Litsch still pink and efficient, though vaguely less round

We'd heard that Jesse Litsch was working out with Roy Halladay over the winter, which perhaps explains why Doc prefers the pinkly efficient starter as the Jays' number five guy. It also might explain why Litsch doesn't look nearly as round and doughy as he did last year. (Then again, it could just be that he looks slim compared to corpulent golfer John Daly, who was in attendance at Sunday's game. Musta been Free Hot Dog Day at the ballpark in Clearwater.)

Speaking of Litsch, here's our vote for the stunning meaningless spring stat of the weekend: Litsch struck out six in four innings as the Jays topped the Phillies 9-4 in Sunday's fake game. His game-high in 2007 was five strikeouts. Not that we want to read too much into Spring stats.

Drunk MLB Rumours
The Drunk Jays Fans' Stoeten has been handed the reins of MLB Trade Rumors for a few hours. True to form, he showed up late and hung over. Aside from that, we're amazed at how straight he's played it so far. Seeing the restraint that he demonstrated when blogging about Sidney Ponson makes us worry about the onslaught of filthy words and thoughts that are sure to spill out when he returns to his home digs.

Well, that's unexpected!

Wow. This news is so unexpected that we had to check our browser cache to make sure we weren't being redirected to stories from last off-season.If there was one free agent that we figured the J.P. would steer clear of, without question, it was Rod Barajas.

And yet, there it is. The very same lard-assed catcher who bailed inexplicably last off-season on a deal that was as generous as the portions that he takes from the clubhouse spread, only to take less money and less term from the Phillies, has signed a one-year deal with the Jays.

He'll ostensibly back up Gregg Zaun, although there is no clear indication as to who will provide his wardrobe for any episodes of Sportsnet's popular series: "Playoff Action with Ginger and the Catcher".

Barajas wouldn't have been our choice for the backup/other catcher. Our heart belonged to Miguel Olivo, who rebuffed our advances and signed a one year contract with the Royals. Must be those fountains in center field.

It's hardly even worth discussing Barajas' stats from last year, seeing as how he only managed 122 ABs. We're looking at this as an Ohka/Thomson/Zambrano signing for this year. If Barajas goes back to his 2005 form (21 HRs and 60 RsBI), then $1.2 million is somewhat reasonable. If he sucks, then at least we've already got last year's surplus Barajas effigies hanging around the crib, aching to be burned.

We'll say this about Barajas: He may be a walking, talking sebaceous gland, but now, he's our walking talking sebaceous gland.

Long may he waddle around the Rogers Centre.