Friday Bantering: A New Park?

Happy Friday. We made it through another week. That is cause for a celebration.

There is actual Blue Jays news this morning. The Globe and Mail is reporting that the Jays are planning on knocking down Rogers Centre and building a new ballpark. The park would be south of the current site.

The plan includes redeveloping a large part of downtown Toronto. Condos (surprise), shops, office buildings, and “public space” (likely a tree or something).

It isn’t going to happen overnight. Rogers doesn’t own all the land they want for this. Some of it is public land. But the nice part is that they aren’t asking for public money for it. The story says that rebuilding the stadium will ‘play out’ over the next 5-8 years.

There isn’t anything about how the park would look. I’m guessing there will be a retractable roof of some sort.

It does sound like the Blue Jays would have to play a season somewhere else, but that’s a long way off, and we are pros at playing somewhere else.

A new park would be great. Rogers Centre is fine, with the roof open. Much less fine with it closed. It isn’t that old yet, and I’m not a fan of tearing things down every 40 years, but great if the government isn’t paying for it.

The Athletic has a list of “Black Friday” deals for each of the MLB teams. For the Jays, they see a deal for Jose Quintana. It does fit with the Black Friday theme. Not a big expensive deal, but a doable thing.

The rotation needs a boost. Quintana is a quality arm who had his 2020 wiped out by a strained lat and a kitchen accident that required surgery on his thumb. He relies more on command than stuff, so he should be reasonably productive as he continues to age.

Jon Morosi tells us that the Jays have ‘checked on’ Brad Hand.

I think we would have a shorter list if we just talked about the guys the Jays haven’t checked on.