Before spring training, I felt that the Jays were likely a team that would finish in the mid-80's for wins and if everything broke right we could be a contender. Now, well we are off to a 10-4 start. Is everything breaking right?
Ok, the 10-4 start hasn't been against AL East teams. But we haven't had 14 games against the Washington Nationals either. We started the season against the Tigers, but they are a pretty good team. They are now tied for first in the Central and are 6-2 against teams not from Toronto. Then we played the Indians who aren't great but they looked pretty good against the Yankees. After that we won 3 of 4 against the Twins 3-1, the Twins are pretty good, 6-4 against teams from south of the border. And then the A's who were picked by some to win the West. So we haven't exactly been playing the crap teams.
So what has been breaking right? Well the middle of the infield, Scutaro and Hill have been off the charts amazing defensively and offensively. Adam Lind has been channelling Babe Ruth. Snider has as great as we hoped he be. Rolen and Overbay have been the corner infield bats that we were looking for last year. Wells has a couple of homers and is hitting at about the level we should expect. Even Kevin Millar has had a couple of big hits and won a game with his legs
Pitching wise Doc, as always has been Doc, but then a pitcher that I don't think any of us figured would make the roster, never mind the starting rotation, Ricky Romero, has been even better than Doc. Richmond done as good a job as we could hope him too. Most of the bullpen as been great Downs, Frasor, Camp and Carlson have been pretty much lights out. Tallet made a terrific start. And Ryan seems to have righted himself.
What isn't breaking right? Rios has been many shades of awful and Barajas hasn't been much better, though he seems to be hitting the ball well. Purcey's had 1 good start of the 3 times he's been out there. And League has days where he can't keep the ball close to the strike zone.
Everything breaking right included us suffering few injuries, we aren't deep and really can't afford to lose players. We've had a couple. Barrett's injury though sad is survivable. The difference between him and Chavez as a backup catcher isn't huge. But Litsch's injury is pretty major. I was really counting on Litsch having the same sort of season he had last year. If he is gone for an extended period we are in trouble.
Compared to last season, something else that is going well is that we seem to be getting the clutch hits occasionally. And, maybe our luck is changing, our Pythag record is the same as our real record. Last year we lagged behind it. Maybe our luck is changing.
So is everything breaking right? No. But you have to figure Rios will start hitting sometime and that if Barajas keeps hitting the ball hard it will start falling in some of the time. Purcey will have more good games.
All in all, I still think we can compete if things go well, but I'm thinking now that not everything has to break right. I think most things have to, but not everything. And I'm looking forward to the ride.