Who Is Alex Rios?

Apparently the question posed by the title of this post was on a lot of minds yesterday. And that was even before Rios turned in a potentially star-making performance at last nights All-Star Home Run Derby.

It seems as though the inclusion of a player with 45 career home runs over three-and-a-half seasons rasied more than a few eyebrows. Some of our favourite blogs didn't quite go as far as deriding his selection (well, some of them did), but still-- when Alex proved himself with a boner-inducing second round (that I didn't actually watch, because the Home Run Derby is unbearably fucking lame)-- managed to unwittingly subject their comments sections to the ire of the sorts of mouth-breathing date-rapist Jays fans that we always seem to be ranting about around here.

Quite obviously I'm not going to lie to you and try to claim these Canadian fans of the game are so astute that for years they've fully understood Rios' potential-- even though anyone who's watched Rios in batting practice would have known that the emerging Jays slugger was going to handle himself just fine. The majority of them have just been conditioned by the Toronto Maple Leafs to react like five year olds to the even most modest degree of their team's success. Yet it's not at all surprising that a player from this side of the 49th is completely off the radar of the mostly-American baseball public. Consider, for example, that the only way Andre Dawson can get into Cooperstown is to buy a ticket. But as for an answer to the question posed by the title of this post, I think it's safe to say that even die hard Jays fans still don't really have a full grasp what we've got-- nor do his coaches, his teammates, or his General Manager.

Allan Ryan, one of the few knowledgeble, sober, and undouchelike writers over at the Toronto Star, did a fine job of trying to pull it all together in this morning's paper. Any Jays fan who Rios hasn't quite endeared himself to needs to read it, though ultimately he still comes off like a bit of an enigma-- an awesome, angry enigma. Undoubtedly that's because his defence, his speed and his ability to hit have made him a useful everyday player for the Jays over the previous three seasons, so we've seen him at his most anemic, whereas many developing players would have spent at least some of that time still hidden away in the minor leagues. It's only now that we're finally starting to see Alex materialize into a genuine, consistent, game-changing, five-tool player.

Casual fans, detatched from the hype that has surrounded Rios up here since he arrived as a skinny 6'5", 23-year-old kid in 2004, can probably be forgiven for not paying attention to stats that show Rios having similar numbers, through this point in his career, as luminaries like Ken Landreaux or Ray Lankford. But the potential for Alex has been there all along, and the Jays have wisely chosen to be patient, and to fend off the numerous suitors who tried to pry Rios away with desperately-needed pitching. Their reward has been watching his production grow, from one homer in his rookie season, to 10, to 17, and now to 17 at the All-Star break. At 26 years of age, they say the sky is the limit for Rios-- but as Ryan's article suggests, getting there should make for an interesting ride.


Here are the other blog posts mentioned:
The Big Picture - which was linked at the mighty Deadspin
Bugs and Cranks
Winning the Turnover Battle