Oh Beej

Well I suppose that no one is perfect. Not even Blue Jay closer B.J. Ryan, who today blew his first save of the season. He allowed a pair of runs in the bottom of the ninth and the Jays fell to the Angels 4-3. A.J. Burnett had a stellar outing throwing eight strong allowing only three hits and two runs while striking out eight.

It was the second day in a row the Jays were on the wrong end of a walk off loss, and they now travel to NYC to face the scumbags for three. Rod Barajas continued to baffle fans, hitting his second home run in as many days and raising his average to .298 while picking up his 17th RBI in the process. As the Jays head East, 31-28 doesn't feel that bad, especially with the lack of offense most of the season.

Tuesday = Doc vs. Joba

I believe it necessary for someone, anyone, Johnny Mac, Marco Scutaro whoever, to explain to David Eckstein he doesn't have to ensure every single throw he makes is 100% fundamentally correct and that he comes directly & 100% over the top on each throw. Clown.

Elsewhere - For the first time in a century (A century is 100 fucking years for those who for whatever reason are idiots) the Chicago Cubs are at the top of the MLB standings on June 1st. You what that shit is, fucked up. Ty Cobb was a fresh-faced 22 year old bigot playing his 4th season with the Tigers. Babe Ruth was only 13 years old, and Henry Ford produced the very first Model T automobile. As we are aware, the Cubs went on to win the World Series in 1908, the last time they accomplished the feat. The poor bastards.

Of course you can play the trap in baseball

Take a look at the scores. It's quite obvious the Toronto Blue Jays have mastered the art of the trap. There's just no other rational explanation.

What is with this B.J. Ryan balk shit? Did he or didn't he balk? Ryan's been playing since 1999 and has balked a grand total of twice. So why is his delivery just now becoming a topic of conversation? Because some umpire in Boston decided he'd mess around and call one on him at a crucial point of the game? Enough already. There are a number of things that can happen to constitute a balk, one of them being that a pitcher throwing from the stretch fails to make a complete stop with both of his hands together before throwing the pitch. If you watch B.J. Ryan he raises his hand to about eye level and stops, albeit briefly, then delivers the ball. End of story. It isn't a balk now, it wasn't 10 years ago, and it won't be unless the fucking rules change. Yapping about it from the dugout in a lame attempt to throw off the pitcher is lame, and you're an idiot for trying.

5-0 to start May is far better than the 0-9 they went last year. Hey, even Shannon Stewart had 3 hits tonight. There must be better things to come still.

Far East and Staying South

Shyte. It appears that Blue Jay closer may not be ready to join the team come opening day. God damn elbows. The Jays are going to keep Ryan out of the remaining games in Spring Training after Ryan complained of soreness in his forearm and elbow after the game with the Pirates. The team has been reported as calling it "normal fatigue" but are going to proceed with caution. After all, Ryan is coming off of Thomas John surgery which shelved him all of last season.

JP was quoted as saying that Ryan won't likely break camp with the team and there really isn't any sort of timeline for return as of yet.

This is a bit of a set back for the Jays, who knew bringing Ryan back would be a slow process but were optimistic about bringing him north with them come the end of Spring Training.

Across the Pacific former New York Mets and Texas Rangers manager Bobby Valentine is making headlines, indicating he thinks it's "ludicrous" that the MLB is holding games at the same time Japanese games are being played. Valentine manages the Chiba Lotte Mariners of the Japanese Pacific League and believes Japanese baseball is selling itself short by hosting MLB games while launching its own season. Valentine is a big booster of Japanese baseball and thinks the game is going to take away some of spotlight on his squad. Probably, but who gives a shit. The MLB teams are better Bobby, that's the way it is. I wouldn't worry about you and your Japanese baseball, it's pretty safe.

Monday in Florida

So the Jays lost to the horrific Pittsburgh Pirates today. A.J. Burnett did his best to get through his outing today, labouring for the better part of it, allowing four runs on four hits while giving up four walks and a grand total of zero strikeouts. Zach Duke, on the other hand, looked solid over five scoreless innings of work. Reed Johnson's ninth inning sacrifice fly kept the Jays from being shutout.

On a sort of positive note, B.J. Ryan pitched a scoreless 6th inning allowing just one hit and striking out one as well. B.J. was quoted as saying he felt pain in his arm and had to pitch through it, though he's still on track to pitch again Thursday. Hopefully this is just part of his recovery process, which I'm sure it is. The Jays bats looked like piss as they only managed to scrounge up five hits on the day. Aaron Hill was one of said Jays to record a hit, and is batting .480 for the spring. He's awesome.

Monday's sure do fucking suck, even if it is St. Patrick's Day.

The Jays are off tomorrow, and face the Red Sox Wednesday at 12:05pm in Fort Myers. Red Sox Nation should be concerned for Josh Beckett. He's a fan of the injury.