Toronto Blue Jays 2019 Season Preview

Opening Day is almost here! Is there anything greater than the optimism that abounds at the beginning of a Major League Baseball season? Thankfully, this long, cold hellscape of ice and snow is beginning to thaw, just in time to enjoy a few cold ones while watching the Blue Jays play.

Okay, let’s be honest: there aren’t a lot of reasons to be optimistic about the 2019 Toronto Blue Jays. Yes, yes, “anything can happen”, “we still have to play the games”, and whatever other platitudes you feel like throwing out there about every team having a chance, but the sad reality is that there’s virtually no chance of a Blue Jays playoff berth this season, and if it wasn’t for the woeful Baltimore Orioles, it’s likely that the Jays would be staring a last-place finish right, straight square in the eyes.

Aside from Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s impending callup – set for sometime after his recovery from an oblique strain and when the Blue Jays’ brass decides his defence is up to snuff (which will, in a near-miraculous coincidence, happen within a few days of when the Blue Jays gain another year of control of the 20-year-old wunderkind) – what is there to look forward to ahead of this woebegone season?

That preamble isn’t to say it’s all doom and gloom though! There are a few things on which we should keep our eyes, a couple glimmers of hope for this season and beyond. And maybe – just maybe – a reason or two to head out to the ballpark amid mounting losses. Here are a few of them:

Roy Halladay's Three Goodbyes

In 2010, Roy Halladay said goodbye to the city of Toronto and to his Blue Jays teammates.

Longing for a chance at a World Series after playing on 12 wholly uninspiring Blue Jays teams, Roy forced a trade to the City of Brotherly Love to pitch for the contending Phillies. How beloved must a player - in any sport - be to be cheered after forcing his or her way out of city? As beloved as Halladay was and continues to be. He was showered with applause in 2012 ahead of his return start in Toronto. A start he won - of course - by throwing a complete game.

That was a difficult goodbye because it was Roy Halladay. Roy Frickin' Halladay. holder of a prime position on the Blue Jays' Mount Rushmore and one of the primary reasons I love baseball to the degree I do today.

Get the ball, throw the ball. Change speeds. Throw strikes. Pitch to contact. No deep counts.

If you went to the bathroom during a Halladay start, you were liable to miss three innings. To love Halladay was to love baseball, and vice versa. He was everything there was to love about baseball. Hard work and talent commingled into the perfect pitching machine.

Did David Price Actually Want to Sign with the Boston Red Sox?

If “The Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase taught 10-year-old me anything, it's that a sleeper hold could get me out of any physical altercation with limited damage. If he taught me anything else, it’s that "everybody has a price."

To that end, I’ve been wondering recently to what degree that idiom affects free agency in the sporting world.

The reason I bring this up is because of the saga of everyone's favourite Blue Jays trade-deadline rental, David Price. As we all know, the Jays acquired Price in exchange for a huge haul of prospects, and he in turn helped guide the Jays to their first playoff appearance since the halcyon days of the early 1990s. Subsequently, Price signed the largest free-agent contract for a pitcher in MLB history with - in a quasi-surprising move - the loathsome Boston Red Sox. The numbers are staggering: $217 million over 7 years, which works out to a tidy $31-million per season, and roughly $1-million per regular-season start.

An Open Letter to David Price

Dear David,

Can I call you David? I think we've reached a point in our relationship where we're on a first-name basis. I'm definitely okay with you calling me Andrew, or a nickname of your choosing. Or Bob, or Tony, or Bridget. In short: call me whatever you like.

Now that you're officially a free agent, I feel it's time to address the elephant in the room: are you re-signing with Blue Jays? Are you? Are you? Are you? Are you?

(And FYI, the second elephant in the room - the Alex Anthopolous-shaped one - will be addressed at a later date)

Like much of baseball-loving Canada, I'm still trying to come to terms with the end of the Blue Jays' season - as I'm sure you are too - but the business of sports never rests, so onto the business at hand. I'm going to take this opportunity to implore you to re-sign with the Blue Jays.

As you're surely well aware, there's untold teams currently on their way to court and woo and throw absolutely obscene amounts of money at you. You're also going to be on the receiving end of promises and sales pitches the likes of which I can't even fathom. But hear me out, the info below may help clarify things for you a little.

Baseball's Top-6 Unwritten Rules

There are unwritten rules everywhere. They pervade almost every aspect of life in some way: at work, while driving, in line at the grocery store, and of course, in sports. And in the sporting world, I'd wager baseball has more unwritten rules than any other.

Initially, this was going to cover all of baseball's unwritten rules, but then I started researching, and frankly, I don't want to write (you definitely don't want to read) 50,000 words about arcane - and ultimately stupid - ungovernable rules that most people don't even know about. (For example: "Don't walk over the mound". Seriously, that's an unwritten rule. Sometimes baseball has to GTFO.)

Therefore, here are the top six unwritten rules that seem to pop up more often: