Spring Break
Beware Red Sox, Yankees
Terry Horstman
Issue date: 5/14/09 Section: Sports
We're a month and a half into the Major League Baseball season and so far everything has been at least fairly normal. With the exception of the 50-game suspension of Manny Ramirez, the season has been going by as expected, with the Yankees and Red Sox dominating the headlines.
However, it's another team from the American League East that has caught my attention during the first 35 games and has already convinced me that this is not a fluke. That team is the Toronto Blue Jays, which have silently been one of the best teams in baseball this year.
Sitting pretty at 23-12 and first place in the AL East, the Jays have gotten off to a fabulous start despite being sent to the back page so the melodramatic story lines of their AL East counterparts can get face time. So while the Red Sox and Yankees are busy fighting each other, both teams are in danger of letting the division slip to one of the usual bottom feeders for a second consecutive year.
So if you call yourself a fan of either of those evil empires, don't kid yourself - Toronto is for real.
For the past couple of seasons, Toronto has strung a couple of runs together but hasn't managed to break into the top of the toughest division in baseball. With stars like Vernon Wells and Álex Rios, the Jays have always been competitive, but they lacked a certain something that prevented them from busting out of baseball mediocrity. That special something has emerged this year in the form of second baseman Aaron Hill.
After a strong season in 2007, Hill only appeared in 55 games in 2008, but he has set the Jays on fire this year with a .357 batting average, nine home runs and 30 RBI. At this point in the season, Hill has been the most reliable bat in the lineup and with several clutch hits, he has been one of the more reliable bats in all of baseball. Hill has been playing this hot with both Wells and Rios not playing their best baseball. It's only a matter of time before the usual studs for the Blue Jays start playing like they normally do, so if Hill keeps this up for the remainder of the season, you may not see much of a change in the AL East standings this summer.
However, it's another team from the American League East that has caught my attention during the first 35 games and has already convinced me that this is not a fluke. That team is the Toronto Blue Jays, which have silently been one of the best teams in baseball this year.
Sitting pretty at 23-12 and first place in the AL East, the Jays have gotten off to a fabulous start despite being sent to the back page so the melodramatic story lines of their AL East counterparts can get face time. So while the Red Sox and Yankees are busy fighting each other, both teams are in danger of letting the division slip to one of the usual bottom feeders for a second consecutive year.
So if you call yourself a fan of either of those evil empires, don't kid yourself - Toronto is for real.
For the past couple of seasons, Toronto has strung a couple of runs together but hasn't managed to break into the top of the toughest division in baseball. With stars like Vernon Wells and Álex Rios, the Jays have always been competitive, but they lacked a certain something that prevented them from busting out of baseball mediocrity. That special something has emerged this year in the form of second baseman Aaron Hill.
After a strong season in 2007, Hill only appeared in 55 games in 2008, but he has set the Jays on fire this year with a .357 batting average, nine home runs and 30 RBI. At this point in the season, Hill has been the most reliable bat in the lineup and with several clutch hits, he has been one of the more reliable bats in all of baseball. Hill has been playing this hot with both Wells and Rios not playing their best baseball. It's only a matter of time before the usual studs for the Blue Jays start playing like they normally do, so if Hill keeps this up for the remainder of the season, you may not see much of a change in the AL East standings this summer.
Note: writers will not reply to comments.
Be the first to comment on this story
Comments by registered users are approved by default.