Toronto Blue Jays sign southpaw pitcher B.J. Ryan

[Halladay_is_God]

The Jays' board needs this
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/bre...p-313970c.html

The Toronto Blue Jays, with a payroll surplus of $25-30 million for next year, have made a bold statement that they intend to be big players in the AL East by signing lefty free agent reliever B.J. Ryan to a five-year $47 million contract, the Daily News has learned.

With the signing of the hard-throwing Ryan, the Blue Jays appear poised to now deal their previous closer, Miguel Batista. They have reportedly had discussions with the Texas Rangers about an exchange of Batista for outfielder Kevin Mench. The Blue Jays were also pursuing righty free agent starter A.J. Burnett and were said to have also offered him a five-year deal. It was unclear if the Ryan signing would now preclude them from continuing their efforts to land Burnett.

finally some real bullpen help and a lefty at that but too much money though and I think in the end it will come to hurt the Jays

[Foster]

Agreed, we don't need to spend this much money for the bullpen.

[Halladay_is_God]

I'm just glad the Jays finally spent some money on pitching for the bullpen, it was always looking within the farm system or bring in old pitchers that never did anything for peanuts.

at least the bullpen looks good if Speier can produce like he did last year in the set up role

[Foster]

It's a reality now. And on tv to bout.

lol - Godfrey made a comment about the rest of the AL being scared, and something about the nervous 9th inning being for the other team. Man I love this guy. And than the comments about being Canada's team by Mr. Rogers.

Godfrey for PM!!!

P.S...check this out on MLB.com

News of the impending deal, which began on Friday, was splashed across the sports sections of Toronto newspapers on Monday morning, but played second fiddle to Sunday's Canadian Football League Grey Cup championship game.

[voodoomon1jd]

Congrats Jays fans, Ryan is a beast, I will hate to be on the other end of the 9th innings this year and beyond. That much money is a little risky IMHO, the O's offered 3 year deal for about 19 million. Math isn't hard. I think the Jays should keep Batista and move him to the back end of the rotation, and if you get Burnett, on paper that's a hell of a rotation.

[SLAM]

Ryan is a great player, it's good that we got him.. but... that's alot of cash.