Toronto Blue Jays batter J.P. Arencibia loses his bat while batting against the Texas Rangers during the seventh inning in Toronto April 30, 2012.MIKE CASSESE
Standings!
Don't bother talking to J.P. Arencibia, the Toronto Blue Jays catcher, about standings with the Major League Baseball season only moving into its second month of its schedule.
Check back in a month or two, he suggests.
"You think Anaheim's going to be under .500 at the end of the year," Arencibia said, about to get on a roll. "You think Boston's going to be under .500 at the end of the year? You think Pujols is going to have zero home runs by the end of the year?
"Baseball has a funny way of, at the end of the year, things always end up where they're supposed to be."
That rush of logic was brought on when Arencibia was asked if the Blue Jays felt fortunate that all of the teams that reside with them in the American League East are still tightly clumped together in the standing.
This despite the fact the Blue Jays have not performed especially well over the first month of the season, especially offensively, which was expected to be their strong suit this year.
And wait, Arencibia still had another point to make.
"You think Jose's going to hit .180 the whole year?" he said, referring to the ongoing struggles of teammate Jose Bautista.
Heading into Tuesday's game against the Texas Rangers at Rogers Centre, Bautista is hitting just .181 with but three home runs.
No time to start to panic according to Toronto manager John Farrell.
"No, not right now," Farrell said. "He has certainly earned however long it takes for him and we believe in him, we're confident in him. And we'll continue to work towards getting his timing and his production back to where he typically is.
"We've been spoiled, and everyone in Toronto's been spoiled for longer than I have over the two and a half years of elite performance. So he's our three-hole hitter."