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The Mockingbird

The Mockingbird: Blue Jays baseball at its best.


Website: The Mockingbird

Just wait, this gets amazing

I know, this looks like just another typical manager mouth-off, but just wait. It gets amazing. Hit tip to BDD for the link, and a rundown of the incident. That ball apparently went straight into the stands (not unlike something I saw at a Jays’ game this year, but it was unintentional and air mailed […]

25Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Just wait, this gets amazing

Just when you think it’s another typical manager shove-off, this video gets amazing. Hit tip to BDD for the link, and a rundown of the incident (including where that ball went. Ow.)

25Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

The Death of a Cutterballer

Litsch is gone! Demoted to AAA in favour of David Purcey (who has been quietly having an amazing season in AAA). Cito had this to pass along from Arnsberg about what could have been causing his recent struggles:
“We’d like him to work on sinking the ball away a little bit more and not throwing as […]

23Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Randomness

Thank goodness for progress - before rule changes made this offseason, Wednesday’s rainout against Baltimore would have been restarted from the first inning even though it made it past five innings, instead of continued at noon tomorrow (because it was a tie at the end of the last completed inning).
You know the season has […]

23Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Wonderfully Strange

At this point, who really cares about the result- but didn’t Tuesday’s game against Baltimore feel like a real baseball game? You know, the kind that other teams play on elysian fields that feature comebacks, multiple lead changes, home runs, a little sweat under the collar in the 9th, etc…Even if B.J. had succeeding in […]

23Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

J.P’s plans for the future

Oh no! The Blue Jays aren’t a whole lot better since the purge of the coaching staff! Quick! Throw some more bodies from the glory days onto the fire…
The Sun tells us that Mel Queen, former pitching instructor (heavily involved with Hentgen and Halladay) and director of player development, has been hired to do some […]

22Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Doc Odds and Ends

First, from two starts ago, Dougie B demands:
Doc appears to be going to the cutter a lot more than usual today. I’m not one to make demands or anything, but is there any chance you could take a look at that with some experienced pitch f/x eyes?
I’m mostly curious because they kept showing him talking […]

21Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

A Ray of Hope

If you haven’t seen this video of Travis Snider winning the AA home run derby, I wouldn’t watch it now. Wait until the next time the Jays pitching staff allows two runs but loses and then watch it over and over until the shaking stops and you can get out of the fetal position.

My favorite […]

19Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

What’s on TV after a 15-inning AS game

Was anyone else rooting for both teams to run out of pitchers!?! I certainly was. Only one more inning and maybe mlb would finally have to admit that the All Star game is actually the terrible joke that everyone knows it is.
Brilliant Idea: why not let a couple pitchers from the “futures game” hang out in […]

16Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Litsch’s Zone (12th)

Here’s the strike zone for Jesse Litsch’s last start. Did it float? Maybe. It was certainly an exaggerated version of the anything-a-foot-outside-as-long-as-it’s-at-the-belt shape of the average umpire zone…

15Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Garland Smokes The Jays

Even though he settled down, it seemed to me that Litsch was getting was hit hard today and it could have been a lot worse than eight hits and six runs. There were a lot of big cuts at hanging pitches instead of the broken bats and jam shots when Jesse is on his game. […]

6Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Checking in with Burnett

With various A.J. Burnett trade rumours flying around, it’s time to check in with his quest to achieve Type A free agent status again. In short, A.J. has to outperform his 2006 numbers in these categories to make it:

Year
Appearances
IP
W
W%
Saves
ERA
WHIP
K’s
K/BB

2006
21
135.2
10
.555
0
3.98
1.30
118
3.02

2008 Pace
33
200
15
.533
0
4.74
1.48
203
2.04

Why do we care? Because other teams certainly will. Even though you can’t literally trade draft […]

3Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Miguel Cairo, Jay Killer?!?!

Do not adjust your sets. The last time the Jays faced the Mariners, Miguel Cairo won the first game with a suicide squeeze and preserved it a great play at first, and then in the last game of the series was bizarrely walked by B.J. Ryan in the 9th to set up another win. This […]

3Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Back to the Grind

The Drunk Jays Fans summed up the other day the sense of perseverance it takes to keep watching the Jays’ second half. As I mentioned in their comments, that song starts with a kid breaking free on the open road for a weekend of freedom and ends with him coming back to have the crap […]

2Jul2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued

Hiatus Update

Long weekends were really not meant for blogging (or surfing, you) but for those poor souls that actually had to go into work on Monday I thought I’d mention that the current HR drought is at 20 innings, and they currently have one of 11 innings going…

30Jun2008 | The Mockingbird | 0 comments | Continued