Windy City Scribe’s “No, Canada” Column: Just Hot Air About Blue Jays

The Chicago Sun-Times’ White Sox beat writer Joe Cowley began his Friday column suggesting that baseball should move out of Toronto with this:⇥The White Sox players and staff were leaving Toronto late Thursday night after their one and only trip north of the border this season.⇥⇥If it were up to most of the traveling party, it would be the last -- ever.⇥

⇥⇥Baseball is failing in Muddy York, as it was once called, and failing miserably. And while Major League Baseball has more than a few issues that need addressing, somewhere in that list should be getting a team out of Canada.⇥

And by “most,” he was already wrong.

The idea of South America as a potential destination comes up in the column, and Venezuela specifically, which Venezuelans Guillen and Garcia shoot down, citing security concerns. Cowley also riffs a list of possible U.S. destinations for the Jays, coming up with New Orleans and New Jersey. This isn’t due diligence, but do-me-a-favor, Cowley beseeching anyone to spare him the indignity of spending days in Canada. The lack of an easy solution should have been a tip that this is a problem that can’t be fully covered in a tossed-off column.

Thankfully, in the wake of Cowley’s caterwauling, others approached the idea of a Blue Jays move with critical eyes instead of jaundiced feeling. Rob Neyer points out that Toronto’s huge market and relatively problem-free existence doesn’t put the Jays in danger of a hemisphere swap any time soon. Blue Jays president Paul Beeston shrugged off the idea of a move, noting that early April games against the White Sox aren’t great draws and calling Cowley’s column “irresponsible journalism.” Blue Jays farmhand Dirk Hayhurst called the column a “literary hate session” on Twitter; Keith Olbermann pointed out that the White Sox and Jays are not so different.

Baseball in Toronto isn’t a lightly-attended attraction because Toronto is a bad place for baseball, but because Toronto’s been a place for bad baseball for the better part of a decade. That’s partly because the AL East has had two of the best teams in baseball all decade, and three of the best since 2007. It’s also, fairly, partly the Jays’ own fault. Garcia tells Cowley, “‘There is nothing up here for baseball players,” but in truth, there has been a powerful lure in Toronto: Plenty of money available for players like Rios and Vernon Wells who got absurd deals from former Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi. “Fans don’t care,” Garcia laments, but they don’t care because the Jays haven’t supported studs like Carlos Delgado and Roy Halladay with the talent necessary to make runs at playoff berths, because the Jays haven’t been half as smart as the Rays.

Baseball in Toronto is in no danger of disappearing, because there is still time for the Jays to find the ultimate panacea -- perennial contention for championships -- and ample money and smarts (with new GM Alex Anthopoulos) to produce that result.

Overheated journalism in Chicago is alive and well, too, it seems. Even without Jay Mariotti to kick around, there are blowhards aplenty in the Windy City.

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