Travis Snider update

The Blue Jays prized prospect Travis Snider was sent down to AAA Las Vegas two weeks ago to fix the long and loopy swing he developed in his first full campaign at the major league level. After a scintillating spring training, and a strong first 9 games to start April, in which he had 3 home runs and 9 RBI, he scuffled mightily at the plate.

The club was hesitant to continue having Snider with the team, given the slate of interleague games they play in June, and because he wasn't playing every day, sitting against left handed pitching. The thinking was that the 21 year old Snider would benefit from regular action with Las Vegas, gain that confidence back, and learn to trust his swing again.

The early results haven't been all that promising with Las Vegas. In a small sampling of just 8 games, the powerful lefty has been anything but that, batting a pedestrian .258, with zero home runs and 2 RBI. His other Achilles heel, the strike out, hasn't exactly improved just yet, with him striking out in just under 30% of his at bats (10 in 31 plate appearances)

There's no reason to push the panic button yet because the kid will be something special. The Jays haven't indicated how long it'll take him for Snider to return to the Blue Birds, but it's entirely possible that if he continues to struggle, it might be a while.

Could Purcey return to the rotation?

After David Purcey was sent down to AAA following his miserable control issues in the first month of the Jays season, it seemed like it might be a very very long time until he came back north of the border. With the Jays having quite a few young hurlers waiting to burst though to make it to the starting rotation, and after Purcey's horrendous first couple starts with AAA Las Vegas, it seemed plausible that he might be passed over in the clubs future plans.

However, the big southpaw has found his game down in the minors and might just be putting himself back on Toronto's radar should Ricky Romero continue to struggle. In 5 of the 6 starts since the demotion, Purcey hasn't allowed more than 2 earned runs, while his shortest outing in that span was 5.1 innings, posting a solid 3.50 ERA overall. If you throw out his horrendous second start, in which he gave up 8 earned runs in 2.1 innings, that ERA would be sparkling.

Purcey has the tools to be an effective major league starter. He displayed that last year, and occasionally this season. If he should continue his strong play, and limit his walks (20 in 36 innings pitched), he could find himself back with the Jays sooner rather than later.

Romero struggling since return from DL

What a disappointing return from the disabled list for Ricky Romero. After looking so good in his first three career big league starts, where he silenced his critics that labeled him a bust, he has struggled mightily since coming back for his oblique injury.

Prior to going on the shelf, Romero was 2-0 with an ERA of 1.71. In his two starts since returning to the starting five, he is 0-2, surrendering 10 runs on 19 hits, including a whopping five homers in just 9.1 innings of work against Baltimore and Boston. Romero has struggled with his command, too often falling behind in counts and has subsequently been susceptible to the long ball.

I would expect the club will allow him to have one more start to work through his mechanics. Should he falter, a trip to AAA Las Vegas likely would be in the offing, with David Purcey, Brett Cecil, Brad Mills or Fabio Castro candidates to replace him in the rotation. Romero must prove his sensational start was not an aberration, rather that his two poor outings were instead.

League thriving in set-up role

I've always defended my boy Brandon League to the throngs of Jays fans that claim that he's garbage. In fact, at the start of the season I predicted he would eventually fill the closer's role if B.J. Ryan struggled. Unfortunately for League, he also had a rough start to the campaign, seemingly losing the trust of the club.

A couple of days ago, I thought that Manager Cito Gaston had no confidence in the fireballer because he didn't go to him to lock down the contest in extra innings in Baltimore, instead electing to turn to Brian Wolfe. Therefore, I proclaimed that logically speaking, Jason Frasor should be the set up man for Toronto, because he's been fantastic so far.

Clearly, Gaston does in fact have a lot of faith in League because he's inserted him in the 8th inning of the first two games of the Boston series. League didn't disappoint, retiring all 3 hitters he faced in both contests. He was provided sorely needed relief at the back end of the bullpen, mixing in his great fastball with a phenomenal splitter.

If he keeps this up, he might just make the transition to closer within a couple of years. He most definitely has great potential to be the stopped of the future, and not so distant present.

Silver lining in 9 game losing streak?

It's hard to imagine there being anything positive to take away from the worst road trip in the entire Blue Jays franchise history. The Blue Birds lost all 9 of their games, dropping from a sensational 27-14 record to 27-23. However, could there be a silver lining to take from that dastardly trip?

Unequivocally, the worst part of the losing skid was falling all three times to division rival Boston. However, it made the club realize that youngsters Brett Cecil and Robert Ray aren't quite ready for the big stage, so they were comfortable with sending the young starts back to AAA and replace them with Casey Janssen and Ricky Romero.

The 2nd part of the excursion was the awful three game sweep at the hands of the Atlanta Braves. Silver lining in that? It's 3 games that we lost to a club that's not in our league. Not a complete disaster. And that leads us to the 3rd series sweep in Baltimore. The last loss was the hardest to stomach, with the team blowing a 5 run 8th inning lead, and then a 2 run 11th inning edge, but it's not like the Orioles will be contending in the American League East, so it's not the worst team to lose to.

We should count our lucky starts the brutal stretch of losses didn't occur to the likes of Boston, New York Yankees and the Tampa Bay Rays. There would have been no words to describe how demoralizing that would have been. It's tough to take any positives from losing so many games in a row, but maybe, just maybe, Toronto got their terrible losing streak out of the way, and can now focus on getting their season back on track against the teams that they'll be in a battle with to make the playoffs.

Rolen ignites the rally; Jays FINALLY snap skid

It's about damn time! The Blue Jays finally won in their first game back home after losing all nine games on the worst road trip in franchise history. They end their skid against the team that started the miserable stretch, the Boston Red Sox.

Scott Rolen was the star of the Jays 6-3 series opening win. Twice in the contest, in the 3rd inning and again in the 5th, the crafty veteran doubled to drive in the tying run. The second time he ignited a rally, as the Jays scored five times in the 5th frame. That was all the run support Casey Janssen (1-1) needed to secure a victory.
Rolen, like many of the other Jays hitters during their recent power outage, now has 3 RBI in his last 2 games, this after having none in an astounding 13 contests.

It's only one game, but this was a huge W. The Jays ensure they are only 1 game back of the Red Sox, and can pull even with them with another win tomorrow afternoon.

Time to make Frasor the set-up man

The Blue Jays bullpen is a mess right now, with few pitchers worthy of being relied upon right now. A big issue, now that Scott Downs is the closer, is having a trusted set-up man work the 8th inning to gives Downs the opportunity to close a contest out. Jesse Carlson has been horrific, as has Blow Jay Ryan. Brandon League could possibly do the job well, but Cito Gaston doesn't have extreme faith in him either.

Enter Jason Frasor. Apart from one awful outing on the road trip, Frasor has enjoyed a renaissance season. Frasor is 4-0 with an ERA of 2.41, which is skewed because of the aforementioned bad game in Atlanta, where he gave up 4 runs. Having been the closer in the 2004 season, Frasor is used to working late in ball games, and he consistently is getting the job done this year. Why not see if he can get the job done? There's nothing to lose (apart from more games with the current set-up guys at the helm.)

Now is not the time to be experimenting in trying to let Carlson, Ryan etc. work through their problems in tight games. The Jays are still in contention in the A.L. East, and if they blow games against Boston in this upcoming series, it could crush our chances immensely of making it back to the playoffs for the first time in 16 years.

Penciling Frasor in as the set-up hurler gives us the best chance to end that nasty drought.