Blue Jays Aiming At Division Or 2nd Wild Card

It’s July 24th, a week away from the non-waiver trade deadline and your Toronto Blue Jays are in 2nd place in the AL East, 3 games back of 1st place. They are also 0.5 games back of the Seattle Mariners for the 2nd American League wild card.

And it all it took it was the Yankees, Rays, Red Sox and Rangers simultaneously wetting the bed baby! (Not going to be the last time I use that joke sorry ahead of time if you’re a regular reader.)

The Jays are 8 games back of the Angels for the 1st wild card spot so you can forget about that. Whoever comes in 2nd place in the AL West is winning the top wild card spot. It’s not even close as the A’s and Angels have the best records in baseball.

But as a Blue Jays fan it’s going to be hard to decide who to cheer for as the Orioles start a 4 game series against the Mariners in Seattle tonight. While the 2 teams the Jays are chasing for a playoff spot are playing each other, the Jays have one more game against the Red Sox and 3 games against the Yankees at Yankee Stadium where the Jays haven’t won a game since 2012. So when the Blue Jays lose to the Yankees they’re going to lose ground to the Yankees and a playoff spot.

OBVIOUSLY in a fantasy world where the Jays win their next 4 games you want to see the M’s sweep the O’s with the Jays regaining 1st place. And heck, even if the M’s win while the Jays lose the Jays can afford to lose ground on a wild card spot more than the division since they’re just a 0.5 game back of a wild card spot now and 3 games back of the division. I also have more faith in the Jays being able to catch the M’s since the M’s haven’t been able to stay in contention until September for a while for whatever that’s worth this season, whereas I have faith in the O’s to bounce back from a bad series.

So I guess I’m cheering for the M’s?

Either way we got ourselves meaningful baseball games in late July!

The Jays best chance to make the playoffs is winning the division or winning the 2nd wild card. And the 2 teams the Jays are currently chasing for those playoff spots are playing each other. So for the next 4 days the Jays are guaranteed to either gain or lose ground in either the division or the 2nd wild card.

Let’s hope they do more gaining than losing and hopefully they’re in an even better position for the division or the 2nd wild card than they are now.