Toronto Blue Jays

Jersay

House Member
Dec 1, 2005
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Now I am a big Toronto Blue Jays fan. I was upset when Montreal left the Major League Baseball, but even as a French-Canadian I have enjoyed Toronto sports teams, I guess its because my father's from Toronto and I lived there for four years.

However, I think Toronto will get into the playoffs this year

Troy Glaus, 37 HRs last year

Lyle Overbay 17 Hrs last year

Beckett

Ryan

And they have Koskie, Hillenbrand, Halladay, Hinske, and they only had to lose Batista and Hudson.

So I think Toronto will go 103-59

What do you guys think?
 

Jersay

House Member
Dec 1, 2005
4,837
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38
Independent Palestine
I don't know.

The only move the Yankees made was Damon, and Boston lost a few key players. If both teams have a really bad start and Toronto has an excellent start than Toronto might make it in as a wild card. We will have to see.

But from what I have heard, people are beginning to find interest in Toronto Blue Jays again.
 

Jersay

House Member
Dec 1, 2005
4,837
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Independent Palestine
Now with Troy Glaus, I predict Toronto winning 112 games. However, in the strange world of baseball, I will predict that they will do the exact opposite and lose 112 games.
 

spaminator

Hall of Fame Member
Oct 26, 2009
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Former Blue Jays Baseball Academy coach charged with child luring
Author of the article:Brad Hunter
Publishing date:Apr 01, 2021 • 1 day ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation
Well-known Hamilton baseball coach and member of the Toronto Blue Jays Baseball Academy John Hashimoto has been arrested on child luring charges.
Well-known Hamilton baseball coach and member of the Toronto Blue Jays Baseball Academy John Hashimoto has been arrested on child luring charges. PHOTO BY JOHN HASHIMOTO /FACEBOOK
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Halton Region detectives have arrested a former top instructor at the Toronto Blue Jays Baseball Academy and charged him with child sex-related offences.

Cops say that John Douglas Hashimoto, 56, of Hamilton, has been charged with luring a child under 16 years and invitation to sexual touching.

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Hashimoto was allegedly communicating online using the name David or David 46.

He is a retired teacher with the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board and is actively involved in youth baseball in the City of Hamilton, police say.

He was also a lead baseball instructor for the Toronto Blue Jays Baseball Academy from 2006 until early 2020 and a master coach developer and evaluator for Baseball Canada.

According to his website, Hashimoto had worked closely with young players “to improve baseball skills.”

“We were deeply disturbed to learn of the charges against a former seasonal employee, but as this is an ongoing legal matter, we cannot comment further at this time,” the Toronto Blue Jays said in a statement Thursday.


Investigators believe there may be additional alleged victims.

Anyone with information about this case is asked to contact Det. Todd Martin at 905-825-4747 ext. 8983 or Det.-Const. Andrew Hulbert at 905-825-4747 ext. 8974.

bhunter@postmedia.com

@HunterTOSun
 

spaminator

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Blue Jays cut ties with Roberto Alomar after MLB sexual misconduct investigation
"I am disappointed, surprised and upset with today's news," Alomar said

Author of the article:Scott Stinson
Publishing date:Apr 30, 2021 • 13 hours ago • 4 minute read • 53 Comments
Roberto Alomar addresses the media at the Rogers Centre in Toronto on Tuesday July 19, 2011. The Toronto Blue Jays announced that Hall of Fame second baseman Roberto Alomar will have his #12 retired by the organization.
Roberto Alomar addresses the media at the Rogers Centre in Toronto on Tuesday July 19, 2011. The Toronto Blue Jays announced that Hall of Fame second baseman Roberto Alomar will have his #12 retired by the organization. PHOTO BY ERNEST DOROSZUK /TORONTO SUN
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If the Toronto Blue Jays were in the business of making statues of team legends, Roberto Alomar would have been an ideal choice for the first bronzing.

He was the best player on the best version of the Blue Jays in their history, a magician with the bat and glove who also authored one of the franchise’s defining moments: A game-tying home run in the ninth inning of Game 4 of the 1992 American League Championship Series in Oakland.


That shot, off dominant closer Dennis Eckersley, was the prototype to the Bat Flip. Alomar crushed Eckersley’s offering and immediately lifted both hands in the air, turning around the narrative of a team that, until that point, had only known playoff heartbreak. That it was Alomar who hit that home run, who did it when it seemed mostly unlikely, was fitting. He was that good. Everyone loved Robbie.

But it’s a relationship that is now deeply strained. Major League Baseball announced on Friday that it was firing Alomar, 53, from his job as a consultant in his native Puerto Rico, after an investigation into an allegation of sexual misconduct from what it called a “baseball industry employee.”

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The incident took place in 2014, but MLB was made aware of it more recently. Commissioner Rob Manfred said an outside law firm carried out the investigation, and after its findings, Alomar has been placed on MLB’s Ineligible List, effectively booting him from the sport.

The Blue Jays said they agreed with the decision and, based on their review of the findings, they “are severing all ties with Alomar, effectively immediately.” His number will be removed from the Level of Excellence at the Rogers Centre and the banner celebrating his Hall of Fame selection will be taken down.

“We commend the courage demonstrated by the individual who bravely came forward, and in order to respect their privacy, the organization will have no further comment at this time,” said a statement from club president Mark Shapiro.


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Alomar posted a statement on social media saying he was “disappointed, surprised and upset” by the findings.

“My hope is that this allegation can be heard in a venue that will allow me to address the accusation directly,” he said. Alomar also appeared to suggest that he was a victim of changing attitudes toward sexual misconduct.

“With the current social climate, I can understand why Major League Baseball has taken the position they have,” his statement said.


MLB is in the midst of a furore over attitudes toward women in the sport. Jared Porter, the newly appointed general manager of the New York Mets, was fired recently after a detailed report of his conduct toward a female media member, and MLB has an ongoing investigation into Los Angeles Angels pitching coach Mickey Callaway, after another detailed report on allegations of lewd conduct dating to his time coaching in Cleveland and with the Mets.



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But while Major League Baseball is clearly at a moment where it wants to be seen taking sexual-misconduct allegations seriously, Alomar’s suggestion that he wants to “address the accusation directly” is a curious one. An investigation by an outside law firm would provide exactly the venue that he would have wanted and, crucially, with the whole thing kept quiet while that process took place, neither MLB nor the Blue Jays can be accused of having caved to public pressure once the alleged 2014 incident was brought forward.

This is the rare case where the process reached its conclusion absent any of the media uproar that typically follows such accusations. So far, none of the parties have aired any of the details. And, given Alomar’s beloved status in the game, it also follows that the investigation’s findings must have been serious for the league and the Blue Jays to cut ties with him so completely. With a few exceptions, Major League Baseball is not often accused of overreacting in disciplinary matters.

For the Jays and their fans, and especially those of that era of Blue Jays baseball, it is dispiriting news. I was one of them, wearing Alomar’s No. 12 when I played baseball in high school. The Jays of that time were a bit of a mercenary crew, with players like Jack Morris, Dave Winfield, Paul Molitor, David Cone and Rickey Henderson showing up to help finally push them to post-season success.

Jays’ Roberto Alomar raises his arms as he watches him franchise-altering home run hit off of Oakland A’s closer Dennis Eckersley sail over the right field wall in the ninth inning of Game 4 of the ALCS in 1992. CHRIS WILKINS/GETTY IMAGES FILES
Jays’ Roberto Alomar raises his arms as he watches him franchise-altering home run hit off of Oakland A’s closer Dennis Eckersley sail over the right field wall in the ninth inning of Game 4 of the ALCS in 1992. CHRIS WILKINS/GETTY IMAGES FILES
But Alomar was a foundational piece, arriving in a trade at 23 years old and just entering his prime. He was a prodigious talent from a baseball family, and played the game with an obvious zest. He made plays, he stole bases when they really needed stealing and, when the Blue Jays absolutely needed a big hit off of a guy who was basically unhittable, Alomar did that too, turning on its ear what it meant to be a Jays fan.

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His record was, in truth, not spotless. After he left Toronto, he was suspended for spitting in the face of an umpire who had ejected him for arguing a strike. That 1996 game with Baltimore came against the Blue Jays, making his split from the team that much more awkward. He was also known to have an active social life, so to speak, although that is hardly uncommon among professional athletes.

By the time of his Hall of Fame call in 2011, Alomar was fully back as a member of the Toronto sporting establishment in good standing, an icon of a franchise that does not have too many of them.

And now this. It’s the problem with retired numbers, or banners, or indeed statues. Those things reflect certain sporting accomplishments, heroics on the field of play.

The people who achieve them, though, are more complicated than that.

sstinson@postmedia.com
 

spaminator

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SIMMONS SUNDAY: Baseball needs to come clean with details on Roberto Alomar's ban
Author of the article:Steve Simmons
Publishing date:May 02, 2021 • 1 hour ago • 11 minute read • Join the conversation
Former Toronto Blue Jays second baseman Roberto Alomar.
Former Toronto Blue Jays second baseman Roberto Alomar. REUTERS
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Roberto Alomar’s history with the Blue Jays will never be erased, you just can’t celebrate it anymore.

That’s the separation of then and now, the separation of emotion and investigation without detail. That’s the shock and the stain of the Friday announcement that still stings and will continue to sting.


You can take his name down from the Level of Excellence. You can fire him, as Major League Baseball has done. You can distance yourself from him, the way the current Blue Jays have, without connection of any kind to the past. And you can make him persona non grata for whatever crimes and misdemeanours he has apparently been found guilty of without any kind of public trial.


That changes today and changes tomorrow but it can’t change yesterday. It can’t change what we saw and what we felt and what we knew. Not for anyone who was in Oakland or watching on television on that sunny afternoon in 1992 — probably early evening in Toronto — when Alomar changed the Blue Jays forever. Not for anyone who watched him invent a way to play second base — athletic, instinctual, easy, natural — something we’d never seen before and haven’t seen since. The greatest of all Blue Jays players. There is no debate about that.

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Only now, the name is disgraced, found guilty without trial of sexual misconduct, gone from the stadium wall, gone from baseball, not gone from the Baseball Hall of Fame, though.

The name is ours and the name is gone. Baseball can take our player away — it has already done that — it can’t steal our memories of the greatest team Toronto has known in the past half century and of their greatest player.

THIS AND THAT

Major League Baseball owes it to fans and especially Blue Jays fans to go public with details of the investigation of Alomar. Imagine if a court in a free society operated with such secrecy. Imagine the outrage. This isn’t Russia or China. I don’t know what Alomar did, or what he’s accused of, or any details at all. None of us do, but we’re being asked to accept a decision without any facts at all. I’m not in any way defending Alomar. Nor would I ever defend sexual misconduct. In this case all I’m defending is truth … Anyone who was around Alomar for any length of time knows there has always been stories about his behaviour. The way there are stories around so many professional athletes. Some of the stories may be true. Some may be fiction. Some are somewhere in between. But they’ve been out there, for a long time, in a lot of places. And that said, I still want to know the facts so I can judge for myself and so can you … This also goes back to an old premise of mine and others: You can think you know the people playing the games you watch. You can believe you do. Even in our business, where we interview them daily, we think, at times, we know who we’re talking to. But the truth is, we don’t. We do our best to bring the athletes to life and their playing accomplishments. We do our best to think we might know them. Truth is, we know them as players, as much as they let us know them, whatever the sport, whatever the game. That’s all. Nothing beyond that … Years ago I had a conversation with Larry Felser, the longtime football writer at the Buffalo News. That’s the extreme of these kind of circumstances. He covered O.J. Simpson is his prime. They had more than a friendly relationship. He thought he knew him well. The late Felser thought the world of O.J. and, when the news broke of Simpson’s barbaric past, Felser took it very hard. He was an O.J. supporter until you couldn’t be anymore … It is six months and three days since former Raptor Terence Davis was arrested in New York and charged with various counts of domestic assault. If you can believe it, the NBA maintains the investigation is ongoing still and that the process takes time. Davis now plays for the Sacramento Kings. No comment, by the way, from the Players’ Association.
 

spaminator

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Alomar resigns from Hall of Fame board of directors
Author of the article:Reuters
Reuters
Publishing date:May 03, 2021 • 20 hours ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation
Baseball Hall of Fame Inductie Roberto Alomar acknowledges the crowd during a ceremony prior to the Toronto Blue Jays facing the Minnesota Twins on opening day during their MLB game at the Rogers Centre April 1, 2011 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Baseball Hall of Fame Inductie Roberto Alomar acknowledges the crowd during a ceremony prior to the Toronto Blue Jays facing the Minnesota Twins on opening day during their MLB game at the Rogers Centre April 1, 2011 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. PHOTO BY DAVE SANDFORD /Getty Images
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The National Baseball Hall of Fame said on Monday that Roberto Alomar, who was fired last week as a consultant by Major League Baseball after an investigation into an allegation of sexual misconduct, has resigned from its board of directors.

The Cooperstown, New York-based Hall of Fame said the two-times World Series champion submitted the letter of resignation on Saturday, a day after MLB terminated his consultant contract and placement him on its ineligible list.

Alomar, a 12-time MLB All-Star during a career in which he helped lead the Toronto Blue Jays to World Series titles in 1992 and 1993, was voted to the Hall of Fame in 2011 and elected to the board in July 2019.


The Hall of Fame also said Alomar’s plaque will remain on display in recognition of his accomplishments in the game, noting that his enshrinement reflects his eligibility and the perspective of the voters at that time.

Alomar said last week that he was disappointed with MLB’s decision and hoped the allegation against him can one day be heard in a venue that will allow him to address it directly.