Biggest Jay problems fixable
If and when the Blue Jays get this mini-wreck of a season turned around, it will happen for the simplest of reasons: They will throw more strikes and swing at more strikes.
The 2013 Jays still don’t play the game particularly well, but many sins differ from last year’s gruesome display of Farrellball. You remember those first-inning bunts, how they ran the bases as if they’d tried peyote for lunch and too often played defence as if someone had just released a hungry leopard on to the field?
Thankfully, under John Gibbons bunts are pretty much history — they can’t bunt well, but that’s another story — and brain-dead baserunning seems to have been reined in. Remember all those guys thrown out trying to steal third base with Jose Bautista or Edwin Encarnacion up and two out? Haven’t seen that this year.
While they lead the American League in both errors and unearned runs allowed, at least entering Friday night’s game in Yankee Stadium, modern metrics suggest they aren’t nearly so hopeless defensively. Then again, Rajai Davis’s bullet throw to the plate Wednesday, helping avert an embarrassing sweep in Baltimore, was a rarity; outfield tosses are seldom accurate, particularly when Bautista is missing. No team has everything, though, and whatever scratches and dents the Jays possess, they remain capable of fixing the biggest problems, which have to do with strikes and not enough of them. Jays hitters tend to swing at pretty much everything, whether in the strike zone or not and too often not. Naturally, this means not drawing enough walks. (For instance Oakland, which draws about 50 per cent more walks than the Jays, had scored 50 per cent more runs and while walks are not the only difference, they’re a big difference.) Gregg Zaun, one of the few loyal Rogers employees not always in sugar-coat mode, constantly mentions Jays hitters arriving at home plate without a game plan. Home runs are great, and Jays hit their share and more, but situational hitting is lacking; so-called “productive” outs are rare. They are third-worst at striking out in the league and quadruple-A Houston naturally is one of the more frequent whiffers. The Jays don’t have enough hitters who grind away at counts and stretch out enemy pitchers. Example: Last weekend, facing 40- year-old Andy Pettitte, the final four batters Pettitte retired in the seventh and eighth innings made outs on the first pitch. That would be inexcusable for a kids’ team. Still, the main problem is fixable — if the team wants it to be: Players either start making the most of their at-bats or the Jays try different players. It’s still early, but it’s not too early. On the other side of the ball, the Jays had allowed the most hits in the league, ranked 14th in runs allowed (thanks again, Houston), 12th in walks allowed and 13th in WHIP. Some of this shabbiness might be attributable to R.A. Dickey’s continuing neck/back issues, but more of it comes from the swelling of numbers that most National League pitchers endure when they come to the AL. Loading up on NL starters (even though Mark Buehrle was there only briefly) suggests this sludgy start is no great surprise. As with hitting approach, though, the problem can be corrected if the team chooses. After the proper period of adjustment for the newcomers has been reached, if your boys still don’t throw enough strikes, you bring in boys who will. There’s a reason, beyond impressing new neighbours in Buffalo, that Alex Anthopoulos has been working the waiver wire like a guy eating peanuts; at some point organizational depth will play a role. The question is whether it will be sooner or later.