Weekly Round Up : Feb. 1 - 7

 

Your Toronto Blue Jays acquired LHP Dana Eveland, 26, from the Oakland A's for a player to be named later or cash considerations.  Eveland is out of options and has 2.065 years of Major League Service Time.  He made 401K last season and had a record of 2 - 4 with a 7.16 ERA.  For his career, Eveland is 13-17 with a 5.54 ERA over 83 games, including 44 starts.  Don't get to worked up about this one, he's a long shot to make the opening day roster.

One interesting note about this trade, currently as I write this, we have 41 players on our 40 man roster.  That's one too many.  Look for Dirk to be placed on the 60 day DL due to his exploratory surgery gone bad.  On Friday in Cleveland Dr. Schickendantz ended up repairing the fraying of his labrum in his pitching shoulder.  This is the same procedure that Dustin McGowan had and it cost him a full season and a bit.  I think I'm going to go buy his book, just cuz.  

Courtesy of  CBS Sports:

Townsend signs with Blue Jays: SP Wade Townsend has signed a minor league deal with Toronto, according to the St. Petersburg Times. He made three starts in 2009 for the Rays rookie league team in Florida, going 0-1 with a 13.50 ERA.
(Updated 02/06/2010).

Injury Report

No information available at this time (Updated 2/6/10).

Fantasy Analysis

The oft-injured and formerly retired Townsend is nothing more than organizational depth at this point. Ignore him in all Fantasy leagues. (Updated 02/06/2010).

Courtesy of Fangraphs:

Right now, the Jays have three players under contract for 2011: Vernon Wells ($26.6M), Aaron Hill ($5M), and John McDonald ($1.5M). Those guys total just over $33 million in commitments. That figure will increase significantly once they hand out arbitration raises to virtually their entire pitching staff (they have a stunning 11 pitchers who will be arbitration eligible next winter), but you’re still looking at only between $40 and $50 million in salaries for the guys who should be Blue Jays next year.

This is assuming they do not tender a contact to either E5 or Bautista.  We are going to have a hell of a lot of cash to spend next off season.  Over at mlbtraderumors they have a link for potential 2011 MLB free agents.  A couple of interesting names are: Carl Crawford, Manny, Jason Werth, Adam Dunn, Carlos Pena, Josh Beckett, Cliff Lee.  There are going to be quite a few studs on the market barring any contract extensions in season.

Courtesy of National Post:

As she oversees the transition to AstroTurf, Kelly Keyes is mindful that a quicker conversion will lead to more stadium bookings. But she also wants "a field that works for the Blue Jays" and their fans.

"Reducing the number of seams will be better for baseball, even just from a visual standpoint," Keyes said. "From what we've seen, the fibres really stand up and it should hide a lot of the seams."

As mentioned briefly before in an earlier post, we are getting a new playing surface at the Dome.  It fucking kills me when I hear shit like what this Kelly chick says.  Thanks for thinking about the fans.  The field is going to be more pretty to look at.  That's fucking great.  Well I guess the plan is to divert attention away from the fact that the team playing on that shiny new field is going to suck.  And the 15,000 or so people that show up to watch games on weekdays probably won't even notice right?  For fuck sakes, we are being predicted to win between 70 and 75 games this year (again) and the cheap bastards at Rogers are upgrading the fucking turf so they can have more stadium bookings?  Does nobody remember why we got rid of this type of shit in the first place?  One word: INJURIES.  Look for Vernon to be limping by July.  Look for the seats to be empty by August.

I have to officially go on record and say: I think Rogers is going to sell the team.  Maybe not right now, but soon.

Question:
What do people do when they decide to sell their home?
Answer:
Clear out all the junk and make it look pretty.  Just saying.

Courtesy of You Don't Know Dick Griffin @ The Star:

Consider that the struggling Nationals finished last overall, partly due to payroll concerns, then were forced to pay the largest bonus in history to keep No. 1 overall pick Stephen Strasburg, a left-handed ace, from going back to university.

I imagine that one of the cutbacks over at The Star due to the global recession was sports editors.  Wow.  Dick, listen, I know you're trying really hard.  And you do sometimes write something that is kinda insightful.  But any chance of me taking you seriously as an expert fly out the window when you say shit like this.  Google the name Stephen Strasburg and what is the first thing you see Dick? First fucking sentence.

Quickly:

A casual fan friend of mine at work today asks me: "What is there to be excited about with the Blue Jays for this upcoming season?"

I paused for a moment, reflected, and came back with: "I got nothing."  Normally the answer would be Doc on the mound every five days but now.....