Romero upset about the demotion

[BIG match]

When you are prematurely placed in a position of need it might go to your head a bit. Its not very often a player goes from being the #1 guy to being somewhat expendable. For the last couple years its seems like his development has been fast tracked and that can be detrimental. Hopefully he doesnt become the Andrea Bargnani of the Blue Jays

[Homer Jay]

Well they certainly did no favours saying he was going to 100% make the team and then cut him out. He may have very well been holding back, not wanting to push himself too hard if he is aching, thinking his performance doesn't matter. Save it for the games which count. Now they are saying, "Of course it mattered, Dumbass!". and he has a right to be upset. Not at the demotion per se, but at being jerked around. They should have had him on the level from day one and said, "Your MLB job is on the line, every pitch matters, make it count!"

[The_Hater]

This is a pretty key quote:

John Lott ‏@LottOnBaseball 53s
Romero: "In no way, shape or form do I want to be here, and I don't have to agree with the decisions they make."

This can obviously be spun 2 different ways. I for one am glad that he's upset with the demotion, this will give him the drive to fix his mechanics and his head and get back up to the big club. Wthout a doubt it's got to be embarrassing for him considering ghe was the opening day starter just 12 months ago. Who cares what's motivating him just along as it's something.

This would be far worse if he sounded defeated and was excepting his fate.

[akakalakin]

NB: This is both a rant about modern teaching and lack of direct communication by those who lead as it reflects Rickey's confusion...it's a bit long.

Today's modern equivalent of discipline is letting the student hang themselves with their own rope regardless of timelines or difficulty of completion. Nowadays, lack of time means teachers have to follow more and more rigid guidelines for completion to assist their students to accept more and more information in a shorter time.

The guidelines have replaced the teacher, ostensibly to provide a more inclusive attempt at self improvement for the student. But whether they know what to do or not, often students need individual assistance and be told they are making mistakes. And not just to notice the mistakes, but to be shown the magnitude of them. All mistakes are not equal.

The idea goes something like this: We tell you what we want, how you can get better in excruciating detail using a checklist and then dump it in your lap, whether you have a reasonable time to do it or not. Either you seek help with what we've given you in that time frame or you are "not taking responsibility for your own actions" a polite way to say you are **** up. It sounds great but ignores the reality of the difficulty inherent in questioning your superiors, as well as the depth of the problem.

This way. if anyone complains, like say....Lind, they can retort, hey, we told you what to do...you could have come to us...it was up to you to communicate if it was unclear....blah blah blah. This way, there is "plausible denial" from the higher ups. To be honest though, a little forthright communication at the correct time could have addressed this issue and helped the individual sooner. All this "rubrc" based crap disguised as objectivity is essentially a way to make what is grey black and white and to distance the learner from the teacher (ie. CYA). It looks pretty but it's not more unbiased than any other construct.

I find it hilarious, too. Like you're going to tell your employer that you don't feel his assessment counts because three other managers gave it a 5/5. Guess what? That's not important. It's THIS guy you are working with and you have to have a healthy understanding of needing to please THEM as individuals. People have a right to make reasoned judgements and don't need to always explain every inch of them or perfectly agree about the end product. The point is, telling people they have to ship up or ship out is sometimes appropriate. Playing nice and pulling the rug out sometimes will breed this kind of discontent, whether the org. has tried its best to provide Ricky with options for feedback (rubricesque) even with the best of intentions.

In Rickey's case, he's a big boy. He has to be able to take a little honesty (privately) from his managing team and have them tell him the truth about his situation. Basically, it looks like they took it's early and it's spring training approach and waited too long to assess him properly until he had that horrible outing against the minor league players.

They knew then he probably wasn't making the team and could have told him so...but CYA technique told them they needed to give him the full shot to say they were being "fair" instead of trying to directly address the problem right away.

Rickey seems overly sensitive here--but it''s the surprise that is interesting. He bought the media message that the team was selling, which means, he wasn't let in on the thought process. Maybe he didn;t need to be, maybe he did. Maybe he was naiive, but I think someone should have intervened before today to alert him as to the thought process--even if they didn't want to tell him before. THAT would be fair.

until it's time to give up his dough, which he should- he's NOT earning it- give it BACK

[ontnut]

A few things are obvious at this point, and hopefully Romero realizes them:

1) Romero still thinks of himself as that all-star pitcher from 2011. That shows confidence, FWIW, so perhaps his issues are indeed mechanical, and he needs to realize, accept and deal with that particular issue specifically.
2) Romero hasn't been pitching anything like that player from 2011. Even if you disregard Spring Training numbers as most clubs tend to do, it's visibly clear that his mechanics and confidence are both below their 2011 prime.
3) If it was in any other season in the past 20 years, Romero would be on the Opening Day roster and would likely be given a long leash to work things out. This year (at this point) is an outlier. Wins are the goal, and more importantly, losses will be deemed as failure, moreso than any other year.

It's nothing personal and there's certainly no agenda against him. I think more than anyone on the roster, he is a victim of circumstance, but at the same time, he will still be given, and has received, a longer leash than most players on this team. He needs to work things out mentally and physically, and not take this as a demotion of Ricky Romero the person, but Ricky Romero the starting pitcher.

[suntzuballin]

he deffently got accept that it is his mechanics and his ego by accepting(letting go) that's gonna get him back on track this a rude awakening,this is what he fear most about happening is failing and its spiraled on him,but its probly necessary to make him a better pitcher.

[Indiana Jones]

i was a pitcher my entire life, and then one day i threw a couple of wild pitches, lost my release point, and haven't been able to throw strikes consistently since then. i'm useless as a pitcher now. kind of like rick ankiel actually. i don't think these things are mechanics based, but rather are entirely mental. i have little confidence that ricky will return to form after struggling so long, and it has nothing to do with the way the jays have handled him.

[LLJ]

i was a pitcher my entire life, and then one day i threw a couple of wild pitches, lost my release point, and haven't been able to throw strikes consistently since then. i'm useless as a pitcher now. kind of like rick ankiel actually. i don't think these things are mechanics based, but rather are entirely mental. i have little confidence that ricky will return to form after struggling so long, and it has nothing to do with the way the jays have handled him.

I notice this happens a lot with pitchers. Sigh, The shelf life of a pitcher is so unstable.

[SharoneWright]

Any one else remember this tv-spot? It kinda has the feel of a man writing his own obituary...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWDsOz01074[/youtube]

[SmoothTofu]

Any one else remember this tv-spot? It kinda has the feel of a man writing his own obituary...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWDsOz01074[/youtube]

[zilby]

When you listen to him speak, sure he's disappointed as any competitor would be, but I didn't get the feeling he was pissed with management. More pissed at himself. Nothing to worry about.

I get the same vibe from this. Hopefully he takes it the right way, and it seems like he is, and he bounces back to form.