It seems to me that for every year there's always a player who struggles and the switchboards light up with JaysTalk Callers demanding that the struggling player be benched and some top prospect be called up.

Two years ago, when Lyle Overbay struggled the cries for Brett Wallace went up almost immediately. Last year, when we couldn't seem to find anyone to play 3rd and Aaron Hill was struggling, they were calling for Brett Lawrie and Adeiny Hechavarria. I even recall one call to Bob McCown when I was a child and someone was complaining about how poor the outfield was and how they should bring "this Vernon Wells kid up from Syracuse". So my question is, who will it be this year?

*This is not about us, this is about the Jays Nation as a whole, which as sad as it is we make up a small portion of.

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It's been suggested on here before that player agents are just using the fact that the Jays will never say anything, to drive the market for their players. This got me wondering whether it could actually be happening, and whether we should be cool with it. I wouldn't be surprised if it was happening because the Jays don't say anything, so when we hear rumours that the Jays are heavily interested in whatever player, that report comes from the player agent or, in the case of a trade, possibly from the executives who got the calls from AA. So with all these players we've heard the Jays are heavily involved in, it's very likely the player agents are just saying that because they know the Jays won't refute it.

On the flip side, should AA care? I think this practice of using the Jays tight lips to drive up a players market may be sleezy and underhanded but it may actually work out for both the players and the Jays. If the Jays are among the front runners to get everybody then does that not give them more leverage with the guys they do want? The players AA will be signing will not be the top of the line guys, it will be the guys who can be easily replaced by another guy on the market. So if AA is the front runner to getting every single one of these guys, then when he goes into the negotiations the player has the understanding that AA could walk out at anytime because he's one phone call away from one of these other guys.

You may think that AA could be hurt by appearing to be bidding huge on big names because then the middle tier guys he's actually after will think he has tons of money to spend. But the above leverage in being heavily involved in every other guy, combined with the fact that he could simply deny it to the player and tell him it was just the player's agent using his silence, would presumably extinguish that hope.

Does this make sense? Or should I adjust my tin foil hat?

This is a question a coworker and I were wondering the other day. Which Blue Jay has played for the most teams as a Blue Jay?

With all the Blue Jays affiliates named after the big club it's not uncommon for players to have played for a few different Blue Jays teams on his way to the big club. I know Travis Snider, Joel Carreno and Henderson Alvarez have played for 4 each (Pulaski, GCL, Dunedin, Toronto and DSL, GCL, Dunedin and Toronto) but has anyone ever played for 5? or 6?

So I saw this thing when I was lurking over at Bless You Boys, the SB Nation site for the Tigers, and I thought it was a good idea. Since all the major organizational prospect rankings have now been released: Baseball Prospectus, John Sickels, Keith Law, The Hardball Times, Fangraphs, Baseball America, and of course B^3, I figured I'd compile all of them into one mega list. The way this works is I took all 7 of these prospect rankings and gave the top ten prospects points in descending order, so being ranked first gets 10, second gets 9..., tenth gets 1. So the highest possible score is 70. Brett Lawrie comes in as number two when a given list (The Hardball Times and Baseball America) was published before he was acquired. When a player (Brad Emaus) was on a list (The Hardball Times) but is gone everyone behind him was moved up by one.

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So I was browsing the videos on Sportsnet.ca (amazingly I can access it without changing my internet browser to Sportsnet explorer one) and this little gem struck me as very interesting.

Manny to Toronto

It's starting everyone's favourite (ironically or sincerely depending on which pole you're at) Mike Wilner and he makes some good points about how well Manny hits in Rogers Centre (apparently .970 lifetime OPS). He goes on to describe how Manny would take away all defensive flexibility, how he'd put butts in the seats, how, if you do that, you need to also go out and get another OF, and how improbable it is for all this to happen.

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