There was a time when Vernon Wells was a fan favourite in Toronto Blue Jay colours, and he managed to parlay that reputation into one of the most bloated, unforgivable contracts in Major League Baseball history, a back-loaded 7-year, $126 million deal.
Baseball is a funny thing, and, particularly in the AL East, when so much time is spent competing against the payrolls of the Red Sox and Yankees and not necessarily the teams themselves. Former Blue Jay General Manager JP Ricciardi knew this and handicapped the team by playing with his cheque book rather than his mathematic smarts. If we learned anything from Moneyball, wherein Ricciardi plays a prominent role, it's that All-Star production is more easily replaceable than All-Star talent. By signing Wells, and by extension, Alex Rios, to large deals, Ricciardi ignored all that had a chance to make him successful.
Showing posts with label Baseball. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Baseball. Show all posts
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Monday, November 22, 2010
Joey Votto wins NL MVP with 31 of 32 first-place votes
The Etobicoke, ON native was given all but one first-place vote on the ballot as the Most Valuable Player for the National League Monday afternoon. Albert Pujols from the rival St. Louis Cardinals, once seen as the dominant first baseman in Major League Baseball for years upon years to come, finished 31 votes short.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Sidney Crosby hits a homerun at PNC Park and other wacky news
-In what is the easiest joke to make in the history of lazy sports blogging, Sidney Crosby hit a homerun in batting practice at PNC Park in Pittsburgh and will be slotted into the three hole for the 47-91 Pirates' game tonight against the Atlanta Braves.
-Who has two thumbs and is from a country whose national men's soccer team won an International Friendly? This guy! Canada defeated Honduras 2-1 last night at Saputo Stadium in Montreal last night.
-So a Waterloo football player pisses into a cup... and becomes the first ever North American athlete to test positive for HGH. Friend of the 'Eh' Factor and newest Yahoo! Sports blogger Andrew Bucholtz writes on the implications this has for Waterloo, the CIS, the CFL, and sports in general. I had a joke on this, but I used it up earlier in the day.
-If the rumour of Jamie Langenbrunner being traded for Tomas Kaberle sounds ridiculous to you, it probably is. This was an Eklund rumour (which is capitalized) that has gained steam today because, well, it involves the Toronto Maple Leafs, and it involves draft picks. Forwarded to me by a friend, the rumour is "The trade would involve Tomas Kaberle and a 4th rounder ending up in NJ, With Rolston, Langenbrunner, a first in 2011, and a second in 2012." [sic]
In other related news, the negotiations between myself and the student union building for the last roasted chicken sandwich hit an impasse when I realized it cost $5.
-Oh yeah. Buck Pierce fell hard and dislocated his elbow against the Riders and his season may be in jeopardy. It may work out for him, since "not playing for the Blue Bombers during the 2010 season" looks way better on the resume than "Blue Bombers starting quarterback- 2010". Also on TSN are reports that former Olympic bobsledder Jesse Lumsden may return to football. Which is appropriate, because nothing emphasizes the Bombers' season like... ah, you know.
-Here's a rumour that might have legs, about Eric Tillman possibly locking up the Edmonton Eskimo General Manager position. Tillman likely won't make a decision until he's found a suitable babysitter in Edmonton. Also on Rod Pedersen's blog can be found excerpts from a Stevie Bagg radio interview earlier today, where it seems like he won't be coming up to Canada this year.
-Who has two thumbs and is from a country whose national men's soccer team won an International Friendly? This guy! Canada defeated Honduras 2-1 last night at Saputo Stadium in Montreal last night.
-So a Waterloo football player pisses into a cup... and becomes the first ever North American athlete to test positive for HGH. Friend of the 'Eh' Factor and newest Yahoo! Sports blogger Andrew Bucholtz writes on the implications this has for Waterloo, the CIS, the CFL, and sports in general. I had a joke on this, but I used it up earlier in the day.
-If the rumour of Jamie Langenbrunner being traded for Tomas Kaberle sounds ridiculous to you, it probably is. This was an Eklund rumour (which is capitalized) that has gained steam today because, well, it involves the Toronto Maple Leafs, and it involves draft picks. Forwarded to me by a friend, the rumour is "The trade would involve Tomas Kaberle and a 4th rounder ending up in NJ, With Rolston, Langenbrunner, a first in 2011, and a second in 2012." [sic]
In other related news, the negotiations between myself and the student union building for the last roasted chicken sandwich hit an impasse when I realized it cost $5.
-Oh yeah. Buck Pierce fell hard and dislocated his elbow against the Riders and his season may be in jeopardy. It may work out for him, since "not playing for the Blue Bombers during the 2010 season" looks way better on the resume than "Blue Bombers starting quarterback- 2010". Also on TSN are reports that former Olympic bobsledder Jesse Lumsden may return to football. Which is appropriate, because nothing emphasizes the Bombers' season like... ah, you know.
-Here's a rumour that might have legs, about Eric Tillman possibly locking up the Edmonton Eskimo General Manager position. Tillman likely won't make a decision until he's found a suitable babysitter in Edmonton. Also on Rod Pedersen's blog can be found excerpts from a Stevie Bagg radio interview earlier today, where it seems like he won't be coming up to Canada this year.
Monday, August 9, 2010
The weekend in Blue Jays
Or, how I learned to stop worrying and love the trade
Toronto somehow managed to sweep the American League Wild Card leading Tampa Bay Rays this week, pulling themselves to within a not insurmountable, yet distant, eight games out of a playoff berth.
That doesn't really matter anymore. The Jays have won consecutive games on the backs of two dominant individual performances.
It started Saturday with the call-up J.P. Arencibia. It's a tough name to spell, but he had one of those debuts that would have found its way into a movie script if Apollo Creed pitched for the Rays. Arencibia went 4-for-5, with two home runs, including one on his first big-league pitch.
Arencibia didn't just explode onto the scene. As Dustin Parkes of DrunkJaysFans mentioned via Twitter on Wednesday after John Buck's injury, "Trying to imagine what Twitter would look like if the Yankees had just called up a catcher hitting .303/.360/.639/.998 with 31 bombs in AAA."
Call To The Pen has a great breakdown of where Arencibia came from, what his numbers look like and where he can go from here.
Anybody who made the trip down to Toronto to catch a couple of ball games certainly got their money's worth, because Arencibia's debut probably wasn't even the best performances of the weekend.
Brandon Morrow (also known as the guy traded for Brandon League as part of the elaborate Roy Halladay trade) came within one batter of a no-hitter on Sunday, with Joe Carter in attendance.
The Jays knocked off the Rays 1-0. It was admirable (for lack of better adjective in this instance) of manager Cito Gaston to keep Morrow in with two runners on in the ninth up by just one, to allow Morrow to finish off his first complete game, and his first complete game shutout.
More amazing than the no-hit bid were the 17 strikeouts, which is the most by a Blue Jay in history not named Roger Clemens. Many people have, thus, been talking about Morrow's trade from Seattle, in an, 'oh, you shouldn't have done that,' sort of fashion. Most notably of these, Bill Simmons.
So can we evaluate where the Blue Jays stand with 'The Doc Deal' looming less than a year behind us? No, but just for a weekend, it became cool to talk about the Blue Jays and not get all teary-eyed about Doc at the same time.
Toronto somehow managed to sweep the American League Wild Card leading Tampa Bay Rays this week, pulling themselves to within a not insurmountable, yet distant, eight games out of a playoff berth.
That doesn't really matter anymore. The Jays have won consecutive games on the backs of two dominant individual performances.
It started Saturday with the call-up J.P. Arencibia. It's a tough name to spell, but he had one of those debuts that would have found its way into a movie script if Apollo Creed pitched for the Rays. Arencibia went 4-for-5, with two home runs, including one on his first big-league pitch.
Arencibia didn't just explode onto the scene. As Dustin Parkes of DrunkJaysFans mentioned via Twitter on Wednesday after John Buck's injury, "Trying to imagine what Twitter would look like if the Yankees had just called up a catcher hitting .303/.360/.639/.998 with 31 bombs in AAA."
Call To The Pen has a great breakdown of where Arencibia came from, what his numbers look like and where he can go from here.
Anybody who made the trip down to Toronto to catch a couple of ball games certainly got their money's worth, because Arencibia's debut probably wasn't even the best performances of the weekend.
Brandon Morrow (also known as the guy traded for Brandon League as part of the elaborate Roy Halladay trade) came within one batter of a no-hitter on Sunday, with Joe Carter in attendance.
The Jays knocked off the Rays 1-0. It was admirable (for lack of better adjective in this instance) of manager Cito Gaston to keep Morrow in with two runners on in the ninth up by just one, to allow Morrow to finish off his first complete game, and his first complete game shutout.
More amazing than the no-hit bid were the 17 strikeouts, which is the most by a Blue Jay in history not named Roger Clemens. Many people have, thus, been talking about Morrow's trade from Seattle, in an, 'oh, you shouldn't have done that,' sort of fashion. Most notably of these, Bill Simmons.
So can we evaluate where the Blue Jays stand with 'The Doc Deal' looming less than a year behind us? No, but just for a weekend, it became cool to talk about the Blue Jays and not get all teary-eyed about Doc at the same time.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Your daily hoser update
-Somehow I think that Joey Votto has this 'Final Vote' All-Star thing locked up. Not only does Votto have the endorsement of former MVP Justin Morneau, but I'm pretty sure that Billy Wagner's campaign doesn't have a re-imagining of a Styx song going for it.
Votto went 0-for-2 tonight, but prior to yesterday's games he had the league lead in most important batting categories: Home runs, on-base percentage, slugging, and, by extension, OPS. Not only does this mean that Votto is turning into a player as good as Albert Pujols, but that the 'Eh' Factor now pretty much only recognizes statistics invented by Bill James. (Votto also lead Pujols in runs created. We needed to use our collective fingers and toes to figure that one out)
Then Ryan Zimmerman, also part of the 'Final Vote' decided to be a poor sport and hit a walkoff home run tonight. But, if Votto's 21 home runs didn't matter in determining who made the All-Star team, I doubt that one from Zimmerman will.
-We like some members of the St. Louis Cardinals. Like Blake Hawksworth, who started against Jeff Francis today. T..t..two!!! Two Canucks started on the mound tonight at Coors Field (In Canada, our Coors Field is stronger).
Unfortunately, the two combined for nine innings, 14 hits, seven earned runs and six strikeouts. Damn.
-Currently, Victoria's Ryder Hesjedal is in fourth place in the competition to ride your bike around former Nazi-occupied countries really fast. Fourth is pretty good. It seems like we're doing well without looking too pretentious.
-Why Not Winnipeg? asks Dave Naylor (played by Aaron Eckhart) in a joint effort between TSN and the Globe and Mail. Well, here's why, Jason Brough of the Kurtenblog says. I guess that solves that.
Votto went 0-for-2 tonight, but prior to yesterday's games he had the league lead in most important batting categories: Home runs, on-base percentage, slugging, and, by extension, OPS. Not only does this mean that Votto is turning into a player as good as Albert Pujols, but that the 'Eh' Factor now pretty much only recognizes statistics invented by Bill James. (Votto also lead Pujols in runs created. We needed to use our collective fingers and toes to figure that one out)
Then Ryan Zimmerman, also part of the 'Final Vote' decided to be a poor sport and hit a walkoff home run tonight. But, if Votto's 21 home runs didn't matter in determining who made the All-Star team, I doubt that one from Zimmerman will.
-We like some members of the St. Louis Cardinals. Like Blake Hawksworth, who started against Jeff Francis today. T..t..two!!! Two Canucks started on the mound tonight at Coors Field (In Canada, our Coors Field is stronger).
Unfortunately, the two combined for nine innings, 14 hits, seven earned runs and six strikeouts. Damn.
-Currently, Victoria's Ryder Hesjedal is in fourth place in the competition to ride your bike around former Nazi-occupied countries really fast. Fourth is pretty good. It seems like we're doing well without looking too pretentious.
-Why Not Winnipeg? asks Dave Naylor (played by Aaron Eckhart) in a joint effort between TSN and the Globe and Mail. Well, here's why, Jason Brough of the Kurtenblog says. I guess that solves that.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Thousands of Torontonians protest Roy Halladay's Philadelphia start
That's what it was about, right?
Holy moly. Why any city would want to host the thing is beyond me.
Roy Halladay, in his "return" to Toronto, threw seven innings, striking out four. The game was played in front of just over 43,000 people, which is technically the best attendance figure for a Blue Jays home game this season.
Major League Baseball, instead of simply rescheduling the damn series, moved the three games against the Phillies to Philadelphia. As if that wasn't enough to patronize the few remaining Jays fans, they dressed Toronto in white, Philly in red, and let Toronto bat last.
It just looks so stupid.
Oh, and Toronto lost 9-0. Technically their worst home loss of the season.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Tuesday June 1st - Morning Briefing
Pronger causes trouble, Jays continue to roll
-We've all played pickup sports with that kid who would pick up the ball and go home if a game didn't go his way. It turns out Chris Pronger is one of those guys.
If you don't have the luxury of the Sportscentre morning loop with Onrait and O'Toole, you may have not noticed that Pronger picked up the puck after the game (you can see it in his left glove at the 0:27 mark) and then flicked a towel at Ben Eager.
Of course, Philadelphia had lost their second straight one-goal game 2-1 this time, and Craig Simpson on CBC speculated that Pronger wanted to keep the puck away from the Blackhawks as a part of team history. Pronger will go down in history as a great defenseman, and also somewhat of a prick. The man might be better served getting his team ready for Game 3 in Philly rather than attempting to play jedi mind-tricks with Ben Eager. "You are not a goal scorer."
"I am not a goal scorer."
"This is not the puck you're looking for."
"This is not the puck we're looking for."
Pronger later said he didn't know what language Eager was speaking. Eager apparently came all the way across the ice to tell him "you can keep the puck."
Either way, this is sure to broil down to a bigger controversy than Greedo shooting first. It may be wise to avoid Nick Kypreos' opinion on this one.
-His numbers weren't spectacular and his form wasn't particularly impressive, but Brendan Morrow put together a solid outing and gave the Jays a huge win in their first of three against the Rays to improve to 4-4 on the year. The Jays knocked Tampa started Matt Garza (5-4) pretty well, but only had three runs to show for their 11 hits. Adam Lind hit an opposite-field shot in the first inning, Vernon Wells had two more hits and Aaron Hill went 3-for-4 to increase his batting average to a paltry .179.
-In more Jays news, the team will honour Roy Halladay with a jumbotron tribute sometime this week. In the comments of that story, commenter JoeKnowsIt points out that the Leafs did the same thing with Mats Sundin when he returned to Toronto as a Canuck. I guess the state of Toronto sports is that bad, where you've run out of players on your own teams to honour. I can't wait to see what kind of montage the Raptors have prepared for Hedo Turkgolu.
-Justin Morneau went 3-for-4 as the Twins beat the Mariners 5-4. Jason Bay went 0-fer with two strikeouts and the Mets got gulled by San Diego 16-8.
-CFL camps start this week, with the BC Lions practicing just down the road from The 'Eh' Factor's head offices in Kamloops. This means that chances are high that Casey Printers will overthrow a receiver during a drill and the ball will carry into my yard.
-Toronto FC's Dwayne De Rosario was voted Major League Soccer's Player of the Week with a two-goal performance against San Jose. This is the kind of momentum that's nice to see from Canadian players as we prepare for the World Cup.
===
I'm really anticipating the start of football season. I think I might spend that time avoiding getting called out in the letters page of community newspapers by anonymous gym teachers. That's a pretty tight burden. Jays are on later, and if you're feeling particularly groovy, you can stay up late and watch the Twins on the Pacific channel, 100 per cent Buck Martinez free.
-We've all played pickup sports with that kid who would pick up the ball and go home if a game didn't go his way. It turns out Chris Pronger is one of those guys.
If you don't have the luxury of the Sportscentre morning loop with Onrait and O'Toole, you may have not noticed that Pronger picked up the puck after the game (you can see it in his left glove at the 0:27 mark) and then flicked a towel at Ben Eager.
Of course, Philadelphia had lost their second straight one-goal game 2-1 this time, and Craig Simpson on CBC speculated that Pronger wanted to keep the puck away from the Blackhawks as a part of team history. Pronger will go down in history as a great defenseman, and also somewhat of a prick. The man might be better served getting his team ready for Game 3 in Philly rather than attempting to play jedi mind-tricks with Ben Eager. "You are not a goal scorer."
"I am not a goal scorer."
"This is not the puck you're looking for."
"This is not the puck we're looking for."
Pronger later said he didn't know what language Eager was speaking. Eager apparently came all the way across the ice to tell him "you can keep the puck."
Either way, this is sure to broil down to a bigger controversy than Greedo shooting first. It may be wise to avoid Nick Kypreos' opinion on this one.
-His numbers weren't spectacular and his form wasn't particularly impressive, but Brendan Morrow put together a solid outing and gave the Jays a huge win in their first of three against the Rays to improve to 4-4 on the year. The Jays knocked Tampa started Matt Garza (5-4) pretty well, but only had three runs to show for their 11 hits. Adam Lind hit an opposite-field shot in the first inning, Vernon Wells had two more hits and Aaron Hill went 3-for-4 to increase his batting average to a paltry .179.
-In more Jays news, the team will honour Roy Halladay with a jumbotron tribute sometime this week. In the comments of that story, commenter JoeKnowsIt points out that the Leafs did the same thing with Mats Sundin when he returned to Toronto as a Canuck. I guess the state of Toronto sports is that bad, where you've run out of players on your own teams to honour. I can't wait to see what kind of montage the Raptors have prepared for Hedo Turkgolu.
-Justin Morneau went 3-for-4 as the Twins beat the Mariners 5-4. Jason Bay went 0-fer with two strikeouts and the Mets got gulled by San Diego 16-8.
-CFL camps start this week, with the BC Lions practicing just down the road from The 'Eh' Factor's head offices in Kamloops. This means that chances are high that Casey Printers will overthrow a receiver during a drill and the ball will carry into my yard.
-Toronto FC's Dwayne De Rosario was voted Major League Soccer's Player of the Week with a two-goal performance against San Jose. This is the kind of momentum that's nice to see from Canadian players as we prepare for the World Cup.
===
I'm really anticipating the start of football season. I think I might spend that time avoiding getting called out in the letters page of community newspapers by anonymous gym teachers. That's a pretty tight burden. Jays are on later, and if you're feeling particularly groovy, you can stay up late and watch the Twins on the Pacific channel, 100 per cent Buck Martinez free.
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