It's okay, today's game is still a 4:05 pm start -- I just need to post the thread now before heading out for the afternoon. Today is Chasing Steinbrenner Day, starting at Tom Cheek's favourite hangout Alice Fazooli's, then moving on to Section 518 at the Dome, as author Rob Bradford shows up to answer questions, sign books, and join Bauxites at what should be a bang-up ballgame with the Cheer Club. This is a red-letter occasion, and if you still haven't signed up, don't let yourself miss this once-a-year opportunity: click on the home page link and get your last-minute RSVP into Coach right now!

It's also Homecoming Day for Kelvim Escobar, one of the most talented players ever to come up through the Blue Jays system, and certainly one of the most frustrating. The Jays organization can take three lessons from Escobar's Toronto career: (1) don't promote young pitchers to the majors too soon, (2) give young pitchers a consistent role and let them stick with it during good times and bad, and (3) don't overpay to keep your wildly inconsistent free agents. Gord Ash & Co. didn't know the first two, and Jays fans should be very happy that the Ricciardi administration knew the third.

Escobar will be matched up against Ted Lilly in a pairing full of ironies: Lilly is the All-Star that many thought Escobar should have been during his time in Toronto; Lilly is putting up numbers as good or better than Escobar's at one-third the price; and Lilly was essentially acquired for Shannon Stewart (via Bobby Kielty), a move that, like the jettisoning of Escobar, was decried locally for any number of reasons -- but with Stewart now on the DL for over a month in Minnesota, and Lilly giving the Jays their best lefty starter since Jimmy Key, doesn't look so bad after all. Whatever misfortunes have befallen the Jays this year, they would have been no better (if not substantially worse) had Stewart and Escobar still been on the team and in possession of rich, multi-year contracts.