Late last season, former Blue Jays designated hitter-turned-malcontent Shae Hillenbrand was unceremoniously traded to the San Francisco Giants after writing the words “The ship is sinking” on the locker room blackboard. Not exactly inspiring stuff, and the Jays staff were more than happy show him the door.
Fast forward to 2007: the Blue Jays are currently tied for last place in the East division, and until recent wins against perennial bottom feeders the Devil Rays, had been 0 for 9 to begin May. Their star pitcher, Roy Halladay, is gone for the next two months after an appendectomy and their closer, B.J Ryan, is out long-term with elbow problems. Rounding out the Jays’ “‘walking wounded”‘ are left fielder, Reed Johnson, catcher Greg Zaun, and third sacker Troy Glaus. Call him crazy, but maybe that Hillenbrand guy was on to something. It may have come a season too early, but his comments could just turn out to be prophetic in the end.
Whether Hillenbrand was a prophet or a madman seems a moot point now, as there are more important questions to ponder in the coming months. One wonders, if the team continues to play in this lethargic, uninspired manner, who will be made to go down with the ship? Will it be “the ‘skipper’,” John Gibbons, or the man at the helm, general manager J.P. Ricciardi?
If the Blue jays have important questions in need of answers, Ricciardi certainly doesn’t sound like the man who has them. “We’re in last place and we’re not playing good baseball. I don’t know what else you want me to say,” he said recently of his team’s terrible May record.
Sounds like the useless hand-wringing to me. And if you had to choose a scapegoat, a strong choice is the much maligned Ricciardi. After all it wouldn’t be the first time the name J.P was associated with sinking ships (J.P. Morgan was the millionaire philanthropist who financed the building of the Titanic).
Unfortunately, this J.P. is simply spending money-and not wisely, mind you. Currently, the payroll for the upcoming season is slated at $82 million U.S, and without some ‘creative’ book-keeping, that would actually be closer to $95 million U.S. averaged over the next five years (conveniently the length of J.P’s own contract).
This roster, all told, is at least as expensive as the Titanic and even easier to poke holes in. In his six years as general manager, the Blue Jays have produced few impact players (save Aaron Hill and Adam Lind) and certainly no pitchers of merit, a fact which that becomes more apparent with each new addition to the disabled list.
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Many of the problems this organization faces stem from bad decisions made off the field, such as poor talent evaluation, misallocation of resources and appalling roster management. There is almost an almost complete lack of baseball IQ and acumen throughout the upper levels of the organization. Paul Godfrey is a business man, not a baseball guy, and he’s looking more and more like baseball’s version of Richard Peddie.
The Jays already face an uphill battle in a division that has the Yankees and the Red Sox, and while owner Ted Rogers may have a lot of money, he can’t afford a general manager with so little foresight. Saddling the Jays with heavily back-loaded and expensive contracts, Ricciardi has a complete disregard for the scouting system which that has been the life-blood of baseball teams since the time of Willie Mays.
Ricciardi apologists will simply point to all the injuries the Jays have suffered this year and say we’ve been dealt a case of extremely bad luck. But that would be a gross oversimplification. Injuries and inconsistent play are facts of baseball-and every team goes into slumps. But that doesn’t explain why, for instance, the team has millions of dollars tied up in players like Eric Hinske and Corey Koskie, who aren’t even on the roster.
When asked to describe his state of mind, Ricciardi quotes Abraham Lincoln saying: “I am too old to cry, but it hurts too much too laugh.” The quote is certainly more poetic than the one Hillenbrand was dispatched for, but for long suffering Jays fans, the end result should be the same. J.P. would do well to read Walt Whitman’s Lincoln-inspired “O Captain, my Captain”, though he probably wouldn’t like the outcome.
