It was going to be about getting better, general manager Alex Anthopoulos told the Toronto Blue Jays first organizational get together after the conclusion of the regular season. And it wasn’t necessarily going to be linear.
Although there were obvious position holes outside of pitching — left field if Melky Cabrera didn’t re-sign, first base if Adam Lind was dealt and for sure centre field and second base — Anthopoulos was clear: he wanted the lineup to be better and wanted better defence at premium positions. That effectively meant that every position, except for right field and shortstop, was in play. It meant that perhaps the Blue Jays really could carry Dalton Pompey in centre field, at least as part of a quasi-platoon, if they upgraded elsewhere. And maybe it meant making a move with implications post-Jose Bautista.
LISTEN: Donaldson joins Jeff Blair on Sportsnet 590 The FAN
Maybe it meant making a move — like Friday’s addition of Josh Donaldson — that included future considerations.
And so that’s why the Blue Jays’ first two significant additions have been at positions that did not appear to be screaming needs at the end of the season: catcher and third base. The Blue Jays have better offensive players at both positions — better by a mile defensively behind the plate with Russell Martin — and, in the case of Donaldson, more of an often under-cited strength: durability.
“Alex likes the fact I played 158 games the past two years,” was the first thing Donaldson said when he was asked what Anthopoulos had told him he liked about his game.
Beyond allowing the Blue Jays to perhaps carry Pompey’s bat, acquiring an everyday, right-handed, middle-of-the-order thumper who is going into his first year of arbitration eligibility is a nice hedge for an organization that has just two more years of control over Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion, if as expected the Blue Jays exercise options on the pair for 2016. What if one of them is needed to be moved for pitching at some point? When Anthopoulos told reporters after the deal that getting middle-of-the-order power was not always easy, he wasn’t just talking about the present. He was considering the future.
Devoid of DeMar
Next Monday will be the year’s anniversary of Masai Ujiri’s trade with the Sacramento Kings that brought Greivis Vasquez, Patrick Patterson, Chuck Hayes and, by extension, Lou Williams to the Toronto Raptors, and Sunday night provided reason No. 200 to give thanks. With DeMar DeRozan out for the first of what could be a month’s worth of games against the Los Angeles Lakers because of a torn adductor longus tendon, head coach Dwane Casey utilized Vasquez as Option No. 1: a two-guard set. Also available? Utilizing James Johnson’s length and moving Terrence Ross to shooting guard, or starting Williams, who was acquired in a deal with the Atlanta Hawks for John Salmons, who also joined the Raptors in the deal with the Kings.
Finding the right combination for the right opponent is Casey’s biggest test. In six years with the Raptors, DeRozan has missed only 12 of 395 games — two of them last season with a sprained left ankle, a third when he rested ahead of the playoffs — and is the only player in team history to start 82 games twice. Several of DeRozan’s numbers are off from last season, most notably his field-goal percentage, but he still leads the team in points and rebounds and has been involved in a shade over 29 percent of the team’s possessions. There have been games the Raptors have won where DeRozan was not their dominant figure, but he’s a going concern for opposing teams and takes up a lot of minutes. It’s going to be tough, and a few lieutenants are going to need to become generals, but it’s not as tough as it could have been.
What I learned
The things you learn in a week hosting a sports talk-show:
“I wouldn’t say we are close to making a decision, other than to say we are still talking to the Blue Jays. It will be a question if it works out … obviously they have a budget. When they signed Russell (Martin) his first call was to me to find out what Melky thought about it.”
— Melky Cabrera’s agent, Peter Greenberg, denies the Rogers Centre artificial surface precludes his client from re-signing while suggesting that Blue Jays general manager Alex Anthopoulos is keen on keeping dialogue going between the sides. Listen to the interview here.
“People don’t remember that during our era, it was me or him. That’s all that was talked about. We were the top lead-off guys in baseball and since that time you can’t find people who can compete with what we did back in those days.”
— Tim Raines, Blue Jays minor league outfield and base-running coordinator, knows his chances of being voted into the Hall of Fame became less likely due to rule changes that cut five years off a player’s eligibility, despite the fact his numbers compare favourably to first-ballot inductee Rickey Henderson, who received the 13th highest first-vote percentage (94.8 percent) in history. Listen to the interview here.
“Pat really liked skillful, two-way players more than just guys who played with an edge. He liked players with edge, but he liked two-way hockey. He couldn’t stand teams that just played defence.”
— Hockey Hall of Famer Scotty Bowman discusses Pat Quinn, who passed away last weekend at the age of 71 following a lengthy illness, saying he was about more than just grit and toughness. Listen to the interview here.
Quibbles and Bits
— Nice back-to-back assignment for the Ottawa Senators on Tuesday and Wednesday: the New York Islanders, coming off their best November in 34 years (11-3-0, compared to 12-1-2 in 1980-81 when they won their second of four consecutive Stanley Cups) and with a goaltender, Jaroslav Halak, who can tie Billy Smith’s mark for consecutive wins with his 10th on Tuesday. Smith set the record from Jan. 23-Feb. 25, 1982. Coupled with next season’s move into Brooklyn’s Barclays Centre, I wonder if we’re seeing the evolution of the NHL’s new sexy team.
— Athletics players, their fans and media are trying to figure out what the deal with the Blue Jays means because on so many levels — analytical, financial, temperamental — Donaldson is their perfect player. John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle raised some eyebrows Sunday when he detailed a contretemps between Beane and Donaldson after the player asked for a couple of maintenance days — to which Beane’s response was, essentially, “I’ll give you 15 days,” as in a stay on the disabled list. Neither side denied the exchange; but both said it was the normal push and pull of a key player-GM relationship.
— One more take on the acquisition of Brett Lawrie, Kendall Graveman and prospect Franklin Barreto: there are those who believe that Beane will now pursue free-agent third baseman Chase Headley, and move Lawrie to second base. “I’m OK with moving to second base,” Lawrie told me in an interview this past week. “I just want to stay at one spot. Third, second … doesn’t matter.” A Blue Jays source tells me the chances of Lawrie starting at third for the Blue Jays this season was “much less than 50 percent … less than you’d suspect,” even before the Donaldson deal.