25 Man Roster Challenge is back!

It's just about that time of year when we all start to think about what the Opening Day lineup for your Toronto Blue Jays will look like. Well, it should be that time of year. The 7th annual 25 Man Roster Challenge is a go once again. It's ridiculously easy to play and you can win cool Blue Jays stuff.

If you do decide to play, you have 3 options on how to get your ballot in:


1: Send us an email: 1bluejaysway(at)gmail.com

2: Make a post on your blog, if you have one and send us a link

3: Add your ballot to the comments section of this post or the reminder post(s) we will do


All ballots should have a team name and a tiebreaker.

In the event of a tie, and it's pretty much a given at this point there will be a tie, we ask that you also give us a prediction on what you think the spring training record will be. From what we can see, it appears as though the boys of summer will attempt to play 30 spring training games this year. That total includes the 2 exhibition games against the Red Sox in the Big O, but not the split-squad game against the Canadian Junior National Team on March 17th.

Try not to forget that sometimes it rains in Florida and the games don`t generally get made up if they are cancelled. There is also a chance that if one of those games goes to extra innings and one team runs out of pitchers, both teams agree the game ends in tie.

It is not a requirement that you select a tie breaker, and all ballots containing 25 names will be considered valid, but it is a really good idea that you choose one. Three years ago we had a stupid close finish and we actually had to break it right down to winning percentage.

It should be noted that no one has ever gone 25 for 25 in all the years we have been running this challenge; it would be really swell if that streak was broken.

Some Things To Consider:

Your Toronto Blue Jays currently have 11 players who are out of options on the 40-man roster and would therefore have to make the team or be sent through waivers before they could be demoted to the Minor Leagues. A few of these players are not in jeopardy at all, but there will be some spring training battles to keep your eyes on here for sure.


OF Ezequiel Carrera
OF Junior Lake
C Josh Thole
C A.J. Jimenez
1B Justin Smoak
RHP R.A. Dickey
RHP Jesse Chavez
LHP Brett Cecil
RHP Steve Delabar
RHP Chad Jenkins
MVP Josh Donaldson


The old regime certainly took the position that if there was a tie between two players and one of them had options, that guy lost and was headed to the minor leagues. That would give the edge to a guy like Chad Jenkins for the last bullpen spot on this club. Not sure how the new guys view this situation and frankly that might be an interesting thing to monitor going forward. The upper minor leagues clearly needs some depth guys around and we doubt, at least for this year, that they let the Delabar/Jenkins types walk but you never know. Apparently we did pretty good last year and have a returning core group of players that are expected to compete for the pennant once again. Maybe it's time to trim some roster fat.

The wild card in this year's roster challenge has to be RHP Aaron Sanchez. He wants to start and there is an open spot in the rotation. He's really good at relieving and there's always a need in the back of the bullpen for shutdown guys. Depending on what happens in spring training with respect to his role on the team could determine the eventual winner. Heck, there's even talk of him starting the year in AAA.

This is a very strong MLB roster and there are not that many position battles, which is a good thing. That should in theory make it easier to select a solid ballot for the purposes of this exercise. At the end of the day, to be the champion all you have to do is put forth a ballot with 25 names on it. Who wins what job is irrelevant in this game, but it can't be played without taking it into consideration.

Prizes:

This year we have a great selection of coveted prizes for the winner to keep. Behold!

Little something for everyone. The foam J is the one you saw during the playoffs.

The deadline for ballots to be in will be Monday February 22nd at midnight. Late ballots will not be considered.

We wish you all good luck.