If we didn't already need another reason to love Marco, he just took Blanton to 10 pitches in the game's first AB.

And another reason? Blanton walks him. Scutaro jogs to first and sees that no one is covering second so makes a mad dash for the bag, getting there easily. I'm not sure I have ever seen that before.

Scutaro and Rios average out to having a normal baseball IQ.

I mistakenly believed Brad Mills to be the son of the Red Sox coach and ex-Expo of the same name. Watching him pitch, however, he's clearly Jamie Moyer's love child. Same m.o. out there.

I was reading on MLB Trade Rumors that Scutaro is likely to be a Group A free agent this year.. http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2009/06/probable-type-a-free-agents.html

Barajas is on the cusp of Group A.... so depending on what happens this off-season the Jays could be looking at a boatload of picks next draft. 

Not sure how accurate that is but interesting that some of the bigger name guys (Lackey, Vlad, etc) aren't projected to be Group A. 

Noah, let's be fair - Hill didn't get the job done either!

Yes that is fair, but to be fair to Aaron Hill, he has been producing throughout the season.

This circumstance isn't an abberation for Vernon Wells, that is my point.  The fact that he remains the number 3 hitter in our lineup is pathetic.

of course right after I type that Hill strikes out with the bases loaded :-S

Barajas would have to be offered arbitration(and decline) in order for the Jays to get a draft pick from him. If the Jays did offer arbitration and he did decline I can't really see anybody giving up their 1st round pick to sign Barajas.  As For Scutaro I would gladly forfeit any extra picks to get him signed to a 2 or 3 year extension. We have needed a leadoff man and a SS for a long time and we finally found one.

Seems that the Jays do fine with their hitting until they get the bases loaded.  Then they can't hit a thing.  What's the deal with that?

Cito and double-switches. A decade and half later and he still gets flummoxed by the concept.

ROD!!!!

hmmm now who comes out to close the door....?

Accardo get a save opp in his first day back in the bigs?

dear Lord... BJ??? UGH

reverse jinx reverse jinx

22 pitchers already and its not even July. Mercy.

I honestly didn't know if that was a lot, so I went to BBRef -- the 1993 Jays (they did well) only used 16 pitchers the entire season? And the 2004 team (they, uh, did not do so well) used 25 (including Frankie Menechino) ... So yeah, I guess 22 by mid-June is a lot, huh?

The '77 expansion Jays only used 15? Last year's Jays used 19? Last year's World Champ Phillies used 18 and the AL Champ Rays used 21? So yeah, definitely, 22 by mid-June appears to be a LOT.

I hope Stephen Chad Jenkins signs soon - by my math, he should be getting called up to the big club mid-August, right after Andrew Leibel hits the DL

I hope Stephen Chad Jenkins signs soon - by my math, he should be getting called up to the big club mid-August, right after Andrew Leibel hits the DL

Ha! This made me laugh.

At this point, this is my Jays game of the year.

The Ugly:

- This was my first time watching Brad Mills pitch and hopefully it’s the last time at the major league level this season. He makes Jamie Moyer look like he has electric stuff. Mill’s fastball was sitting at 86/87 mph and he had trouble hitting the strike zone with all of his pitches. From what I witnessed, he’s a junkball pitcher. I’m glad Cito gave him the quick hook before the game got out of hand.

- BJ Ryan. I don’t mean to kick a guy while he is down, but Ryan should never be used in a close game unless there are no other pitchers available. As Ryan walked off the mound, he gave Meriwether an earful but the pitchers that were called balls were balls in my eyes. I’ll be Mr. Obvious and say the 2006 Ryan is never going to return.

The Bad:

- I have no idea what Raul Chavez was thinking when he turned around while running towards 1st base in the 7th inning. Fletcher mentioned it could have easily turned into a double play and he was right.

The Good:

- Marco Scutaro. Today was the first time I’ve ever seen a player turn a walk into 2 bases. Once ball 4 was called, he looked at Blanton right away to see if he was paying attention and once he went to 1st base, he took a brief pause and than turned on the burners. Ignoring steals, Scutaro is the best base runner on the Jays. He’s the best SS in the AL this season. If he can keep this up, some team will pay him a lot of money in the off-season and probably regret it.

- Adam Lind. It doesn’t matter if the pitcher is a righty or a lefty, he’s torching them. Lots of people were saying he should have been used as trade bait in the off-season but boy have those discussions disappeared. His pitch recognition has vastly improved.

- Vernon Wells. He had a clutch hit in the 8th and took a hit away from Werth in the 9th.

The Somewhat Amusing:

- If the Phillies tied it up in the bottom of the 9th, Overbay was going to pitch in the 10th. Hey if Swisher can do it, why can’t Overbay?

- The Phillies are 13-19 at home and 23-9 on the road. I have no explanation for this and neither do the Philly players.

Anthopoulos was on the Odd Couple today (PTS with McCown&Brunt) and said some really interesting things, particularly about tracking pitching (appearances, ups, ups & hots).  Anyway, one interesting tidbit was that Janssen would be back throwing on Monday and his days of starting are over.  He also said that Zip would be headed to Vegas to fill in for Cecil/Mills.

Short Season ball starts today.

With Purcey and Castro waiting in the wings, I wonder how many more chances Brad Mills will be given?  He was very unimpressive yesterday, and there really wasn't much at Las Vegas to suggest that he is ready for the majors yet.  One or two more starts, and then Purcey is back?  Based on the season so far, Cito and JP are quite comfortable with limiting the young pitchers to just a small handful of starts before giving them the hook.  It's nice to give Mills a taste of the majors, to prepare him for a possible role in 2010, but there's no point in throwing him out there regularly when there are good pitchers like Purcey and Castro available.

Similarly, I have to wonder whether BJ Ryan will stay much longer on the major-league team.  Cito is openly questioning Ryan's command, and he yanked him very quickly from the 9th inning yesterday.  When a manager is publicly expressing his lack of faith in a reliever, it's a sure sign that he won't be with the team much longer.  It's very interesting that the Jays are now confirming Casey Janssen's future as a reliever.  When he and Downs come off the DL, we might see Ryan going on -- with one of those mysterious injuries that the Jays like to trot out as an excuse to send a pitcher to extended spring training for a while.

Here are Cito's actual words about BJ Ryan, which show (rather devastatingly) his lack of trust in the guy:   "It's not so much his velocity," Gaston said. "He doesn't have any control."

Cito said this BEFORE yesterday's game, when Ryan committed the near-fatal sin of issuing a leadoff walk in the 9th inning of a one-run game. Cito must have been even more furious after that.

And here, courtesy of Jordan Bastian, are the particulars on Ryan's failure to throw strikes:  During Ryan's last nine appearances, which included 6 2/3 innings, he has allowed four hits and issued five walks, throwing strikes at a 56-percent rate. On Wednesday against Philadelphia, Ryan used 17 pitches and threw only six strikes to the four hitters he faced. 

But there are worse things than striking out.

Here in Tejas, Chris Davis would like to see you sell that poster far and wide!

Cito and double-switches. A decade and half later and he still gets flummoxed by the concept.

This seems a little unfair, now that we have the full explanation of what happened in yesterday's game.  He wasn't flummoxed by the concept at all.  He knew exactly how to switch the players in the lineup, and he was in the process of making the right moves.  He just screwed up on an extremely technical point:  the procedure for informing the umpire.  The manager has to approach the umpire before going to the mound.  Cito made the simple mistake of going to the mound before informing the umpire.  It was a mental error, and he admitted it today.  To me, this seems like a mistake that anyone could make, in the heat of a game, especially when the rules are quite technical on this point.  To imply that Cito is a stupid man who is "flummoxed" by the basic strategy of doing a double-switch, even after 15 years -- that goes too far and is quite unfair to the guy.

Here is the full story on Cito's error:  http://mlbastian.mlblogs.com/