The Orioles and the Jays finish up their weekend series today in Toronto. The Orioles are looking to avoid the sweep and falling 21 (!) games under .500. When looking at these two teams the improbability of their seasons is striking.
We have been talking about the strikingly improbable badness of the Orioles all year so far, but look at the Toronto Blue Jays. The Jays have scored the second-most runs in the league so far this year, just six runs behind the Yankees, they have the fourth-highest team OPS in the league while simultaneously having the third-worst team batting average and the league’s WORST on-base percentage.
The Jays have hit 85 (!) homeruns this year. 85, think about that, the Jays have played 51 games this year meaning the Jays are averaging 1.6 homeruns a game. The Boston Red Sox are a distant second in the league with 67 homeruns, just over 1.3 homeruns a game. All of this while having a league average pitching staff.
All logic dictates that the Jays will not be able to keep up this level of play all year. Logic tells us that eventually the power numbers will normalize and the BA will rise a bit – but most likely not that much. But you know what, logic says a lot of things.
Logic says that: Adam Jones should be playing much better.
Logic says that: Nolan Reimold shouldn’t be struggling in AAA, let alone even being in AAA
Logic says that: the Orioles bullpen should be able hold down a win once and awhile.
Logic says that: Mark Teixeria should be batting higher than .215 with seven homers
Logic says that: Alex Rodriguez should have more than six homers
Logic and reason are having a bad year. hell, Zack Greinke leads the AL in losses with SIX!
This whole season has just been stupid. The Orioles are playing like a AAA team and nothing seems to go right. They can’t hold a lead when they get one and it seems every game there is a new goat. Matusz has been struggling, Markakis isn’t hitting for power, Wieters just isn’t hitting.
What else is there to say? The Orioles have a .300 winning percentage going into this afternoon’s game. We haven’t seen any team play this badly for this long in a very long time.
