Jose Luis Cruz, Jr. | CF, LF | 1997-2002

Jose Cruz, Jr. was born April 19, 1974 in Arroyo, Puerto Rico. His father, Jose Cruz, was a terrific outfielder for the Cardinals and the Astros, Bill James listed dad as the 29th best left fielder in major league history in the ‘New Historical Baseball Abstract'. His uncles Hector and Tommy Cruz also played in the majors. Our Jose Cruz was drafted by the Seattle Mariners in the first round (3rd pick overall) of the 1995 draft out of Rice University in Texas where he was a 3 time All-American. The two picked before him were outfielder Darin Erstad and catcher Ben Davis, right after him the Cubs took Kerry Wood. He had been picked by the Braves in the 15th round of the 1992 draft but decided to go to university instead.

Jose was your basic five tool player good speed, good defense, power, strong arm, good eye at the plate and on top of that a switch hitter. Like I said his dad was a heck of a player, not as good defensively, but was a better player than his son. A few years before the Mariners used their first round pick on another outfielder that had the same name as his major league father, Ken Griffey, Jr. That one worked out pretty well.

Jose zipped through the minors in less than 2 seasons. In late May 1997 he was called up to the Mariners. In 49 games with the M's he hit 12 homers and drove in 34. The Mariners were in the pennant race that year and their bullpen was awful. So to fix up the bullpen they made a pair of just terrible trades. The first one they traded Derek Lowe and Jason Varitek to the Red Sox to get Heathcliff Slocumb, a 31 year old journeyman reliever who had a 5.79 ERA at the time of the trade. Then they traded Jose to us for Paul Spoljaric and Mike Timlin. Spoljaric had a 4.76 ERA after the trade, that year, then the next season his ERA 6.48. Timlin was much better for the M's saving 20 saves for them in his season and bit with the team. As much as it was a good trade for us, the Boston's trade has to be one of the best trades in baseball history.

Anyway Cruz continued his good rookie season, hitting a homer in his first game with us and finishing with 26. His batting average was just .248 but he had a OPS+ of 110 and finished second to Nomar Garciaparra in the Rookie of the Year vote. In 1998 he started the season with the Jays but was sent down to Triple A June 14th with a .214 BA. They recalled him on July 31 and he went on a tear hitting .366 with 5 homers and 28 RBI in August, bringing his average up to .253 for the season.

In 1999 Cruz again split time between Syracuse and Toronto. He played 106 games for us, mostly in center field. Fangraphs has this as his best season with a 2.5 WAR but all his seasons with the Jays come in between 1.7 and 2.5, In 2000, he had his first full season with us, a really full season playing in all 162 games. He had a pretty good season, hitting just .242 but walking 76 times for a .323 on base and he hit 31 home runs. He scored 91 runs and drove in 76, hitting in every spot in the order but cleanup and 9th. With Carlos Delgado, Tony Batista, Brad Fulmer and Cruz we were only the 2nd team in baseball history to have 4 players with 30+ homers and also the 2nd team to have 7 players with 20 or more homers.

2001 was Jose's best season setting his career highs in runs (92), hits (158), doubles (38), home runs (34), RBI (88), steals (32), batting average .274 and slugging .530. Baseball Reference credits him with an oWAR of 4.0 (but none of the metrics liked his defense that year). The steals were a new part of his game; he had never before stole more than 15 and would never again. But he's one of only a bunch of guys to have a 30/30 season and only the second in Jay's history. Shawn Green was the first. The only part of his game that was off was his batting eye as his walks dropped to 45 and he had a career high of 138 strikeouts. He was voted Jay MVP by the Toronto chapter of the BBWAA (anyone else find it strange that there is a Toronto chapter of the Baseball Writers of America?).

2002 was his last season in Toronto and his numbers fell off quite a bit. Part of that was because of a month on the disabled list. The Jays moved him out of center field too, which was good as he really didn't have the range for center. After the season he signed with the Giants as a free agent. Since then he has played for the Diamondbacks, Red Sox, Dodgers, and Padres. In 2008 he had 49 at bats for the Astros and that was the end of his major league career. He played for Puerto Rico in the World Baseball Classic in 2006 and had .353 with a .476 on base.

Cruz is married and has two sons. They lived in Bellaire, Texas at one point. If Bellaire sound familiar it is because former major leaguer Bobby Tolan's son Robert was shot in his driveway by police after getting out of his dad's SUV on New Year's Eve. Tolan was unarmed.

Jose had his own story of trouble with police in Bellaire: he and his family were in his new Mercedes and police stopped him because of a missing front license plate. They told him there were warrants out for his arrest and took him in. He ended up spending a night in jail and, of course, there were no warrants for him. They moved away soon after that.

He had a pretty good career, 12 season, 204 home runs and 1167 hits. He was a pretty good fielder, not really good in center field but a good defensive corner outfielder, winning a Gold Glove in 2003 when he played with San Francisco. But he never quite lived up to what was expected of him. Unfortunately he never learned to cut down on his strikeouts, if he could have his batting average would have been some better and he would have what we hoped he'd be.

Jose Cruz's place among Jay batting leaders:

Batting Average (>1500 PA) 41st .250
On Base % (>1500 PA) 23rd .331
Slugging % (>1500 PA) 12th .462
Games 26th 698
Runs 20th 394
Hits 24th 640
Home Runs 9th 122
RBI 19th 355
Walks 14th 316
Strikeouts 8th 635
Stolen Bases 11th 85

Paul Leo Molitor | DH | 1993-1995

Notable Achievements as a Jay:
1993 World Series MVP
Silver Slugger 1993
All-Star 1993 and 1994

Paul Molitor was born August 22, 1956 in St. Paul, Minnesota (he shares a birthday with Carl Yastrzemski and my wife). He was drafted in the 1st round of the 1977 amateur draft, the 3rd pick overall (Harold Baines and Bill Gullickson were drafted before him) out of the University of Minnesota. The Jay's first pick that year, Tom Goffena. You can't win them all, though we drafted at the bottom of the first round, MLB's way of sticking it to the Expansion teams.

After only 64 games of A ball Paul started the 1978 season with the Brewers. He finished 2nd in the Rookie of the Year voting to Lou Whitaker. He played 15 years for the Brewers making the All-Star team 5 times and receiving MVP votes in 6 different seasons finishing 5th in the voting in 1987. Milwaukee's ‘Harvey Wall Bangers' made the playoffs in 1981 and made it to the World Series in 1982 losing out to the Cardinals. Bill James called the Brewers infield of Cecil Cooper, Jim Gantner, Robin Yount and Molitor the best infield in the majors in the 1980's and the 5th best infield of all-time.

He was moved around the infield and even played CF one season for the Brewers as they didn't seem to realize he was the sort of player for which you moved the other guys around . Paul was kind of injury prone in his time there.

In 1993 the Jays signed him as a free agent, to replace Dave Winfield who went the Twins as a free agent, at DH. I remember the anchor on Sports Desk, at the time of the trade, saying the Jays finally had a leadoff man, but Cito still used Devon White in the leadoff spot. Molitor came thru with one of the best seasons of his career batting .332/.402/.509, finishing 2nd in the league with 121 runs and driving in 111. He also led the lead in plate appearances (725), hits (211), batting average in late innings of close game (.411) and with runners in scoring position (.384). Wouldn't you love to have a player like that on the Jays now? At 36 he set some sort of record for being the oldest player to drive in 100 runs for the first time. He also hit 22 homers and stole 22 bases. He finished 2nd to Frank Thomas in the MVP vote. Fangraphs credits him with a 5.2 WAR that year, his best number with the Jays.

Molitor was terrific in the playoffs hitting .391 in the ALCS win over the White Sox scoring 7 runs and driving in 5 with 1 homer. In the Series he hit .500 with 2 homers, 2 triples and 2 doubles in our win over the Phillies, scoring 10 runs and driving in another 8 to win the Series MVP and he was on base for Joe Carter's series winning home run. The enduring memory, for me, is him hugging Cito and crying after they won. In a long, terrific career this was his first and only World Series win.

1994, the lockout year, Paul was having just as good a season, hitting .341/.410/.518 before the owners locked the doors. He made the All-Star team for the 4th season in a row and finished 18th in the MVP vote, but the Jays didn't do as well, they finished 55-60. And at the age of 38 he was 20 for 20 and a base stealer. In the shortened 1995 season Paul's numbers fell off, finishing at .270/.350/.423 and the Jays had a bad season that year too, finishing 5th.

Rob Neyer picked Molitor as the Jays best DH ever and we did too in our Best DH poll. Bill James called Molitor 3rd greatest leadoff man of all-time behind Rickey Henderson and Tim Raines as well as the 8th best third baseman of all-time. One strange thing about his career is that the first 10 years he was very injury prone and the second half of his career he played almost every day.

After the season he signed with the Twins as a free agent to finish his career playing for his home town team. Paul had a terrific career ending up with 3319 hits, 504 stolen bases and a Hall of Fame Plaque. Since retiring he has worked as a bench coach for the Twins and hitting coach for the Mariners. I used to think he'd become a manager one day, but he hasn't yet. After retirement he talked about a drug problem early in his career and talks to children about drugs. The drug problem likely had something to do with all the injuries early in his career. He's married and he and his wife do work for Camp Heartland that works with children with HIV.

Paul Molitor's place among the Jay's batting leaders:

Batting Average (>1500 PA): 1st, .315
OBP (>1500 PA): 5th, .387
Slugging %: 6th, .484
Games Played: 49th, 405
At Bats: 39th, 1615
Runs: 30th, 270
Hits: 34th, 508
Doubles: 33rd, 98
Home Runs: 35th 51
RBI:31, 246
Walks: 29th 193
Stolen Bases: 22nd, 54

Joseph Chris Carter | RF, LF, 1B | 1991-1997

Notable Accomplishments: All-Star 1991-1994, 1996 Silver Slugger 1991, 1992

To be honest, I don't know where to put Joe Carter on the list. When I did this list the last time, I had him much further up. Joe had three good years with the team and then had 4 more where he struggled to get to replacement level. I'll admit, I think it is unfair to penalize a player for playing below replacement level. It's not his fault that the manager kept using him. He deserves credit for hitting that big home run too. But then he doesn't deserve credit for playing poorly either. So I'm putting him here this time.

Joe Carter was last man to touch the ball (well touch is the wrong word, make contact with the ball, the second time he touched it with his bat) in both our World Series wins. The first Series win against Atlanta, Joe was playing first base when Otis Nixon came to bat with two out and the Jays up by one in the 11th inning of game 6. Nixon had great speed, despite looking like a character from Lord of the Rings, and he tried to bunt for a base hit, but pitcher Mike Timlin had been reminded that Nixon liked to try for bunt singles, so he was ready for it. He got to the ball, near the first base line, quickly and flipped it to Carter. After the out, Joe jumped up and down higher than I've ever seen anyone jump. Somewhere I still have video tape of that game. But I don't have a VHS player. It was great to finally cheer for a winner after years of being a Expo and Blue Jay fan.

The next season....well you all know the story but let's tell it again. Game 6, Jays down by a run, 2 out, Ricky Henderson and Paul Molitor on base. My favorite closer (well soon to become my favorite closer), Mitch Williams, pitching to Joe Carter, 2-2 count. I am thinking, well Pat Hentgen is pitching the next game and he's been great and we clubbed Danny Jackson, who would be the Phillies starter in game 7, back in game 3. Mitch's pitch was down and in, I really don't know how Carter got enough bat on it to get it out of the park. But then Joe was experienced at swinging at pitches out of the strike zone. It was only the second walk-off home run in World Series history. Tom Cheek's line was perfect, "Touch ‘em all, Joe! You'll never hit a bigger home run in your life!" How did he come up with that line off the top of his head? He was a terrific announcer and should be in the Hall of Fame.

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Damaso Domingo Garcia Sanchez| 2B | 1980-1986

Notable Accomplishments: Silver Slugger: 1982, All-Star: 1984, 1985

Damaso Garcia was born February 7, 1955 in Moca, Dominica Republic. As a young man he was more into soccer than baseball, he was captain for the Dominican Republic's national soccer team at the Central American and Caribbean Games in 1974. He was signed by the Yankees as an amateur free agent in 1975 as players from the Dominica Republic weren't included in the amateur draft.

Damaso got up to the majors for a few games in 1978 and 1979, but the Yankees had Willie Randolph and Garcia wasn't going to move him off second base. The Yankees traded him, Chris Chambliss and Paul Mirabella to the Jays for Tom Underwood, Rick Cerone and Ted Wilborn, a trade that worked out pretty well for both teams. The Jays quickly moved Chambliss to the Atlanta Braves for Barry Bonnell, Joey McLaughlin and Pat Rockett.

The Jays had the unimpressive paring of future Boston Celtic star Danny Ainge and Canadian Dave McKay at second base so Garcia was a big upgrade at the position. Damaso had an ok rookie season with the Jays, hitting .278/.296/.381. Well, maybe a little less than ok when you add in that he was caught stealing 13 times in 26 tries and hit into 14 double plays. He did hit 30 doubles. And he finished 4th in the Rookie of the Year voting, getting 3 first place votes. It was a very thin rookie class that year, Joe Charboneau won the award that year, and he wasn't a great. But still, I can't imagine a player with Garcia's numbers getting votes today; we understand baseball stats much better now.

Garcia had even worse stats in the strike shortened 1981 season, hitting .252/.277/.304, but he did learn to steal better, being successful 13 of 16 attempts. 1982 was his first good season, the best of his career, he hit .310/.338/.399. He set career highs in runs (89), doubles (32) and stolen bases (54 second best in the AL). Fangraphs has 1982 as easily his best season, crediting him with a 4.4 WAR (his next best was 2.5 in 84). He became the first Jay to steal 50 bases. If he would have learned to take a few walks, he'd have been a heck of a player. But, as he said, "I don't like to walk and I don't like to bunt." Can you imagine a leadoff hitter saying that today? To be fair, at the time, most players from the Dominican didn't like to walk. The line was ‘you couldn't walk off the island'. Taking a base on ball was seen as less than masculine.

He was voted the Silver Slugger award as the best hitting AL second basemen and he received some MVP votes. The Jays had a number of good young players at that time, a many of the pieces that would get them into the playoffs. With Willie Upshaw, Alfredo Griffin, Lloyd Moesby, Jesse Barfield, George Bell, Jim Clancy and Dave Stieb they had some good players that would grow together to become a good team.

In 1983 had another pretty good year hitting .307/.336/.390. He stole a few less bases (31) but was proving himself to be a decent middle infielder, though maybe illustrating his biggest weakness, he drew his career high in walks that year, with a whopping 24, not exactly what you would like from a leadoff hitter.

1984 saw Damaso's number fall off some, he hit .284/.310/.374 with 46 steals. He had a huge left/right split hitting .354 against lefties but .255 against righties. He had the large split each season of his career. Damaso made the All-Star team. Can you imagine a leadoff hitter with a .310 on base percentage making the All-Star team today? We had three players on the All-Star team that year, Dave Stieb started the game for the AL and Alfredo Griffin made the team, mostly because he travelled to the game with Garcia and when Alan Trammell was injured, Griffin was there, so they put him on the roster.

In 1985, Garcia made the All-Star team again. I'm not really sure why. He hit a big .282/.302/.377 with 28 steals (but was caught 15 times so we'd have been better off if he didn't run), and scored 70 runs. He also received 2 MVP votes. The best news about 1985, for the Jays, was that we made the playoffs for the first time that season. Garcia leadoff in all 7 games of our series loss to the Royals, hitting .233/.303/.367 with 4 runs, 4 doubles and 3 walks.

1986 was his last year with the team, he really wore out his welcome. He hit much the same as always (.281/.306/.375) but his, often, rather surly personality hit a new high in temper tantrums when, upset at being removed from the leadoff spot, that his friend Alfredo Griffin was traded in the offseason and that he had a bad game, had a little bonfire with some bats and his uniform in the clubhouse.

After the season Garcia was traded to Atlanta with Luis Leal for Craig McMurtry. The trade didn't do anything for either team; Garcia was terrible in his few games with the Braves in 1988 after missing the whole 1987 season. Before the 1989 season the Expos signed him as a free agent.. After that season the Yankees signed him as a free agent but he didn't make the team and he retired after 11 seasons in the majors at 35.

Damaso had all the tools to be a really good player, he was good defensively but his refusal to take coaching or, you know, a walk, limited him. Bill James listed him as the 101st best second baseman in baseball history in his ‘New Historical Baseball Abstract', but I'd imagine a few have passed him by on the list by now. And Rob Neyer lists him as the second best 2B in Jay's history, but that was a few years ago now, as well.

Ernie Whitt's had a quote that summed him up "When he was healthy and wanted to play he was the best second baseman in the game. But there were days when (he) simply didn't want to play".

Garcia was an example of a type of player that you don't see in today's game. He had pretty good batting average, .288 as a Blue Jay, but didn't take enough walks have a decent on base average (.312 as a Jay) and didn't have any power (.377) and he stole bases at about a break even rate (69%). Nowadays, we know we want players that get on base, or slug or preferably both. There is no way you'd have a player like that leading off now. Back then, middle infielders of this type were common. That was baseball before Sabermetrics.

All that said, when he going good, he was an exciting player and was a favorite of mine. He was pretty good defensively and, compared to the second basemen we had had, up until then, he was pretty good.

A year after he retired he was found to have a malignant brain tumor. He had surgery to remove it and after chemo he was told he had 6 months to live, but he recovered with some minor troubles.. He has had a minor stroke in 2001. Last I heard he wasn't well, bedridden and unable to speak.

Damaso is married with 2 children one of which has hemophilia, which causes blood not to clot. Damaso did charity work to raise awareness and funding for the disease in the Dominican Republic.

Damaso Garcia's place among Jay batting leaders:

Batting Average (>1500 PA) 6th .288
On Base Average (>1500 PA) 36th .312
Slugging Average (>1500 PA) 39th .377
Games 16th 902
At Bats 9th 3572
Runs 11th 453
Hits 8th 1028
Doubles 14th 172
RBI 25th 296
Walks 45th 110
Stolen Bases 3rd 194
Runs Created 21st 407
Caught Stealing 1st 86

Ricardo Romero | LHP | 2009 -

Notable accomplishment: All-Star 2011

Ricky Romero was born November 6, 1984 (making him the youngest man on our list) (give Brett Lawrie a couple of years) in East Los Angeles, CA. He was drafted in the first round of the 2005 draft (6th overall) by the Blue Jays, out of California State University, Fullerton. A lot has been made of the fact that Troy Tulowitzki was the next pick, by the Rockies. No one mentions that the Mariners used the third pick on Jeff Clement, so we could have done worse.

Ricky didn't exactly burn it up on his trip through the Jays minor league system. In 2008, the season before he made it to the majors, Ricky went 5-5 with a 4.96 ERA in 21 starts at Double-A New Hampshire, though he did have a 3.38 ERA in his 7 Triple-A starts. In his 81 career minor league starts he was 16-23 with a 4.42 ERA with 183 walks and 336 strikeouts in 430 innings. Not numbers that make you think you have a top of the rotation starter.

Romero became the poster boy for the 'Ricciardi doesn't know how to draft' crowd. I'll admit, I thought he wasn't really a prospect, back in 2008. I thought that a lot of pitchers had moved past him on our prospect list. His control was not great and he didn't strike a lot of guys out, so I didn't think he had much hope for a MLB career. Shows what I know.

Something changed during spring training in 2009. Then Blue Jay pitching coach, Brad Arnsberg made a small change to Romero's windup. I don't know if that's what turned things around for Ricky, but he made the major league rotation to start the season.

Romero went 13-9 with a 4.30 ERA in 29 starts in his rookie season. He walked 79 while striking out 141 in 178 innings. He was second among AL rookies in wins, 3rd in innings pitched, 2nd in strikeouts and 4th in ERA. His 13 wins was also the 2nd most wins ever for a Blue Jay rookie, one short of Mark Eichhorn's 14 in 1986. His first major league start was against a fellow first round draft pick, Detroit's Rick Porcello. Ricky got the win. He tied for the season record by throwing 24 consecutive scoreless innings (matched by teammate Roy Halladay) from June 24 to July 6. Ricky missed a few starts with an oblique strain, going on the DL April 20 returning to the Jays May 25.

Ricky improved some in 2010, winning 14 games, making 32 starts and pitching 210 innings. He brought ERA down to 3.73 his walk rate down a little and strikeout rate up a little. Ricky started the season really well, he was 5-2 with a 3.12 ERA at the end of May and finished well, going 7-2 over the last couple of months. He helped himself out by keeping the ball on the ground and getting 25 double plays turned behind him. On April 13th he took a no-hitter into the 8th inning against the White Sox but Alex Rios hit a home run to end the fun. He led the AL in wild pitches with 18.

During the 2010 season, the Blue Jays signed Ricky to a 5-year contract extension, worth $30.1 million with a club option for the 2016 season at $13.1 million.

In 2011, with the off-season trade of Shawn Marcum, Ricky became the number one starter in the Jays rotations. He set new highs in wins (15), innings pitched (225), strikeouts (178) while setting a new low for ERA at 2.92, 6th best in the AL. He made his first All-Star team and was 10th in Cy Young voting. He went 5-0 in August, with a 2.05 ERA and was named AL Pitcher of the Month. He finished the season on a 8-2 run. Baseball Reference has him at a 5.9 WAR for 2011, making it his best season so far but Fangraphs figures WAR differently and has 2010 as his best season at a 4.1 WAR.

Ricky seems very driven to improve and become the best pitcher he can be. He was part of the Blue Jay Winter Tour that came through Calgary last year and we had a quick interview with him and Woodman663 has a scouting report on him here.

When I did this list the first time, a few years back, I wanted to stay away from players that had less than 4 years with the team, then Paul Monitor's name came up, so that idea went out the window. The team doesn't have a long history so players can get on the list after just a couple of good years. Ricky will, hopefully, be moving up the list over the next few years. If he gets 10 wins this season, he'll be in the franchise top ten for pitching wins.

Ricky Romero's place among Blue Jay pitching leaders:

ERA (>500 innings): 7th, 3.60
Wins: 14th, 42
Win-Loss %: 7th, .592
Innings: 17th, 613
Strikeouts: 15th, 493
Starts: 15th, 93

Allan James Burnett | RHP | 2006 - 2008

Everybody's favorite starting pitcher A.J. Burnett was born January 3, 1977 in North Little Rock, Arkansas. He was drafted by the Mets in the 8th round of the 1996 draft, one of just 3 players out of that round who made the majors. The Jays had the pick right before the Mets and picked Dave Marciniak, a shortstop.

In February of 1998 he was traded, along with Robert Stratton and Jesus Sanchez to the Marlins for Al Leiter and Ralph Millard. A.J. was called up in late August of 1999 and made 7 starts. In 2000 he came up about mid-season and made 13 starts. He had his first full season in the majors in 2001 and pitched a no-hitter for the Marlins (giving up 8 walks in the game), on May 12. He had Tommy John surgery in 2003, came back in 2004 but missed several games with an elbow injury. Burnett made 32 starts, in 2005, the first time in his career that he made over 30. It was good timing as he was a free agent after the season. A.J. is currently 3rd in career wins, with 49, in Marlin history.

At the 2005 winter meetings, JP Ricciardi made a big slash, signing both B.J. Ryan and A.J. Burnett to huge, long term contracts. A.J. was given a 5-year, $55 million contract that contained an opt out clause after the 3rd year. The Jays were taking a big risk, signing a pitcher that had many injury issues, over the years, to such a big contract, but Ricciardi thought that it was time to make a move to get to the top of the division.

We looked to have a very good rotation, going into the 2006 season, with Roy Halladay, Ted Lilly, Gustavo Chacin, Josh Towers and A.J. all having good seasons in 2005. But Towers was awful in 2006, Chacin wasn't great and A.J. spent about half the season on the DL. He started the season on the DL, with some troubles from some scar tissue from his Tommy John surgery back in 2003. He was activated in mid-April, made two pretty poor starts and went back to the DL. He came off it again on June 22, throwing a shut-out for his first Blue Jay victory, and played the rest of the season.

Other than the injuries, he didn't have a bad year, going 10-8 with a 3.98 ERA in 21 starts. He struck out 118 and walked 39 in 135.2 innings. The team finished 2nd in the AL East but 10 games back of the Yankees.

In 2007 the Jays pitching staff had more than its share of injuries, Roy Halladay missed a month after an appendectomy and B.J. Ryan was lost for the year after Tommy John surgery. A.J. stayed healthy until the mid-June, going 5-6 with a 4.00 ERA to that point, then hit the DL with a shoulder strain. He came back for one start, on June 28, and then went back on the DL for the month of July. Coming back in August he went 5-2 the rest of the way.

When he did pitch, he was pretty good, holding batters to a .214 batting average, second in the AL and getting more than a strikeout an inning. He was great against AL East opponents, going 7-1 against them. In all he was 10-8, with a 3.75 ERA in 25 starts. He gave up 131 hits, 66 walks while striking out 176 in 165.2 innings.

2008 was Burnett's best year with the Jays, managing to stay off the DL (though he started the season with a torn finger nail, after catching the finger in a car door), he went 18-10 with a 4.07 ERA in 34 starts. He also led the league in strikeouts with 231 and strikeouts per 9 innings with 9.4. He and Doc made a very successful top of the rotation, winning 38 games between then (Doc came in second in the Cy Young voting to Cliff Lee). A.J. set career highs for wins, innings pitched and strikeouts, finishing 3rd in the AL in innings and 4th in wins. He finished the season strong, going 13-6 over his last 19 starts and winning 8 of his last 9 starts. Fangraphs gives him a 5.5 WAR for that season, his career best.

Timing has always been Burnett's strong suit, having a strong season before he could become a free agent in 2005 and then having the best season of his career right before he could opt out of his Blue Jay contract in 2007. In the off-season he signed a 5-year $82.5 million contract with the Yankees in the off-season. I have no hard feeling towards A.J. for opting out, any of us would have done the same, but I do enjoy watching his troubles with the Yankees. I even enjoyed watching the Jays pound him in a spring training game last year. Against the Jays, he is 3-4 with a 5.64 ERA in 10 starts.

He was pretty good, in 2008, for the Yankees, going 13-9 with a 4.04 ERA in 33 starts. The highlight of that season, at least for Jay fans, was the May 12 start in Toronto, against Roy Halladay. The Jays and Halladay came out on top, with a 5-1 win and A.J. was booed, loudly, throughout the game. After that first Yankees season, he's had nothing but trouble in New York. I can't say that I'm sad that he signed with them, as things turned out.

It seemed, at least from the outside, that A.J. was a good teammate in Toronto. He was friends with Halladay, their friendly competition seemed to make both pitchers better and he started the Jays tradition of getting the star of the game with a shaving cream 'pie', generally while the player was on camera, being interviewed.

A.J. was pretty much a fastball/curveball pitcher for the Jays. He had one of the hardest fastballs in baseball at one time, it's dropped off some since then. He used the curve as his strikeout pitch, going to it when he was ahead in the count. Each game seems to depend on his feel for those two pitches, if he has them, he is has been almost unhittable but when he doesn't life isn't as good. As a Jay he was 38-26, with a 3.94 ERA, in 80 starts. He had 525 strikeouts in 522.2 innings.

Burnett is married and has 2 children.

A.J. Burnett's place among Blue Jay pitching leaders:

ERA (>500 innings): 11th, 3.94
Wins: 16th, 38
Winning %: 6th, .594
Strikeouts per 9 innings: 3rd, 9.040, tops among starters
Innings: 24th, 522.2
Strikeouts: 14th, 525

Otto Franceschi Velez | DH,RF,LF | 1977-1982

Here is a name from the distant past. Otto Velez was born November 29, 1950 in Ponce, Puerto Rico. He was signed as an amateur free agent in 1968, by the New York Yankees. In 1973 he made it to the majors playing in 23 games as a September call up for the Yankees. For the next 3 seasons he played a handful of games for the Yankees but he was blocked from a full time job by the Yankee's fondness for signing free agents.

The Jays picked Otto up in the major league expansion draft in 1976. That first year the Jays were awful, finishing with a 54-107 record and didn't get much better in the years Otto was with the team. But, he was pretty good, in 1977 he hit .256/.366/.458 with 16 home runs and 62 RBI in 120 games. He had a good eye at the plate leading the team in walks. He mostly played right field that year and he was, well, terrible as a RFer. Rob Neyer says that Velez was the worst right fielder in team history and I can't argue that. He had little range and basically no arm at all. But the team had a 38 year old Ron Fairly and a handful of other guys that really couldn't field, so the DH spot was filled. A typical right handed slugger he crushed lefties, hitting them at a .318/.420/.527 rate.

In 1978, the Jays weren't any better, but Velez still hit quite well batting .266/.380/.448 with 9 homers and 38 RBI in 91 games. His playing time was split between left and right field, he also DHed some and played a game at first. He continued to crush LHP, hitting .302/.421/.560 against them.

In 1979 he hit .288/.396/.529 in 99 games with 15 home runs and 48 RBI. He again played mostly left and right field, DHed in 9 games and played first 6 times. Fangraphs has 1979 as Otto's best season, giving him a 2.8 WAR. Otto had a reverse split that year.

1980 saw Velez become a full time DH, playing 97 games as a DH and 3 at first base. He set career highs in home runs (20), runs (54) and tied his high for RBI (62). He hit .269/.365/.487 and an OPS+ of 127 his 4th straight year with the Jays with an OPS+ over 120. On May 4th he hit four home runs in a doubleheader against Cleveland and he hit one of each type, solo, two run, three run and grand slam.

1981, the strike year Velez had a poor season batting .213/.363/.404. When he was a young player he had old player skills and turning 30 those skills diminished quickly. 1982 he played in just 28 games, hitting just .192. He was replaced at DH by Dave Revering and a cast of thousands. After the 1982 season the Jays released him and he signed with the Cleveland Indians. He played just 10 games for the Indians and that was the end of his major league career at 32.

The early Jays were a pretty poor group, Velez was one of the few reasonable players they had. He was a pretty good DH type, had a really good eye at the plate and good power.

There is very little information on the web about Otto. He coached the Puerto Rico National Team in the 1992 Olympics and the 1994 Baseball World Cup. And that's about all that can be found about his post major league life. If anyone has any more information about Otto Velez, let me know.

Otto Velez' ranking among Jay batting leaders:

Batting Average (>1500 AB): 32nd, .257
On Base % (>1500 AB): 7th, .372
Slugging % (>1500 AB): 13th, .461
OPS (>1500 AB): 7th, .834
Games Played: 38th, 522
At Bats: 4th, 1531
Runs: 40th, 214
Hits: 42nd, 394
Total Bases: 37th, 706
Doubles: 38th, 76
Home Runs: 25th, 72
RBI: 32nd, 243
Walks: 17th, 278
Adjusted OPS+: 6th, 127

Mark Anthony Eichhorn | RP | 1982, 1986-1988, 1992-1993|

Mark Eichhorn was born November 21, 1960 in San Jose, CA. He was drafted by the Jays in the 2nd round, 30th overall, in the 1979 amateur draft, out of Cabrillo College, CA, where he played shortstop and pitched. He quickly rose thru the Jay's farm system and made 7 starts for the Jays as a September call up in 1982. They didn't go well, he went 0-3 with a 5.45 ERA and to make matters worse he suffered a shoulder injury. The injury cost him the speed off his fastball.

Returning to the minors he learned to throw submarine style in fall instructional league in 1984. As a right handed submarine pitcher, Mark threw, likely, the slowest pitches in the majors. He threw an extremely slow change-up, a ‘fastball' and a slider. And with releasing the ball from very low to the ground, coming from behind a right handed batter, he had a huge split in his stats, righties couldn't hit him at all, while lefties did pretty well against him. In 1986, his return year to the majors and his best season as a Jay, right handed batters only hit .135/.186/.165 against him, while lefties went .259/.345/.434.

In 1986 Mark had the best season ever for a Jay reliever. He pitched in 69 games, throwing an amazing 157 innings and finishing with a 1.72 ERA. Manager Jimy Williams offered to let him start in one of the season's final games so that he could have enough innings to get the ERA title, but he passed on it. Had he not spent a couple of weeks on the DL at the start of the season, he would have likely had the ERA title. Fangraphs has him at a 5.3 WAR that year. The Sporting News selected him as the Rookie Pitcher of the Year. He also finished 6th in Cy Young voting and 3rd in Rookie of the Year voting. Williams used him often and generally for multiple innings, pitching as many as 6 innings in a game out of the pen and going 3 or more innings several times. No star reliever would be used like that now.

It is hard to blame Williams for over using Eichhorn, when you have a 'get some shutout innings free card', you tend to use it. Mark was terrific finishing the '86 season 14-6 with 10 saves. He gave up only 105 hits in the 157 innings, striking out 166 while walking 45. He was 3rd in the Rookie of the Year voting, trailing Jose Canseco and Wally Joyner, and was 6th in the Cy Young voting. Rob Neyer rates this as the best season ever for a Jay reliever.

In 1987 Mark wasn't as good but still was very effective with a 3.17 ERA in 89 games, setting the Jays record for games pitched in a season. He won 10 games and saved 4 more, serving as a setup man for Tom Henke. Even though he pitched in 20 more games than 1986 he pitched 30 less innings, though Williams still would have him out there for 3 or more innings on several occasions he also used him to get one or two right-handers out several times. Jimy used him as an all-propose reliever, sending him out there in any situation. Eichhorn made the most appearances and faced the most batters of any AL reliever. As always he had a large split with a .642 OPS vs. righties and a .760 OPS vs. lefties.

In 1988 he was on pace to get into a lot of games again but he suffered an injury in early June that kept him out till September. Baseballlibrary.com says that he altered his delivery to try to make it harder for runners to steal on him and that cost him some effectiveness. His ERA did jump to 4.19, but I would kind of think some of that was because of the number of innings he had pitched over the last couple of years. Since some of his effectiveness might have been due to batters not being used to his different delivery, with pitching so much, batters may have been able to get comfortable with it and maybe had an easier time picking up the ball when he released it. And, even throwing sidearm, that much work has to cause some wear and tear on an arm.

After the 1988 season, feeling he had lost his effectiveness, the Jays sold Eichhorn to the Braves. After a pretty average season in Atlanta, the Angels signed him as a free agent. There he was again a very useful pitcher. After 2.5 good seasons with the Angels (he appears on Halos Haven Top 100 Angel's list), the Jays traded Rob Ducey and Greg Myers to get him back on July 30, 1992, just in time for Mark to get 2 World Series rings. He pitched 4.1 shutout innings, over 4 games, in the two post seasons.

In 1993, he pitched in 54 games and had a 2.72 ERA. Cito started the season using him as a multiple inning reliever but as the season went on he was used more as a 1 inning or less late inning setup man. After the second World Series win he signed as a free agent with the Orioles. Near the end of a very good season with the O's he was injured and missed the whole 1995 season. He signed back with the Angels in 1996 but didn't do well. He bounced around in the minors for a bit after that, including pitching in the Jays farm system in 2000 but didn't pitch in the majors again.

One of the things I've always wondered is why we don't see more side arm/submarine type pitchers in the majors. The ones we do see have success; I think if I were a minor league pitcher that wasn't likely to make the majors I'd give it a try, or try a knuckleball. In the 70's and 80's Kent Tekulve and Dan Quisenberry were very successful submarine style closers. As a group sidearmer's tend to have very good control, but beyond that they don't have much in common. Some have been hard throwers, some have had great curves or sliders, some throw sinkers, Dan Quisenberry even threw a knuckleball for a while and Eichhorn got by with a slow slow change. You can see Mark Eichhorn's delivery in this YouTube video.

Sidearmers seem to be pretty durable and have, on average, had long careers. The most infamous one is Carl Mays who stands as the only major league pitcher to have killed a batter with a pitch. Likely the strange delivery had something to do with why Ray Chapman didn't pick up the pitch and get out of the way. There were a number of other factors, balls were used longer back then and tended to be dirtier. With no lights at the stadium, in late afternoon, the ball would have been hard to see. But I digress, a lot. Mays was a straight underhand pitcher who threw very hard, a very good starting pitcher, just short of being a Hall of Fame type.

Mark ended his career with a 3.00 ERA in 885.2 innings over 563 games. He is now a pitching coach for a high school baseball team in California. His son was drafted in the 3rd round 2008 draft by the Arizona Diamondbacks and pitched in their system last year. Mark coached his son's team that was featured in a documentary movie called Small Ball, A Little League Story in 2002. It was about their team trying to make the Little League World Series. He also helps out at 'Kelly Gruber's Baseball Camps'.

And, of course, Eichhorn was a personal favorite of mine, I always liked the guys with a different throwing style. He pitched a ton of good innings for the Jays and seemed like a good guy.

Mark Eichhorn's place among the Jay all-time pitching leaders:

Wins: 22nd, 29
Games Single Season: 1st, 89 in 1987
Games: 14th, 279
Innings: 28th, 493
Strikeouts: 23rd, 372
Hit Batters: 14th, 24