Gerry Fraley Hacks Out Another

Oh Dear Fucking Lord. On a day when The Sporting News issued it's brand new daily online newspaper, our old friend Gerry Fraley showed that the writers at the barely relevant sports news publication would rather remain in the dark ages than actually research what they're writing about.

In his latest piece of dump, Fraley picks up on an erroneous Bob Elliot story from earlier in the week that suggested that Mel Queen was being hired by the Blue Jays organization to evaluate the minor league development. Unfortunately for Elliot and Fraley, the truth is that Queen is being hired as a roving minor league pitching instructor, which makes their innuendo over J.P. Ricciardi's autonomy completely asinine.

J.P. Riccardi's standing as Toronto's general manager further eroded with the return of Mel Queen to the organization. Queen and Bobby Mattick ran Toronto's player-development system during its heyday.

This week, the Blue Jays brought back Queen to evaluate the current system, which is a shell of its former self. Queen's report could be an ominous development for Ricciardi, who recently took a hit when ownership brought back Cito Gaston to replace John Gibbons as manager.

Gaston and Queen represent a time when the Blue Jays were a model organization that did not need to bring in consultants to determine what has gone wrong.

Okay, big guy. If you bothered to check up on your supposed source, which I'm convinced is merely a rolled up copy of a two day old Toronto Sun, you might have learned the real reason that Queen was hired.

And can we please stop this fucking cliche about Ricciardi's draft record? Yes, Russ Adams was an unequivocal bust. There's no question, but don't you think it's a touch early to start lambasting a draft record that's less than seven years old? If not, please have a look at the Jays starting rotation, their bullpen, their starting second baseman (when he's healthy), and their starting left fielder. Could it possibly be that the cupboards appear bare because the food is on the table?

Queen's return came as another of Ricciardi's personnel moves was declared a failure. Gaston recently informed David Eckstein that he would no longer be the every day shortstop.

Ricciardi brought in Eckstein on a one-year, $4.5 million deal, even though the club already had a better defensive shortstop in John McDonald. Eckstein, who had a small margin of error in the best of times, has been a defensive liability because of his miniscule range.

Where to begin? Do I like Eckstein as the starting shortstop? Not really, but even I have to admit that he's done pretty much exactly what should have been expected of him. In fact, I'm pretty sure that Fraley was the only person in the known fucking universe that actually expected Eckstein to improve the infield defense as he suggested in his season preview. That's right, way back then, Fraley thought Eckstein to be a defensive improvement over John McDonald.

Throw in a bad contract for outfielder Vernon Wells, big mistakes on Frank Thomas and Reed Johnson and the growing dissatisfaction of ace righthander Roy Halladay, and it does not take a baseball lifer like Mel Queen to determine the Blue Jays are broken.

Fuck off! I admit that the vesting option in the Frank Thomas contract was a mistake. There's no question that J.P. fucked up on that one, but did any one else honestly expect Thomas to land that many ABs over two seasons?

However, to suggest that the multi-year deal Vernon Wells received is a bust after the first year, a year in which he's missed multiple months of action, seems a little premature. I would really like to hear Fraley's explanation as to why Reed Johnson's removal was a bust, and we all know how overblown Halladay's innocent comments over the All-Star Break became when the got into the hands of other local media hacks.

The least Fraley could've done was mention Ricciardi's reluctance to bring up the team's current best player until half way through the season. However, I would guaran-fucking-tee Fraley is unaware that a baseball player exists named Adam Lind.

Then again, maybe he just knows more about baseball than I'll ever forget.