With only a week left until Opening Day 2009, the Jays are no closer to revealing the bottom portion of their rotation than they were at the beginning of Spring Training. It’s not for a lack of trying, though.

Casey Janssen was penciled in as one of those starters, but after experiencing shoulder tightness was shut down until May. Add him to the list of Jays with clipped wings including last year’s 3 and 4 in the rotation, Dustin McGowan and Shaun Marcum. Marcum’s out ’til 2010 after recovering from Tommy John surgery. McGowan is out until June at the earliest, although skipper Cito Gaston has hinted he might be shut down for the rest of this year to recover.

Where does that leave the Jays rotation behind the ungodly durable Roy “Doc” Halladay and youngsters Jesse Litsch and David Purcey? A couple of other youngsters, presumably.

Let’s start with the oldest of those youngsters: Scott Richmond. At 29, he’s actually older than Litsch and Purcey, but he still qualifies as a rookie. The native Canadian had some major league experience last year and could push for one of the vacant spots simply because he’s a righty and the other candidates are lefties.

Ricky Romero and Brad Mills are those two young southpaws also gunning for rotation spots. Romero was the Jays’ first-round pick in ’05 and Mills was drafted in the fourth round just two years ago. They seem to have the advantage on Richmond, but would the Jays really include three lefties in their starting five?

My guess here is that Romero jumps to the 4th spot with his recent impressive showings and Richmond ekes out the final spot (at least until Janssen recovers or he implodes). Romero will return to the minor leagues, but, along with impressive lefty Brett Cecil (’07 first-round pick), shouldn’t stay there too long.