page 3
Blue Jays to not play anyone at second base
NE W S
EVAN IVKOVIC
Staff Writer
The Toronto Blue Jays, in a surprise twist, have
just announced that they will not be playing a
second baseman, despite initially confirming Ryan
Goins as the opening day starter at the position.
In a press conference, General Manager Alex
Anthopoulos said, “Out of desperation we named
Ryan Goins the starting second baseman. The
previous year we signed Macier Izturis with the
expectation that he would be our second baseman
for the foreseeable future, but he turned out to be
god-awful and has continued to be god-awful in
spring training as well. We thought that Ryan
Goins would be the logical, in-house alternative,
but after carefully reviewing our decision, we have
decided that this team is honestly just better off
without the shitbag options we have at second
base disgracing the field with their incompetence,
either defensively or at the plate.”
In response to criticism of his decision, Anthopoulos responded by saying, “Listen, it’s in the
numbers. Ryan Goins, according to our internal
statistics team, projects to be a below replacement level player, so by not having him play it’s
addition by subtraction. Also, new hitting coach
Kevin Seitzer says Ryan Goins is hopeless, and
this is the same guy who didn’t even think Jeff
Francoeur was hopeless enough to not bother. As
for Macier Izturis, we speculate that he was the
cause of Melky Cabrera’s back tumour, so we’re
just hoping he either retires or dies. We have no
interest in having him even give eye contact to
the other players on the team, let alone actually
play baseball in any capacity.”
What about free agency? Stephen Drew,
whose natural position is at shortstop, has
expressed a willingness to play second base—as
he has in the past—depending on the right situation. Drew turned down a qualifying offer from
the Red Sox, and has still not found a suitor to
meet his contract demands, despite the impending
start of the season. The Jays could sign Drew to
play second base, and also to act as a back-up to
Jose Reyes at shortstop in case of injury—which
would be especially prudent for the Jays given
Reyes’ history with injury and his most recent
MRI confirming a mild hamstring strain that
could bother him throughout the early parts of
the season.
Anthopoulos, when pressed on the issue,
defending his inaction this offseason, saying,
“Okay, for one, we got rid of JP A ɕ