Jays sacrifice Rogers to Darvish

So yesterday with the storm clouds rolling in on the south side of Chicago many Blue Jays fans rejoiced at the notion that not only would the Jays miss an opportunity to lose a game, and also at the thought that Esmil Rogers would not be appearing in the rotation for at least four more games. But then word came from on high that that would not be so, as tweeted by Shi Davidi.

Well so much for that wonderful idea, we can now all look forward to Esmil Rogers taking the mound against Yu Darvish tomorrow, fan-f**king-tastic!!

The Jays will be sending out stopgap starter Esmil Rogers against Japanese phenom Yu Darvish Mandatory Credit: Tim Heitman-USA TODAY Sports

But is the Rogers, Darvish showdown really that dreadful a scenario?? As our own Michael Wray pointed out at the end of May, the Jay’s starting pitching has been awful. So when you have a pitching staff that cannot be counted on would it not make sense to send the pitcher least likely to do well up against Darvish??

If Mark Buehrle goes out and throws 7 innings of 2 or 3 run baseball but Darvish shuts down the Jays offense, you are likely to have wasted a solid outing with nothing to show for it. Sure it helps the bullpen getting those innings, but overall the Jays are not in a position where they can afford to squander a good pitching performance.

Remember frustrated Halladay in the dugout?? Mandatory Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

Sure a win is a win and it seems foolish to concede anything no matter what the outcome may look like on paper, I mean “that’s why they play the games” right?? But can you remember back to the days when Roy Halladay still toed the rubber for Toronto. Can you recall nights when Halladay would go 9 innings against the other teams Ace and lose 1 to nothing. Then the next game the Jays lose 9 to 7 with a couple of junk ballers pitching. Now imagine if instead of an infuriating Halladay loss, the Jays lose big against the opposing teams Ace with a lesser pitcher on the mound then pick up the W for Halladay the next day against an inferior opponent. Sure this may seem like just padding stats, but in reality it is more to save fans and team officials from pulling their hair out in a fit of rage.

For the Jays to win against Darvish the offense will need to get to him regardless of who’s pitching. And I much prefer the Jay’s odds of winning slugfest in homer happy Rangers Ballpark then winning a pitching duel with any of our starters going up against Darvish. Why risk our best against their best when we can use our worst, probably have the same outcome and still have our best pitchers there to take on their not so hot starters.

Esmil Rogers could help the Jays steal a win.Mandatory Credit: Daniel Shirey-USA TODAY Sports

While having offense and defense both performing up to expectations would negate the need for this sort of silly rotation shuffling until then the team might need to get creative to try and maximize their win total. If offering up Rogers as a sacrifice to Darvish in order to give their other better pitchers a shot at pitching the team to victory in the rest of the series, maybe that is for the best?

Sure it may not be in Rogers best interest, but as my favourite Vulcan said as he was dying. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few… or the one. And I must say of all the middling relievers forced into the rotation for the Jays, he was the most…human.

And although the embed wont work, you should all go checkout Darvish racking up 14 strikeouts through 7 and two thirds innings because well it’s awesome.