John Gibbons has support of players: DeRosa

He is the voice of experience in the Toronto Blue Jays dressing room. His knowledge of the game is unparalleled. He has seen it all.

So when you ask Mark DeRosa if he agrees with Blue Jays General Manager Alex Anthopoulos, who recently insisted John Gibbons will return as manager, he wastes no time in responding.

“I completely agree 100 percent with him,” said DeRosa. “We’ve had a lot of things since spring training happen to this ball club that John had no part in.”

DeRosa went on to say, “Gibby is a players’ manager. Everybody in here to a man has completely enjoyed playing for him. He’s given us a long leash probably a little longer than to be expected based on the way we played. I’ve completely enjoyed playing for him.”

DeRosa has had a big influence on Brett Lawrie and his improvement in recent weeks. He has become a mentor to the Blue Jays third baseman.

He’s also direct when asked what went wrong this year.
 

“Everybody has their own little piece of the fault as to why we are in the place we are at,” said the 38 year-old. “I definitely don’t feel that Gibby should be the scapegoat for it at all.”

The struggles of the starting staff, at-times atrocious defence, and poor fundamentals are all reasons why the Jays have so badly under achieved this season.

Gibbons acknowledges more teaching needs to be done. He probably was too laid back in that area because he thought he had a veteran team that didn’t need to be taught. He was wrong.

DeRosa for his part credits Gibbons with keeping the team loose during a trying season and not losing the clubhouse.

“You got to have pride in yourself and be willing to compete and do whatever it takes that night,” said DeRosa. “You find the true colors of people when things are going bad. It could have been easy for us to disband in the clubhouse and we haven’t. We’ve stayed strong, we stayed together.”

And with the bulk of the team expected back next season, DeRosa hopes the lessons learned this season will be used to turn things around next season,

“We understand the reasons we are where we are. It’s disappointing coming off a spring training where I felt like we had such a swagger about us and so confident, to find ourselves in this situation is obviously not a good one but we better learn from it.

Anthony Gose and his "very frustrating" year

Ask Anthony Gose to describe what this year has been like, and he won’t mince his words.

“It’s been very frustrating,” said the 23 year-old, recalled by the Toronto Blue Jays from AAA Buffalo.

After a 23 at-bat showing with the Blue Jays earlier this year in which he went 7-23 (.304 batting average) Gose was sent down to Buffalo. Instead of improving on those numbers, he digressed and at times his attitude got him benched.

While his attitude went south, so did his hitting.

“Was I happy I was sent down? No.  I wasn’t thrilled about being sent down,” said Gose. But it wasn’t his frustration at playing in the minor leagues that got the best of the speedy outfielder. It was his performance at the plate that led to his at times poor behaviour.

“It wasn’t so much being sent down it was the fact that I couldn’t hit the ball,” said a candid Gose, just hours after being recalled to the Blue Jays. “In order for me to be here I have to hit the ball. It definitely was frustrating going out every night. You guys see the numbers. 130 strikeouts in 300 at bats and you give those numbers to anybody they are going to be happy.”

To be fair, Gose had 121 strikeouts in 393 at-bats, but you get the point. His .239 batting average in Buffalo had him questioning if he was even going to get called up to the big leagues this year.

But in the last 10 games with the Bisons, Gose was hitting at nearly a .300 clip, and cut down his strikeouts.

“I just kind of said forget about it. Whatever happens, happens,” said Gose. “I didn’t expect to come here now. I figured at best a September call up if I get called up at all.”

But since returning to the Blue Jays in mid-August, Gose has not produced much of an impact. He has had 26 at-bats and has struck out 8 times while batting .231.

Happ and Cobb grateful to return; would consider wearing protective head gear

As J.A. Happ and Alex Cobb stood side by side on Sunday afternoon, it was apparent both men are grateful to be standing and talking – let alone pitching again.

“Not too many people know what you’ve gone through on a personal level so to know his battles, although they were different, they were almost more severe and more troublesome in some cases,” said Cobb, a starting pitcher with the Tampa Rays. “It’s really nice to see him back out on a big league field. It’s definitely a bond that most people won have with another person.”

“We are going to be linked together for this possibly forever,” said Happ, a starting pitcher with the Toronto Blue Jays. “The key thing is we were both able to come back and we are ok. It’s something that we will definitely being staying in touch about.”

On May 7, Happ was struck by a Desmond Jennings liner in the side of his head. He suffered a minor skull fracture behind his left year as well as MCL and PCL ligament strains to his right knee. Happ returned to the big leagues three months later and returned to the Tampa mound on Saturday for the first time since the scary incident.

Some six weeks after Happ was hurt, Cobb was struck by an Eric Hosmer line drive in the head of a game June 15^th against Kansas City Royals. Cobb suffered a concussion and returned to the majors on Thursday, two months after his injury.

“We were able to touch- base a couple of weeks ago and it’s good to see things are back to normal,” said Happ, as the two met face to face on Sunday for the first time since their returns to the big leagues.

Happ happened to be watching the game in which Cobb was injured.

“It was just such a surreal thing,” said Happ. “Again, just to see him and be able to catch up and see that the healing has taken place, that’s the biggest thing. Definitely a scare with some of the issues that he had to deal with that I didn’t.

"He had a little bit more to overcome in that sense and really glad to see he was able to do that."

On Sunday the two spoke out in favour of protective head gear for pitchers.

“Whether that pitcher wants to pitch with head gear or not is up to him but I definitely think there should be an option,” said Cobb. “I haven’t heard too much but I do know that it’s moving in the right direction and hopefully there will be an option by next year.”

“You’d be crazy not to look into it if it was available,” said Happ. “I think function is the big issue. We were struck in the ear so like I said it would almost have to be a helmet situation. If it was functional and comfortable and didn’t hinder the performance at all than absolutely.”