Blue Jays Morning Brew: Podcast 76, news, notes

The Blue Jays are coming off a strong, albeit nerve-racking, 4-2 win over the New York Yankees in game one of their three-game series. J.A. Happ is scheduled to face CC Sabathia tonight at 7:07 ET.

Jays Jest Podcast Episode 76
Shaun Doyle of Jays From the Couch and I are back with another week of the podcast, available here for you listening pleasure. Subscribe below, and tweet in your questions for the show throughout the week.

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We discuss the recent DFA of Jimmy Paredes and promotion of Ryan Tepera. Where will the Blue Jays go with their roster construction when they’re prepared to return to an eight-man bullpen, and what is the real impact of losing Troy Tulowitzki for 15 days? Also: pitcher win-loss records, what are they good for?

Lady Luck
For VICE Sports, John Lott looks at the poor luck that’s plagued the Blue Jays’ offence through the first third of the season. Toronto is making hard contact at a higher rate than last season, but finding more gloves with a .281 team BABIP that ranks 25th in the majors.

“The times I do hit balls hard right now, it’s kind of going at somebody,” Josh Donaldson told Lott. “Do I think that’ll even out over the long haul? Yeah. I’ll say this: I feel like that’s the case for a lot of guys on our squad right now. When we hit balls hard, it’s right to guys.”

All-Star chatter for Happ

More from Toronto Blue Jays News

File this under “conversations we all knew we’d be having in late May”. Blue Jays starter J.A. Happ has been brilliant outside of one rough outing, but TSN’s Scott MacArthur

writes that Happ is working to keep his level mentally

“I think there’s been a long time, a lot of years where I’ve been hard on myself and extremely disappointed,” Happ told MacArthur, “and those things are okay to be as long as it’s for one night; it doesn’t affect the rest of your starts or anything else. It never affected preparation, but it affected mentality a little bit. I’m trying to stay away from that.”

Concussions
Here’s a piece that grabbed my attention from Spencer Redmond of Jays From the Couch on the Blue Jays’ handling of concussions this season. Major League Baseball is relatively “new” to the increased spotlight put on concussions when compared to traditional collision sports like football or hockey.

It’s especially dangerous behind the plate, where catchers have accounted for 34 of the 87 concussions recorded since the start of 2010.

ICYMI: The Monday Morning Mailbag
While we’re on the topic of things that might give you a headache, enjoy yesterday’s version of the Blue Jays Monday Morning Mailbag.

Forgetting about Floyd?
With Joe Biagini now earning some late-inning looks, Gavin Floyd has taken a back seat while his ERA has slowly risen to 3.91.

“He’s been working and pitching a lot,” manager John Gibbons told Gregor Chisholm of MLB.com. There’s a lot of innings over his career and he’s had some arm issues, so we’re trying to be careful with him, but the way the games have all gone the last week.”

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