The Roy Halladay blockbuster trade to the Phillies a couple months ago has recently brought this blog, my screen name, my life and Toronto Blue Jays into an identity crisis! 

First of all, there is no way that I am changing my ‘welikeroywelikeroy‘ screen name!  ‘The Simpsons‘ reference coupled with my favorite all-time player’s name is just too good to let go of. 

For those of you that don’t watch ‘The Simpsons,’ there is an episode where a motivation speaker, Brad Goodman, is intrigued by Bart Simpson’s attitude towards life.  Goodman gets the people of Springfield (the town where the Simpsons live) to chant in a motivational town hall meeting:  “‘Be like the Boy’ ‘Be like the Boy’.”  After that, Goodman gets just the ladies in the crowd to chant:  “Be like the Boy”, “Be like the Boy.”  Then Goodman asks the old people in the back of the crowd to do the same chant.  Hilariously, the old people hard of hearing come up with:  “We Like Roy, We Like Roy.”

Combined with Halladay being my favorite player, this was naturally one of the best screen names that I’ve ever thought of, in my opinion.  I even tried to get that chant going at a couple of Blue Jay games, but it never caught on.  This is the gift that I give to you City of Philadelphia!  Make the ‘We Like Roy’ chant work!   

I’ve come to realization that I will always be a HUGE Halladay fan, no matter where he goes!  And to prove this fact, without completly destroying my identity as a life-long ‘die hard’ Blue Jay fan, I’ve taken a drastic step.

That is right!  I got a Roy Halladay Phillies jersey, and I wear it proudly, not even being a Phillies fan.  Call me a traitor all you like, but I still wear my Halladay Blue Jay jersey just as proudly.  Having this jersey is a statement that I realize the economics/business of baseball, and I have accepted it.  Halladay wanted to get paid, and go to a winner.  As long as that doesn’t come at the Blue Jays expense, I accept it, and embrace it.  From now on, I am a serious Phillies fan when Halladay is pitching.  I will be skipping Jay games to see Halladay starts!  That is a bold statement for me, but in figuring my ‘identity crisis,’ the loyalty I have towards Halladay partially trumped my loyalty towards the Jays.  It had an impact, is all I am saying.  My personal ‘Blue Jay world’ was devastated by some kind of natural disaster when the Halladay trade went through … to use a terribly timed metaphor.

The Jays Future Identity        

In losing Halladay, the Jays have lost their one definable ‘star player’ that all MLB fans,
teams and media were aware of.  We now look on to a much younger team
that has wide array of possibly emerging talent.  It is hard to say who will be the ‘marquee’ Blue Jay moving forward.  Aaron Hill and Adam Lind
would be the likely candidates, but we all know a ‘marquee’ player is
not given that moniker after only one ‘all-star caliber’ year.  It
takes time and consistant success.  Halladay gave the Jays many
‘all-star caliber’ years.  So, who will step into Halladay’s old
shoes?  Other than Lind and Hill, the Jays have some intriguing young
players that could be future All-Stars?  However, I’m not comfortable
enough to definably predict any of them as that.  Brett Wallace, Travis
Snider, Kyle Drabek, Zach Stewart, Shaun Marcum, Dustin McGowan, Ricky
Romero, Brett Cecil and Brandon Morrow are the guys in the
organization that I could possibly see being future All-Stars.  If any
two of these guys actually turn into an all-star, the Jays will have a
promising future.  That said, nobody can replace ‘the Doc,’ but it will
be interesting to see what player(s) round out the Blue Jay ‘identity‘ for years to come.

In Closing: My Life

In closing, uncertain in life as I look for steady employment, figuring out my baseball allegiance had to be cleared up before appling to more jobs.  I was lost.  My life usually follows the condition of the Blue Jays franchise in some eerie way.  You’d have to talk to me for examples. 

Right now, the Jays and I are both searching for an identity.  Hear is hoping that we both hope find our identity moving forward.