Let's hope Lidle responds positively for a full outing. His pattern this year is three to four innings of beauty, followed by a collapse.

The Jays are 2-0 against the Red Sox on Patriots day according to the Red Sox radio guys. I will take any good omen I can get.

Somebody -- probably Sparky Lyle -- said good omens were the only ones he paid attention to. So I'll ignore that Delgado hit into a double play after Stew and Cat started the inning with singles.

CBS Sportsline is again ahead of the Internet radio call, if you're stuck at the office today.

Lidle's inconsistency this year..

Start 1 - Allowed 7 hits, 5 in the 2nd inning
Start 3 - Allowed 7 hits, 4 in the 4th inning
Start 4 - Allowed 7 hits, 6 in the 5th inning

He looks like a star, then he looks like a bum. Like Harvey Haddix he bunches his hits.

Wheeeeee.

When do we get to declare Hinske's slump over? I say today.

Woodward hits a HR. 7-0 in the 3rd.

Eric's having himself a helluva morning. Another RBI double. Myers cashes in two. 5-0 Jays (cue eerie music). BOOM! Woody connects. 7-zip. And it all started with a 2-out walk.

Anybody watching the game on TV? I am following on the web. I assume there is nothing like bad pitching to get hitters out of their slump.

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy than John Burkett. Phelps, Hinske and Myers got to him twice, then Woodward added a little flourish. Note to other AL managers: walking Delgado can be just as bad as pitching to him.

Cory just has to pace himself through seven, and the flight to Florida is going to be just a little bit more fun. Any of the bullpen critics want to do a little first-guessing? Who needs work? Who "should" be used today? When?

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Bullpen second guessers.. here's your chance to first guess. How long should Lidle stay in?

I won't pick an inning, but I'll say between 100-105 pitches, then go to someone in the bullpen. What's your take?

MP

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Jeez, Coach you beat me to it.

I'd say give Kershner a try, but since they're playing in Fenway, that might not be a great idea. Maybe Tosca will want to have Tam redeem himself.

MP

Tam sort of redeemed himself on Saturday with his 1 1/3 on Saturday but he didn't have the lead if that's what you mean.

I have to think the only person unavailable will be Lopez. I'd like to see Escobar get more work today.

Who needs work ?

Creek, Escobar and Miller all have just 5 innings pitched. I guess they would be the top candidates. Everyone seems to have been in a game recently but Tosca has had the LaRussa thing going on.

I'm sure most of us would like to see Lopez get a couple of innings.

AIEEEE! Here they come again!

I pronounce Hinske's slump officially over.

If the bullpen blows this one, I may be tempted to commit a felony.

Which felony?

Now, admittedly, I am only licensed to practice in New York State, but aren't felonies called "indictable offences" in Ontario?

Great minds think alike, MP. For sure, they didn't bring Kershner up to watch. In fact, he'll be the #1 lefty, as neither Miller nor Creek has assumed that role. He's not overpowering, but if he gets people out, Tosca will use him in the high-leverage spots. Miller, at this point, is ahead of Creek, at least in my bullpen. I'd get Politte out there again today, for sure. He needs to be thinking about successes, not that last pitch.

There are no more places for Hinske to double; he's used all three fields. This must now be considered a typical Woodward plate appearance -- Ball, Foul, Foul, Ball, Foul, Ball, Hinske to third on wild pitch, Woodward walked -- Chris is making pitchers crazy, from the 8-hole.

Stewart with a 2-out RBI single, Eric scores again and it's 8-2.

Hey, just tuned into MLB TV on my desktop. Truly an excellent at-bat by Stew: a good eye; spoiled a ton of pitches by protecting and fouling balls off; and a sharply hit RBI single with two out. 8-2 and the Jays should finally salvage one.

Marathon Monday in Beantown,lets hope this doesn't turn into a four hour debacle.

Lidle doing okay,appears to be elevating his curve a little bit too much.Lidle actually started the game second in the A.L. in strikeouts(26/4 ratio in 26 innings)Thats pretty good but his ERA is poor,why the discrepancy?

Thats pretty good but his ERA is poor,why the discrepancy?

Homeruns are not the issue. His hits allowed must be being clumped efficiently by the opposition. I'm more inclined to write that off as random chance rather than a "weakness" on Lidle's part (i.e., making poor pitchers with men on base).

Going off topic here while there is a good sized audience...

I wasn't around for the last few games so this subject may very well have already been discussed. If so, my apologies.

On Friday's game, why the hell was no one attempting to steal off Wakefield? He does have a quick move to the plate, but Mirabelli was only cleanly catching about half his pitches.

There was one instance where there were two outs, Wells at bat and Stewart on first. Definitely a running situation for Stewart (in fact, the SportsNet producer elected to show the view of the field from behind home plate), but there were not even any bluffs from Stewart nor mention of such from the talking heads.

It's one thing to downplay the importance of stealing, which the organization seems to have done, but to entirely dismiss it as an option seems ludicrous.

Is there something I don't know? Is Stewart suffering from hamstring problems or something?

Woody will be buying the beers tonight ,2 botched DP balls.Lidle deseves better.

Most unfortunate. I think Cory gets to face Millar, but I'd rather see Lopez try Manny. After that, it might be Kershner time, which would make a Nomar appearance likely.

Surprisingly, Lopez is in after being the only bullpen arm to throw a significant number of pitches yesterday. That sort of tells you the confidence Tosca has in the other members of his bullpen.

El Aguila! The aquiline one stays in to face the lefty Ortiz, with Hillenbrand on deck. And he gets him. 9-6 good guys.

Why did Berg bat for Phelps? Was Josh hurt when he got hit by that pitch?

Why did Berg bat for Phelps? Was Josh hurt when he got hit by that pitch?

With the big lead and the game a virtual lock, Tosca wanted to give the subs some playing time.

I tried to type that with a straight face, but couldn't.

Sorry, I don't know the real reason Phelps was taken out.

Earlier in the game it appeared Phelps fouled a pitch hard off his foot,perhaps why he was subbed.

Tom Cheek speculated it was the plunking on the elbow that forced Phelps to leave.

Carlos must have had a vision of the Berg HR -- 10-6.

Politte is in, so let the squawking begin. I'm completely on the same page as Tosca. You use the setup guy and the closer; yesterday is history. Cliff was too careful with the dangerous Nixon, but he went after Varitek, only to lose him too. A ground ball would sure help.

Myers takes Brandon Lyon deep. Kelvim's thinking, "of course, it was a non-save situation."

"Kelvim coming on in a non-save situation."

Yikes.

Perhaps, because of Kelvim's problems this year, we can get the league to issue an edict whereby a 5-run lead for Escobar does satisfy the save criteria.

It's the minimum sized lead I feel safe with him protecting.

Well, that was easy. Bring on the Devil Rays!

There's a "Kent" talking to Mike Wilner right now? Could that be our very own Coach?

While one might be tempted to classify Lidle's high ERA as due to chance, I tend to think he really does change his approach when he starts losing confidence. Having been at a game he pitched against Minnesotta I witnessed it first hand. As soon as a couple of runners get on, Lidle slows right down to slower-than-Trachsel pace and completely undermines the rhythm he had going to breeze through the early portion of a game.

His control within the strike zone is also an issue. If he loses it even for brief stretches, he can be hit hard and get into trouble very quickly. He has to live around a hitter's knees and relies on location and movement as his velocity is not overpowering.

Yes, Eddie. I called to see if Mike had a Phelps update (he was working on it) and what he knew about Jayson Werth (wait 12 hours for his callup to be official). I didn't plug Batter's Box; maybe another time.

Too bad we won't get to see more of Reed Johnson.

I knew it - the voice goes with the picture.

Good question btw.

From Peter Gammons' latest:

Red Sox manager Grady Little has deemed Brandon Lyon his closer for now, less than 10 innings into his major league career as a reliever. "He throws strikes and he's fearless," said Little, who in time will see if his stuff holds on back-to-back days and whether or not Lyon's old bugaboo pitching out of the stretch gets him. Teammates kid Lyon that he doesn't know the difference between the ninth and sixth inning, which is why he got nicknamed "Spicoli" (from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High") by the Jays.

Can't be our pal Spicol; he was commenting above while Lyon served up the gopher ball to Myers.

I'm surprised they don't try to use Johnson a bit to see what he can do...as far as I can see there's no rush to get Werth up here and Johnson fits that utility role ideally.

Right now I'm more concerned about the middle infield...Woodward and Hudson have been making game altering errors.

From the transactions on ESPN.com

Toronto Blue Jays Optioned catcher Reed Johnson to Syracuse of the International League (AAA); recalled outfielder Jayson Werth from Syracuse.

I know Reed is good, I never knew he was a catcher too!

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This somehow got put in the wrong thread.. this is the second time it's happened to me. Weird.

---

Johnson must be wondering what more he had to do to stay in the bigs.. I mean, he was only hitting .500. :)

I'd like to see both Johnson and Werth in the bigs with one less pitcher, but I know that isn't going to happen anytime soon.

MP

Wait, so if Lyon has been Brandoned the closer, does this mean the committee is over?

Maybe we trade bring up both Werth and Johnson and trade Stewart.

Another Gammons tidbit:
"Best left fielders: Hideki Matsui, Garret Anderson, Jacque Jones, with a vote for Shannon Stewart."

Stewart's trade value is as high as it has been for a while. Gammons is like Warren Buffet in the way he can affect the market.

Gammons is like Warren Buffet in the way he can affect the market.

I think you may be overstating Gammons' influence.

I do believe it's true that he's occasionally leaked information for the purposes of floating trial balloons. But I believe he's also just as frequently leaked misinformation (unbeknownst to him) for strategic purposes, say salary negotiations.

The trouble is, when you listen to him you don't know whether you are getting information, misinformation or his own self-produced rumour.

Wow, the Jays won, it's a love in all over the batters box map once again, as per usual. Real tough crowd. A round of circle-jerks for everyone.

Chuck,

I guess sarcasm doesn't come out very well in print. Really though, was I overestimating Gammons' influence or overestimating Buffett's influence?

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Gee, Yawn, I know I haven't questioned anything the Jays have done today.

Wanker.

MP

"Gee, Yawn, I know I haven't questioned anything the Jays have done today." - M.P.

What does this even mean?

With the recall of Werth if he is sent to RF what then are the plans of the braintrust as regards the Cat and then possibly Hudson, this starts a domino effect with some interesting possibilities

I think they'll go with a lefty-righty platoon of Cat-Werth in RF. Cat can rest his back occasionally from the turf, and be used as a PH coming off the bench when Werth is starting. If Tosca really wants to push the envelope, he can use Cat as part of the 2B rotation. Cat should get 400 to 450 at-bats, Werth should probably get 150 to 200 at-bats.

I would hope Werth gets more like 300-400 at bats if he's going to come up now. I think he'll be able to spell all three outfielders (for whom days off have been rare), Delgado at first, and be the emergency catcher.

I went to the New Haven game last night. Arnold dominated the whole time. 6 innings, 1 hit, 1 walk, 1 hit batsmen, 7 or 8 K’s. The first few innings I was behind home plate and was able to see the radar readings. His fastball was as high as 92, but more consistently in the 87-90 range. His changeup was in the low 70’s and his other(s?) offspeed pitch was in the low 80s. He only gave up 1 hard hit ball the entire 6 innings, and that was tracked down at the wall by Rios (I didn’t see any dimensions, but it looked like the wall in CF was at least 400 ft. It was 340 ft down the left field line). The hit given up was a grounder to RF.

Quiroz threw out the only basestealer, an unusual site for this Jays fan. He’s referred to as ‘Q’ and ‘GQ’.

JF Griffin was the big hitter. He had an opposite field shot in his first at bat over the LF’s head. The next at bat he hit a towering jimmy jack right now the RF line.

Gross looked bad in his first 2 at bats before getting a hit to left center that he stretched into a double. He walked his next AB.

Fun fact of the night: Diego Markwell and Andruw Jones are first cousins.

A ‘huge’ crowd of about 150 last night. I think JP will be signing Vlad now with all that extra revenue. The Yale Bowl isn’t awful (of course, I went to Silver Stadium growing up….) but it certainly is a bowl. The foul ground size and shape is similar to Oakland.