And why have him play the outfield when you have Matt Stairs filling that role.

Then again, the fact that he can play pretty much anywhere and there's no obvious replacement for him in Syracuse makes me wonder whether there's any real advantage of cutting him loose at this point. Unless, of course, you think that Roberts, Griffin or Adams is ready to come up for good, which I don't. Or you're president of the Chad Mottola fan club, which I'm not.

On the Fan 590 yesterday morning, Zaun had some interesting comments to the effect that the Jays had to do a better job of playing with a lead.  He called out Burnett in particular, saying that once the offence spots him a couple of runs, the pitchers really have to shut the opposition down.  Those are valid points, and games one and three of the Cleveland series are more grist for that particular mill, what with the team blowing early three and four run leads, respectively. 

But that points to another problem the Jays seem to exhibit from time to time, although perhaps no more than other teams.  After putting up a bunch of early runs, the lineup stops producing - the Jays scored one run in the final 8 innings Tuesday, one in the final six Thursday.  If the team keeps the pedal down, it would take a spectacular pitching meltdown to hand the game away, instead of just an ordinary one.  

Bring on the Rangers!

The extremely ticked-off Rangers, incidentally. The only reason they're not totally getting thrown under the bus locally in North Texas is the little matter of the Mavericks Meltdown which is of course dominating sports talk radio and news.

I'm not sure I understand what the attraction is with Wayne Lydon, but I admit I don't know much about him.

What's the big deal with a guy that cannot play the infield (as Smith can) and is a career .260 hitter in the minors, with no major league experience.

Is the idea here that management just needs to light a fire under the team's collective butt?

   The latest quotes from Ricciardi are proof of what I've always said:   he routinely lies about injuries.  Last year he lied abour Burnett and Rios, and this year he lied about Ryan.    It betrays a lack of respect for the fans.  In fact he has an arrogance that verges on contempt for the fans.   If he lies about injuries, what else is he lying about?   That's all very well when the team is winning, but it will backfire on him very badly when the team is losing.   If the fans feel that he is misleading them and manipulating them, they'll desert him in droves when the team has another disappointing year.

My response to this latest imbroglio is the same as it was during l'affaires Hillenbrand and Lilly last year.  These things never would have happened when Paul Beeston and Pat Gillick ran the show, or at least if they had, there would have been serious repercussions for the delinquents involved.  The Jays used to be a class organization.  I'm not sure exactly when that ceased - whether it was the Interbrew regime or the current one - but they aren't any more, that's for sure.  And as someone who has been a fan of the team for 25 years, it's terribly disappointing.

I think Ted Rogers needs to clean house - Godfrey, Ricciardi and Gibbons should all be relieved of their duties.

Phew, I'm relieved. Here i thought Ryan had elbow problems and a bad back. ;-)

Something about Ricciardi and how he conducts himself has always bothered me. That put me offside with the former management of this site. Somebody said it earlier. This was a classy organization. One that dispite being in Canada was respected.

The hands on the Ricciardi doomsday clock have been moved forward again. 

Gibby better watch himself as he could be carried of to the sacrificial alter as a distraction.

If people decide that they no longer want to support an administration that has a President that "lied" about weapons of mass detruction by saying it was a threat to our homes and the very fabric of our nation, well then I feel sorry for those people. Actually on that note, anybody who doesn't support their Administration  team because of any President, is simply a fool to begin with.

Sorry VBF, just a little fun with propoganda and embelishment. ;-)

I really don't care that Ricciardi lied.  People lie all the time, and I don't take it personally.  I just wish I could understand why.  It's the stupidity of the whole thing.  If J.P. was trying to deal Ryan, then at least he'd have a motive for lying.  In contact sports, there's some logic behind lying about the location of an injury.  But what purpose does it serve to lie about the location or severity of Ryan's injury?  It's not like another team could take advantage of the situation by targeting the elbow!  The only thing I can think of right now that makes sense is if the Jays were trying to deal for bullpen help at the time, and Ricciardi was concerned that if the team they were talking to learned of the severity of Ryan's injury they could demand more from the Jays.

Anyway, I'm much more frustrated with Ricciardi over his use of pitchers this year, and this is the least of my worries. 

Yes, God forbid we, you know, support a team during a time of bad management

Ask Leaf fans how their 40-year plus investment in bad management has worked out for them.

In any event, I'd be curious to see the evidence behind your contention that the Blue Jays are good for the local economy.  All the economic studies I've seen suggest that a local sports team has less impact on the local economy than a typical Wal-Mart.  I'm not in a position to link to any of them at the moment, but if you do a Google search on Andrew Zimbalist, you'll find lots of interesting analysis.