Colby Rasmus' Final Chance?

I can easily admit I have a soft spot for Colby Rasmus, he seems like the type of guy I'd like to meet, kind of quiet, but interesting and seems like he has a good sense of humor. He just seems like an interesting guy.

I'm sure some of why I like him is because of the dislike Tony LaRussa had for him. I never understand why a manager would let everyone know he doesn't like a player. I get that we can't like everyone, some personalities mesh, some don't, but what value is there for a manager to tell everyone how much he hates a certain player. Does it serve the team in some way? I don't think so. It would have to hurt a player's trade value. I don't see it being a motivating factor, would you work better if you knew your boss hated you and he wasn't shy in telling everyone how lousy you are? I get there was a personality difference, LaRussa is the fast talking, lawyer, genius manager and Colby is the slow talking southerner. And Colby's dad didn't help. But still, why be so public in your dislike of one of your players?

Anyway, Colby's having a nice start to his season, hitting .262/.340/.619 with 4 home runs. He's walking more than last year, 10.6% of the time, compared to 7.5% last year, but then he's getting a ton of strikeouts. So far this year, 40.4% of the time he strikes out. And he really doesn't look good doing it. Sometimes I'd swear he closes his eyes and swings. I'd like to think the strikeout rate will drop. He as a little better, this past week, going down on strikes 33% of the time. Small steps, or maybe just small sample size. I'm pretty sure Chad Mottola's plan wasn't for him to strikeout this much.

The home runs he's just crushed. The distances on his four home runs: 410, 468, 381 and 439 feet. Two were pulled, Two were to almost dead center. They weren't brushing the top of the fence on the way out.

His wOBA is .406, second on the team to, the injured, Jose Reyes. He's also second in wRC+ at 160. His BABIP is very high, .368, but he is hitting the ball hard (the rare time he does make contract). And it is a small sample size.

He's had a big 6 at bats versus lefties, 2 hits. I'd be more willing to let him play against lefties than Adam Lind. Colby has defensive value, so if he doesn't hit lefties great, at least we have his glove.

Defensively, to my eyes, he's looked very good. I know that he's a pretty average CFer but there are a lot of really good CFers in the league. He looks really good going back on balls.

Anyway, small sample sizes and all, and last year he was great for the first half of the season and just awful for the second half, so I do want to see him keep up decent numbers for a full season.

Lurking in the wings is Anthony Gose. Gose is far better defensively, has much better range, a much better arm, all of that. Gose is having a nice start to his Buffalo Bison's season, hitting .313/.371/.406 in 32 at bats. I do think, at some point, Gose comes up, Colby moves to right field, Jose Bautista moves to first base (preferably not in mid-season) and Edwin gets more of a full-time DH role. I know it is a waste of Jose's arm, but he doesn't have a lot of range in right and that won't be improving as he ages. I'd love to have one of those really good outfields with 3 guys with lot of range.

Anyway, what do you think of Colby, so far this year, and what do you think the Jays plans should be for him?

Buy Blue Jay tickets