Another season, another injury-filled campaign for the Toronto Blue Jays. More importantly, another season with no playoff berth. The injuries to the likes of Edwin Encarnacion, Jose Reyes, Brett Lawrie, Melky Cabrera and company were too much for the club to handle over the majority of a 162-game season. As the Blue Jays hope to finish the season strong, the only thing Blue Jays' fans can look forward to is next year. For Blue Jays fans, this season has been a splitting image of the team over the course of the last half-decade.
The Jays didn't even start the season hot, it seemed to be yet another season of underachieving and below-.500 play from the MLB's lone Canadian franchise. However, the month of May brought the team to new highs that the franchise hadn't experienced since it's glory days in the early 90's. Encarnacion stacked up a team-record sixteen home runs in the month of May and the Blue Jays seemed unstoppable. Toronto jumped into the driver's seat of the AL East, with only Baltimore even remotely in the rear view mirror. Despite an average June, the Jays still held onto the top spot in the division by a good margin. However, July and August killed the team entirely. Brett Lawrie tweaked his back just one at-bat after returning from his hand injury which would eventually sideline him for the remainder of the season, topped off with losing Encarnacion for the majority of the next two months and GM Alex Anthopoulous making zero moves to improve the team at the Trade Deadline sent the team into a downward spiral.
Loss after loss, and eventually the Blue Jays came to a cross-road with the Seattle Mariners in mid-August. Both teams had identical records and were both in the hunt to claim the second wild card spot. The Blue Jays got spanked in all three games by the M's, and the Jays lost all hope of getting a playoff spot after that crushing blow. The Mariners would go on to win ball games and keep themselves in close contention for the AL Wild Card while the Blue Jays continued to slide deeper into the basement.
Now heading into the last few weeks of the season, the Blue Jays are basically out of the playoff hunt for good. All the fans have to look forward to now is the future that Marcus Stroman and Aaron Sanchez hold for the organization. This is the second year that the new core group of the Blue Jays have failed to meet their goal of a post-season berth, meaning it will be a pivotal offseason for Alex Anthopolous, Jose Reyes, R.A. Dickey and Melky Cabrera to decide if they belong on the Jays in the future.
It's been another season of disapointment for the Toronto Blue Jays, and if Kansas City makes the postseason this year, it means that Toronto will hold the longest playoff draught in the majors. It's time for change; whether it's the manager, pitching staff, people up in the offices or batters, the atmosphere of Blue Jay baseball needs to change. It's time the Blue Jays finally reward it's fanbase for their support.
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