Saturday Night Grab Bag

Anybody else catch Snappy the Turtle (aka Blairsy, aka The Globe's Jeff Blair) jump to JP's defense on Friday's Prime Time round-table when McCown suggested that even though Ricciardi surrounds himself with smart advisers, he doesn't listen to them? Not true, says Snappy. In fact, "the reason that Dustin McGowan is still here is largely because of Tony LaCava's input. Tony LaCava whispering in his ear, don't move this guy, don't move this guy." I wonder whether our friend Mr. Law would agree. Oh, and uh... thanks a serious fuckload, Tony. (1:07:20 mark)

Did you also catch Snappy's awesome Ray Emery comment? McCown said that goaltending in the NHL has lost so much of its style that if you lined up all thirty number one goaltenders wearing exactly the same masks and uniforms, and watched them play, you wouldn't have a clue who was who. Cue radio magic: "Well, you'd know who Ray Emery was, because the puck would always be in the net," Blair quipped. ". . . You thought I was going to say something else when I picked Ray Emery, didn't you?" Yes, Blairsy. God yes. (51:50 mark)

Folks here in Toronto know that The Sun is always good for a brutal, rage-inducing headline, and apparently the fine people of Edmonton get to taste this same sort of shit from their version of the rag. Yet, even though this shit is completely expected, one of the gems they came up with this week was just so lame I feel I have to mention it. BJ closer to being B.J.'s closer??? For fuck sakes, if you're going to use shit that at least throw in a meuh.

I'm sure most Jays fans just assume that pitching coach Brad Arnsberg is pure awesome, and base this on the way the pitchers have progressed under his watch. Personally, I don't know what the fuck a pitching coach actually does, let alone enough about his impact on a staff to give him credit when it turns out the guys he's been told to coach mostly don't suck. Because of this, I require just a little more evidence before I can go off assuming he's a real king hell of a human being.

Fortunately, I need not look any further than Pirate first-baseman Adam LaRoche's first baseball memory: While LaRoche's dad was managing the Columbus Clippers, an affiliate of the Yankees, Adam was 7 and sat on the lap of Yankees farmhand Brad Arnsberg. Arnsberg, now a pitching coach with the Toronto Blue Jays, gave Adam his first taste of chew - and the exchange just happened to be caught by a newspaper photographer. The picture was splashed across the front page of the next day's paper. "(Arnsberg) got ripped," LaRoche said, "for giving a young kid chew." Awesome!

(Oh, uh... I'm just going to assume that by "got ripped" LaRoche means: "went out and got shitfaced." As in, he was so pleased with himself for turning a seven year old on to terminal jaw cancer, he went out and got really fucking ripped.)

OK. Now pardon me a second while I shed a fucking tear for poor little Troy Glaus, who evidently can't get his dick up unless 50,000 people are watching (and is a wizard with grammar, FYI). “I’m just like everybody else,” he told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “You get in the middle of the season and I’m worn out. But when you have energy in the stadium it helps you get through those days when you’re not feeling good physically. There’s 50, 000 people cheering for you to deal with. That’s significant to me.”

I'm not saying that the city of Toronto shouldn't be ashamed of itself for its lack of interest in the Jays, but Glaus can fuck off all the same. Yeah, Troy... It's those empty seats' fault that your feet are breaking down under the weight of your roided up fucking body. We're so goddamn sorry, douche.

Lastly, watch for me tomorrow at the helm of MLB Trade Rumors for a couple hours.

Alright, drinkin' time... (well, I've already been drinking. I just mean now it's time to get serious...)