mathematically eliminated #12 the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim

Somewhere towards the end of last season, Albert Pujols made that Sammy Sosa-like transition from baseball darling to evil cocksucker. So when he signed a majillion dollar deal to play for the Angels, it only made him seem worse. Thus the Angels season was a power struggle between Evil Asshole Under-performing Haha Stupid Angels and Young Kid Mike Trout Super Human Baseball Is Great memes. Personally, Mike Trout is too stereotypical a baseball player name for me not to assume he is a closet racist, rapes fat chicks for leisure on road trips, and is also a going to end up an evil asshole being he is young and malleable and under the tutelage of elder evil assholes of baseball like Pujols. Thus, the Angels not making the playoffs is really funny to me, like when the Red Sox or Yankees don't make it, just with a west coast flavor. Of course, you cannot make angry light of the Angels without mentioning how stupid the whole "Los Angelese Angels of Anaheim" thing is.
Also, Bobby Grich forever.

Blue Jays 11, Angels 2; Angels 10, Blue Jays 6: So It Goes

canada day cursive: makes me want ginger ale (even more than usual)

On Saturday, Peter Bourjos, who is awesome, dropped a fly ball and the Blue Jays scored a million runs and won handily. In a much more interesting and yet ultimately contemptible game Sunday, the Toronto bullpen coughed it up and sent the Canada Day crowd home hating their country. But what can you do? We still basically have no guys, but we're still only 2.5 out of the wild card, somehow, with Kansas City coming in for three, so it could all be worse. It could all be, I guess, slightly worse.


KS

Blue Jays 7, Angels 5: Adam Lind, Home Run Hero

home run hero adam lind amidst several lessers

I am not going to act like I thought Adam Lind had even a little bit more to give, even after he tore it up in Triple A, which, I mean, he'd better have torn it up in Triple A, as I may well have said at the time (I am unwilling to check). So yeah it came as a full-on surprise to me that Lind jacked not one but two entirely credible dingers last night, leading the Blue Jays to victory with his mighty wallops. Other cool things that happened twice last night include Rajai Davis stealing two bases, which is way less surprising than Rajai getting on, because on those rare occasions he reaches he just takes bases at will man he just straight up takes them. It is always somewhat more surprising when E5 swipes a couple, but swipe them he did! All of these cool things happened in support of the totally useful Carlos Villanueva, who just goes out and pitches completely OK-ly in whatever role he's cast in, and just like that, the Blue Jays did not make me sad on this night. That's all it took: all of those many things.


KS

Angels 9, Blue Jays 7: The Angels Are Sort of Good Now, The Blue Jays Less So

pretty much yeah

No, Brett Cecil did not pitch well, and yes, Jose Bautista dinged his twenty-sixth dinger of the year last night, but what I would like to talk to you about here however briefly is how there was totally this little pigeon that made its way from the first baseline to the third baseline in the fifth inning, and as it approached the pitcher's mound and time had to be called, the crowd went nuts for it, and Jerry Howarth called it all like it was the most exciting thing to have happened during a baseball game in weeks, which maybe it was. Baseball is awesome.


KS

Angels 6, Blue Jays 2; Angels 4, Blue Jays 3: Well That Was A Funny Looking Four-Game Sweep

hey congrats on the dinger I hate you

Winning the first two on the road against the lowly Angels in such sick fashion made me greedy, and I have been punished by the gods (the old ones probably) with two dispiriting losses. Albert Pujols finally hit a home run and that is something we were all supposed to be interested in but I refuse to be. The only thing I wish to share with you about these games is that I had one of them on the radio and Howarth and Ashby were still casually referring to Vernon Wells as "Vernon" as I do too and probably will forever and my wife said, "He's 'Wells' now; they should call him 'Wells,'" and what could anyone do but reflect on the fleeting nature of all things.


KS

Blue Jays 4, Angels 0: I Hope You Enjoy Back-to-Back Shutouts

Bautista has the coolest batting gloves here imo

A night after Brandon Morrow threw a complete game three-hitter, Henderson Alvarez allowed six hits going the distance for a shutout of his own. Which ruled. Also Jose Bautista (whose BABIP has got to straighten out sooner or later, you'd think, but at present: yikes) hit his fifth home run of the year. Will Kyle Drabek make it three shutouts in a row tonight? Almost certainly not! But it would be cool if he did!

KS

Blue Jays 5, Angels 0: I Probably Have to Stop Minding Brandon Morrow

neat

I went to bed last night wondering if J. P. Arencibia's three-run home run was going to stand up, and it turns out it totally did, because Brandon Morrow threw a three-hitter against the unexpectedly woeful Angels. Will that be enough for me to finally stop minding Brandon Morrow, a little? Only time will tell. 


KS

Blue Jays 11, Angels 2: Baseball is Crazy, Man

Ricky Romero, unflapped.

Just crazy! Yesterday I was pretty sure I was about to sit down to a pitcher's duel between Jered Weaver, who is having the best season of any pitcher in the AL who isn't Justin Verlander, and Ricky Romero, who has been very good and of whom I am fond, so I was ready to go. Then it turned out that the Blue Jays decided to give a bunch of guys the day off against the Weaver and his wacky arm slot and release point, sending the following obviously awful lineup out there to get slaughtered:


Escobar
Thames
Encarnacion
Lind 
Arencibia
Teahan
Lawrie
Davis
McDonald


Gadzooks! On top of that, Romero missed with ten straight pitches -- nine of them fastballs -- in the first before escaping the inning with a helluvtimely double play. It did not look good. I seriously, seriously considered going outside. 


But, no problem, Romero settled in and allowed only one run on two hits over seven innings, and the Blue Jays bats just ripped Weaver to shreds, no big deal. Encarnacion hit one out in the first. Lind hit a grand slam in the fifth, an inning that went so amazingly that even Mark Teahan got in on it. Every Blue Jay in the lineup -- in that lineup -- had a hit yesterday. Against Jered Weaver.


Baseball, man.


KS

Angels 3, Blue Jays 1: Good lookin' out, Jo-Jo Reyes

Pray for Jo-Jo.

First off, that was more than anyone could have rightly expected from Jo-Jo Reyes. The bullpen was so wiped out after the sheer madness of Saturday night's fourteen-inning debacle that the Blue Jays called up reliever Scott Richmond over night -- and sent down Mike McCoy, which is too bad, but so it goes. Jo-Jo, though, got it done: one earned run over seven complete is pretty commendable out of a guy who, as Alan Ashby said on the radio, "is just trying to have a career." Jo-Jo's struggles are our struggles. I could go on, but we are all just people, people trying to be happy, is what I'm getting at here, and, fundamentally, Jo-Jo Reyes, c'est moi. 

The two unearned runs that fell the Angels' way were kind of amazing: Rajai Davis just dropped it.  Like, there was the ball, about to be caught like it was not a big deal -- because in fact it was not a big deal -- and there was Rajai, just plain dropping it in a way that would make you think unkind thoughts about a member of your intermediate co-ed intramural softball team, but of course you would never give voice to those thoughts, because that's the kind of behaviour that has no place in intermediate co-ed intramural softball (you know what, why don't you just take that attitude to advanced co-ed intramural softball, pal?). Rajai later left the game with an ankle injury, and with McCoy sent down that meant center fielder Travis Snider! That could have been a nightmare, but wasn't. So that was cool.

Still on the subject of things that didn't go as badly as they might have, that fourth inning could have been way, way worse than it was had Jose Bautista not made a diving catch in right for the third out (take that, haters), which allowed Jo-Jo to go back out there for what turned out to be his three best innings of the day. Bautista saved Jo-Jo, and Jo-Jo saved the bullpen.

Of couse Jered Weaver struck out fifteen and allowed only four hits over 7 2/3 innings, but what are you going to do; that guy is awesome. The Blue Jays really needed to get more out of their half of the sixth, but with two men on, Bautista was called out on a pretty funny looking strike (I concede nothing, haters). 

And so the Blue Jays make their way to Seattle, where there is every reason to expect Romero and Drabek to absolutely carve up that wretched lineup. Also it will be neat to see Felix Hernandez pitch, because I basically never do. Farewell, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim: I will forever admire the first-to-thirdness of the soul that you so hustlingly embody, even if Baseball Prospectus is right that last season such basepathic enthusiasm produced a net loss. You may very well be running your way into outs, but you continue to run your way . . . into my heart.

Oh yeah, finally, holy shit is Vernon Wells ever struggling: .100/.163/.125. Poor guy.