Will The Blue Jays Trade Dickey? Jon Heyman Goes Trollin’

May 9, 2013; St. Petersburg, FL, USA; Toronto Blue Jays starting pitcher

(43) reacts to the first base umpire Mike Everitt (43) as he was called for a balk during the fifth inning against the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field. Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

In case you hadn’t noticed we Toronto Blue Jays fans are one of the more active online communities in all of baseball. This is fantastic as a fan of the team as it has spawned an extensive blogging community that is constantly pushing out great material to be consumed at your desk when you should be doing something less fun like your job (It’s not bad if you’re a blogger and enjoy seeing a fortuitous number of page views either). One unfortunate and notable side effect of the Blue Jays online army however is the unbelievably blatant, utterly inane, frustratingly stupid troll jobs by some of the members of baseball’s main stream media contingent.

If you haven’t already guessed by now, this little tirade has been inspired by a post Tuesday by trolling royalty Jon Heyman. In a piece about the Baltimore Orioles apparent hunt for a staff ace, Heyman mentions the Orioles offseason interest in the now Blue Jays ace R.A. Dickey.

"The Orioles, according to sources, showed considerable interest in Dickey last winter. But while he’s off to a rough start in Toronto, the Jays have him on a reasonable three-year deal for $30 million, so he may not be available."

The underline there is mine…but COME ON. He may not be available? I would love to rip apart this column a little more but Old Reliable himself Andrew Stoeten did a fine job of that over at DJF.

If this was a one-time thing, it would barely merit a mention, sure we’d still dismiss Heyman as being full of it, but that’s where it would end. Every team has players mentioned in ridiculous rumours once in a while. But this isn’t an isolated incident, it’s become quite apparent that these so-called journalists are just stoking the fire of Blue Jays fandom cause they like dem clicks.

So what I’m going to do is take a look at the more memorable troll jobs by our American journalistic friends so far this season and take a look at why we shouldn’t grace them with the Blue Jays traffic bump.

John Trolololosi

GIF via @andrewstoeten on the Twitter Machine

The nickname bestowed upon Mr. Morosi by our friends at DJF is well-earned. Mr.Morosi through both his columns and on Twitter is constantly jabbing and prodding at the Blue Jays looking to stir up  a few clicks. After the Jays slow start Morosi instantly starting penning his narrative of Marlins North. Morosi rarely adds anything of value to his columns, never provides any information that’s breaking or worth your time to read, especially when you have to deal with his Morosi-ness.

The guy started into the ridiculous trolling 7 games into the season. Since two teams having the same record over a 7 game period is 100% indicative of the quality of that team and how the season will play out.

So in the matter of a month the Blue Jays went from having only one question mark (the bullpen) to not having the rotation to go on long winning streaks? I understand that a month can change some things (but not really much), but once Johnson is back from injury you’re telling me that Morrow, Johnson, Dickey, Buehrle rotation can’t put together a few decent winning streaks?

Alrighty then.

Verdict? Don’t click EVER. This guy loves and embraces his trolliness, and knows how to wield it against Blue Jays fans. If he comes up with an interesting nugget (we all get lucky), you’ll most definitely hear about it from another source anyways.

The Knobler

Danny Knobler is another of CBS Sports resident trolls. The man loves him a little bit of controversial Blue Jays subject matter. With hard hitting and insightful articles like “What If Ricky Romero Is the Next Dontrelle Willis” where the only comparison made is the fact that both pitchers throw terribly with their left arms after being good once upon a time, or pointing out to all of us who weren’t aware “Booing Can’t Hurt Farrell” The Knobler is a must read right?

"Sorry, Blue Jays fans, but you can’t hurt John Farrell. You can hate him all you want, you can boo him all you want, but you can’t hurt him."

I mean how could I possibly ever have known that my attending a baseball game and booing someone wouldn’t actually cause them any harm?  Why is this just coming out now? Shouldn’t we fans have been told years ago that our booing of players and managers and anyone else we felt like didn’t actually hurt them? I feel so lied to.

Verdict? Not worth your time. Between inane points backed up with little evidence, and one sentence paragraphs, The Knobler doesn’t deserve our traffic.

Ken Rosenthal & Buster Olney

Buster and Kenny Ken Ken aren’t the worst of trolls, but they made my list for their unbelievably weak reporting when it came to the manufactured story regarding Jose Bautista’s relationship with the umpires. Never mind that Jose Bautista has had the same disposition with umpires ever since becoming a Blue Jay, if this was a real story should it not merit some follow-up? Shouldn’t these two hard-hitting journalists keep on telling Jose Bautista that he’s misbehaving? Oh the fact that Jose has an OPS of .922 is enough to make it a non-story again? Okay then.

Verdict? Olney and Rosenthal both occasionally provide some decent content I guess, although most of the information can be found through one of the hundreds of Blue Jays sources out there. Neither of them provides what I would consider terribly original analysis or information.

What I’m really trying to get at is we have to stop feeding the trolls. I’m as guilty as the next person for seeing Blue Jays tagged on a post and clicking through blindly. But by feeding these trolls we’re empowering them, and it can only get worst.

You want Blue Jays information, analysis, and opinion? Get it from a Blue Jays centric source. Come here to Jays Journal, and check out our blogging brethren over at DJF or Bluebird Banter. You can head to Twitter and follow one of the many competent beat writers assigned to the Blue Jays in John Lott, Shi Davidi, Bob Elliot, or Richard Griffin. Follow the almost always level headed Mike Wilner, or if you want to get trolled make it by someone local like Dirk Hayhurst or Greg Zaun (hey maybe you can even goad him into saying something sexist/misogynistic in response).

The trolls know exactly what they’re doing with these Blue Jays related items, they know that this fan base is constantly looking for more information to satiate its desire for knowledge, and they take advantage of it. There’s only one way we can stop them (hint it’s not by clicking on their article and sharing your displeasure in the comments section)