A (somewhat fictionalized) transcript of Bob McCown's recent discussion on the Jays' president and CEO position

McCown: Grumble grumble grumble grumble Stan Kasten grumble Stan Kasten grumble grumble grumble Stan Kasten? Stan Kasten blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah Stan Kasten! Grumble grumble grumble blah blah blah Stan Kasten, Stan Kasten grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble blah blah blah Stan Kasten; Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten; Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten, my friend Stan Kasten.

Jim Kelley: Ahrbshholuuuutely, Bob!

McCown: Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten? Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten! Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten, flying faddoo Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten Stan Kasten.

Jim Kelley: You know in Burffalloo whhhere III aaam frrom...

McCown: STAN KASTEN!

Jim Kelley: AAArgh...I haahte paaaaying taxes in Caaanadaaa.

McCown: STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN!

Stephen Brunt: Fuck it. I'm taking the rest of the year off. If you need me, I'll be smoking fish in western Newfoundland.

McCown: STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN! STAN KASTEN!

What the hell are the Jays doing to their pitchers' arms?

In spite of the title of this post, we don't want to unnecessarily feed into any b.s. about how J.P. is singlehandedly wrecking the arms of the entire pitching staff. Because seriously, you know that whole argument is coming, don't you? How else are the dyspeptic Jim Kelley's of the world going to deal with Shaun Marcum's name being added to the list of fallen pitchers, alongside Dustin McGowan, Casey Janssen, and Jeremy Accardo.

When as many pitchers start to hit the 60 day DL with elbow and shoulder issues, you have to take a look at how they are utilized and whether if there is some level of unnecessary abuse that is coming into play. There's nothing that immediately comes to mind for us, and a mere recounting to the pitchcounts and innings totals for the fallen will probably not tell the whole story. Those numbers don't tell how many pitches the pitchers were throwing in the bullpen before the game, nor do they tell how many pitches they threw in their side sessions in between starts/appearances.

We'd guess that what is happening with the Jays is just part of the peril of relying on young homegrown pitching talent. Yankees fans can probably spill volumes on this after the year that their future pitching stars have had. (Or not had, as it were.)

Incidentally, there's a great interview with Jays pitching coach Brad Arnsberg that was posted at Baseball Prospectus last week. In it, he mentions that Roy Halladay has significantly cut down his side sessions to ensure that he has more left in the tank (or the arm) for his starts.

Viva Las Vegas!
The word isn't yet official, but it appears as though the Jays' Triple A activities will be run out of Las Vegas next year. Given how few options the team had, the City of Broken Dreams is probably as good a spot as any for them to stash their top minor league prospects.

Although if Travis Snider gets sent down to start 2009, we sincerely hope that he's kept away from the cheap and plentiful buffets.

The Dodgers got the hell out of Las Vegas after this past season, noting that the facilities at the cavernous and rapidly aging Cashman field were inadequate for their prospects.

As a side note, Las Vegas is changing their franchise's nickname. The new ownership group which purchased the franchise last year didn't care for the name "51s" and the associated alien/UFO/conspiracies that are tied to it.

Statler and Waldorf have got nothing on the PTS crew

Listening to Bob McCown, Jim Kelley and Bob Elliot talk about the Blue Jays is much like the Muppet Show segments with the crotchety critics, only devoid of the humour, reason and reasonable resemblance to actual human beings.

Also, the PTS baseball segments are generally stretched out over five minutes, which is a seemingly endless amount of time to allow Jim Kelley to try to make an argument about anything.

(We think Kelley's point tonight was that J.P. overspent Rogers' money on A.J. Burnett, and therefore should have overspent with the personnel that he has accumulated in order to acquire Jason Bay. Which is quite possibly the stupidest thing we've ever heard spoken on Sportsnet, the Fan 590, or on any sports talk radio program anywhere.)

Come on, guys. We fucking well get that you hate J.P., and that anything he does is wrong in your eyes, and of course you are right because the proof lies in the fact that they haven't won the World Series under his watch.

This whole act is so tiresome. We're almost rooting for J.P. to get fired at this point if only so that the thin-skinned Toronto media can get over their fucking imaginary wounds and move on.

Hopefully, Tony LaCava won't offend anyone's precious sensibilities.

3-0! Undefeated in May

The powerhouse Jays are unstoppable! Sure, the Chicago Southsiders booted the ball around the park in today's 5-2 win, but at least the Jays were able to take advantage. It certainly wasn't the case last month...but April seems like so long ago, doesn't it?

More media thoughts
We're not going to beat any dead horses, but we would like to concur with the Drunk Jays Fans' Stoeten with regard to the fact that the Prime Time Sports crew should stop talking baseball. In Friday's show, the assembled crew got themselves worked into a lather about two year old minor league contract signings, and actually got simultaneously angry about the fact that J.P. Ricciardi had a "FIVE YEAR PLAN!!!", and that he had "NO PLAN"!!! Seriously guys...would you all like for J.P. to send you the Jays' player personnel strategy in a duotang so that you can review it and sign off on it?

We get that BobCat McCown hates J.P. since he refused to come on the show, but his petty vendetta against the Jays GM is tiresome.

And by the way: Is it just us, or is James Deacon getting a little dimmer with each passing year? Maybe we just gave him too much credit to begin with, since he is well-coiffed and well-dressed and wears glasses. Lately, Deacon sounds like Captain Obvious on the air, piping in with incredibly dull "insight". We get the impression that he's just hanging around the studio, agreeing with McCown, because he's got nothing better to do.

The Tao of Stieb's Enemies List

Nixon had one. P.J. O'Rourke had an ironically smug one. So why can't we? There are so many people that we have an immense dislike for that we could break this off into a whole separate blog.

Let the listing begin.

Enemy #1 - Jim Kelley of Sportsnet
Let's begin with a measured statement: Jim Kelley is the root of all evil.

Okay, maybe we've gone too far with that one. How about this: Jim Kelley is singlehandedly running the Fan 590 and Sportsnet into oblivion.

We came to this conclusion last week while in the midst of our profound malaise. We thought it had everything to do with the length of Spring Training, but as the week went on, we came to understand that it had everything to do with Kelley's co-host duties on Prime Time Sports.

PTS is an institution, and we've gladly given them more than five hours out of our busy week for years now. But after listening to the wretched depths that the show reached last week, we've made a decision to never tune in again when Jim Kelley is on. (And don't even get us started with Kelley and Mike Toth being on at the same time. Seriously, when those two guys are on at the same time, our brains start to seep out of our ears.)

Listening to five hours of Jim Kelley in the run of a week is seriously fucking depressing. Instead of being a foil to the grumpy irascible Bob McCown, he cranks up the grumpiness to 11 and spouts off endlessly and cynically about stuff that he knows nothing about. Especially nauseating are those moments when Kelley gets into a lather about the Jays, then punctuates his rant with a comment that demonstrates his complete lack of knowledge, like "You know J.P. goes out and signs, um...er...what's his name? That guy who pitches and played for the team from California. Erm. You know, the Hispanic guy who wears a cap. Well, whoever it is, why did they sign him?"

It's fascinating to see the difference in the tone and content of the show when our mancrush Stephen Brunt sits across the console from McCown. He is able to play off of McCown's angry hanging judge mentality and steer the conversation back onto the rails with, you know, logic and reason. Brunt brings out the best in McCown.

Kelley, on the other hand, is a pompous, arrogant buffoon who growls, takes cheap shots, asks stupid non-questions (that are actually cheap shots), and helps lead the show into areas of idiotic
truculence that are worthy of a small-town Red State talk radio hoedown. He brings out the worst in McCown, and together they end up sounding like a pair of petulant, cantankerous old men, bitching and moaning about how kids these days just don't get it. It's like listening to two Morton Downey Jr.'s with hemorrhoids sitting on a cold metal bench and complaining about their ass pain. Not only is it unpleasant; it's completely uninteresting.

For doing his all to ruin the second best sports talk radio show in Canada (after Jays Talk, of course), we scrawl Jim Kelley's name at the top of the Tao of Stieb's Enemies List. (You been served, sucka!)