what is everybody thoughts . for awhile there i was hearing draft him late and maybe he will be ready by mid season. but now on cbs they are saying that he might be ready for spring training and take the role back from accardo
B.J. Ryan, RP TOR News: Closer B.J. Ryan, who sustained a season-ending elbow injury last April, is set to resume throwing from a mound within days. If Ryan is ready by opening day, Jeremy Accardo is expected to move back into the setup role while right-hander Casey Janssen would return to the starting rotation. "Obviously we're not going to really know about B.J. until we see him in March when he's 10, closer to 11 months post-op and have a better idea of where he stands," GM J.P. Ricciardi said. Analysis: Ryan should take some advice from Octavio Dotel and Eddie Guardado, closers who previously tried to come back from reconstructive elbow surgery in less than 12 full months. Consider Ryan an injury-risk sleeper on Draft Day and a potential standout if he proves healthy for a Blue Jays club that can generate ample save opportunities. Accardo remains out pick to open the year as the Blue Jays' closer, but Ryan should take the role by midseason. Janssen might stretch out to start in spring training, but there isn't a rotation spot for him, barring injury, so consider him nothing more than a middle reliever for deeper leagues on Draft Day.
Ive seen him go in the 12-14th rounds in the two mocks on the Cafe (I took him in the 14th in the one Im in), and I saw him go in the 15th in another mock I was reading online the other day. I think this is probably about the right spot to grab him. Tremendous upside if you have 2 closers by that point and want to take a flier for your staff/bench...
If hes healthy and ready to go by spring training I definitely will save a closer spot for BJ Ryan.
Your talking a player who was drafted anywhere from rds 6-8 last year. If he can give me that kind of value drafting him this year after 12th rd I don't see how I could pass that up.
I drafted Accardo late, after Ryan. He did awesome last year as the closer, and he's definitely going to start the year with the job. Ryan is pretty damn old, and who knows how he'll return from the injury. If you want to use a draft pick on the Blue Jays closer, go with Accardo.
I also have been able to draft Ryan with a very late round flier in most of my mock drafts (Round 19-Round 21) in 12 Team Mocks. There isn't much to lose with such a high reward pick with low risk, just stash him on your DL slot and wait for the Saves to be reeling in by mid May.
Bit of an update........Ryan threw a little yesteraday.
With gusts whipping up to 50 km/h, they put B.J. Ryan on a mound with the wind at his back Saturday morning. Not that he needed an edge during a simulated game at the Toronto Blue Jays minor-league complex.
Ryan faced four batters, allowing a cheap infield hit and striking out two in his second session of the spring against Triple-A hitters in a controlled environment. On the advice of his surgeon, the Jays are moving Ryan along slowly as he comes back from the elbow surgery that iced his 2007 season last May.
He says his focus is on his game, not his elbow.
“I’m not even really thinking about my elbow now,” he said. “I’m just worried about the end results. I threw some fastballs that had some good life. They finished down in the zone.”
Ryan’s fastball reached 88 on the radar gun, which is pretty swift for this time of year, even if a guy isn’t coming off the sort of surgery that often keeps a pitcher out of game action for a year or more.
“I kind of started out crummy the other day,” Ryan said, referring to his first simulated game on Wednesday. “Today I kind of went out there with the mindset that we’re going to go from the first batter. No more kind of feeling your way around there, just get out there and make some pitches.”
Ryan is scheduled to face minor-leaguers one more time on Tuesday before pitching in a big-league exhibition game. The medics don’t want him overdoing it.
“That’s what they say – don’t try to do too much too fast, because I know when I get out there, the adrenaline will be out there,” he said. “It’ll be little bit different.”
I think a guy like him is def. worth a late-rounder. He's the definition of a value pick. I took him in the 19th round in my draft (10-team). I also snatched Accardo in the 20th.
Nobody actually believes that the signing of Armando BLOW-nitez by Toronto is going to affect atleast one of these two closing, right? Why even sign that bum...
DUNEDIN, Fla. -- B.J. Ryan's goal of returning to the Blue Jays' bullpen in time for Opening Day may have been a little too optimistic. With less than two weeks remaining in the spring slate, Toronto has decided to hold its recovering closer out of games for the time being.
Following a one-inning outing on Monday, Ryan complained of some minor soreness in the forearm and biceps of his throwing arm. The Blue Jays are describing the discomfort as normal fatigue, but the club wants to take a cautious approach with Ryan, who had Tommy John reconstruction surgery on his left elbow in May.
That being the case, the prospect of having Ryan break camp as a part of Toronto's Opening Day bullpen appears doubtful. On Thursday, Blue Jays general manager J.P. Ricciardi said the team doesn't want to bring Ryan north with the rest of the relief corps unless the pitcher is fully capable of returning to a regular role.
"We're not going to take him unless he can be B.J.," Ricciardi said, "where we use him three or four times a week. If he can't do that, then we'll just let him stay down here, let him keep pitching and eventually he'll be ready at some point. When he's ready, we'll take him."
"For us to sit here and say he was going to be here on Opening Day," he added later, "we never threw that date out there, and I don't think it was fair to him to throw that date out there. I think it's important that he just keeps getting better and he feels good."
Ricciardi said Ryan will continue to throw on flat ground, but there's no timetable as to when the left-hander might appear in his next Grapefruit League game. Ryan said that he hopes to throw off a mound in the bullpen on Friday, but he will wait to see how his arm feels when he arrives at the ballpark.
"We'll just push it back a day or so and see how it goes," Ryan said. "It's just a little soreness and it's still early. I'm not trying to do too much, too fast. Like I've said the whole time, we're going to be smart about it.
"You set a goal," he added, "but sometimes you can do everything you want to do and sometimes you're going to hit a little bump in the path. ... You don't do something for 10 months and you come back and kind of get after it for a couple days in a row, it'll flare up.
"It's nothing to worry about. It's not a huge step backwards."
Toronto waited until this past Friday to have the 32-year-old Ryan -- signed to a five-year contract worth $47 million prior to the 2006 season -- appear in his first spring game. Ryan reported no issues after that one-inning affair against the Rays in St. Petersburg, Fla., and he rested two days before taking the mound again.
On Monday, Ryan turned in one shutout inning against the Pirates in Bradenton, Fla., but he said he felt sore after the appearance. Jays bullpen coach Bruce Walton said Ryan went through his normal throwing routine on Tuesday, throwing on flat ground and in a long-toss session, without any unusual soreness.
Even so, Ricciardi discussed the matter with Ryan and Toronto's medical staff, and decided that having the pitcher skip his scheduled appearance against the Yankees on Thursday was the best course of action. Ricciardi said the team trainers and doctors don't believe Ryan's soreness to be anything more than fatigue.
"He's a little sore, so we're going to back him off a little bit," Ricciardi said. "He's still throwing -- he's just got regular soreness from throwing. So we're just going to watch him. He's done really well. He's come a long way.
"We said all along, 'Day-to-day and we'll just see how it progresses,'" he added. "If he can break with us, that'd be great. If he can't, then we'll just get him ready for when he's able to really come and be able to help us."
Ryan, who posted a 1.37 ERA and saved 38 games in his first tour with the Blue Jays in 2006, exited a game against the Tigers in Toronto on April 14 last season due to the elbow injury. On May 10, Dr. Timothy Kremchek performed the reconstructive surgery on Ryan, meaning the pitcher would be less than a year removed from the operation if he returned by Opening Day.
While Ryan was sidelined last year, right-hander Jeremy Accardo slid into the closer's role and finished with 30 saves. When Ryan is back in the fold, Accardo projects to be Toronto's primary setup man. Even if Ryan does break camp with the team, Jays manager John Gibbons has said the closer wouldn't appear on consecutive days.
This spring, Ryan has been on a three-day throwing program, meaning he's had two off-days sandwiched between appearances. Ryan said he won't feel comfortable rejoining the bullpen if he has to remain on that type of schedule in April.
"Do I think I can help this team? Yeah," Ryan said. "But I can't help them if I need two days off in between [outings]. I mean, that's selfish and that's something I'm not going to do. If I can pitch, and then maybe have an off-day and pitch, or something like that, but then again, that's not my call."
The fact that Accardo has the ability to handle the ninth-inning role could have the Jays leaning toward keeping Ryan on a throwing program in Florida at the season's onset. Ricciardi wasn't willing to speculate on that possibility, but he repeatedly noted that Toronto wants to have Ryan back in the mix when he's healthy enough to pitch multiple times per week.
"If we have him for six months, great," Ricciardi said. "If we have him for five months, great. Four months, whatever we have him for, we're going to make sure we have him right. We can't have him with us right now if he pitches on Monday and we have to wait until Saturday to use him again.
"He knows that and he understands that. Another month maybe [until he's completely healthy]? Or a couple weeks? I don't know. We'll see how it goes."
Cafe Home
Fantasy Football
Fantasy Basketball
Fantasy Hockey
by dukedude2440 » Sat Jan 26, 2008 2:34 pm 
