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1) Rumors about Jeff Samardzija being available and the Jays perhaps considering making a play if they are in contention near the end of July. The reported price for the Jays was Marcus Stroman and Aaron Sanchez. Would you make that deal? The Blue Jays are in first place in the AL East. Read that again! The Blue Jays are in first place in the AL East!! I have visions of thousands of people outside of Rogers Centre just like there were for the Raptors outside of the Air Canada Centre. How much fun would that be? The AL East will be won by a general manager; not by players or managers this year. Who will make the moves that will give his team the advantage to separate from the pack? When is the last time we saw the Yankees, Red Sox and Rays as vulnerable as they are this season? This is the best chance in the last two decades that the Jays have to win the division. When I was in the front office of the New York Mets, John Gibbons was a manager and coach in the farm system there. When I got the Mets GM job it was Gibbons who made a statement that impacted me tremendously. He said, "Go for it. You dont know how long these jobs last or how many opportunities you will get to win, So Go For It!" That stuck with me and when I had chances to be a playoff team I did what I needed to do to get there and win. That included trading away some very good prospects to bring in winning players. I never regretted trading away prospects in years I made the playoffs. I searched "Toronto Blue Jays" online and went to the Jays Wikipedia page. Interestingly, the chronology of the Jays history is broken down by the era of the general manager. There is the Pat Gillick era, Gord Ash era, JP Riccardi era and now we are in the Alex Anthopolous era. It is time for Alex to write his legacy for his era. Go For It Alex! Prospects can get general managers fired. We all have waited for top prospects to impact our major league team and have seen many of them fizzle away. This is the year to go for it. Trade away what it takes to get Jeff Samardzija. He is darn good. If it takes both Marcus Stroman and Aaron Sanchez then so be it. Do it now. Dont wait. Get Samardzija for as many starts as you can. He is still young and in the prime of his career and you control his contract next year as well. Dont wait until the trade deadline. Be the team that people are trying to catch at the deadline. This is the year that will define the Alex Anthopoulos Era. I hope he goes for it! 2) Did you like the decision to send Stroman back down to continue starting in AAA, or should the Jays have kept him to help the struggling pen? It was definitely the right decision to send Stroman down to the minors to assume his spot in the starting rotation. It is the best thing for Stroman and the best thing for the Jays. Stroman pitched like a youngster in his first stint in the majors. He got knocked around a bit coming out of the bullpen. He isnt an obvious solution out there. He has more value going back to AAA as a starter in case he is needed in Torontos rotation. The main reason he needs to go back to AAA and start though is for marketing purposes. He is a chip for Samardzija or any other starting pitching deal that the Jays will consider. Toronto needs Stroman to go down and pitch successfully at AAA so another teams scouts and general manager can dream about him in their rotation. It is not a matter of IF Stroman will stick in the big leagues, it is just a matter of WHEN and with WHOM. 3) The Jays swept the Red Sox, who fell to 20-26, 4th in the AL East. Whats wrong in Boston with the champs? This is an interesting question because in some way it means that we are surprised that the Jays could sweep the Red Sox. The Sox clearly have issues but in detailing those I dont want to take away from the Jays who outhit, outpitched and out defended the Sox. The Jays won by playing Blue Jays baseball the way the team was built to play. The Red Sox are struggling and those struggles are indicative of some serious issues. They are not nearly the team they were a year ago. In 2013, the Red Sox led the AL in runs scored by a wide margin (+57 runs on second place Detroit). They also were in the upper half in pitching with their starting rotation ranked fourth in the league. This season not much is going right for the Sox. They are ranked a respectable sixth in the league in pitching but only because their bullpen is significantly outpitching their rotation. The starters have a combined 4.50 ERA which is ranked 12th among the fifteen AL teams. The Red Sox find themselves trailing in games quite often since their starters give up early runs. That ultimately impacts the quality of the at bats of the hitters as they feel more pressure to produce. The offence is the biggest issue for the Sox. They average 5.26 runs per game in 2014 and just 4.04 per game this year. That tells you all you need to know. The Sox won 97 games in 2013 because they could score in any number of ways. They had great team power (fifth in HR) and great team speed (third in stolen bases). This season they are 10th in HR and 14th in stolen bases. This is a team wide struggle and is most prevalent against right-handed pitching. They are just 10-20 against right-handed starting pitching whereas they were 65-43 last season. Certainly the loss of Jacoby Ellsbury to the Yankees couldnt have been this substantial or is it? Consider that Ellsburys stat line last season vs. right-handers was .328/.374/.489. Plus he stole 39 bases in those games. The Red Sox are barely on pace to steal that many bases as a team this season. Ellsburys replacements in CF, Grady Sizemore (.233/.307/.344) and Jackie Bradley Jr. (.209/.313/.279) are not doing much to make Red Sox fans forget about Ellsbury. It is not solely the loss of Ellsbury that is hurting the Red Sox against righties: Davis Ortiz is significantly less as well but that may be tracked back to Ellsbury too. Without Ellsbury on base in front of Ortiz he is getting much different pitches to hit. The Red Sox need much better starting pitching if they are going to win the division. They are also going to have to find a catalyst offensively (and it wont be the recently signed Stephen Drew) and they are going to need David Ortiz to have his best season ever. I thought Ellsbury was significantly overpaid by the Yankees but maybe he was worth it….to the Red Sox!!! 4) When we were kids growing up, we all played baseball and at times imagined ourselves as major league players. I have four boys and love to ask them what they want to be when they grow up. "I want to be a baseball player," says one. Another says, "I want to be a football player." During basketball season I get, "I want to play in front of Raptors fans." Another son says, "I want to be a baseball analyst." He is my favorite. Most sports fans at one point or another dreamed of playing professionally. When we grow up we all want to be general managers. We call in to talk radio shows with opinions about players and trades and free agents. It seems like such a great job doesnt it? The first two months of this baseball season has made me remember the pain of being a general manager. John Steinbeck wrote in his 1937 novel Of Mice and Men, "The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry." Well isnt that the truth. You all want to be a general manager but there are days that I would have rather been raking the field than making decisions about the team. So often in baseball you can have the right design and configuration of your roster but stuff happens: injuries, underperformance, marital problems, etc. There are so many unpredictable variables that can impact a teams results. The Dodgers started the season with the best one-two punch in baseball with Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke, but Kershaw hurt his back and has missed time. The As and Rays started the season with great young starting pitching depth but both have two starters out from elbow surgery. The Pirates and Indians both made the playoffs last year with very young teams. They came in to 2014 expecting their young players to take another step forward and to be competitive again for a playoff spot. Both clubs are struggling. Werent those fair expectations? Heck the Red Sox won the World Series last year. Even though they lost a player here and there they should still be among the best in baseball…right? The Nationals were a very popular pick to represent the NL in the World Series this year. They have been just mediocre, but who would have predicted that Bryce Harper and Ryan Zimmerman would miss weeks of the season and that Doug Fister and Gio Gonzalez would spend time on the DL. It is the most frustrating part of being a general manager. Your thinking and decision-making can be spot on yet the results can completely collapse. So much happens that cant be predicted. Stuff that is completely out of your control. I am breaking out in hives just thinking about it. Having been in the room when my kids were born I have always wondered why women go back for more after having one. It hurts so much why would anyone want to do it again. Women say they have "selective memory." They have the ability to move away from the pain and only remember the joy of childbirth. I guess being a GM is kind of like that too. The anguish of seeing your plans blow up before your very eyes can be painful. Yet GMs go back for more year after year. As for me…no more kids please! .J. - The New York Jets have signed former Green Bay Packers backup quarterback Graham Harrell, giving them some added depth at the position. . Ghoulam has put pen to paper on a four and a half year deal, tying him to Napoli until 2018. The 22-year-old Algeria international, who played for France at Under 21 level, has made 87 league appearances in four seasons at Saint-Etienne. . Strasburg (1-1) got 14 consecutive outs in one stretch and allowed only three hits, including Marcell Ozunas homer in the seventh. The right-handers lone walk was to the last batter he faced. Washingtons starter Wednesday, Jordan Zimmermann, left after a career-low 1 2-3 innings, leaving the bullpen "taxed," as manager Matt Williams put it. . The 23-year-old Neustaedter will move at the end of the season when his contract with Moenchengladbach expires. He signed a four-year deal with Schalke. . Fourteen players were suspended last summer by Major League Baseball as part of the Biogenesis drug scandal, ranging from All-Stars to also-rans.MALDONADO, Uruguay - New England Revolution forward Diego Fagundez has chosen to play his international football with Uruguay — the land of his birth — and not with the United States, where he grew up and has lived since he was five.Fagundez debuted for Uruguay this month in the South American Under-20 Championship, which means he is no longer eligible to play for the U.S. at the senior level. He has a Uruguayan passport, but is not eligible for an American one for several years.Thats fine with the 19-year-old winger, who has scored 22 goals in four seasons with the Revolution and grew up in Massachusetts.Fagundez said he was enticed by playing for a country that has a rich football heritage like Uruguay and grew tired of waiting for the right American documents.He said his parents immigrated to the United States in 2000 to look for a better future.I cant say anything bad, Fagundez said in an interview with The Associated Press. My family is well and we have everything that we need to live well.Fagundez played on U.S. youth teams, but said he was eventually told that — without the right residency documents — he could not keep playing.The moment came when they told me I couldnt continue because I wasnt a citizen or a resident, said Fagundez, who speaks Spanish and English but prefers to write in English. A lot of years passed — so many years — and the situation didnt change. I was tired of waiting for the United States.Gaining exposure in Uruguay should increase Fagundezs international value, though the competition could be tough.dddddddddddd Despite a population of only 3.3 million — the greater Boston area alone has more with about 4.5 million — Uruguay produces some of the worlds top player like Luis Suarez and Diego Forlan.Fabian Coito, technical director of the Uruguay under-20 team, said Fagundez brings a foreign aspect to the side.Hes a player brought up with a different game, and aspects of his game are hard to find in Uruguayan players, Coito said. He is always linking up, plays the short pass, repeating those passes up the pitch. Its different to our style. We are very vertical, direct and looking to quickly put the ball in an attacking position. Weve always been interested in this part of his game.To the surprise of his Uruguay teammates, Fagundez loves ice hockey, a sport ignored in the small South American country.Im a hard-core fan, said Fagundez, who turns 20 next month. I love to watch it. Its a violent sport, lots of physical contact and fights. The fans are so passionate.But he said his new teammates already treat him like a brother.This biggest adjustment will be the intensity of the play.The South American game is different than the American one, Coito said. Diego will have to adapt to the style: less space and more contact.Coito said Fagundez had a great future and could eventually make the senior team.Fagundez said he had no hard feeling against American soccer officials.Right now, I dont want to play with the United States, he said. Im very happy with Uruguay and I think we can go far. ' ' '
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