Pre-Opening Day Sundaze

A few things to take care of here on the dawn of the season. Firstly, a little rosterbation and/or lineup wankery. I'll post my dream lineup alongside Cito's probably Opening Day lineup, the one he's currently engraving in tablet until injury forces his hand.

Cito's Jays Marco Scutaro, SS Aaron Hill, 2B Alex Rios, RF Vernon Wells, CF Adam Lind, DH Scott Rolen, 3B Lyle Overbay, 1B Rod Barajas, C Travis Snider, LF

The Toronto Drew Jays Alex Rios, CF Adam Lind, DH Vernon Wells, LF Travis Snider, RF Scott Rolen, 3B Lyle Overbay, 1B Aaron Hill, 2B Rod Barajas, C Marco Scutaro, SS

Wow, that was much more difficult than I originally imagined. Despite my most earnest prayers, the Jays don't have a player like Grady Sizemore (pop, speed, and patience) for the top of the order. Am I overrating the ability to see pitches and get on base in the number one slot? Either way, I like Rios in that spot a lot more than Alex Rios does. I fought with myself to leave Hill second, but Adam Lind sees more pitches, hits left and doesn't quite have the power we all wish he did. Aaron Hill doesn't generally swing the bat at the top of the order as well as he does at the bottom, so I'll leave him there to do his thing. Travis Snider hits in the middle of the order because he will fuck you up like a bad accident, why hide him? Scott Rolen almost led off, but he's too awesome for that stigmatized lineup slot. Scutaro and Barajas get the fewest at bats because they're the worst hitters. It's just that simple.

Other Stuff for the Spring Christmas Eve

• I hope this doesn't make me a racist, but I consider the four different black American baseball players that Baseball Daily Digest predicts to compete for Rookie of the Year honours in 2009 a good thing. Am I wrong? Am I racist? More diverse talent pool just makes for better on-field talent, so we the consumer win. Right? Racist!
  
• Baseball Musings compiled the WAR (wins over replacement) totals for every team's lineup, rotation and closer. The Jays rank just above the Orioles with 29.3. The Yankees and Red Sox lead the way. Sigh, No Funeral.
  
• I don't mind that Jeff Blair's proud of not watching Carter's home run, I deeply mind that he exchanged hard-earned currency to watch Madonna. Remember that next time he pimps Gaslight Anthem or something of that ilk.
  
• I wrote a post for Walkoff Walk yesterday based on this post at Baseball Analysts. Championship Win Probability Added and Championship Leverage are enough to blow your mind and make you cry. The Jays "biggest" game of the year, the game with the highest level of importance relative to them making the playoffs took place on May 31st. Let's hope they can hold on until Victoria Day once again.

Finally, the season is about to start. What better way to kick off the 2009 baseball season than joining me at the Score for a live blog of Sunday's Phillies Braves lid-lifter. Everyone who reads this site or any like it believes we baseball fans are underserved (relatively) by the mainstream Canadian media outlets. If we can turn up en force for stuff like this, content producers and suits alike will recognize the breadth and intelligence of Canadian baseball fans and work harder to satisfy our nearly insatiable needs. It's worth a shot, worst case scenario you crack wise with me for a couple hours. What else were you doing on a Sunday night?

/shameless whoring.

Tuesdays are for Whoring

Do you ever feel as though you've stumbled upon the set of a hacky hidden camera show? I was on the subway the other day and I came across a guy that took the "nerd" archetype to new heights. This poor bastard looked like every shitty sketch comedy cliche heaped on top of one another. The ferret-like posture, the mustache/goatee of dried and cracked skin, the Issac Asimov reader (not a book underlined; clearly something that picked up at an event that's title ended in -CON), all the way down to glasses that resembled, in both thickness and aesthetic appeal, the headlights of 1986 K Car. I don't know that I felt bad for him, but I definitely couldn't take my eyes off him.

With that self righteousness out of the way, I encourage everyone to read my Jays season preview over at 3:10 to Joba. These fine fellows are previewing every team in the league, and they asked me to address the desperation felt by Jays fans. The only thing I'm really desperate for is acceptance of the Jays as a good team. I hate that they're swept aside as a "non-contender" despite being such a good team. A little respect is all we ask for, AMIRITE?

Speaking of respect, Walkoff Walk celebrated it's one year anniversary on Saturday. This week kicked off with some best of lists, and today was my turn. It's truly a pleasure to work with those fine gentleman, and I thank them for the opportunity to spread my Clooneyness.

If you are a Mariners fan, there is good reason for excitement. A new GM has taken the club in new and modern directions, giving hope to the pointy heads at USS Mariner. Recently they used the 2003 Mariners as a successful model that the 2009 Mariners could follow. While I don't care too much for the M's, I certainly see connections between the 2003 Mariners team that won 93 games (Pythaged for 98!) and the 2009 Toronto Blue Jays.

In fact, the 2008 or 2009 Jays stack up very favorably to the 2003 Mariners. That year the Mariners had a pretty meager offense, solid pitching and excellent defense. Looking around the diamond, they got next to no production from 4 positions (C, 3B, LF, 1B). The Jays aren't likely to match the 3 offensive wins at DH and 2B, but they can more than make up the slack at the previously mentioned spots. Lyle Overbay should easily match the output of 36 year old John Olerud offensively while providing the same high level of defense.

As the USSers point out, they were one of the top defensive clubs with a +55 for the season. The Jays were +72 last year, and could improve in a few ways. A full season of Aaron Hill, no Mench-Wilkerson-Stairs shaped holes in the outfield, a hopefully recovered (or relocated) Vernon Wells could all contribute to improving the Jays already excellent defense.

Even with big seasons from Bret Boone & Edgar Martinez, an Ichiro-sized season from uh, Ichiro, and average contributions from the rest, that Mariners offense was almost identical to the 2008 Jays. 20 extra points of team OPS, a little higher isolated power (4 points) yet the Mariners were worth almost 50 more runs above average than the 2008 Jays. How could this be? Get the vomitsacks ready, it's all about situational hitting.

The 2003 M's lead the league with a 3.74 "clutch rating", or how much the performed in high leverage situations versus their calculated context neutral rates (WPA/LI). That is a very high number, but not nearly as out of this world lucky as the 2008 Angels, who's unsustainable 7.32 dominated the American League in unnatural ways. As you may know, the 2008 Jays were a terrible situational or clutch team, notching a pathetic -1.65 clutch measurement. The main offenders predictably were Lyle Overbay and Alex Rios, each struggling in high leverage situations.

So a few bounces, continued glove work, the kids make up AJ's 3 wins - boom the Jays win 90 games. Right?? Right??? Why not debate it tonight with the Blue Jay Hunter, he's hosting a live chat over his way at 9pm. Swing by and check it out!

Gumming the Hand that Feeds

As you may have noticed, things look a little different around here today. We GROFmen are lucky enough to be included in the The Score's Sports Federation, a network of blogs from all walks of life. Use the dropdown menu and sample them all. I cannot recommend the Habs blog Lions in Winter enough, because I'm a giant homer.

So yes, there will be an ad or two strewn around, advertising anything from automated kitten drowners to the latest works of Cannibal Corpse. And that's okay, because I never had much credibility in the first place. But we're excited for the opportunity to offend new sets of eyeballs, probably at first glance.

Speaking of offending eyeballs, I just realized how patently ridiculous this site looks when using Internet Explorer. I know! People still use Explorer? Does your Commodore 64 not run Firefox? Heathens. In any event, I'll work to ensure this site looks moderately terrible on whichever platform you choose to allow Google deep inside your psyche.

Blue Jays Stuff

JP says no dice on free agents. It's likely bullshit, but I don't think it's the end of the world. That is a route often frought with disaster, for every Carlos Beltran there's a potential Carlos Beltran waiting around the corner.