The J.P. Arencibia Era Begins
With a team like the Toronto Blue Jays, when September call-ups roll around each year it’s like a Christmas of sorts. And yesterday, we got to open up one of our Christmas presents a little early.
J.P. Arencibia got the call about a month early, but he’ll make his way to Toronto and fill in for the injured John Buck. Now it’s not official whether or not JPA will actually start Friday’s game behind the plate, but my guess is that he won’t.
If Cito didn’t start Travis Snider the very second he was called up, then he certainly isn’t going to throw Arencibia into the fire just yet. In the meantime, expect him to backup Jose Molina for the catching duties.
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All indications point to Kyle Drabek being shut down for the season in the near future, so this makes J.P. Arencebia’s call-up undoubtedly the most anticipated of the season.
Seriously, wow can you not be stoked about bringing up a slugging catcher who already has 31 home runs? Whether they’re Pacific Coast League home runs or not, you can’t deny this kid has some power.
All I can say is …. welcome to the club J.P. Arencibia. Glad to have you here.
I am excited, and making my way to the Saturday game. Hopefully he starts.
I just hope he can call/manage a good game. All the reports talk about how he can mash, but his baseball smarts will determine if he has staying power.
Matt, I'll also be there on Saturday as well and all odds point to JPA starting Saturday's game since it's following a night game the day before.
Likewise – I think it would be great to have a power hitting catcher, but his defense needs to be solid, especially with wild pitchers like Romero on the mound.
I'm just glad there's another J.P. around. Looking forward to seeing what the kid can do.
You have got to figure Molina will catch Morrow on Sunday while the other two games will be split between the two catchers. Cecil is starting on Friday and Litsch on Saturday. I would think J.P. would be more familiar with Cecil's reprtoire so maybe Cito gives him that assignment or maybe he just gives him the day game after the night game because that's the conventional time to use the backup catcher and Cito likes to stick to established patterns. Litsh has a good temperament so it's not like that would be a bad assignment either.
eyebleaf, with Ricciardi gone … this organization has been severely lacking in the John Paul department. JPA fits the bill nicely.
Noisyflowers, we can all speculate but Cito is all over the map so it's difficult to say who's going to take over the catching duties this weekend. I'm guessing it's probably going to to Molina Friday, JPA Saturday and Molina Sunday. I'd just like to see Arencebia get a crack at the Rays at some point this weekend.
Although I already have Carlos Santana and Derek Norris on my fantasy keeper league roster, I'm hoping I can get Arencibia on a waiver claim as well. He wasn't drafted in our initial draft of the year, meaning you can only claim him when he's called up.
Go for it, Steve! Unfortunately, I think they just said JPA will get the majority of the catching time, but only until John Buck comes back – then he's back to Las Vegas. But by that point, it will be close to September call-ups so you might as well hang onto him.
See, if I got him, hos keeper lost is really low anyway – We get 30 "years" and he would only count as a 2 to keep for the 2011 season on my 35-man roster. So, that would be awesome if I got him, but I think someone is going to jump ahead of me on the waiver wire for him.