The Toronto Blue Jays made it all the way to the ALCS before falling to the Kansas City Royals, the eventual champions. In came Marc Shapiro to be president of baseball operations and out went GM Alex Anthopoulos In a move that may have surprised some, Shapiro chose to retain manager John Gibbons. As well, Shapiro picked up the options on key players of last year's team Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion, and starting pitcher RA Dickey, seeming suggesting they are giving it one more go.
The Blue Jays have some questions to answer about their starting rotation but retaining two of their three bigger boppers in Bautista and Encarnacion, who along with third baseman Josh Donaldson, combined for 120 of their 232 home runs and along with 338 of the teams 852, will make the life of whoever toes the pitching slab in Toronto all that much easier. To understand how potent this trio was, together they hit more home runs than the Atlanta Braves entire team (120 to 100) and as many as the Miami Marlins (120).
As for the state of the starting pitching, Shapiro had this to say during his state of the team address, via Sportsnet Canada, "It's important to fill two spots in the rotation, either with guys that exist internally or externally," Shapiro said. "We're going to work to do that in a way that not just supports one year, but gives us the best chance to sustain a championship-calibre team."
As for Gibbons, Interim GM Tony LaCava was quite content with the job he was doing, "He did a great job. It's a no-brainer,"
So, what do you think the Blue Jays will do this year? Will they win the East this year? Big questions surround the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees. The Tampa Bay Rays will be better and the Baltimore Orioles are big questions. So, what do you think?
