New Guy´s » So, what are you expecting from the Toronto Blue Jays

In the end it was an all too familiar tale that played out on an all too familiar stage. Alonzo Mourning Jersey . When Toronto FC travelled to New Jersey to play the Red Bulls back in 2009, the prospects of making the playoffs for the first time weighed all too heavy on the shoulders of a team that was simply not good enough for such a burden. The 5-0 humiliation that day simply rubber stamped the inevitable. The team wasnt good. With or without a ticket to the playoffs. On another October night in the Garden State, almost five years on, a different looking TFC got a similar dose of medicine. Only this time it was supposed to be different. This team was supposed to be ready for the big time. Ready for the bright lights. Instead, they arrived back to their hotel in Hoboken, where the lights of Manhattan glisten in the distance, closed the curtain on the dream and fell asleep pondering a failed season. A bloody big disappointment. More finger pointing. Some will say what else could have MLSE have done, after all they threw $100 million at the team and they still failed? Its a lovely round number that adds exclamation marks to another season of ineptitude but it hardly paints the true picture of ineffectiveness. In less time than it takes for a mother to carry a child full term, Toronto FC had gone from Tim Leiwekes Why cant we be great? message to a season of failure once again. During those nine months there were many answers to Leiwekes question. Coaching, formations, tactics, injuries, defensive errors, flights to England, the World Cup. The list can go on and on. The main answer to his question, though, is the lack of combinations in the squad. This is professional sport, it is not like running a team on a football manager videogame simulator where you can buy a bunch of players, run their stats through a system and win games. Yes, money was thrown around but what use is it if you bring in players who dont mix? Leiweke and MLS had three golden tickets in their hands the moment Leiweke convinced the board to spend more money on the team. Yet, they gave two of them to strikers who never looked like compliments to each other. Along the way, of course, there were other factors, notably Jermain Defoes multiple injuries and frequent flyer miles, but when you sign TWO designated players to play up top, you would hope they would somehow have some kind of understanding of how to play off each other. That should, at least, have been the minimum requirement. Thirty-two games in, under two different coaching staffs, and the jury is officially in. The verdict delivered is a harsh one.... Toronto FC have played 2,880 MLS minutes this season. Gilberto and Defoe played together for 530 of them. Less than 19% of the season. The club has now scored 43 league goals this season. They only scored eight of them when the two big money strikers were on the field together. As if that wasnt a big enough problem, the signings themselves led to bigger problems. Having them both around forced the team into a system that didnt suit them and even when they did play together, it didnt make the team better. Strike one. They gave their third golden ticket to Michael Bradley, a player, like Defoe, this franchise could only have dreamed of having one year ago. Yet, with him and Defoe they failed again. Why? Another strike for combinations. Toronto FC GM Tim Bezbatchenko admitted to me earlier this season that the deal for Bradley came together very quickly and late into the offseason. The club has paid for it ever since. Not the signing of the player, but the timing of the signing. In order to get Bradley they had to move the perfect player to get the best out of him. Matias Laba has been immense for an excellent Vancouver side this season and would have been the ideal partner for the American international. Instead, the club spent the entire season looking to find ways of getting more out of Bradley and they never accomplished it. With Laba and Bradley in midfield and a healthy, fully committed Defoe up top it would have been hard to imagine this team not making the playoffs. Laba, however, is a Whitecaps player and is not returning. There will be those who believe throwing DP money after central midfielders is a waste but the modern game is so often won in transitions and having such a solid core can win a club a lot of matches. Bradley is a rare talent at this level who needs to be treasured. It is easy to say he is vastly overpaid but the truth is the club has never had anyone like him in terms of his distribution and football intelligence. Under Ryan Nelsen, he was often asked to play too high up the field, when he is far best suited facing the field where he can pass and attack from deep positions by breaking lines. Vanney recognized this but was already forced to marry, temporarily, a system that required two strikers, forcing Bradley into a midfield two. Inside that, Vanney, like Nelsen, never found the right balance for the American international because he simply didnt have the right players in the squad to get the best out of him. Strike two. Behind whichever midfield combination they played was a back four that never settled together all season. Toronto FC has had some of the worst defences in recent times in Major League Soccer and this current group is not one of them, but they certainly were culpable for much of this seasons disappointments. Full back is clearly a position Vanney is looking to evolve and his work with Justin Morrow since he took over shows real positive signs as he tries to bring a high pressing style and the need for at least one full back to advance forward to not make the attack narrow when the left midfielder, usually Jonathan Osorio, cuts in to help centrally. Defending is a collective responsibility across the entire team but it was clear this season that far too many errors were made by centre-backs. Out of the 64 starting apperances by the two this season, 40 of them were combined between Nick Hagglund and Doneil Henry, two players who played the majority of the season having turned just 21-years-old. Hagglund, now 22, has shown a lot of promise but no one at the start of the season would have thought starting him in 23 league games was the right thing to do. Henry had a season to forget with a number of high-profile individual errors and the team never found the right balance at the heart of the defence. Under Nelsen the team went behind often and recovered often. It was a formula that was not sustainable. In their 32nd match of the season on Saturday they went behind for the 26th time. They had recovered 14pts from losing positions by recovering 12 times from losing deficits, but there are only so many times you can do that. Playing from behind is a dangerous game and, the Portland match aside, they havent looked capable of winning a game they trailed in for two months. Captain Steven Caldwell is arguably the best centre-back the team has ever had. His leadership and tenacity was exactly what this team needed for many years but when Vanney recognized the team needed to play higher up the field with more tempo and an intelligent pressing game, it didnt do Caldwell and his partners any favours. They arent the most technically gifted, possession based defenders who can step up with the team. Instead, to compensate for the lack of pace, they dropped deep and into their comfort zone. Strike three. Maturing and learning how to win is what this team needs as a group. Theres no need for this team to be blown up, said Vanney after Saturdays match. It may be easier said than done. He clearly has some very useful parts to work with but some will be moved on and for the good of the team they should be. In the end it was another poor season, one where collective responsibility is needed following a far too simplistic reliance on individuals. This winter the club will need to do a better job at evaluating talent and they should start by looking at their own. Derrick Jones Heat Jersey . The 20-year-old Inoue landed a series of combinations and the bout was stopped 2 minutes, 54 seconds into the sixth round. Inoue, the first Japanese boxer to claim a world title in just his sixth professional fight, improved to 6-0 with five knockouts. Chris Silva Jersey . None of them was better than playing with LeBron James again. https://www.heatlockerroom.com/Kelly-Olynyk-City-Edition-Jersey/ . Halak, 28, split his eighth NHL seasons between the St. Louis Blues, Buffalo Sabres and Washington Capitals, compiling a 29-13-7 record in 52 games.What a difference a year makes. With Opening Day less than a week away, the excitement surrounding the Toronto Blue Jays is much different than it was a year ago. Going into last season, many believed this team could win the World Series, or at the very least, make the playoffs for the first time in 20 years. This, of course, never came to fruition and the Jays have gone from pre-season favourites to almost an afterthought in the baseball world. Their window to win with this group of players might only have a season or two left, so the time to be successful is now. Having said that, what are your expectations for the 2014 Toronto Blue Jays? The Jays Opening Day roster wont look drastically different from 2013. Aside from losing the much-maligned J.P. Arencibia (replacing him with Dioner Navarro) to the Texas Rangers and Josh Johnson to the San Diego Padres, the Jays have pretty much stood pat. Will another year of the same crew result in a similar outcome, or, with a season together already under their belts, is it possible Toronto can find their grove and be a competitive ball club?? The pitching rotation has been a major question mark this spring with R. Tyler Johnson Heat Jersey. . Dickey, Mark Buehrle, and the oft-injured Brandon Morrow returning to this years staff. Youngster Drew Hutchison, 23, who missed last season due to Tommy John surgery and long-time Blue Jay Dustin McGowan round out the rotation. Will the Jays go as far as their starters take them? How much faith do you have in this group to stay healthy and produce wins? It looks as though the AL East is as strong as its ever been with the Orioles, Yankees, Red Sox and Rays making improvements to their ball clubs over the off-season. Are the Jays good enough to compete in the toughest division in baseball? There is the opinion that the expectations – and pressure – were so high for the team in 2013, that they were set up to fail. With the team not having the weight of the world on their shoulders this time around, its possible the team could pull a 180 and play like they were supposed to last year. So, what are you expecting from the Toronto Blue Jays in 2014? As always, its Your! Call. ' ' '