Jays Following Recent Offseason Champion Trend

Apr 26, 2013; Seattle, WA, USA; Los Angeles Angels first baseman Albert Pujols (5) is greeted at the dugout after hitting an RBI-sacrifice fly against the Seattle Mariners during the first inning at Safeco Field. Mandatory Credit: Joe Nicholson-USA TODAY SportsBefore the 2012 season the Miami Marlins and LA Angels were the offseason champions. Before the 2011 season the Boston Red Sox were one of the offseason champions. All 3 teams ended April with records below 500 and were dead last in their division. Kind of like the Toronto Blue Jays now!

All 3 teams missed the playoffs. Hopefully not like the Toronto Blue Jays!

The high spending LA Angels and LA Dodgers currently find themselves in 4th place.

Say what you want about the New York Yankees but winning after spending money isn’t as easy as they make it look.

It’s not as simple as saying the last few offseason champions got off to bad starts and missed the playoffs so the 2013 Blue Jays are going to have the same fate.

The Miami Marlins traded two of their stars, Hanley Ramirez and Anibal Sanchez before the trade deadline. They ended the season with 69 wins so it’s hard to make the argument that 2 more players would have been the difference between the playoffs and a terrible team. But you never know.

The LA Angels were the best team in the MLB from May 1st to the end of the season. They still only won 89 games and missed out on a playoff spot by a painful 4 games. Not very encouraging but if you’ve been a fan of the Toronto Blue Jays before this offseason you’ll “settle” for being in a playoff race in September.

The 2011 Boston Red Sox not making the playoffs is the most misleading. The Red Sox whopped butt for the rest of the season after April. They were cruising to a playoff spot by the start of September, so it’s not out of a realm of possibility that the Jays do that. The Red Sox had a historic collapse that September and still only missed out on a playoff spot by 1 game. Under the new playoff format they still would have made the playoffs!

The Jays won the offseason. Just like recent offseason champions they haven’t started the season winning when and where it matters. But a couple of those other offseason champs showed you can still stay in the playoff race.

Hopefully the Jays change the recent trend and do more than just stay in the playoff race and actually make it to the playoffs.