Seventy To Go (A Tale Told By an Idiot)

Monday, July 19 2010 @ 06:46 PM EDT

Contributed by: Magpie

The Jays have 35 home games remaining and 35 road games. Their future looks like this:

Road

at KC (3)
at DET (4)
at NYY (6)
at LAA (3)
at OAK (3)
at BOS (6)
at TBR (3)
at BLT (3)
at MIN (4)

Home

BLT (6)
CLE (3)
TBR (6)
BOS (3)
NYY (6)
DET (4)
TEX (4)
SEA (3)

The vast majority of these games - 52 by my count - are against teams with better records than the Blue Jays. Almost half of the remaining games - 30 to be exact - are against the three Beasts of the East.

The 2010 season has been a fabulous, unexpected success so far. (Even if all I hear are complaints about the manager.) Last October, you might have guessed that Roy Halladay would be in Philadelphia in exchange for three minor leaguers. You may have anticipated that Marco Scutaro would be in Boston or someplace similar. These two things were bad news indeed, especially for a team that went 75-87 with those two guys in the lineup. If you were then informed that Adam Lind and Aaron Hill would spend the entire season struggling with the Mendoza Line - well, come on. You would have expected to see something like the 2003 Tigers. That they'd only lose 105 games if they were lucky.

Anyway, it's going to get a whole lot harder the rest of the way. It would be nice if they could split those 70 games, although that's probably far too much to ask for. The main thing I've been hoping for this season is for the Jays to end up with a better record than the Phillies.

'Twould make me laugh long and hearty, that would.

Curiously, Toronto actually has a winning record against all three AL divisions (thanks to their brutal domination of the Orioles, of course.). It's their traditional futility against NL teams that has held them to just 2 games over .500 overall (curiously, both Tampa and Baltimore also post 7-11 marks against the NL.) So, just for the heck of it, here are the standings if we were to eliminate games against the Other League. The White Sox and the Mets, among others, are thanking their lucky stars for Bud Selig's innovation. The Dodgers and the Rays aren't so happy...

AL East        W-L    GBL
Tampa Bay     48-25   ---
New York      47-26    1
Boston        43-35    7.5
Toronto       40-34    8.5
Baltimore     22-51   26

AL Central
Minnesota     41-33   ---
Detroit       37-35    3  
Chicago       35-38    5.5
Cleveland     33-41    8
Kansas City   31-42    9.5

AL West
Texas         39-35   ---
Oakland       38-36    1
LA Angels     39-38    1.5
Seattle       27-47   12

NL East
Atlanta       45-32   ---
Philadelphia  38-35    5
NY Mets       36-38    7.5
Florida       37-39    7.5
Washington    35-39    8.5

NL Central
Cincinnati    43-35   ---
St Louis      42-35     .5
Chicago       34-41    7.5
Houston       34-43    8.5
Milwaukee     33-45   10
Pittsburgh    30-46   12

NL West
San Diego     45-31   ---
LA Dodgers    45-32     .5
San Francisco 43-34    2.5
Colorado      41-35    4
Arizona       28-49   17.5

Has anyone noticed how little of the baseball conversation these days seems to be about baseball? No one seems all that interested in what's going on out on the diamond. It seems to me that everyone is looking at the game and imagining they're either in the dugout, second-guessing the manager, or in the front office, second-guessing the GM. Trapped by the illusion of knowledge, and in hot pursuit of that eternal will'o'the'wisp - the idea that the game can be understood, and maybe even controlled. The Steinbrenner Fallacy.

I've done it often enough my own self. I don't even know how to justify it it - all I can say is that what Gaston is doing or what Anthopoulos is doing doesn't make sense to me, according to what I know of the game and situation. But always, always bearing in mind that the total tonnage of what Gaston and Anthopoulos know that I don't know would stop a team of oxen in their tracks...

It's a part of the baseball conversation I'd simply rather do without these days. I'm just tired of it. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. And I've contributed enough hot air for one lifetime, thank you very much. (Although it's extremely unlikely that I've actually finished with the hot-air generation...)

I have this idea that I want to go to a ball game and, first of all, not have to work: not have to record what happens on every pitch, not follow the ball every time it's put in play. I think it would be fun to focus on the fielders who aren't involved in the play... the silly little things that you can't see on televison because they're outside the action of the moment - the third baseman backing up the pitcher after a pickoff attampt at first, the middle infielders, scurrying into cutoff positions, the first baseman trailing the runner to second base...

And some other time for all that stuff that produces so much heat, so little illimination, and pretty well no pleasure.

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