WHAT'S THE DIAGNOSIS FOR DOC?

The question to ask now that it's confirmed Roy Halladay won't pitch again this season is how much certainty can Blue Jays fans have that he's ever going to be recapture what he did in 2003, pitching masterfully over a full season.

It's only two starts at the tailend of a lost season, but it's a little troublesome that this is the third straight season that Doc has had a significant injury. What happened in '05, when he suffered a broken leg after being struck by a line drive on July 8, was a freak occurrence, but he's averaged just 165 innings over the past three years, compared to the 266 he threw in '03.

Halladay did pitch 220 innings this season, but his strikeout rate dropped to 5.4 per nine innings pitched, after being in the 6.3-6.9 range that previous four seasons. That's actually quite significant. The higher a pitcher's strikeout rate is, the more likely he is to be able to have long-term success in the majors. As Bill James once wrote, not noticing that pitchers with higher strikeout rates tend to last longer is like not noticing that basketball players tend to be tell.

Really, when you dip down into the low 5s, it's tough to be successful -- unless you pitch like Halladay, getting a lot of groundballs, hardly ever walking anybody and seldom giving up a big inning. Perhaps this year illustrates how fine a line the Jays are Halladay have to toe.

That's pretty dicey. The Jays aren't deep in pitching and have built the entire staff around Doc. It's not ideal to have to hold your breath every time your staff ace pitches. In a pipe dream, A.J. Burnett picks up the slack and throws 225 innings next year, but he has his own history of arm problems.

OTHER BUSINESS

• Bill Simmons has a good column about The Rock's football movie, Gridiron Gang: "Hollywood just ran out of sports movie ideas. Switch the color of the cast and it FEELS like a different formula ... even though it isn't."
• Have to be careful there... almost typed Coach Carter in the last paragraph.

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.