Thursday Bantering: Jays to end Spring Training in Montreal again next year

The Blue Jays are ending their 2018 spring training in Montreal again. This time they will play the Cardinals on 26-27th at the Big O, before beginning the regular season in New York, in Toronto, playing the Yankees on March 29th.

If you haven’t gone to Montreal for one of these series, you really should. It is a great city. Great food. Tonnes to do. And, surprisingly enough, Olympic Stadium, when it is full, is a fun place to watch a game. I’d imagine it might not be as fun to play on that turf.

Bodog has sent out an email showing how their pre-season bets went. The Jays, of course, we under their 84.5 wins (glad I didn’t bet). Here are some of the other bets you could have made.

If you took the under on everything, you could have made a fair bit of money.

In retrospect, the 31.5 homer over/under, for Jose Bautista, was wildly optimistic. I’m sure I would have taken the over on wins for both Happ and Estrada. The only ‘overs’ for our pitching staff were Stroman over on wins and Osuna over on saves. Aaron Sanchez was over the 3.25 ERA mark, but I guess they are talking over as the good side.

On the offensive side, the only ‘over’ we have is Morales over on homers (though Donaldson could get to the over on homers too.

That pretty much sums up our season, very few players have put up the numbers we expected.

I guess Aaron Sanchez’ season is the one that makes me the saddest. After leading the league in ERA last year, I expected him to build on it. Stupid new baseballs. How different would the season have been if Sanchez had been able to pitch? Likely not enough to put us into the playoffs, but I’d bet we wouldn’t be last. And a good start, at the right time, would have pushed us to .500, at several different points of the season.

We go into the last series tied with the Orioles for last in the AL East. I know it isn’t important, but I’d like us to get ahead of them. Moving 1 spot in the draft won’t, most likely, make a difference in who we get. And I enjoy winning more than losing.