(It seems more than a tad overindulgent to attempt to explain away why I haven’t been filling your inboxes with more — or at least SOME — Blue Jays analysis over the past months. Suffice to say, life has generally kept me busy enough that whatever salient thoughts I have on baseball pass through quickly enough that I rarely have time to ponder them long enough to see if they are worth sharing, much less actually capture them as more than passing ephemera. Moreover, when you haven’t written for some extended period, there’s a temptation to think that whatever you produce next needs to be some grand gesture.
I make no promises of salience or grandeur about the following few observations. Mostly, I just wanted to stop by and say hello. And maybe remind myself how to do this.)
That old familiar feeling
The dawn of the Toronto Blue Jays’ 2023 season has left me with a sense of unease. Yes, the team seems poised to perform well this season, with the young core maturing and the recent additions promising a new and different approach to the game.
Still, I find my mood harkening back to the spring of 1992.
I have a vivid memory of an early morning that year, sitting in a McDonald’s, absent-mindedly playing with one of their aluminum ashtrays and reading a Globe and Mail piece from Stephen Brunt.
That year’s edition of the Blue Jays had added Jack Morris and Dave Winfield in the offseason, two veterans who were supposed to help finally push the team over the top. To take the core of the franchise that had been assembled, and add some experience and leadership and savoir-faire to help the team finally attain their long-promised success.
I can’t recall any specifics of Brunt’s prose, but suffice to say, the general tone was “let’s not get too excited.” Winning championships is hard, he suggested, and new and notable additions were certainly no guarantee of success.
We now know it all turned out well in the end , but my feeling in those early days and throughout the 1992 season was very much aligned with Brunt’s perspective, where the emphasis was more on caution and less on optimism.
In retrospect, we may point to the 1987 Blue Jays as having been the greatest heartbreak in the team’s history, but that underplays the succession of disappointments and unfulfilled promise that followed in the seasons to come.
A flat and uninspired 1988 team. A resurgent 1989 team that got its butt whooped by the juggernaut Oakland A’s. Another late season collapse in 1990, losing the pennant in the last weekend of the season. A 1991 team that went out to what felt like an inferior Minnesota Twins team in the ALCS.
By the time 1992 rolled around, you could be forgiven for hesitating to throw your whole heart into the hope that it would turn out better this time.
Zoom ahead to this season, and it’s a similar sense of vigilance that seems to tempering my enthusiasm. One isn’t so careless with their emotions when they’ve had their heart broken too many times,
The 2020 Blue Jays were probably a bit of a tease in a year where we needed the diversion. The 2021 team missing the playoffs on the last day of the season was a reminder of how close you can get while still being so far away. And last year? Well, that’s a bit of anguish from which we’re still averting our thoughts.
There’s ample room for enthusiasm this year, and if you’re the sort who can dust yourself off and get back on the horse after being unceremoniously tossed off repeatedly, you may be feeling a sense of anticipation for the season to come that is pleased and positive.
For me, it may well be a repeat of that 1992 season, where it felt as though I didn’t exhale until Mike Timlin’s underhand toss found Joe Carter’s mitt. There’s arguably even more ways for the current seasons to end in disappointment, so while I’m nudging myself to enjoy the moments along the way, there’s a hesitancy that’s never far away.
On Berríos and the benefits of old age
A late start on the West Coast is always a trade off. On the one hand, the day’s responsibilities are likely have been disposed, and there’s a chance to enjoy the game without interruption. On the other hand, one’s ability to stay awake through the entirety of the nine innings is rarely guaranteed.
I’ll confess that my intermittent slumber last night was timed in such a way as to leave me with a generally positive feeling about José Berríos’ start.
In the end, it’s still a loss, and as I wandered into a dream state, the arse came out of Berríos’ efforts once again. Still, my obliviousness allows me to cling to the positives from his early-inning effectiveness last night.
His stuff looked better, and he seemed to be mixing it well, generating swings and misses and soft contact. All the things that we were hoping to see if we are to cling to some hope that there are better days ahead this season, if not in the many seasons of contractual commitment to the pitcher that are still to come.
Moreover, Berríos seemed composed in the early innings. There has been an unfortunately all-too-familiar look that the hurler assumes at the first spot of trouble, which generally prefaces an impending full scale meltdown. But in the early innings, he at least didn’t appear to be panicking.
By now, we’re grasping at straws to accentuate the positive in Berríos’ starts, hoping that the problem was pitch mix, or pitch tipping, or confidence, or composure…whatever. Something fixable.
If avoiding his worst innings is helpful for me, perhaps it could be even more so for him.
A brief word on: Preparedness
“Best shape of his life” is the spring training cliché to which we’ve become hyperaware over the past decade or so. No matter how ready the entirety of the baseball world is to knock it down, it still finds a way to enter the chat, albeit in increasingly creative ways.
But another spring training talking point has emerged from the Jays’ early efforts, and perhaps it is one that deserves to be put in its properly dubious place. It is the assertion that veteran players do not really need the preparatory time afforded in Florida or Arizona, and that they know how to be ready to answer the bell once the season starts.
In particular, both Brandon Belt and Chris Bassitt, newcomers to the team, seemed eminently comfortable with a lighter load of preseason practice. Assurances were made, either by the players or by those for whom past experience is an inherent aptitude, that they would be just fine.
But as the season began, both veterans look decidedly unprepared for serious competition.
Belt 1-for-23, striking out in 15 of 25 plate appearances thus far and leaving many of his new teammates stranded on the bases. In 13 plate appearances with runners on base, Belt has failed to even put a ball in play by striking out eight times, being exploited high and inside by even pedestrian fastballs.
Meanwhile, Bassitt reached the games that matter with diminished velocity and a delivery that seemed as though it was still being sorted out. His second start against the Angels eventually got back on the rails after he fumbled with technology and ended up down 2-0 within five pitches. His movement and location improved and some velocity returned by the time he left after six innings and 109 pitches without any further damage on the scoreboard.
But for both players — and maybe for the collective of veteran ballplayers who seem less than committed to the notion of getting the rust out while the games don’t count — we should probably view future comments about their ability to get prepared for the season with a minimum of spring training action with a healthy dose of skepticism going forward.
Salutations
If you’ve made it this far, please accept my gratitude. I find writing has become increasingly difficult for me in recent years, to a point where I repeatedly mention how I dislike writing, but I enjoy the feeling of having written something.
If I’m keeping my hopes for the Jays’ season in check thus far, I am optimistic that I might be able to share some thoughts in this format that are more elaborated and considered than a series of tweets, but perhaps with less ambition or angst than a postdoctoral dissertation.
Here’s hoping for a fun season all around.
It's always a pleasure to hear from you!
That Bassitt couldn't use the pitch calling thing strapped to his arm (or hip, or wherever) really underlines your point. Beware the arrogance of the 'veteran' label.