TSN Baseball Analyst Steve Phillips answers several questions surrounding the game each week. Aqib Talib Jersey . This weeks topics include the Toronto Blue Jays young hurlers going forward, whether or not a pitcher should be up for league MVP, Phil Hughes missing out on a hefty bonus and Derek Jeters last game. 1. Daniel Norris got his first ever MLB start Thursday, marking the third high-profile debut for a Toronto Blue Jays hurler in 2014 after Marcus Stroman and Aaron Sanchez both stepped in to make an immediate impact. How realistic is it for Jays fans to expect these pitchers in the 2015 rotation? I believe that prospects get general managers fired. For every young superstar, there are 20 young studs that never fulfill their potential. I also dona€?t trust young pitchers. I like predictability and young guys are often inconsistent and erratic in their performances. That is particularly true about starting pitchers. It doesna€?t mean that there is not a place for young guys, but one has to be realistic in their expectations. Marcus Stroman is 11-6 with a 3.77 ERA. He made 20 starts within his 23 appearances in the majors. He threw strikes and got swings and misses. He looks to have a bright future, but I dona€?t anticipate he will be more than a number-two starter at best. And this isna€?t going to happen in the short term. The most I would expect out of him for next year is to be a number-four-type starter. Expecting anything more than that is setting ones self up for disappointment. Whatever performance you get beyond that is a gift. Aaron Sanchez has thrived in his role in the bullpen. He can overpower some very good hitters. He throws strikes and gets a ton of swings and misses. With Casey Jansen headed to free agency, there may be a push to insert Sanchez in the closer role. I would recommend against that. It is too much responsibility, too soon for a young pitcher. The league will make some adjustments on Sanchez next season. A lesser role wona€?t cost the Jays games and will take some of the burden of perfection off of him. Daniel Norris got a taste of the big leagues this September, which is a statement from the Jays that he is in their short-term plans. He is just 21 years old and moved through three levels of the minors this year while posting a 12-2 record and 2.53 ERA. Norris is a young lefty starter with lots of promise. He needs to experience everything for the first time as big leaguer. Any expectations beyond that of a number-five starter are overly optimistic. The Jays will have RA Dickey and Mark Buerhle in the rotation next year. Both Dickey and Buerhle are more like number-two starters than the aces they once were. Dustin McGowan and JA Happ are under the Jaysa€? control next year with options on their contracts, but they are number-four starters at best. If the Jays want Norris and Stroman in the rotation, then they really need to sign an ace and cut loose McGowan and Happ because neither of them is an impact starter. I like the Jays young arms, but they will need to protect Sanchez with a veteran closer in the pen and reduce expectations on Stroman and Norris by signing a number-one starter to slot in front of Buerhle and Dickey. I am not sure the Jays have the resources to pay for an ace and closer, but if they do, they will win the AL East and maximize the production of their young guns on the staff. 2. Clayton Kershaw has had an insane season. Hes currently leading the NL in wins (21), strikeouts (239) and boasts an ERA that is .40 runs lower than the next-best MLB pitcher at 1.77. Is he a lock to win the National League MVP Award? How do you feel about pitchers winning MVP when therea€?s already the Cy Young to recognize their achievements? Clayton Kershaw is by far the best pitcher in baseball. He does everything an NL pitcher needs to do to be successful at the highest level. He has great stuff. He can command all of his pitches and throws them at any time in the count for strikes. This makes him unpredictable and keeps the hitters off balance. He fields his position extremely well. Did you happen to see the no-look behind the back snag of a shot hit over the mound on Wednesday night? He can handle the bat, too. In fact, he tripled in Wednesday nighta€?s NL West clincher. He is fulfilling the potential that everyone saw in him when the Sandy Koufax comparisons were so unfairly being thrown around even before he threw a single pitch in the majors. Kershaw is definitely the NL Cy Young Award winner this year beating out Johnny Cueto of the Cincinnati Reds and Adam Wainwright of the St. Louis Cardinals. I have no hesitation about pitchers winning the MVP in addition to the Cy Young Award. If there is a worthy position player, I would opt for the everyday player over the pitcher, but when Kershaw puts up numbers like this, he absolutely put himself in the MVP conversation. For most of the season, the closest competition to Kershaw was Giancarlo Stanton, but the fact that Stanton plays for a Miami Marlins team that is 17.5 games behind the Nationals in the NL East and, unfortunately, had his season cut short by a beaning diminishes his candidacy. Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder Andrew McCutchen has made a late push to repeat as the NL MVP. He is hitting .313/.408/.545 with 25 homers and 78 RBI and has been really good in September (.349/.443/.614.) He is playing his best when the games mean the most. That being said, his season doesna€?t come close to comparing to Kershaws. In 2011, Justin Verlander of the Detroit Tigers was the AL Cy Young Award winner and MVP. He was 24-5 with a 2.40 ERA with 250 strikeouts in 251 innings pitched. Kershawa€?s numbers compare favorably to those of Verlander, as he is 21-3 with a 1.77 ERA with 239 strikeouts with 198 innings pitched. Clayton Kershaw should become the 11th pitcher in baseball history to win the Cy Young Award and his leaguea€?s MVP award. 3. The Minnesota Twinsa€? Phil Hughes posted the lowest strikeout-to-walk ratio in MLB history this season with an astounding 11.63-to-1, besting seasons from the likes of Pedro Martinez, Greg Maddux, Cliff Lee and Bret Saberhagen. However, he also fell one out shy of a $500,000 bonus that kicked in with 210 inning pitched on the year because a rain delay in his final start left him at 209.2 innings. What should the Twins do about this and whata€?s your take on his achievements this season? I dona€?t know about you, but I am really tired of entitled athletes who feel like they are owed something for nothing or guys who feel like the rules dona€?t apply to them. This Phil Hughes situation is an amazing story as it has continued to unfold. Phil Hughes has every right to be bitter and resentful for missing out on $500,000 by just one-third of an inning. Even when you make $24 million over three years, $500,000 is a lot of money. The Twins cana€?t just pay Hughes the money, as it would set a precedent that MLB would not find acceptable. To the Twins credit, they offered Hughes the opportunity to pitch in relief over the weekend to get at least one more out and reach the 210 innings pitched threshold so he could earn the bonus. Amazingly, Hughes has rejected their offer...thata€?s right! Can you believe it? I owe too much to this organization for the next two years to risk getting hurt for an incentive, Hughes said. My outing got rained out and the last inning of my last start got rained out, so for whatever reason, it wasnt meant to be. Theres a lot bigger problems out there. Im proud of my season. Never in my wildest imagination would I have expected any major league player to take such a mature approach. Heck, I would have taken the Twins up on the offer and pitched in relief. For $500,000 I would lay in a tank of snakes...and I hate snakes. Phil Hughes had a remarkable year. He is a strike-throwing machine. He proved what throwing strikes can do for a pitcher as he had as many wins (16) as he had walks. With his 16-10 record and 3.52 ERA, Hughes proved to be one of the best free agent signings last year. His 1.13 is ninth-best in the AL and is better than Max Scherzer and James Shields. Not putting runners on base and keeping the ball in the ballpark is a good formula for success. It bodes well for Hughes moving forward, as well. He has come into his own and has figured out what he is as a pitcher. He is living up to the potential that the Yankees thought he had. The Twins have their ace. Wouldna€?t it be nice if he were on the Jays? 4. After all of the angst over the foreboding weather the Orioles and Yankees game was played without a drop of rain. In fact, the baseball Gods wanted to be clear what they thought of Derek Jeter and his final game. Not only had it stopped raining but there was a beautiful sunset as the sun broke through the clouds and a rainbow that fell from the sky and ended at Yankee Stadium. Only Jeter. Of course, in his first at-bat Derek Jeter doubled off of the wall to drive in a run. He advanced to third on a great base-running play, reading a throw in the dirt and getting a great jump. He then scored the second run of the game on an error by the Orioles. That is Derek Jeter in a nutshell. He is a great hitter, run producer, base-runner and leader. Jeter would later drive in another run with a fieldera€?s choice. So much has been made of Jetera€?s career over the last couple of weeks. Where does he rank as a Yankee? Where does he rank in the pantheon of baseball greats? So many people want to minimize his accomplishments. Some say he is overrated. How is it possible to minimize 3,642 hits? How can the player with the sixth-most hits in the history of baseball be overrated? Derek Jeter is the second-best shortstop to ever play the game. Most baseball experts and historians cite Rogers Hornsby as the best ever. I am old, but not that old to agree or disagree with them. I never saw Hornsby play, but I will accept their judgment that Jeter is second-best. Here is the more compelling argument: Derek Jeter is the greatest Yankee ever. He played the most games of any Yankee and has the most hits. He is second in runs scored. Sure, there are past Yankees who have hit more home runs and driven in more runs. But here is the clincher: Derek Jeter could have played in any generation of baseball and produced his stats. I dona€?t believe that Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle could have thrived in this era of baseball. Everywhere you go today, someone has a smartphone or a camera. Ruth and Mantlea€?s off-field life would have been the subject of every New York tabloid. Their lifestyles would have been exposed. They would be answering so many questions about their off-field behavior. The NY Post may have had to change the Page 6 gossip column to Page 3 for Ruth or Page 7 for Mantle as they would have appeared in it so frequently. This would have crushed their production on the field. Plus, we have to remember that Jeter played into and through the steroid era of baseball and he did it without cheating. Skeptics criticize Jetera€?s numbers and lack of MVP awards without any acknowledgement as to how other playera€?s numbers were inflated due to PEDs. In fact, nine AL MVP trophies were handed to players who have ties to PEDs in their careers. Also consider that Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig and Joe DiMaggio played most, if not all, of their careers without competing against some of the best players in the game because of segregation. Their performance and stats were enhanced because of that. The old Yankee Stadium was called the House That Ruth Built. The new Yankee Stadium is the House That Jeter Built. If not for Jetera€?s great run of success, including seven World Series appearances and five World Series championships, the new stadium would not have been built or look at all like it does. Jeter impacted the business of New York Yankee baseball. The more the Yankees won, the more money they made. The more money they made, the more they spent on better players, which helped them win more games. The more they made, the more they had to pay in revenue-sharing with other teams. The more they spent, the more they had to pay in luxury taxes, which subsidized other teams, as well. Derek Jetera€?s retirement is not just a big deal for the Yankees. It is a big deal for the business of baseball overall. There are big shoes to fill. Thank goodness that we have Mike Trout, Andrew McCutchen, Clayton Kershaw, Yasiel Puig, Bryce Harper and Stephen Strasburg headed to the playoffs this year. Either individually or collectively, someone needs to step up and become the new face and voice of baseball. That someone will be playing this October. I cana€?t wait to watch. Thank you Derek Jeter for two decades of excellence both on and off the field. May you be successful in whatever comes next. Brian Allen Rams Jersey . At times during a solid but not spectacular season, they looked all three. Still the defending AFC champions persevered, riding their top-ranked defence and key contributions from younger players to a 12-4 record and their eighth playoff appearance since 2000, remarkable consistency in a league where change is the only constant. John Kelly Jersey . The Argentina striker has not played for the Premier League leaders since September when he refused to warm up during a Champions League match and only returned last week from a three-month unauthorized absence at home. City coach Roberto Mancini had initially told Tevez he would never play for City again after his act of public insubordination, but later softened his stance and only asked for an apology. http://www.ramsrookiestore.com/Rams-Ramik-Wilson-Jersey/ . Its the games against the leagues struggling franchises that have proved to be an issue.PINEHURST, N.C. -- The number on the scorecard was the same as Thursday but Graham DeLaet definitely felt as if he played much better at the U.S. Open on Friday than a day earlier. The Canadian, who used 75 strokes to get around Pinehurst No. 2, took 14 of those on just two holes, recording a triple and a double bogey. He also added a penalty shot on a morning that simply didnt go his way. Even with all that adventure and some visits to the newly added native areas, he walked off the course feeling not too badly about his play. "Im not even really disappointed because I felt I was in total control of my game all day," he said. "Three balls in that natural rough and twice I couldnt get a club on it and I made a triple and a double and the other time I went to move some debris next to my ball and my ball moved and that cost me a stroke. Other than that I played well all day." Thats the U.S. Open. So hard to make birdies, so easy to make doubles. DeLaet started his day on the right note, making his first birdie of the competition on the third hole. He cancelled that out with a bogey at six, when his approach shot came up short of the putting surface and he wasnt able to get up and down. On the eighth, however, disaster struck. DeLaets tee shot sailed left and ended up in a troubled lie against some wiregrass. His second to the green also went left and ended up in another almost impossible lie. He hacked it out and the ball ended up behind a tree, so he took an unplayable then chipped it over the green. He lobbed his next shot to 20 feet and, of coursse, dropped the putt for a triple. Marcus Peters Rams Jersey. Two holes later, another errant drive led to a double as he scrambled around the green, and a hole after that, he incurred the penalty. "I guess its a little disappointing," said DeLaet. "Coming in, I didnt expect to miss the cut. But at the same time I feel like I played well and a lot better than my score but thats the U.S. Open and Im packing." This was DeLaets first time teeing it up in the American championship and the learning curve is steep. Its also the third straight major in which hes failed to make it to the weekend, something thats frustrating for 32-year-old. "I feel like my game should be suited for tough golf courses," he stated, "but my record hasnt shown that quite yet. "Theres a lot more to [the Majors] than golfing your ball. There are all the outside distractions and the mental pressure and everything that goes along with a major championship. Now Ive got my feet wet in all four and Im looking forward to the next one." DeLaet is planning to play the next two events on the PGA Tour as well as the RBC Canada Cup, a special outing in Halifax as part of the new Web.com Tour event there. Hell then take two weeks off before playing a long stretch of what could be eight tournaments in nine weeks, including the RBC Canadian Open. The schedule will be busy, DeLaet said, but it isnt as if hes moving pianos. "Im playing professional golf and going to a lot of cool places," he said. "Overseas, Montreal . . . you cant really complain." 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