mathematically eliminated #7 the Oakland Athletics

It was such a magical glorious run for the A's, to not only fire up from nothing to challenge for the wild card, but to actually steal the AL West title on the last day of the season. They did not lead the division all year long until the very end of the last game. That is amazing. Then they drop the first two to Detroit and it looks like the magic was over. But no, the A's are cocksure assholes who looked at Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder's giant auras and said, "Fuck you Jobus, I do this for us," and they did it.
But then along comes Justin Verlander, who does what only he can do - shut a fucking team down for a complete game 4-hitter, on the road, like a boss. But those scrappy Athletics, who were supposed to be in some sort of pretend rebuilding process - which is what you are required to say the year after you trade away all your good players for a bunch of unknown dudes, had a great run, one that the poor tormented and cockteased fans of Oakland will long remember as the latest and greatest underdog moment of near glory. And as much as I dig the Tigers, I have to admit, it would've been pretty awesome to see an As/Os ALCS, not only for the double underdog factor, but also because of the beautiful uniform colors on display. Dark blue and white is so fucking boring, with pinstripes and old english Ds. Baseball doesn't need more of that. It needs more oranges and yellows and greens and craziness and magic. Alas, the magic came to an end, at least on the west coast.

Blue Jays 3, Athletics 1 (F/11); Blue Jays 6, Oakland 5: It Is Going to Be Like This The Rest of the Way Isn't It

don't act like you've never seen Moises Sierra before, jaws all on the floor , etc.

So yeah hot on the heels of all of the muck and shit and despair of basically the whole west-coast trip until Saturday, the Blue Jays picked up two against the A's to put them, well, five games out of the wild card, which is to say, just close enough that you keep checking the scoreboard but far enough back that they are still totally doomed. What we have before us now is a team of unrecognizable dudes, several of whom I am sure will be totally serviceable, but seriously man this is too much. Today, for instance, both Drew Hutchison and Dustin McGowan are going under the knife. Two dudes. Same day. Why not. 

KS

Mariners 4, Blue Jays 1; Marines 7, Blue Jays 2; Mariners 5, Blue Jays 3; Athletics 4, Blue Jays 1; Athletics 5, Blue Jays 4 (F/15): OK Cool What Did I Miss

in there, regrettably

Due to my almost fanatical devotion to the Olympics in general and Olympic judo in particular, I have barely had baseball on at all over this last week, and one day I didn't even check the previous night's score until like three in the afternoon, a thing that is, I assure you, a thing that is rare. So let's see here what did I miss oh OK they have lost all of the games and traded away Eric Thames and Travis Snider alright see you in a bit.

KS

Athletics 7, Blue Jays 2; Athletics 16, Blue Jays 0; Blue Jays 10, Oakland 4: Even With That Win This One Felt Like a Sweep

me too, rick

Yeah, that second game was so fucked up that it cast a shadow over what should have been a pretty cool win in the getaway game. Romero has got to be hurt or something, right? There is no way he could just have gotten this bad this quickly, is there? This is just depressing. As is this: with J. P. Arencibia out for a while now, you'd think this would be an exciting opportunity to get a look at Travis D'Arnaud, one of the top catching prospects in all of baseball, but no, he wrecked his knee. So get used to Jeff Mathis, I guess, who actually pitched the ninth in the blowout, which is the sort of thing we all like to see I think (not kidding here actually). 


Coming into this series I was telling myself things like, "all we need is a sweep here against these ridiculously and unaccountably hot and possibly even magical Oakland A's, and we're tied for the wild card," which, looking back, may have been folly on my part. 


And yet, with basically no players at all at this point, here we sit, right at .500, a mere four games out of the wild card. What if everybody totally got healthy right away? What if this major-league-leading offense (look it up, it's true!) were supported by a couple of even league-average arms picked up before the trade deadline? What would all of that do to me? 


Oh yeah also Jason Frasor's arm is in ruins, how about that.

KS

Blue Jays 5, Athletics 2: Now That Wasn't That Hard, Was it

lovin' that stride

All it took was an overdue demotion of the basically reprehensible (baseballically, I mean) Adam Lind -- a man who is a career 2.4 WAR player, guys/ladies -- to the eighth spot in the lineup and a promotion of my main man Casey Janssen to the closer spot (a made-up spot that should be abolished in my view because I am enlightened in that regard) and there you have it, a nice and easy 5-2 win in which Brandon Morrow was cool and Lind (and Arencibia and E5) homered and Janssen pitched a still-as-deepest-sleep ninth and we are golden. That's the way, fellows!


Did you know that the Blue Jays are actually second in the AL in run differential this year, behind only the mighty Texas Rangers? Isn't that awesome? No doubt, there have been areas of concern: too many blown saves (a stat that I of course despise; see earlier parenthetical remark re: my enlightenment), some troubling outings from Kyle Drabek, from whom we had smokey expectations (indeed, the smokiest), and Jose Bautista not at all doing what we have come to expect him to do. Also have I mentioned that Adam Lind is wretched? But E5 has been a beast, Kelly Johnson has been really good, and the starting pitching has been, on the whole, as good as you could have hoped, really. With four games against the pitiably lowly Minnesota Twins and so a chance to really put some wins together here before some big games with Tampa and New York, I remain wildly optimistic about what this season could bring! Seriously I do! Also my wife got me a new fitted hat for my birthday! How is that for excitement?  Tonight my friend was like, "Hey did you get that for your birthday?" and I was like "Yeah!" 


AND TODAY THE BLUE JAYS SIGNED VLADIMIR GUERRERO! On my birthday! Were you aware that every time I play Baseball Mogul, like every time, I move heaven and earth to get Vladimir Guerrero on my team? Of course you were not aware of that, but that doesn't make it any less true. Like, if I were running the IRL Toronto Blue Jays right now, this is absolutely something I would have done. Immediately. Actually maybe instead of feeling amazingly about Alex Anthopolous for making this happen, maybe I should be furious he didn't do it sooner? Anyway: come to me Vladi. Come to me.


KS  

Athletics 7, Blue Jays 3: I Am Glad I Went to Bed

Perfect Strangersesque

Instead of staying up for this one, I watched the Game of Thrones where Ned Stark gets played to the death and then I went to bed furious and saddened at that injustice and it really is better that I did not tune in for Francisco Cordero's complete collapse that made a hash out of Ricky Romero's imperfect but credible quality start and delighted the nine people in attendance in Oakland but that would have caused me to consider a life of complete emotional detachment from all things had I been witness to it as it unfolded.


KS