Toronto Blue Jays

The Toronto Blue Jays will try to take the third game and lead 2-1 over the series.

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Also see part 2 of this article
Visit The Blue Jays site

Drake Moment for Life (6.5MB)

MLB OPS Leaders

Rank	Player	Team	OPS	HR	RBI
1	Jose Bautista	Toronto Blue Jays	1.060	43	103
2	Miguel Cabrera	Detroit Tigers	1.032	30	105
3	Ryan Braun	Miluwakee Brewers	1.001	33	111
4	Matt Kemp	Los Angeles Dodgers	.983	38	124
5	Prince Fielder	Miluwakee Brewers	.980	38	120
6	Lance Berkman	St.Louis Cardinals	.963	31	93
7	Adrian Gonzalez	Boston Red Sox	.955	27	117
8	David Ortiz	Boston Red Sox	.951	29	96
9	Joey Votto	Cinccinati Reds	.947	29	103
10	Jacoby Ellsbury	Boston Red Sox	.931	32	105

Now Who do you think should win MVP? Who is the best player of the game? Let's see.
To find out this we just put basic math in this, how about we do HR*2+RBI+OPS*1000.

Value Ranks	Player	Team	OPS	HR	RBI	VALUE
1	Jose Bautista	Toronto Blue Jays	1.060	43	103	1249
2	Miguel Cabrera	Detroit Tigers	1.032	30	105	1197
3	Matt Kemp	Los Angeles Dodgers	.983	38	124	1183
4	Ryan Braun	Miluwakee Brewers	1.001	33	111	1178
5	Prince Fielder	Miluwakee Brewers	.980	38	120	1175
6	Adrian Gonzalez	Boston Red Sox	.955	27	117	1126
7	Lance Berkman	St.Louis Cardinals	.963	31	93	1118
8	Joey Votto	Cinccinati Reds	.947	29	103	1108
9	David Ortiz	Boston Red Sox	.951	29	96	1105
10	Jacoby Ellsbury	Boston Red Sox	.931	32	105	1068

Stats as of September 28,2011
AL-Jose Bautista
NL-Matt Kemp
There you have it. Ok, that wasnt expected was it? Well, Jose does lead the next AL competitor by 52 points and he leads the next HR competitor by 11 home runs.
Lets go to the non-DH land now. Well, he is just about the triple crown winner and well he leads his next competitor by only 5 points but Triple Crown does deserve MVP I think.
Iman Tajadod
Baseball Author

Go Bautista MVP 2011!

Major League Baseball MVP Race Stats

Toronto Blue Jays

  The Toronto Blue Jays will try to take the third game and lead 2-1 over the series.

---

Also see part 2 of this article
Visit The Blue Jays site

Blue Jays Logo

Drake Moment for Life (6.5MB)

1. Blue Jays
2. Yankees
3. Red Sox

Toronto Blue Jays vs. New York Yankees SEPT.2-SEPT.4

It's the first official series of September. The Blue Jays are going to be in New York and the entire team is excited about their time in NYC. However, at 7:05pm, their game faces will be on and ready play spoiler against the Yanks who are just 0.5 back of the Sox. The Jays do have a 3 Game series at home vs. Boston when they conclude the New York series.

BASED ON STATS

The Blue Jays unarguably have one star in the name of Jose Bautista who will have a nice hitting match up against Curtis Granderson.  In 107 AB, Curtis is hitting .252 with 3 HR, 15 RBI, 13BB all leading up to an OPS of .755. Bautista on the other hand is hitting .272 with 10 HR, 19 RBI, 30 BB all adding up to an extraordinary OPS of 1.042.
Here are stats of baseball's homer leaders against the opposing team.

Jose Bautista

Curtis Granderson

BOTTOM LINE:
The Stars numbers go in the Jays ways however the Jays other players do not match up against the Yanks.
RICKY ROMERO WILL BE THE JAYS ONLY WIN
NEW YORK WINS 2-1

JAYS VS YANKS VS RED SOX (2B and SS)

Second Base

       Yep, the dreadful second base! The Blue Jays  second base crew has hit for a .232 average, The RedSox .311 and the Yanks .299! The Jays  60 RBIs from seconds base is well behind the 74 for Boston and 98 from the Yanks. Aaron hill was not the answer and Kelly Johnson has only had 26 AB (in which he has been impressive). Without a doubt a return to the old from Hill would have really helped this team on the year but now the Jays are hoping they get that from Kelly Johnson. The direction in unknown in the off season, however I belive that the Jays future second base man is playing Minor league ball somewhere in some team. The Sox probably have the best second baseman out of the three team but the Yanks are very close. The Jays clearly need to decide what they are going to do there. Lawrie is NOT moving back and Hech is one year away. 2012 maybe for a Kelly Johnson type of guy getting one last chance as Toronto is concerned.                                             

Short Stop :

     I promise its only going to get better from here on for the Jays! Yunel Escobar just had a monster couple of games,collecting 8 hits with a couple of four hit games. The Jays short stops have hit for a .293 average, That number drops down to .256 for the Red Sox while the Yankees have hit for a respectable .287.  There is one thing that the Jays have that the other teams do not have. Escobar is the youngest starting shortstop on the three teams, the best defensively and the best offensively. Derek Jeter despite going on a tear since his 3000th hit is not half the player he was, his 4 long ones would agree with the fact and Scutaro is far from an elite shortstop.

Stay Tuned:

                  All stats can be found here!(make sure you scroll a bit)! Who is the better one of the three? Lawrie? Kevin Youkilis? or A Rod? Read the other articles and feel free to comment! All comments will be read and responded to

JAYS VS YANKS VS RED SOX (1B and C)

The Blue Jays are trying to take over the Yankees and the Red Sox in the AL East or at least compete with them. It is very apparent that they far behind this year. Today we will for the first time take a look at every position and the starter there and see which team has a better player now and which one will down the road.

Catcher:

             The Blue Jays catcher have hit for a .233  average which is largely due to the work done by Jose Molina.  You see that number increase to .244 for the Red Sox and .245 for the Yanks. As you see the Jays are behind both the Sox and the Yankees in the average department. As far as RBI's go 75 for the Jays catchers 75 for the Red Sox catchers and 77 For the Yanks catchers. Jays and the Sox are tied for the HR lead with four more than the Yanks 18. But there is one key to success that the Jays have, its called Arencibia. Touted by many as the second base Catcher in the system he is the youngest backstop between the three teams. Post All Star he leads the Jays in HRs and RBIs. Overall on the season he is doing very well in terms of HRs and RBIs. The hope is that the average will pick up for the young Catcher and if it does he will have no problem turning into an All star.

                                                                    First Base

            A position where you usually see a lot of offensive  production from has without a doubt been the same this year between the teams. The Toronto First Baseman have hit for a .266 Average, Thanks to Adrian Gonzalez that number raises to .340 for the Boston Red Sox, however the Yanks have only hit .259 from that position. While the 34 HR's from the Yanks sit well in first place the Jays are not far behind at 27, the Sox have 24 HR's from first base which however does not take their already 104 RBI's away from them. The Jays have 91  from first base and the Yanks have 98. As you see once again the Jays are not far apart from either team however the Jays Starting First Baseman Adam Lind has not produced the way you would like your everyday first baseman to do so. His 75 RBI's (which all not all from first base) sit well behind the Gonzalez and Teixeira. Gonzalez is a serious MVP contender and Teixeira despite not having a great average year is among the major league HR leaders.  Adam Lind can very well be the answer at first base but he has to be more consistent to compete with the likes of Gonzalez. With Pujols and Fielder available this off season and many more via the trade market time will show if Lind can hold onto his job.

                                                              

Conclusion: 

      The jays have themselves a pretty good catcher in JP but Lind may just not cut it at 1B. As hard as it is to give up on a player as talent as Adam the Jays may need to look for a solution somewhere else.  The best Catcher in the AL EAST is probably Russel Martin but don't be surprise if that changes as soon as the end of this year.  At first base there is no question that the best one this year is Gonzalez and that will probably not change within the next few years unless a big time first baseman is added to to the East.

    All stats can be found here in our stats page. and please comment and stay tuned for the other 6 defensive positions.

5 Reasons Why The Jays are going in the right direction

5-  Drafting: Tyler Beede was not signed but there is no doubt that the Jays drafting has improved a ton over the past two years. The Jays are spending a lot of money on drafts and have had a lot of top 100 picks in the last two years. With all the free agents this summer the Jays will have even more picks. Good teams build from within and that is very obviously what the Jays are doing


4- Trades: From a team that was not active at the deadline to one that you can expect a deal at anytime! The Toronto Blue Jays have traded for the likes of Brandon Morrow, Yunel Escobar, Kyle Drabek and Colby Rasmus which will make this teams long term Core.

3- Young visible Core: From behind the plate, to Center field Jose Bautista is the only player in his 30s on the team. With three Rookies starting every night in Thames, JP and Lawrie the offense is looking bright. Romero has taken the next level and is very close to being considered one of the best in the game. Brandon Morrow, Brett Cecil, Hendeson Alverez are all above average pitchers and Kyle Drabek is still without a doubt one of the best pitching prospects in the game.

2- Jose Bautista: Baseball is not like any other sport, No one player can turn a non playoff team into one. However,Jose Bautista is arguably the best player in the game and is alone worth the price of admission. He can turn the game around with one swing of the bat and given the right protection in the lineup can take this team to the next level

1-Alex Anthopoulos: From taking the fans letters to being one of the top GM's in all of baseball, this mastermind ninja works quietly but beautifully. not only does AA not shy away from trades and risk, he welcomes it. Going into this off season the Jays hopeful can expect the team improving, as they have up to this point with every move he has made

2012 Free Agents and Possible Jays Additions+2012 Projected Lineups

The Blue Jays organization is filled with potential, hope and is only pointed upwards. The Jays are 16GB of a AL East title and 14 games back of the Wild Card. Although most say this was gonna be a horrible year for the Jays as they wouldve finished 10 or 15 under 500, the Jays are only 1 game under .500 with a 66-67 record which is only 3 games back of last year's Jays who were 67-62 going in to Aug.29th Game. The Alex Anthopolous trades have done nothing except bring more and more potential in this team but with a free agent market packed with stars such as Albert Pujols , Prince Fielder, Jose Reyes and Jimmy Rollins, I think there is a high possibility of the Jays acquiring a player to give them a push for next year. Don't expect it to be a MVP candidate player because no one is expecting the Jays to finish better than 7 games back next year. However if a second wild card team is added which is very probable, the Jays might pick up an Ace or #2 pitcher like Mark Buehrle and Aaron Harang and make a trade deadline trade in 2012 boosting their chances of a play off run.

AUG 2011                                                 2012 Opening Day
DH-Edwin Encarnacion                              DH-Eric Thames/ Encarnacion
1B-Adam Lind                                           1B-Adam Lind
2B- Kelly Johnson                                      2B- FA (Maybe Kelly Johnson)
SS- Yunel Escobar                                     SS-Yunel Escobar
3B- Brett Lawrie                                        3B- Brett Lawrie
LF-Eric Thames                                          LF- Travis Snider
CF-Colby Rasmus                                      CF- Colby Rasmus
RF-Jose Bautista                                         RF- Jose Bautista

BOTTOM LINE
The Blue Jays may be filled with young guns but if they are thinking of contending in 2012/2013, a big contract needs to be acquired but with AA as our GM, that is unlikely so look at 6-8 Games Back.