Watching the Jays' current funk at the plate, it begs the question of who the scapegoat really should be.
BOSTON -- Somewhere, Mickey Brantley is smiling.
At the end of the highly disappointing 2007 season, the Blue Jays hitting coach was made the scapegoat, shown the door after the team offence went into the crapper. Apparently, it was the personable Brantley’s fault that Vernon Wells hurt his shoulder, Gregg Zaun and Lyle Overbay broke bones in their hands and Troy Glaus’ feet and legs barked the whole season while playing on the unforgiveable artificial surface at the Rogers Centre.
You might remember that when they were all healthy in the 2006 season, the Jays hit at a .284 clip, good for third best in the majors. They hit 199 home runs as a unit and their 574 extra-base hits tied the Cleveland Indians for best in the business. Last season, the spate of injuries forced the likes of John McDonald, Howie Clark, Ray Olmedo, Sal Fasano, Jason Smith, Jason Phillips and Royce Clayton –- all bench players and/or career minor leaguers –- to receive way more at-bats than they normally would have and the dramatic drop-off in production was inevitable. How could Mickey shoulder the blame for that? It would be like putting Robert Plant in front of a high school garage band and expecting him to put out a string of No. 1 hits. Not going to happen.
What should be of paramount concern to the deep thinkers down at One Blue Jays Way is the pitch and tenor of the grumbling from the masses. The level of vitriol is starting to rise at an alarming rate among the Blue Jays faithful fans, judging by the comments from fans at the bottom of my columns, Jamie Campbell’s blogs and Jeff Blair’s musings on the Globe & Mail website. These are very dangerous times for Canada’s only remaining major league baseball team.
And judging by the TV ratings from last weekend, which were among the lowest I’ve seen since I took over in the booth in 1993, viewers are tuning out en masse. The refrains are all the same, someone needs to hit the bricks, with it being split down the middle whether the general manager or the manager should pay for this horrible offensive start to the season.
But let’s also throw new hitting coach Gary Denbo into the mix. Brantley’s replacement was brought in as some kind of video wiz who tirelessly sits by the TV and picks apart swings to find what works and what doesn’t. His one claim to fame was that he, as urban legend goes, turned Derek Jeter into a hit machine while working with the future Hall of Famer in the Yankees’ minor league chain. One month into the season, Jays’ hitters are somehow worse than last season, minus the injury excuses, devoid of any semblance of power, or even extra-base hit strokes of any kind.
They continually go deep in the count, which is their preferred, yet terribly flawed, offensive m.o. But when they get a gut-shot fastball, they let it go and then feebly make outs on pitchers’ pitches. The fact that they continue with this approach, which clearly isn’t working, is the most frustrating thing. Forget re-jigging the lineup on a daily basis, how about just saying to the boys, "Swing from your heels." Not sure if it will work, but, hell, things can’t get any worse, can they?
We wouldn’t even be having this digital discussion if we were seeing signs that the Jays are close to coming out of this funk. But their outs on this road trip have, for the most part, all been the same: can-of-corn pop outs and topped, infield choppers. Only Scott Rolen, whose five extra-base hits (four doubles and a home run) lead the team on this trip from hell despite joining the team in Kansas City, is the only Jay hitting with any authority.
Heck, I sit and watch batting practice from on high in the booth and they don’t even hit the ball hard off 51-year-old left-hander Jesus Figueroa and a fastball that is clocked using an hour glass.
Will they finally come out of this? You would think so, but when? And will it be too late to salvage this season, a season where the franchise is at the crossroads? Do you realize that it took the Blue Jays almost half as long to make the playoffs the first time (9th season) than it has taken them to return to the post-season (15 seasons) since Joe Carter last "touched ‘em all."
And in this era where ticket prices to watch all professional sports in Toronto continue to rise, and none of the teams are even remotely close to winning championships, it’s turning into an expensive game of chicken with patience reaching an all-time low.
