Blue Jays Morning Brew: On Revere, Encarnacion and more

With the Blue Jays offseason news cycle showing all the
life of a Randy Wolf heater, we round up the best stories
for you from the weekend that was

Time marches on in Blue Jays land, and with a new week comes the hope that Toronto will dip their toe back into the free agent waters. Any waters, for that matter. But as we wait for a veteran minor leaguer to Google, enjoy a fresh cup of the Morning Brew with the best of Blue Jays coverage from around the web this past weekend.

Minor League Power  –  Ryan Mueller over at the newly-minted Jays From The Couch took a look at some internal power options in the prospect ranks. These names could come in handy should the Jays fail to re-sign both Edwin Encarnacion and Jose Bautista, but after years of Alex Anthopoulos focusing on speedy and more athletic prospects, it’s a position that could afford some growth.

More from Toronto Blue Jays News

• Blue Jays: Adam Cimber, the unlikely decision King
• Toronto Blue Jays: Has the Shift Killed Kevin Gausman’s 2022 Cy Young Hopes?
• Blue Jays: What Yusei Kikuchi’s latest stumble should mean
• Blue Jays: Alek Manoah on pace to succeed in possible postseason
• Blue Jays: Bradley Zimmer has carved himself a valuable role

Regression from Edwin?  –  Sticking with Jays From The Couch, and sticking with Edwin, our friend Shaun Doyle broke down the possibility that Encarnacion could be due for some level of regression in 2016. Working off of Paul Zimmerman’s FanGraphs piece, we see that Encarnacion’s Pull% and Contact% were down last season. He also saw an increase in soft-hit balls and a decrease in medium/hard hit balls. Edwin’s been a model of consistency in Toronto, but that’s something to keep an eye on.

Revere at leadoff?  –  Over at MLB.com, Gregor Chisholm takes some mailbag questions including one on Ben Revere in the leadoff spot. Like it or not, this does appear to be John Gibbons preference entering 2016.

“Manager John Gibbons went on record during the Winter Meetings to say that Revere will start the year in the top spot. The mentality is “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it,” and it’s hard to argue with that approach after the success Toronto enjoyed during the second half of last season.”

Stro Show  –  Michael Clair of MLB.com’s Cut4 chimed in on Marcus Stroman‘s upcoming appearance in a music video for his friend, rapper Mike Stud. He doesn’t seem as thrilled as the rest of us. Stroman is keeping busy, though, and even gave us some love on Friday! 


Learn your ABC’s  –  A fun one here from Richard Griffin of The Star as he goes through the ABC’s of the year that was in Major League Baseball, including some Blue Jays goodness.