Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Tuesday Morning Link Dump

Because this morning, we don't think that we could offer up anything better than our blog colleague, we offer up bucket trucks full of links.

Enjoy.

Blair on the Blue Jays: Now that he's a high-falutin' general sports columnist, we don't always get the chance to hear Jeff Blair's thoughts, feelings and impressions of the Jays. But in this morning's edition of Canada's National Bird Cage Liner, Blair lays it down for the Jays: "Change must be complete. It can’t be half-assed. The Flashback Fridays stuff? A generation doesn’t care any more. Sorry, that’s just the way it is." (Also, he uses the word "mollify". "Half-assed" and "mollify" in the same article? That's Blair. Awesome.)

A true meeting of the minds: Rather than watch the game last night, we listened to the Drunk Jays Fans podcast encounter with Toronto Star Chief Baseball Bloviator Richard Griffin. Griff tried his best to be a good sport, but towards the end, you could hear his angry old man thoughts come through. Then the boys took turns criticizing each other for not being hard enough on Dick. And there are cymbals struck throughout the show. Good stuff.

More rosterbation: We always like it when other blogs name-check us, especially when they do it in the first paragraph of a post in a flattering way. So how could we not link to Drew/Lloyd's post at Ghostrunner on First as he reconsiders his Adrian Beltre-J.J. Hardy strategy for Jays salvation? In short, we can't not. So here's the link. (Also, we comment on the post, and it's the best thing we've written in weeks.)

Milton Bradley, redux: Ian at Blue Jay Hunter has a fully elucidated argument about the mercurial Milton and his potential place on the Blue Jays. It is longer but more smarter than ours. So read it.

Travis Snider's Dad and his D: Mop Up Duty's Kman took apart Travis Snider's defensive abilities way back when, and Snider's dad didn't care for it. Kman insists that after further evidence, he is right about the Rosy-Cheeked Hope's glovework. We think that people just forget what it's like to have league average fielders.

Aaron Hill ain't all that: Newish blog Jays in Seven rates the second basemen in the AL East, and finds the Jays' elfish dinger-machine lacking. Then again, he likes the Fake Umpires, so he may not be in possession of all his faculties.

Let's discuss J.P.: MLB Trade Rumors opened up a discussion of J.P. Ricciardi, which opened up the digital floor to all sorts of JaysTalk callers, armchair GMs and people with a tenuous grasp of the rules of punctuation and capitalization. (Excuse us, but we're sticklers for language skills. If you can't write coherently, you probably can't think coherently. Grammar is the foundation of logic.)

There you go...that's enough for this morning. If you want more of our precious thoughts, then check us out on the Twitter.

20 comments:

The Ack said...

Blair basically rules, and I say that with the disclaimer that I don't even agree with him all the time. But that's the thing - you don't have to in order to appreciate his genius.

Navin Vaswani (@eyebleaf) said...

He's the best sports writer in this town. Hands down.

Anonymous said...

It's a Blairsy love-in!

Alex said...

oh man that MLBTR discussion is hilarious...

this guy takes the cake...

Blue Jay's 2009 Off season -

1) Resign Marco Scutaro - 10M over 2 years.
2) Sign Bengie Molina - 6M 1 year
3) Sign Jim Thome 5M 1 year
4) Sign Bobby Abreu 16M 2 years.
5) Sign Justin Duchscherer 1 year 3+ incentive's + options
6) Trade Adam Lind + Prospects for Jair Jurrjens

The lineup.
SS - Scutaro
2B - Hill
RF - Abreu
DH - Thome
CF - Wells
C - Molina
1B - Overbay
LF - Snider
3B - Encarnacion

Halladay
Jurrjens
Romero
Duchscherer
Cecil

SP said...

LOL at the Jurrjens trade. Jurrjens is an NL East bully, and not much else.

Tao of Stieb said...

Hey, I like Jurrjens as much as anyone...but I have to agree that the 2.75 ERA in an unsually weak NL East would not necessarily translate.

(Although he put up good numbers against Boston and Philly).

Like I said before: John Lackey is the answer.

Navin Vaswani (@eyebleaf) said...

For our 2010 pennant push: Orlando Hudson at 2B, with Aaron Hill moving to 3B.

I'm not even drunk.

Yet.

SP said...

Jurrjens is good, no doubt, but his 2.75 ERA isn't in line with his 3.70 FIP and his 78.2% LOB rate and .279 BAbip show he's been lucky this year. But mainly, why the hell would we give up our first true home-grown .900 OPS hitter since...Wells(?..!), for a #3 starter in the AL East. We already have a Ricky Romero.

In other words, John Lackey, please.

SP said...

By the way, Carlos Delgado for Jays 1B. Come on, obviously. He's gonna have an age 38 season like Frank Thomas had for Oakland. What better way to bring back the fans than a homecoming for the best hitter in team history? Get 'er done, Rogers Blue Jays Baseball Partnership!

Anonymous said...

Not trying to hate here, just a question. Did you, after sternly insisting on proper grammar:
1) Forget “the” in the last sentence?
2) Leave out “the” as a joke and it’s just too high concept for me and has gone over my head.
3) Quote some statement that is well known, just not to me.
Seriously, this is just a Question Mr. Stieb. Love the blog.

Tao of Stieb said...

I forgot the "the". Not on purpose. Because I am a tool.

Gil Fisher said...

Because I am a tool.

sentence fragment?

Anonymous said...

I don't know what Blair has against Flashback Friday.

Joanna said...

I was shamed into posting, Tao. That is the power you wield.

Tao of Stieb said...

And what an awesome power it is.

Roy said...

I was in Moab this summer. Loved it. Jurrjens is sick, he'd still be a hell of a pitcher out of the NL East. Let's keep Lindy.

brent said...

Griffin wasn't exactly great when he was trying to make it through what were JP's biggest mistakes. I think when he said that he doesn't read others before he writes is a poor way of going about things. He just wants to avoid plagiarism accusations instead.

Colin said...

Yes, trade the best hitter (who's young and still under control) plus prospects, for a number 3 starter.

Or you could keep him and put that Thome/Duchsherer money towards Lackey (or hell, gamble on Harden or Bedard) and plug Marcum in there too.

If you resign Scutaro and sign Abreu, Lackey, Molina/Barajas/Zaun, and Figgins, you could probably compete.

plain_g said...

you know what sucks? greinke is going to win the cy young bc he plays in a crappy division. doc's 2 month cy 'push' came against - NYY, Bal, TB, Bos, TB, BOS, NYY, Min, NYY, TB.

Greinke got TB, Oak, Det, CWS, Cle, Sea, LAA, Cle, Det, Bos.

fuggin ridiculous.

Jayszone93 said...

Greinke is having one of the best seasons a pitcher has had in a LONG time, competition (this time) be damned...