Jays Journal » Evan Longoria

Evan Longoria v. Brett Lawrie: The Blue Jays Should Exceed Their 5-Year Contract Limit

Mat Germain — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 13:30:01 +0000

As I’m sure you’ve all heard and read about by now, one of the biggest sticking points for the Jays when speaking about the possibility of signing a player like Prince Fielder is the length of the deal. More specifically, the Jays supposedly have a policy whereby they will not commit to signing a player to a deal that includes a term longer than 5 years. I wrote supposedly, because I entirely believe that this is simply great posturing by a GM and a team that wants to limit the risk they take on when signing their own players and free agents. (more…)

Jays Journal: A.L. East Predictions for 2011 Season

Mat Germain — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 18:00:58 +0000

With the season just about set to begin and most of the position battles settled, I’m ready to set forth and make some bold predictions, and others not so bold. I’ll post my MLB wide predictions (most of which are unlikely to come true but make for good stuff to talk about), and hopefully I’ll come up with a few gems that will make some sense (as my 2010 prediction of the Jays finishing above .500 and Texas winning the West did last season).

Here are my A.L. East predictions, going from last to first, just to make things more interesting and to build up to the surprise team that I expect will win the A.L. East.

#5 – The Baltimore Orioles – Record: 78 – 84 (more…)

Jays Journal: Leonys Martin, Richard Thon, Spring Notes, and Links

Mat Germain — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 11:53:59 +0000

I recently broke down the argument for the Jays to sign Leonys Martin out of Cuba (actually, he is currently in Mexico), and heard a lot of feedback from fans who were apprehensive about spending so much money on a light-hitting, good speed and good defensive ability center-fielder. So, I asked John Manuel of Baseball America, a professional who actually has the scouting breakdown on Martin, the following question on Twitter in order to get a sense for how Martin would fare amongst Jays prospects:

“@johnmanuelba Would Leonys Martin be within the top 15 Jays prospects if signed?“

And he answered as follows: (more…)