Thursday, April 29, 2010

C'mon Down to the Great At Bat Giveaway!


Get your front foot down and get them while they're hot! We've got league-leading impatience available for you at rock bottom prices!
  • Out of zone swings? WE GOT'EM
  • League Worst On Base Percentage? WE'RE NEARLY THERE!
  • Contact Rate on Pitches in the Hitting Zone? BOTTOM FIVE AND AIMING FOR THE CELLAR!
  • Walk per Strike Out Rate? SO LOW, YOU'D THINK WE'VE SUFFERED BRAIN DAMAGE!!
  • Fly Balls? LEAGUE MOST! More balls sent skyward than the Pride Parade!
  • Infield Fly Balls aka Automatic Outs? CAN'T BEAT US IN THE AMERICAN LEAGUE!
The era of patience and avoiding outs is over. This is the dawn of a new epoch, one of grips, rips, and sitting on the fastball come hell or high water. The time has come to to make Jon Lester & Clay Buchholz1 look like Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale.

It's fine, we've got some big sticks on this club. We're so good, in fact, we aren't interested in getting into hitter's counts, the 2010 Toronto Blue Jays are all about trying to hit the pitcher's pitch. We'll flail at a thousand sliders low and away before we take one fastball off the plate. Aggression isn't just out motto, it's our way of life!

1 To be fair, both these guys pitched brilliantly. Credit to them; though pitching against the Jays isn't exactly grounds for hazard pay these days.

Image courtesy of Flickr user Nep, depression courtesy of Fangraphs.

13 comments:

  1. When I read that sign, I'm shouting it in my head in a monster truck announcer voice. Try it, it's fun.

    Scott

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  2. Word to Scott on that comment. Same here.

    And Drew, this is exactly why this team is so hard to watch at times.

    Growing up a baseball player without any real power, I knew i had to do two things - don't strike out (give an at bat away) and don't pop up.

    I've seen so many at-bat given away this season - three to four pitch strikeouts when you know a deuce is coming (out of the zone) with 2 strikes, pop ups on the first pitch. Opposing pitch counts are incredibly low.

    Lester has been awful this year. Yet the Jays had, what, 1 hit? And 15 times as many K's.

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  3. If one didn't know better, one might think you were pinning this on the manager.

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  4. Good thing Cito's at the helm, what with his ability to work with hitters and all...

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  5. You see, this is why I hate statistics. Because they keep making me sad.

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  6. Cito was actually critisizing Overbay the other day for being too patient at the plate. You know, the same Overbay who's led te team in OBP for years, and just got off to his worst start ever as he hacked away at pretty much everything opposing pitchers threw at him?

    This team was fun to watch for a while but it's pretty obvious that the whole league is aware of their approach... If the bitters do t adjust then we're going to be stuck watching a lineup comprised almost entirely of 1997 Joe Carters striking out while The Manager praises their aggression.

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  7. That picture makes this post even more amazing. I can't wait until the Clarence sale is over forever this September.

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  8. That picture is my find of the year. Amazing.

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  9. Did anybody else notice that when the count is 2-0, or 3-1 there's an unwritten code to take the pitch, even if it is a fastball?

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  10. Yeah, I don't get why even people who think Clarence is an awful manager are so quick to concede his incredible hitting prowess.

    "Hey, let's make Adam Lind a one dimensional pull hitter!" I think home runs are the only things that arouse Cito anymore. Swinging for the fences every at bat makes for boring baseball. But it takes the least amount of strategizing, because you know, Cito deserves a break after winning those 2 rings.

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  11. Took me a while to notice that the sign said Clarence instead of Clearance.

    Well played.

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