Surveying the damage

Well, well, well.
Jobu is clearly not pleased. Time to start searching for a live rooster.

in the last 11 games, the Jays are 3-8, and in that time almost everything that can go wrong HAS gone wrong. A lot has been said - rightfully so - about the hitting in general and the hitting with runners in scoring position in particular, but the starting pitching has also been uncharacteristically sucktitudinious as well.

Here's how the team has preformed over that ugly stretch of games:
[key: ab/h 2B-3B-HR RBI bb/k BA OBP SLG OPS]

Eck'n    40/10  1 - 0 - 1  5  3/3  .250  .302  .350  .652
Hill     43/11  4 - 0 - 1  4  2/4  .256  .289  .395  .684
Rios     34/11  1 - 0 - 2  5  2/6  .324  .361  .529  .890
Wells    40/10  0 - 0 - 1  4  4/5  .250  .318  .325  .643
Stairs   30/10  0 - 0 - 2  5  1/1  .333  .355  .533  .888
Overbay  28/8   1 - 0 - 0  0 11/7  .286  .487  .321  .808
Stewart  23/4   1 - 1 - 0  2  4/3  .174  .296  .304  .600
Zaun     29/9   2 - 0 - 1  2  7/3  .310  .444  .483  .927
Barajas  17/1   0 - 0 - 1  1  1/1  .059  .111  .235  .346
Inglett  25/6   1 - 1 - 0  1  3/1  .240  .321  .360  .681
Scutero  28/7   1 - 0 - 0  5  6/4  .250  .382  .286  .668
McDonald  9/1   0 - 0 - 0  1  1/2  .111  .200  .111  .311
Thomas   22/3   0 - 0 - 0  1  2/3  .136  .208  .136  .344
Diaz      4/0   0 - 0 - 0  0  0/1  .000  .000  .000  .000

That's a collective team total of:
372 - 91 - 12 - 2- 9 - 36 - 42 - 44 - 7 - .245 - .321 - .360 - .681

Note, if you will, that Rolen and (presumably) Lind are about to step in for the collective efforts of Scutaro, Inglett, Stewart (v. RHP at least) and Thomas.
Collectively those 4 have an line like this: .204 - .310 - .276 - .586

The rest of the team combines for:
274 - 71 - 9 - 0 - 9 - 27 - 27 - 33 - .259 - .326 - .391 - .717

Even if Rolen isn't 100% with the bat yet we should see an improvement there right away. If we can get Eckstien, Hill, and Wells out of their collective slump the overall hitting should be in much better shape. Given that the power outage and the RISP situation is freakishly abnormal, one HAS to assume that these will even out as most statistical anomalies tend to do.

In short, there's nowhere to go but up and the probabilities suggest the upturn will come sooner rather than later.

On the pitching side of the ledger, we find this:

Halladay - 17.0 - 20 -  9 - 9 -  2 - 10- 4.76 - 1.29
McGowan  - 17.0 - 21 - 10 - 9 - 10 - 12- 4.76 - 1.82
Burnett -   6.0 -  7 -  5 - 5 -  7 - 6 - 7.50 - 2.33
Marcum -   12.1 -  9 -  7 - 6 -  7 - 6 - 4.38 - 1.30
Litsch -    8.1 - 17 -  9 - 9 -  2 - 9 - 9.72 - 2.28

Ryan -    3.0 - 3 - 0 - 0 - 2 - 5 - 0.00 - 1.67
Downs -   5.0 - 4 - 1 - 1 - 1 - 8 - 1.80 - 1.00
Accardo - 3.0 - 4 - 4 - 3 - 0 - 0 - 9.00 - 1.33
Tallet  - 4.2 - 9 - 2 - 2 - 3 - 2 - 3.86 - 2.57
Frasor  - 4.2 - 5 - 2 - 2 - 2 - 2 - 3.86 - 1.50
Carlson - 8.2 - 6 - 2 - 2 - 2 - 12- 2.08 - 0.92
Camp -    3.2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 4 - 0.00 - 0.00
Wolfe -   2.1 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0.00 - 0.43

Do complaints about the pen as a whole, but the starters are defiantly out of whack.

Again, this is so wildly aberrational that it's virtually certain to be brief. I have my doubts about Litsch, and there's no predicting exactly when AJ gets a grip on his curve again (but he will) but there's no way the starting staff as a whole continues to struggle like this.

For someone such as myself who has very lofty expectations, this season has been excruciating. But I take comfort in knowing that we are at rock bottom right now, it can't possibly be that this is the real talent level of this team.

Oh, and before i stop I have to give a big shout out to the folks who have been cursing Gregg Zaun and demanding Rob Barajas supplant him. I invite you folks to consider their respective stat lines above and repent of your heresies. I once said "Even if Reed Johnson is the question, Shannon Stewart is not the answer" now I say "Even if Gregg Zaun is the question, Rod Barajas is most assuredly NOT the answer."

~WillRain