Down and Out

YEAH BABY!!! JP is done with the Jays!!!

Wait...let me finish! There are so many people out in Blue Jay land that are jumping with joy after hearing of the dismissal of JP Ricciardi as the Jays General Manager. The guy came in 8 years ago with and what did he bring to the club. Four winning seasons, AJ, BJ, bloated contracts in Wells and Rios, $18mil for Thomas, $17mil for Koskie, and (in my opinion) a disaster in trade talks about Halladay. There was a lot of bad that has come with JP.

But looking back over the past 8 full seasons can you really put all the blame on the GM? Yes, he has the GM title and that is what comes with the territory so therefore he should take blame for what has transpired over the past 8 seasons. Some argue that he is not responsible for most of the decisions and Jay's fans should point their finger and direct their anger at upper management who JP reported to. Why do people even bother saying this BS about JP being the lightning rod when upper management is to be blamed. Maybe JP was a puppet and did whatever his superiors asked of him, we will never know. Ultimately, it all came down on his shoulders because he had the title of GM after his name. If he was opposed to the decisions coming from the top then he should have voiced his concerns and if they fell on deaf ears then a resignation letter should have been drafted and dropped off onto the proper desks.

Don't give me all this crap about JP shouldn't be blamed for the problems that Jays endured over the past 8 seasons. He was the GM and it was his team that took the field for the 162 games a year. It was his team that produced no post-season appearances. It was his team that finished with four losing seasons.

In my eyes, it doesn't matter who takes the GM office for the Jays because of how baseball is currently structured. The Rays showed it is possible to overcome the powers of the AL East but without a play-off birth in 2009, it proved my point, it was just a year that things went their way.

Looking ahead and all I see is a nice 3rd or 4th place finish in the AL East behind the usual suspects. You never know, our young guys can all put up career years and push us into the post-season and maybe even make a run at the World Series. Unlikely, but that's why we play the games.