After a rocky start and numerous injuries in his first couple of years with the Blue Jays, shortstop Jose Reyes is hoping to knock fans’ expectations out of the park this season.Tommy Gilligan
Jose Reyes sits down in front of his locker in the Toronto Blue Jays clubhouse at Florida Auto Exchange Stadium, clad in shorts, a nifty pair of orange sandals and his ever-present Superman T-shirt.
It has been a relatively quiet spring training here for the Toronto shortstop, who played in the first game of the Grapefruit League season on Wednesday but has been kept out of the next two, including Friday night's game in Sarasota against the Baltimore Orioles.
Reyes is healthy and his absence has more to do with the Blue Jays wanting to take a look at the capabilities of others who are at camp they are not as familiar with.
A four-time all-star, Reyes has something to prove this season after having his cape consistently tugged on over the two seasons he has been in Toronto.
A severe ankle sprain limited him to 93 games in 2013. Last year, he was tormented by a sore left hamstring he pulled in his first at-bat in his first game of the regular season.
It kept him out of the next 18 games.
And although the 31-year-old came back to play in 143 games, the leg was never really right.
And when you add to that a sore right shoulder that required a cortisone shot during the All-Star break in July, it was an all-round difficult year.
Reyes toughed it out, but his range was noticeably diminished and he committed a career-high 19 errors, the highest total for any American League shortstop.
"I think it was just one of those years," Reyes said when asked about his defensive lapse last season.
"I don't feel very happy about that.
"But I know for sure this year is going to be way better than last year. Nineteen errors, that's not me."
Reyes said his leg soreness – since cleared up, he insists – hampered his movement from side to side.
He said it cost him a step in his quickness. And when you throw in the shoulder issue, it was double jeopardy.
Another factor could be the revolving-door aspect the Blue Jays were forced to resort to when sorting out who would play third and second base alongside Reyes.
As a result of injuries to other players, last season Reyes played with seven second basemen lined up to his left – Maicer Izturis, Ryan Goins, Jonathan Diaz, Chris Getz, Steve Tolleson, Brett Lawrie and Munenori Kawasaki.
To his right at third base, Reyes teamed with five players in Lawrie, Kawasaki, Tolleson, Juan Francisco and Danny Valencia.
Those are a lot of players to have to get to know and understand, especially at second base where familiarity with your teammate is crucial to turning the double play.
"As a baseball player, you want to play every day with the same guys," Reyes said. "You don't want be playing every day and when you come to the ballpark you're wondering, who's going to be playing second base today, who's going to be playing third?
"As the shortstop, I don't want to have that in my head."
Reyes said it takes time to develop a working relationship with his infield partners – where they like to catch the ball and where they like to set up when a hitter steps into the batter's box.
Reyes said it was like night and day for him when Francisco, a lumbering 6-foot-2, 245-pound specimen, was in the game at third when compared to Lawrie, who was nimble as a ballet dancer and quick as a cat.
"With Francisco, I had to watch where I had to position myself because Francisco was kind of a little bit slow moving side to side," Reyes said.
When Francisco played, Reyes said he had to position himself closer to the plate and a bit more to the third-base side, which cut down on his ability to get to some ground balls.
With Lawrie, who had incredible range, Reyes could move back a bit and stray just a bit more toward second base.
"Lawrie's a guy who can take up a lot of ground," Reyes said. "He's one of the best third basemen that I ever played with, one of the best. David Wright was good, too, but Lawrie is an unbelievable athlete. He can do everything you want to at third base."
Lawrie is gone this year, but the third baseman the Blue Jays got back in the trade with the Oakland A's – Josh Donaldson – is none too shabby.
"Everybody knows what he's capable of doing," Reyes said of Donaldson, a most-valuable-player candidate in Oakland the past two seasons. "That's not to take anything away from Lawrie, he just wasn't able to stay on the field.
"Donaldson, he's a guy who will be out there every day. That's the one thing that we need."
Who will play second base remains a mystery but the front-runner right appears to be Izturis.