What do the Jays do now?

The Toronto Blue Jays just finished sweeping the New York Yankees. They currently sit 4 games back (in the AL East) of the Baltimore Orioles, who are almost certainly terrible playing over their heads. They’re only 3 games back from the Tampa Bay Rays, an admittedly very good team that will only get better when its best player (Evan Longoria) returns from injury.  Somehow they’ve managed to do this without bothering to put their best foot forward on a daily basis.

On Thursday, the team took a step in the right direction and finally sent down struggling first-baseman Adam Lind in favour of utility man and certified non-superstar-prospect Yan Gomes. Gomes and his crazy-aggressive approach managed to go 2/3 with a strikeout and 2 singles in his first game, which is great, but expecting him to be an improvement for this team’s 12^th ranked offense is like expecting J.P. Arencibia to lay off pitches outside of the strike zone ridiculous.

What should the Jays do?

Barring any trades (which the team should be looking to make considering the bevy of young arms in the system and the obvious need for a hitter who can hit a strike AND lay off a ball), here are 9 ways to improve the current roster:

1)       call up David Cooper and alternate him and Edwin Encarnacion at 1B, while Encarnacion DH's on his non-1B days

2)       on days when Enarnacion is playing 1B, alternate Cooper and Eric Thames in the DH spot

3)       only give Eric Thames at bats as a DH and spare the pitching staff his horrific defense

4)       platoon Rajai Davis and Colby Rasmus in CF, with Rasmus starting in CF against righties and Davis against lefties

5)       call up Travis Snider and make him the almost-everyday left fielder, spelling him with Rajai Davis, to (at least) showcase him for a trade

6)       send Ben Francicso to the minors where he belongs

7)       never, ever play Omar Vizquel again, even if it means playing error-machine Edwin Encarnacion at third base once in a while

8)       never, ever play Jeff Mathis again, even if it means starting me Yan Gomes at catcher

9)       employ batting lineup optimization as opposed to old-school-baseball “wisdom” and bat Kelly Johnson first, Encarnacion second, Yunel Escobar third, Jose Bautista fourth, Brett Lawrie fifth, and then in descending order, from best to worst, whoever the other 4 guys are on the lineup card that day, with the exception that I’d always bat Rajai Davis sixth when he’s playing…again, this is according to statistical research, and not whatever cockamamie logic is used when making the majority of baseball’s managerial decisions

The Jays have a legitimate shot at the new additional wild card game. The pitching staff is solid, and the bullpen will be decent when Santos returns.

If the team wants to make a real run at it, though, they should be looking to add another good-to-very-good bat and another bullpen arm.

In the meantime, they ought to at least try to maximize what they presently have under contract.