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.

The 25 Man Roster Challenge Is Back Once Again!

This spring, pitchers and catchers’ first workout to be held on Feb. 23 & the first full team workout will take place on Feb. 27
— Blue Jays-Official (@BlueJays) November 21, 2014

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. No matter. The 6th (!) 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 32 spring training games this year. That total includes the 2 exhibition games against the Reds in the Big O, but not the split-squad game against the Canadian Junior National Team on March 15th. 

Try not to forget that sometimes it rains in Florida-we are too cheap to get a dome down there and the games don`t generally get made up. 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 to say "Fuck it, let's go play some golf" and 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. Two 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 10 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.

RHP Kyle Drabek 
RHP Liam Hendriks 
RHP Todd Redmond 
LHP Scott Barnes 
1B Justin Smoak 
INF Steve Tolleson 
INF Danny Valencia 

Josh Donaldson, Brett Cecil and R.A. Dickey are also out of options. These players should be on all ballots unless you think there is a chance they get injured during camp. Note to the training staff, keep Cecil away from the damn blender, please.

For a very detailed look on the out-of-option situation, check out this article.

The starting rotation looks far from settled after Dickey, Marcus Stroman, Mark Buehrle, Drew Hutchison take their turns. Between Aaron Sanchez, newcomer Marco Estrada and top prospect Daniel Norris, any one of them could emerge and grab that spot. The trickle down effect of who gets that job has some implications for the bullpen too.

Regarding the bullpen: Realistically, this is the most likely area where the winning ballot will distinguish itself from the others. We don't have a closer, unless you've had the idea that it will be Sanchez's role on the team rammed down your throat by the MSM long enough that you actually believe it. Drabek is an interesting name to think about here as well. Does the braintrust pull a Jeremy Jeffress (he's good enough. Oh, no, wait a minute, let's send him down a week into the season) type deal on us here?

And how about the clusterfuck behind the plate? No chance the team can break camp with three catchers while trying to convince us that "We're going to take the best team North." Dioner Navarro doesn't have a role on this team, especially if the plan is to get EE lots of DH at bats while rolling the dice with bounce-back candidate Justin Smoak at 1B. If Navarro is dealt, what, if any, MLB-ready return does he bring back?

The second base situation has long been a soft spot in this lineup and it appears as though that trend will continue, at least in the short term, until recently acquired Devon Travis lays claim to the spot. This should be the wide open race in camp. There is a chance that some passed-over free agent is looking for a minor league contract after spring training opens and comes in to win the job.

As always, there are a few intriguing names on the spring training invite list that could factor in on your ballot. Click here for that.

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:

The winner of this year's roster challenge will receive a Upper Deck Cecil Fielder baseball card, an autographed Rawlings baseball signed by former Blue Jay greats Brandon League/Gregg Zaun, AND a vote Jose button.

All prizes are yours to keep if you are proven to be victorious.

Behold!

The field in last year's edition of The 25 Man Roster Challenge was jam-packed with all-star calibre participants. We were able to get ballots from the president of the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame, the MLB beat writer for the Blue Jays, a finalist from the MLB Fan Cave, the beat writer for the biggest newspaper in the country and a writer who is in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, just to name a few.

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

We wish you all good luck.

25 Man Roster Challenge Update

We have been thinking about doing an update regarding the 25-Man Roster Challenge for a few days now. With less than a week to go, things are still somewhat unsettled with respect to your Toronto Blue Jays opening-day roster.

There isn’t much point in going into too much detail about the remaining job battles and where they're currently at—the minute this post is uploaded, things are certain to change. This has been one of the most interesting and frustrating spring training camps to watch in recent memory.

With respect to the challenge, it appears as though someone going 25-for-25 will have to wait for another year. Up until the demotion of Anthony Gose, both Team @gregorMLB and Team @scottwspicer had real shots at the elusive perfect ballot. It now seems that having just one player wrong might be enough to take home the prizes and bragging rights.

Of course, things could change if Jose Reyes’s hamstring isn’t fit enough for games, or Dustin McGowan’s general arm/shoulder area starts to hurt again, or Casey Janssen can’t answer the bell after having only a week of practice, or someone finally realizes that Ryan Goins is at the very best a really shitty utility player, or Erik Kratz and his handful of bullpens is somehow deemed to be better at catching the knuckleball than Josh Thole and his 565 2/3 innings of major league game experience, or Matt Tuiasosopo impresses enough with his play in a short period of time, or J.A. Happ refuses the pending optional assignment he is surely to receive, or another borderline MLB player gets plucked off the waiver wire.

Got all that? Did we forget anything?

The following teams, as of right now, have only one player wrong on their ballot:



Team @gregorMLB

Team @scottwspicer

Team @BirdsOfBABIP

Team Man With The Golden Arm



Of note is that Team @BirdsOfBABIP has Jeremy Jeffress and lottery ticket Ubaldo Jimenez on his ballot. Since Jeffress is still technically in the hunt for a job, we couldn’t rule him out as a "possible" to break camp with the team, even though it appears to be a longshot. It should also be noted that all of these ballots have Josh Thole winning the back-up catching job. If he gets cut and starts the year in AAA, this thing could get real interesting in a hurry.

Tick Tock

 

The 25 Man Roster Challenge deadline is coming quick. If you intend to play your ballot must be in by Saturday February 15th at midnight. Check out this post for info on all the rules, how to play and prizes!

As much as we want to see your Toronto Blue Jays sign a free agent pitcher to help us out in the rotation this year, we'd really like it if this happened after the deadline to have your ballot in. We think this might add yet another element of the unknown into the process of selecting the 25 names you think will be on the team opening day.

Anthopoulos said Wednesday he’d be open to adding a player during spring training, though it might be “a little bit awkward”  #BlueJays
— Ben Nicholson-Smith (@bnicholsonsmith) January 31, 2014

If you need a bit of insider assistance selecting the players on your ballot, we've taken the time to collect a few articles that might prove helpful to you.

Courtesy of Shi:

Projected Rotation: R.A. Dickey; Mark Buehrle; Brandon Morrow; J.A. Happ; and Esmil Rogers/Todd Redmond/Marcus Stroman/Drew Hutchison/Kyle Drabek 
Projected Bullpen: Casey Janssen; Steve Delabar; Sergio Santos; Dustin McGowan; Brett Cecil; Aaron Loup; Esmil Rogers/Todd Redmond
Projected Starters: C Dioner Navarro; 1B Edwin Encarnacion; 2B Ryan Goins; SS Jose Reyes; 3B Brett Lawrie; LF Melky Cabrera; CF Colby Rasmus; RF Jose Bautista; DH Adam Lind
Projected Bench: C Josh Thole/Erik Kratz; INF Maicer Izturis; INF Brent Morel; OF Moises Sierra/Anthony Gose

Shi basically breaks down all the battles for you. He does have McGowan in the bullpen but it should be noted he will be stretched out as a starter in the beginning of camp. Not sure how wise an idea this is but he could very well end up in the number five slot in the rotation. It should also be noted that he went with the classic four man bench by giving some love to Brent Morel. The possibility of an eight man bullpen to start the year is quite high in our estimation. Especially if it means we have to carry a plug like Brent Morel as the guy who might play twice a week.
 
Courtesy of Gregor, here's a closer look at the full list of players attending camp:

Catchers: A.J. Jimenez, Mike Nickeas, Josh Thole, Dioner Navarro, Erik Kratz, Jack Murphy, Derrick Chung
Infielders: Jonathan Diaz, Maicer Izturis, Jose Reyes, Brent Morel, Edwin Encarnacion, Brett Lawrie, Dan Johnson, Ryan Goins, Steve Tolleson, Adam Lind, Jarad Goedert, Chris Getz, Adam LaRoche, Munenori Kawasaki, Andy Burns, Kevin Nolan
Outfielders: Anthony Gose, Kevin Pillar, Moises Sierra, Jose Bautista, Colby Rasmus, Melky Cabrera, Ricardo Nanita, Kenny Wilson
Pitchers: Drabek, Santos, Morrow, Romero, Cecil, McGowan, Rogers, Jeffress, Nolin, Hutchison, Storey, Sanchez, Dickey, Janssen, Wagner, Perez, Happ, Delabar, Stilson, Stroman, Ohka, Buehrle, Perez, Redmond, Rasmussen, Loup, Jenkins, Walden, McGuire

Hope you can join us and play. Terribly sorry for the weekend deadline but we really have zero control over the reporting dates. Not sure what the team intends to do with all these pitchers and catchers on a Sunday but it probably involves a bunch of doctors and needles.

This picture isn't weird at all

Assessing The Current Options

Tough decisions lay ahead

Thanks to King Jordan, we have a "quick glance" at the contract situations facing your Toronto Blue Jays going into 2011. Big time hat tip.

Here is my take..... 

Leading Off:

Boy Wonder just found $16,000,000. I doubt that figure will even cover the raises he owes his players through arbitration. 

Digging for Second:

There is the potential for a whopping 15 different arbitration cases that need to be negotiated. Bautista included. Good thing we got a guy for that.

Legging out a Triple:

Lewis and Wise are out of options and arbitration eligible. They both project as the back up outfielder right now. I can see a scenario unfolding where they go against each other for the same job next spring, with the loser being put on waivers. Unless, we non tender E5 and J-Bau plays third base. In that case Lewis would start in LF with Wise on the bench.

Collision at Home Plate:

Check out the clusterfuck in the bullpen!

The following relievers are out of options and would have to be placed on waivers if they don't break camp with the team: Camp, Purcey, Accardo, Buchholz, Tallet.

Quickly:

There are 7 jobs available in a Major League bullpen.

You have to figure Camp and Purcey are locks.

Assuming neither of those guys are the closer, that leaves only 4 jobs remaining.

If you also consider the possibility that neither of them are the set up man, then only 3 jobs will be up for grabs.

Normally a Major League bullpen has at least 2 lefties. And a long man.

Can Brian Tallet fill either of those roles? I doubt it.

I'll take Jo-Jo Reyes as a darkhorse to earn a spot in the pen next year.

So what the fuck are we going to do with Dustin Michael McGowan this year? 

More Quickly:

Behold, your Toronto Blue Jays out of options bullpen: Tallet, Accardo, Buchholz, Reyes, Camp, Purcey, McGowan.

Yikes!

I think I'm just gonna go ahead and stop right there. Waaaaaaaaaay to many possibilities right now.

Even More Quickly:

And just think.....we haven't even traded for or signed anybody yet.