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Another September begins with no meaningful baseball to be played around here.

In ways, it is like the September of last year and the year before, a final month of optimism heading towards next year.

But with the Blue Jays, the future is never now, and the next year of our expectations always seems a year away.

This has been a summer of hope and stories, a summer of discovery for the Blue Jays. You may see the future through the eyes of Brett Lawrie and Colby Rasmus.

You can see it, if you squint hard enough and if you don't consider what this season was supposed to be about, and what hasn't been from the Blue Jays.

That is the easy part about selling optimism. The public tends to forget what it was you were selling in the first place. But if you dial back a few months, back to March, back to when the baseball publications were making predictions, what you quickly come to realize is what a season of regression this has been in what was supposed to be the Blue Jays' area of strength.

This was to be a team build around young arms, promising pitchers, the hope that next September games will factor in the standings for the team that calls Rogers Centre its home.

There was some talk that a young rotation of Ricky Romero, Brandon Morrow and Brett Cecil would be the Blue Jays whittled-down version of Greg Maddux, John Smoltz and Tom Glavine. Or failing that, something along the lines of Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder and Barry Zito.

So what happened? Romero has taken a giant step forward this season: He has become the rock of the Jays rotation, the ace he was designed to be.

Romero has made 27 starts this season and by baseball's own definition of a quality start, he's made 21 of them. He won't win 20 games this year, but he's pitched well enough to be close.

The leap Romero made has been a false start for Morrow. Born the same year, looked at as a possible ace of the future, he is more about possibilities than he has been about performance.

The truth on Morrow: He pitched better last season than he has this year.

Maybe they'll make it back.

But maybe this is all it is right now.

In order to compete in a division with the Yankees and Red Sox, the Jays have to be better pitching-wise. They can't be 11th in earned-run average in the American League or 24th in all of baseball. They can't give up the fourth most hits or 3rd most walks or be 12th out of 14 teams in saves.

And while the everyday lineup has improved with Rasmus and Lawrie and the rejuvenated Edwin Encarnacion, the Jays can't hope to be a factor unless they upgrade their pitching staff significantly.

The arms they believed in for the future let them down this summer.

sonn wrote:Simmons should stick to hockey and write about nothing else.

sonn wrote:Simmons should stick to hockey and write about nothing else.

blackflash234 wrote:Why the hell is Simmons basing Morrow's season solely on his ERA?

With apologies to Justin Verlander and Jose “I’m sure as hell not the same at home after that ESPN Mag sign-stealing story” Bautista, [Desmond] Jennings has been the best player in either league since Tampa brought him up.

sonn wrote:Here's something just as stupid from Simmons that was posted on DJF.

With apologies to Justin Verlander and Jose “I’m sure as hell not the same at home after that ESPN Mag sign-stealing story” Bautista, [Desmond] Jennings has been the best player in either league since Tampa brought him up.

http://www.drunkjaysfans.com/2011/08/to ... mmons.html

There There wrote:

sonn wrote:Simmons should stick to hockey and write about nothing else.

Simmons is the absolute worst this city has to offer... he shouldn't be allowed the opportunity to be writing about anything