Simmons: Deep soul-searching about team, Gibbons, Walker

[dagger]

http://www.torontosun.com/2015/05/18/bl ... re-not-now

It has been learned that on holiday Monday morning, before the Jays slugging victory over the Los Angeles Angels, club president Paul Beeston and general manager Alex Anthopoulos met at length to exchange views, assess the club top to bottom, and try and figure a way out of the first quarter of a season that one front office person deemed “a f---ing disaster.”

Atop the list of matters that were discussed is the continued employment of Gibbons as manager and whether to do the Red Sox thing and consider replacing pitching coach, Walker.

In the meeting between Beeston and Anthopoulos everything apparently was looked at — including the performance of those in the meeting. There is a certain sense of uncertainty around this team. With high-end executive Keith Pelley already gone from Rogers, Beeston in his last year as club president, Anthopoulos in the final year of his contract and Gibbons forever year to year everyone’s employment and performance has come under scrutiny. Whether there is a possibility of player transactions that didn’t include mortgaging the future was discussed.

It came down to “the whole f---ing organization,” said a source.

The last time they made major trades of such consequence they came away with Buehrle, Reyes, Josh Johnson, Dickey: How has that worked out? The famed deals with the Marlins and Mets have actually set the Blue Jays back. Both Beeston and Anthopoulos were on board for those transactions. Now privately while neither wills say so, they wish it never happened.

Depending on how the final three quarters of this season go, both Gibbons and Anthopoulos could be gone by October. Gibbons may not make it that far. This is Anthopoulos’ fifth season on the job. Somewhere in time they were expected to contend. The case to retain him as GM is built around the array of young pitchers he has on the make. The list includes Osuna, injured Marcus Stroman, Sanchez, Drew Hutchison, Norris, Miguel Castro, Jeff Hoffman and the AA lefty, Matt Boyd. Had Brendan Shanahan put a list like this together for the Leafs of 24-and-unders, he would probably have a job for life.

[Fairview4Life]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/JoeyBats19/status/517179902215585792[/tweet]

[dagger]

You have to wonder if this column is a set-up by the organization for action of some kind during or at the end of this homestand.

[Lateral Quicks]

Walker has presided over a staff that is performing dramatically below expectations. He has no track record of success as a coach. He needs to go.

It has been said that manager's don't win games, but they can lose them. Gibbons has been costing them games this year, whether it's through bullpen misuse (letting Castro blow up repeatedly, letting Francis pitch in close games) or such gems as batting Pompey 2nd and using our backup catcher at DH. I liked the pre-September Gibby, but he seems to have fallen off the deep end. He's not getting the full value out of this roster. He needs to go.

[BigLeagueChew]

Simmons is a goofball.

[Sifu]

Walker has presided over a staff that is performing dramatically below expectations. He has no track record of success as a coach. He needs to go.

It has been said that manager's don't win games, but they can lose them. Gibbons has been costing them games this year, whether it's through bullpen misuse (letting Castro blow up repeatedly, letting Francis pitch in close games) or such gems as batting Pompey 2nd and using our backup catcher at DH. I liked the pre-September Gibby, but he seems to have fallen off the deep end. He's not getting the full value out of this roster. He needs to go.

Its debatable whether Walker or anyone else for that matter can influence the on field performance of the players. However, I think we got to try something. Not doing anything and hoping for a better outcome seems to be like praying yo win the lotto.

[Lateral Quicks]

Walker has presided over a staff that is performing dramatically below expectations. He has no track record of success as a coach. He needs to go.

It has been said that manager's don't win games, but they can lose them. Gibbons has been costing them games this year, whether it's through bullpen misuse (letting Castro blow up repeatedly, letting Francis pitch in close games) or such gems as batting Pompey 2nd and using our backup catcher at DH. I liked the pre-September Gibby, but he seems to have fallen off the deep end. He's not getting the full value out of this roster. He needs to go.

Its debatable whether Walker or anyone else for that matter can influence the on field performance of the players. However, I think we got to try something. Not doing anything and hoping for a better outcome seems to be like praying yo win the lotto.

I've never understood this argument. If coaches have no impact on the on-field performance of players, why do we have coaches in the first place? I agree that making the link between the coach and player performance is tricky. For me it comes down to player performance vs. expectations over an extended period of time. Walker has had good kick at the can and has very little to show for it.

Gibby was a solid manager up until September of last year, and it's been all downhill since then. Some of his moves this spring have been truly mind-boggling.

[Sifu]

I've never understood this argument. If coaches have no impact on the on-field performance of players, why do we have coaches in the first place? I agree that making the link between the coach and player performance is tricky. For me it comes down to player performance vs. expectations over an extended period of time. Walker has had good kick at the can and has very little to show for it.

Gibby was a solid manager up until September of last year, and it's been all downhill since then. Some of his moves this spring have been truly mind-boggling.

Sometimes a move is needed just to shake people up and get them refocused or energized. I take last year's Royals as an example where they fired the hitting coach and the hitters seemed to have responded. I don't think a new hitting coach magically fixed things seemingly overnight, but if you believe that at this level half of performance is physical and the other half mental, then a new coach may be what the doctor orders to help refocus the mental aspect.

[Schad]

I've never understood this argument. If coaches have no impact on the on-field performance of players, why do we have coaches in the first place? I agree that making the link between the coach and player performance is tricky. For me it comes down to player performance vs. expectations over an extended period of time. Walker has had good kick at the can and has very little to show for it.

Our starting pitching wasn't particularly bad last year, nor were our most-commonly deployed relievers. We were right around average, and would have been well above it if not for the truly miserable innings pitched by some of our depth guys, and I doubt there's anything Walker could do, in the week or two half of them were in the bigs, to make them functional major league pitchers. Mix in the fact that we were relying on several pitchers with ugly recent injury histories (Morrow, Santos, McGowan, Hutchison) and it looks much more like a roster failure than a coaching problem to me.

[C Court]

More Jays stuff from Steve Simmons' Sunday column:

Is there a larger indictment of the Blue Jays than this: They are 2-21 in games in which they do not score five runs or more. They have lost their past 11 when scoring four or fewer runs. And they’ve had five strong starts in a row and have just one win to show for it

This is Paul Beeston’s last season as president. He wanted to go out with a bang. Not this kind of bang. If the Jays continue this way, unfortunately this will be Alex Anthopoulos’ last season as general manager and John Gibbons’ last season as manager. The upper-ups at Rogers have been privately very clear about that

[Raptors Realtor]

More Jays stuff from Steve Simmons' Sunday column:

Is there a larger indictment of the Blue Jays than this: They are 2-21 in games in which they do not score five runs or more. They have lost their past 11 when scoring four or fewer runs. And they’ve had five strong starts in a row and have just one win to show for it

This is Paul Beeston’s last season as president. He wanted to go out with a bang. Not this kind of bang. If the Jays continue this way, unfortunately this will be Alex Anthopoulos’ last season as general manager and John Gibbons’ last season as manager. The upper-ups at Rogers have been privately very clear about that

At the end of the day, Rogers has to start being realistic and realize that by not increasing payroll the Jays aren't going to contend. If what we've heard is true, that Rogers has quietly handcuffed AA's budget then what do they expect. He's built a great offense, and that has come at the expense of the pitching. The budget doesn't afford him to build a high-end offense and high-end pitching.

The only thing that is apparent to me, is that unless Rogers loosens their purse strings than it doesn't matter what GM is manning the ship, it will be a similar outcome.

[AirCanadaMouse]

More Jays stuff from Steve Simmons' Sunday column:

Is there a larger indictment of the Blue Jays than this: They are 2-21 in games in which they do not score five runs or more. They have lost their past 11 when scoring four or fewer runs. And they’ve had five strong starts in a row and have just one win to show for it

This is Paul Beeston’s last season as president. He wanted to go out with a bang. Not this kind of bang. If the Jays continue this way, unfortunately this will be Alex Anthopoulos’ last season as general manager and John Gibbons’ last season as manager. The upper-ups at Rogers have been privately very clear about that

At the end of the day, Rogers has to start being realistic and realize that by not increasing payroll the Jays aren't going to contend. If what we've heard is true, that Rogers has quietly handcuffed AA's budget then what do they expect. He's built a great offense, and that has come at the expense of the pitching. The budget doesn't afford him to build a high-end offense and high-end pitching.

The only thing that is apparent to me, is that unless Rogers loosens their purse strings than it doesn't matter what GM is manning the ship, it will be a similar outcome.

The "budget" is not an issue. They're spending a lot of money on the current team they have now, and have had one of the higher team payrolls for awhile now. This isn't a "Money Ball" kind of team, they just happen to spend their money stupidly.

[s e n s i]

OT, but simmons idiocy needed to be shared somewhere

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