ever wanted to stick that kind of bat in the lineup. Never. Sometimes they were forced to. Sometimes they just got tired of losing games because of lousy defense. But they never, never willingly chose MacDonald as their first option. Well, coming into this season, it wasn't even clear that Goins could hit at the John MacDonald level. At this time last year, I was reviewing the names of several National League pitchers who were quite clearly more dangerous with the bat. So this was a big step for Goins. His 2015 season was better than almost any MacDonald season, and his glove work, as always, was simply breath-taking. He might be the best defensive infielder this franchise has ever had.
Mark Lowe C
Now with Detroit. Big arm, had his moments. Gibbons seemed to have some trouble trusting him at first (his awful Jays debut probably accounts for that) but he was fine after that. Only walked one guy as a Blue Jay.
LaTroy Hawkins C
Pitched pretty well when he first got here, but had obviously used up all the bullets in his arm by the time the calendar hit September. It was nice having him around. It was interesting watching him pitch, stretching out those long basketball player's arms, like an enormous praying mantis. We got to discover why he's been such a popular guy with the fans and team mates of the other ten teams that had employed him along the way. The man made a lot of friends and earned almost $50 million dollars as well. Not bad.
Daniel Norris C
Now with Detroit. Had a pretty exciting year. Made a major league rotation out of spring training, got traded, hit a home run, had to deal with cancer. Good luck to him.
Dioner Navarro C-
Now with the White Sox, where he'll fight Alex Avila for playing time. That's better for him than fighting with Russell Martin.
Ezequiel Carrera C-
Not an ideal fourth outfielder (I wouldn't want to
see him play CF, would you?) but he was pretty useful on a team that
found itself regularly putting career infielders in the outfield for a
little On-the-Job Training.
Jose Reyes C-
Now with Colorado. His game is not aging very well, but he's got bigger problems than that.
Bo Schultz C-
He's kind of Ryan Tepera lite. Schultz doesn't allow
quite as many home runs (that would be pretty difficult) but he still
gave up way too many. And Schultz is not quite as impressive when he is
keeping the ball in the park.
Drew Hutchison D
In the year 2525, if man is still alive, we still won't be able to make sense of Drew Hutchison's home-road splits. It is a phenomenon outside of human understanding or knowledge. Like the song the sirens sang, or the infield fly rule.
Ryan Tepera D
Allowed 8 HRs in 33 IP. The man only allowed 23 hits, and 8 of them left the yard?
Miguel Castro D
Now with Colorado. Had some trouble locating the strike zone in 2015, at all four stops. Just turned 21 in December, so he should have some time to find it.
Felix Doubront D
A left-hander with a decent looking arm? He'll be getting chances from people for another ten years. In related news. that was Jo-Jo Reyes winning a game for the Angels at the end of the season. See?
Munenori Kawasaki D
Now with the Cubs, which seems appropriate. He's always reminded me of a guy who would have been a fine major leaguer around 1908. That, of course, was when the Cubs ruled the world.
Cliff Pennington D
Now with the Angels. Pennington actually used to be a pretty good shortstop, but that was five years ago. Now he's just an ordinary second baseman, who doesn't give you as much with the bat as Kawasaki. At this point, I'd say he needs to come up with a good off-speed pitch if he expects to get by with that 90 mph heater.
Aaron Loup D
It was a very difficult year for Loup, on a number of fronts, but I expect he should be able to recover his innate ability to mess with LH batters. It's enough to give him a career.
Dalton Pompey D
It worked out so well the last time the organization tried to force a 22 year old prospect into an everyday outfield job, you can see why they'd want to to do it again. Sheesh. Don't force the kid into taking the job. Let the kid force you into giving him the job.
Josh Thole D
The reason he remains in the major leagues, and the reason he'll be back in 2016, is because it's a really good idea to have someone who can spare Russell Martin the burden of catching Dickey's knuckleball. Being the regular catcher is tough enough already. Only a handful can manage as many as 120 games a season as is. Making the same guy also catch a knuckleball on a regular basis... well, that's just mean.
Steve Delabar D-
I've always liked Delabar, but I'm not going to be stubborn about it. He hasn't pitched well since the 2013 All-Star Game, the one he was mysteriously invited to suit up for. The bases on balls had killed his game since then, but in 2015 he did something that got that under control. Alas, while his BB/9 returned to their regular levels, this happened at the expense of the rest of his game. His strikeouts fell, his hits allowed jump. Same crap, new recipe.
Steve Tolleson D-
Now with the Orioles. That was messy.
Scott Copeland E
I don't believe he can pitch in the major leagues. Useful organizational depth, because he can get AAA hitters out. But if you see him on a major league mound, things have gone awry.
Jeff Francis E
Retired. He was obviously never the same after the 2009 shoulder surgery. Because he was left-handed, and because he had been a very good pitcher (and in Coors, too!), teams kept giving him chances. He pitched in six seasons after the surgery, and went 21-38, 5.32, ERA+ of 82. He did earn roughly $17 million playing baseball, and half of that came after the surgery.
Todd Redmond E
Now with Baltimore. I think he's done. He's reached that age in a right-hander's life when The Change happens, and he's not good enough to survive what ensues.
And as advertised, we have a podcast version of the whole thing. It consists of young Eephus and I yakking away about the team. It comes in three parts, and here are the links.
Part 1 - The Hitters
Part 2 - The Relievers
Part 3 - The Starters
Because this piece went live Before Its Time, people read it and commented on grades that had not been weighed and calibrated with that precision you've come to expect from me. (I start with a list of names, throw a letter beside them, and start commenting. When I'm done, I... make revisions!) Anyway, that's my fault.
Also - the grades given above may not perfectly
match what you hear me say, should you listen to my recorded musings. For much the same reason. Science can probably be defined as "that thing I do not do."
But hey - I did tell you where I was getting
them from....
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=2015091704362930