What happened to the Blue Jays? Five key issues!

The Toronto Blue Jays were winning 11-0, and it is now currently 11-10. They are playing the Texas Rangers and are possibly in the middle of their biggest blow up in team history, and Texas’s biggest come back in their respective franchise history.

Vernon Wells just stole a home run from Chris Davis off of a shaky slider thrown in by the hands of Scott Downs during the first pitch of the bottom of the seventh. In all honesty it was a very nice catch, at least Wells can still do something right.

The rest of the details of tonight’s game won’t matter to anyone else outside of Texas, Boston or Tampa. Most Toronto fans have already turned off their TV’s, put away their jerseys, and grabbed the Maple Leafs pre season schedule.

Another dismal year for Toronto baseball, the only difference this year compared to last year is the Blue Jays actually played very well at the start of 2009. They indeed played so well that being 12 games under .500 at the end of August would have seemed silly had the words have been uttered in early June.

Just another year, roughly 23 games back of New York, 16 games back of Boston and around 12 games back of Tampa. People will wonder why this collapse happened; here are the five main reasons why the Blue Jays have collapsed from first in the Majors to their more familiar standing of forth in the AL east.

1. J.P. Ricciardi

The boggling of the Blue Jays has been taking place for years. But let’s just focus on recent history.

Vernon wells= overpaid. Frank Thomas= nice severance package. BJ Ryan= never really did anything other than collecting 15 million after passing go and collecting a minor league contract from Chicago.

Alex Rios= overpaid yes, yes he should have been signed for less money, but thanks to his large contract we had to lose one of our best young talents.

Roy Halladay= basically Roy, we don’t want you anymore because we can’t afford you, so we’re going to tell you you’re going to be traded, and then we won’t trade you and you will go 3-5 in your next 8 decisions.

Are you getting the hint? Before we blame the Yankees payroll, or the Blue Jays players, take a look at the borderline idiot who has been running the Jays for 8 seasons.

PS. Thank god we don’t have Scott Rollen anymore, and what a steal we got for trading him, Encarnacion!

2. Rios, Wells...

Thanks for underachieving in a year when we actually needed your bats, too much money locked up in two unreliable B-list players. Not much else can be said.

3. Injuries

The season wouldn’t be complete unless we could complain about injuries. However, this year it did take its toll. I wonder how their pitching would have looked with Marcum and McGowan, but that’s life.

We lost Scott Downs for a bit, BJ Ryan never recovered from injury, Wells is apparently playing with a sore leg, but that hasn’t been substantiated. We lost Jesse Litch for a bit, just not a great year for the pitching staff or our supposed franchise player.

Al East

The Jays came out flying in '09 until they played New York. They have been able to play alright with teams in other divisions but the Jays haven’t played very well in their own.

Toronto just got swept by the Red Sox and most likely will win only one game at best this weekend against New York. And yes, they can’t compete with the Bo Sox or Yanks payroll, and that does have a large effect over 162 games.

Cold bats

Aside from Lind, Hill, and Scutaro, no one currently on the roster is tearing it up. Rios, Wells, Overbay, Barajas never really hit very well. Rollen was hitting well, but thank god we got rid of him.