Another Saturday Grab Bag

Hey everyone, just sitting here on a Saturday afternoon, watching Brandon League mow down the Phillies-- and looking pretty good doing it-- about to start a little grab bag. Sure, Brandon had a bit of a battle with Jimmy Rollins, but fooled him in the end with a wicked Paul Reiser. Victorino managed a shitty little infield single that Aaron Hill almost got to, and... OK, Utley is battling too, and then didn't get fooled like Rollins did with a 3-2 Paul Reiser. He took a walk. So maybe I was premature with the mowing down comment. But he's looking OK, I guess. . . Well... not really. He just went 3-0 down to Ryan Howard... who's now walked. But at least League's velocity is fucking with the radar gun, which keeps showing 64s and shit.

Alright, so League just had a little conference with some dude I have never seen before (Bruce Walton), and immediately threw a 64 mph zanger past Pat Burrell. The bases are loaded and it's now 2-2. League has good stuff but is struggling with the command. Let's just assume it's the cold. And then League finally fucking nails a breaking ball on the outside corner for a called strike three. Feliz is up and League has now thrown about 70 pitches by my count. Feliz grounds out and no damage is done. What a performance!

Let's all give a big round of applause for your 2008 Toronto Blue Jays maybe setup man!... for a little while. (Oh shit.)

Oh, Fuck Off
Speaking of League, Jeremy Sandler of the National Post had an article in Friday's paper that focused on ol' Brandon and his role with the team. Evidently Gibbers hasn't established a full bullpen pecking order just yet, and suggested that all of his relievers (aside from the closer, Accardo, and the lefty setup man, Downs) will need to be ready to pitch at any point in the ballgame (which is different than usual how?).

With the competition for appearances still seemingly pretty open, it appears like this is a rather important point in young League's career. He could either really step up and grab the bull by the horns, or fuck his way through some other lame cliche that sees him wind up at the back of the pen, or even down in Syracuse.

That topic, in particular, prompted this little shit nugget to come dribbling out of the mouth of a certain GM:

"Now that he's here, now the second question is being able to be a contributor for us," Ricciardi said. "It's really not a 'pen where we can carry someone for the sake of carrying him and say, ‘Well, he's got a good arm.' We need to not only carry him, but he needs to be productive for us."

Um... maybe bullshit? Maybe big fucking stink-ass bullshit? Maybe unused Towers Frasor DeJong Gronkiewicz Vermilyeashit?

Are you fucking for fucking real? After Jason Frasor sat for longer in 2007 than all of Ernie Whitt's morning dumps combined? Jesus fucking off Christ nailed to a big fuck off. Fuck off, JP.

By the Way, Sorry for the Play-By-Play Back There...
Hmmm... I didn't really mean to give a whole play-by-play of League's inning there when I first mentioned it. I kind of actually expected him to mow through the top of the Phillies order, and somehow fell ass backwards into talking you through the whole inning. I had really just wanted to write down what happened when the person who was pitching started the inning. And then that happened. And by that, of course, I mean that the person pitching got into a tough 3 blue, 2 yellow count on... um... Jimmy Rawlins, or Roh-lins (I'm not sure). Oh and then THAT happened. It just kind of snowballed, y'know?

This asshole can relate...



A New York State of Mind (Or, Aaron Harang: Portrait of a Junkie)
Ken Davidoff of the New York's Newsday seems to have a bit of a boner for the Jays, and risked the ire of his NYC readership by picking the Jays to win the AL Wild Card and then beating Boston in the ALCS.

He tried to make it up to them by "predicting" the Jays would lose to the Mets in the World Series, and while I actually do, almost certainly stupidly, believe that the Jays have all the tools to win the East, and have a pitching staff that could be outstanding in a short series, um... for real?

This must be predominantly a Mets paper or something, right?

But then, hold on... what's this? Newsday also goes and ranks the aces, and our own Roy Halladay only comes seventh! After Aaron fucking Harang! I'm kind of getting mixed messages here, Newsday. And I mean, I know Harang is a good pitcher and all, but it's obvious to me from the photo on the right that this little heroin problem of his will inevitably catch up with him. Maybe this is the year.

Get off the horse, Aaron. You need help.

Quickly
Guess what? Matt Stairs has arthritis in his hip. So, for the last time, please seriously tell me again how much you fucks really want Reed "black hole against RHP" Johnson over Shannon Stewart. (Oh, and somewhere Adam Lind is getting a little too comfortable. . .)

The Rios contract talks have stalled. Cue panicky idiots getting the band back together...

I've been informed (though I already kinda knew) that the link I provided for the Grill Room the other day went to their Sun TV page, which is kinda shit. Here's a much better way to catch up on the best sports roundtable in the city that has ever invited me on... their blog. (That appearance, again would be this Wednesday at 11pm, before Super Dave).

Oh! The vid games have arrived and it seriously wasn't a scam. We actually do have stuff to give away during our live blog of Monday afternoon's opener (only for PS3, though). Weird.

We don't usually bother to report on shitty ex-Jays, or even ones that were once marginally decent, but are now shitty, but this just happened, so I guess I'll mention that, after being released by the Astros, Woody Williams has decided to call it quits. I know what you're thinking, and I had no idea that he was still pitching either.