M.S.U. - #2 Edmunds!

Gonna try to be really brief here.

Here's what we know:

1. Jays are at least considering playing Jose Bautista in RF and leading him off in 2010;

2. Jose Bautista is extraordinarily suckish vs. RHP;

3. Cito seems to have no problem sending out suckinsh players in his lineup;

4. Cito loves veteran players;

5. Even as he was winding down, Jim Edmunds still raked vs. RHP.

6. Edmunds says he wants to play in 2010 and expects to sign within the next week or so. Now, to be clear, Edmunds doesn't fit the plan, he'd be only a stopgap. And he's been off a year so you would HAVE to think that he's only good for a minor league contract and a chance to make the team. In addition, while he tends to have a high OBP v. RH, he's not your traditional lead-off guy and you have to accept that and he has to accept that role. but IF AA doesn't have some ace-in-the-hole to solve that RF/lead-off problem, in my opinion the Jays could do a lot worse than tossing a million or so at Edmunds (on a make good basis) - one of the ways they could do worse is play Bautista every day.

----------------

On another note, the Jays acquired one time hot prospect Merkin Valdez from the Giants today for cash. Valdez missed almost two years with TJ surgery and 2009 was his first year back. In the low minors Valdez missed a lot of bats and reached AAA by the age of 23. Hew wasn't quite as dominant that year but he still had a lot of promise to be doing well in the PCL at 23. Up to that point he had been a starter. Since coming back from injury he pitched in the Giant's pen but SF is not short of quality options for the rotation.

If Valdez can get his control back (for a hard thrower, that tends to be a problem the first year after surgery) the Jays might have picked up a relatively valuable chip here - albeit there are way more candidates than jobs for pitchers in Toronto as well.

IN fact, if you count every reasonably potential candidate to pitch in either Toronto or Las Vegas, it totals up to a startling THIRTY pitchers - and that's without counting Mcgowan and Litsch. Alex A was on the Fan today and he mentioned that he still had his ear to the ground to add more pitching if it was "the right guy at the right price" but some of these dudes are gonna have to walk in march.

Here's how it breaks down (locks or near locks bolded):

Possibilities for the major league rotation - Marcum, Romero, Morrow, Rzep, McGowan, Richmond, Tallet, Purcey, Cecil, Mills, Ray, Valdez, Jackson

Possibilities for the major league 'pen - Frasor, Downs, Carlson, Accardo, Tallet, Richmond, Janssen, Roenicke, Zinicola, Valdez, Hayhurst, Ray, Jackson

Possibilities for the AAA Rotation (doesn't included any bolded player above) - Mills, Ray, Purcey*, Stewart, Valdez, Jackson, Broadway, Drabek, Perez, Gonzalez

Possibilities for the AAA bullpen - Janssen, Roenicke, Zinicola**, Valdez*, Hayhurst*, Jackson, Broadway, Boone, D. Romero, Register, Henn, Stidfole

That's a lot of guys looking for innings already.

* - possibly or probably out of options

** - Zinicola can't be sent down unless we give the Nats some sort of compensation for the right to.

-----------------------

Finally, looking back at the payroll projection - Brian Tallet blew my projected total a bit. I was within 1/4 million on every other guess. The total of all the arbitration eligible guys ended up being $8.43 million. A reader reminded me we owe $1.6 million to the Reds on Rolen (which may have already been paid but we'll note it) so right now the total projected salary for 2010 is right at $63 million on roster and just a bit over $80 million including off-roster payments.