Blue Jays Morning Brew; Locating Romero, Turf Wars, and More

Sep 10, 2013; Toronto, Ontario, CAN; Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Ricky Romero (24) throws against the Los Angeles Angels in the seventh inning at the Rogers Centre. Los Angeles defeated Toronto 12-6. Mandatory Credit: John E. Sokolowski-USA TODAY SportsGood Morning Blue Jays fans! Welcome to another edition of Blue Jays Morning Brew, where we’ve conveniently replaced your morning caffeine fix with our salute to the best Blue Jays posts from around the web. Consider this our way of paying it forward without casting that kid from the Sixth Sense.

Gregor Chisholm of MLB.com updates us in his latest Blue Jays notebook about the steps taken by Toronto to honor the first responders to the 9/11 tragedy. 12 years ago we were all reminded, Americans and Canadians alike, that we were not so isolated from terrorism as we thought. More importantly, we were reminded that at the heart of this tragedy, the true nature of heroism was the beacon that pulled us together.

On a less serious note, our buddy (and staff member) Jay Blue breaks down Ricky Romero’s pitch selection from his appearance on Tuesday night. As Jay points out, Romero seemed entirely focused on getting his fastball over the plate last night, rather than mixing up his repetoire. That may have been a case of the Jays wanting Romero to stick to something he was comfortable throwing, but it certainly wasn’t fooling the Angels, who only swung through 3 of his 23 pitches.

Meanwhile, while Romero works his way back, the Blue Jays are moving forward with plans to replace the turf at Rogers Centre with real grass in 2018. Interestingly enough, Craig Calcaterra at Hardball Talk (NBC Sports) notes that Rogers Centre is one of just two remaining ballparks that currently have turf. Unfortunately, he makes one mistake in the post, citing Tropicana Field as the other park, as we all know that The Trop can’t be considered a real baseball field until fans start showing up there.

Over at Drunk Jays Fans, Andrew Stoeten addresses the comments from Josh Johnson’s agent Matt Sosnick. Sosnick seems to be under the impression that after his client completely loaded his pants while pitching for the Blue Jays this season, that he would somehow still command $10-$15 million for a one-year contract on the open market. Stoeten goes on to somewhat support the notion that the low-end deal might be a worthwhile risk, at least more so than chancing it with the likes of Todd Redmond, Esmil Rogers, etc. I’m not sure if necessarily agree, but you’d have to think Johnson is better than he pitched this year. But then again, the other potential candidates to take that money aren’t necessarily making a better argument.

Finally, over at the National Post, John Lott details some of the changes that Anthony Gose is making to try and get his timing down at the plate. It was somewhat refreshing to hear a young players so unabashedly take himself to task, when Gose replied to the question about getting rid of the leg kick with, “Cause I suck with it.” Well, he wouldn’t rate so highly in the Jays system if he completely sucked, but anything that trims that astronomical total of strike-outs down is good for me.