Notes From The Nat

We’ve said the words "Vancouver Canadians’ new GM" more times than we care to remember these past two years or so, because the position has been somewhat of a revolving door… and ’somewhat’ may be the biggest understatement since Marion Jones asked her dentist if she needed any work done.

First there was Dan Kilgras - the tassled loafer GM, who was eventually (according to unconfirmed reports) promoted to Team President to stop him from leaving.

Then there was Delany Dunn - the ‘doing the best with what we’re given’ GM, who was installed to run the team on a shoestring so Kilgras could concentrate on ad sales and sponsorships, until new owners came in with a big broom and let him concentrate on what he does best - the game day experience.

Then there was Aileen McManamon - the ‘bums on seats’ GM, who brought in the biggest crowd in ages for opening day last season, but badly miscalculated what it takes to feed such a crowd once they’re in the door, and was quickly shown same.

Then there was nobody, though Andy Dunn handled the job as a consultant for a while… but not really (shh, Immigration might be listening).

Then there was Andy Dunn - the ‘Major League experience’ GM, who would also be Team President, at least according to the info given to the press a few weeks ago.

And now there’s Andy Seymour [seen above] - the ‘fun is good’ GM, who has stepped into the GM spot that, apparently, Dunn didn’t want, nor actually agree to handle, despite what was said to the press… 

So who is Andy Seymour? Why, he’s the Vancouver Canadians’ new GM… and he’s not one to make short term plans, if his last gig is anything to go by.

From his days dressed up in an inflated sumo wrestling suit, to donninga trenchcoat, hat and sunglasses as the mysterious ?G-man,? to creatingaward-winning promotional campaigns such as ?Billy Donovan Night,?Andrew Seymour has been a fixture for the Fort Myers Miracle sinceSeptember 1995. Not anymore.

The Miracle enter their 18th season as the Class A affiliate of the Minnesota Twins. Seymour has been there for 13 of them.

?Youknow what?s rewarding, is seeing the families growing up,? Seymoursaid. ?This community has been fantastic down here. But I?ll get to gonorth and continue to have fun.?

Get used to that word - ‘fun’.

A supporter of Mike Veeck?sworking motto, ?Fun is Good,? Seymour said he has been strolling downmemory lane as his last day with the Miracle, Wednesday, Jan. 23,approaches. Memories include:

?The Bobble-butt doll. Madein the likeness of Riverdale High School graduate Tommy Watkins, onlyabout 500 of the dolls were made.

?On June 4, 2003, the dayafter Chicago Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa was caught swinging a corked bat,the Miracle announced ?Sammy Sosa Night,? handing out pieces of cork tofans.

?In July 2003, less than a week after Pittsburgh Piratesfirst baseman Randall Simon swung a bat at a Milwaukee Brewers racingsausage, the Miracle held a ?Salute to the Italian Sausage Night? withrandom sausage giveaways and a ?Safe Sausage Race.?

?Lastseason, the Miracle had ?Billy Donovan Night,? at which fans whochanged their minds about attending the game could negotiate with alawyer for refunds, poking fun at the University of Florida basketballcoach who backed out of a contract with the Orlando Magic.

That promotion placed first in the inaugural Minor League Baseball Promotion of the Year Award.

Granted, such a promotion might not hold the crowd’s interest like a pair of three-year-olds building a giant Subway sandwich, or a ‘$1 off your next fish and chips’ voucher from Mr Pickwicks, but one would think we’re in for an interesting ride with Senor Seymour pumping out the bizarro promotions.

Pleasant side benefit: he’s not a pinball executive. That is to say, he doesn’t bounce around from team to team, like many in the minors. And by all accounts, he’s a heck of a guy.

?Asa fan, as a worker and as a friend, I?m dumbfounded to say the least,?[Fort Myers Miracle] season ticket holder Bobby] Izzo said upon hearing the news. ?Andrew?s an institution. He?s theface of the Miracle. He has been forever… There?s not much thatthe man wouldn?t do for anybody. In all the time I?ve known him, Idon?t think I?ve ever seen him have a bad day. I don?t think I?ve everseen a frown on his face. He?s been super… The dedication and the loyalty that I have for the Miracle comes from Andrew.?

It’s not often that when a pro sports GM leaves a town, that people are actually sad about it, and the local press writes glowing tributes of their time with the team.

Some background on the Larry Donovan promotion:

In this much-lauded promotional extravaganza, the Florida StateLeague franchise paid tribute to the painfully indecisive FloridaGators basketball coach (on June 1, Donovan signed a massive contractwith the NBA’s Orlando Magic, but backed out one day later in order toreturn to the University of Florida).

On "Billy Donovan Night," the Miracle did everything short of handingout flip flops to fans as they walked through the turnstiles. But atthe heart of the evening was this little nugget of genius — any fanwho had second thoughts about attending the game was given theopportunity to negotiate out of their ticket purchase by consultingwith a lawyer and then (in certain cases) shooting a basketball througha hoop.

"It was like — Bam! — there it is. There’s our hook. For us, thehoneymoon continued. We put out a teaser about the promo, and theAssociated Press picked it up and ran a story. After that, everybodyjumped on it. All of this occurred during a period when there wasn’tmuch happening in the sports world, so the timing worked out great."

Indeed, the Miracle’s unorthodox promotion received prominent local andnational media coverage, and resulted in a crowd that was more thandouble the team’s Wednesday night average. All in all, it was a fittingstunt for a franchise with ties to the most legendary name in the worldof sports promotions.

And finally, from Seymour’s own bio on the Fort Myers Miracle staff directory:

Often mistaken for THE ROCK, Andrew enjoys entertaining. An interestthat has served him well in his second career as a Motion Pictureaction & Stunt double where Andrew has done body stand-ins for VinDiesel, Sean William Scott, Will Smith and Jack Black. In his sparetime, Andrew enjoys watching infomercials, organizing his fridgemagnets and speaking of himself in the-third-person. Favorite MoviesInclude: Slapshot & House Party 1 thru 4. Favorite Players: PaulKariya, Michael Vick, Torii Hunter & Bill Bellamy. IQ:Self-described ? ?somewhere yo-yo?ing between Nickelodeon and C-Span.?Little known fact: Andrew has written songs for both Luther Campbell& Glen Campbell.

Methinks maybe we got a good deal here.

Side note: While I’m on the ‘good people arriving’ tilt, I should also mention that a good person is leaving the C’s. Long time pleasant person, Game Day Goddess, and Ticket Mistress, Lori Bonang, is moving on to opportunities new.

One of the last remaining folks on staff from the pre-ownership change era, she will be missed (especially by guys like me, fighting opening day crowds to find someone - anyone - who knows where my press pass is).

Be happy, Loz. 

(Nat Bailey Stadium ? Vancouver, B.C.) ? The Vancouver Canadians are proud to announce that Manager Rick Magnante, Pitching Coach Craig Lefferts and Trainer Travis Tims have been assigned to Vancouver (A) for the 2008 Northwest League baseball season.

 Rick Magnante returns for his 3^rd season as Manager of the Canadians compiling a record of 76-75 (.503) guiding Vancouver to 2^ndin the NWL?s Western Division in 2007.  Rick is one win away frombecoming the Canadians Short-Season winningest coach as his 76 wins asManager trail Dennis Rogers 77 (2003-04).  This winter, Rick traveledto Taiwanas Manager of the South African National Team for the 2007 WorldBaseball Championships, and remains active with the South Africanprogram trying to develop their program.  Rick resides in Van Nuys, CA and has been with the Oakland Athletics organizations since 1997 both as a Manager and as a area scout.

Craig Leffertsmakes a triumphant return to Nat Bailey Stadium after missing theentire 2007 season due to health concerns.  Craig?s health is muchimproved and will now focus his efforts on helping Vancouver?spitching staff this coming season.  A major league career that spanned11 seasons, Lefferts pitched in 696 games over his career, placing him87^th all-time in MLB appearances.  ?Lefty? as Craig is knownaround the ballpark also has pitched in two World Series (84-Detroit,88-San Francisco) as well as a career 72-45 record with 101 saves. Craig resides in Arizona; this will be Craig?s 4^th season in Vancouver.

Travis Tims takes over the trainers room for Nate Brooks who this season takes over in Kane County (A).  Tims is a graduate of Western Kentucky University graduating with a B.A. in Sports Medicine.

The release from the Canadians goes on to mention how a hitting coach has not been announced as of today, but the name will be released as soon as it is official.

After talking with Rick Magnante at season’s end, he wanted to come back, and he will after all.  As for Lefferts, this is tremendous news.  After sitting out last season he is back in Vancouver for the 4th time, and of course having him as a coach is motivation enough for the players - considering his baseball past.

Jimmy Escalante is heading to where he was originally going last season, the Arizona A’s where he’ll be their pitching coach.  Fan favourite Benny Winslow - former player and hitting coach - will remain in Kane County after a good start in the Midwest League in 2007.

Just a few days over six months until the Canadians open the season, buy your tickets now!

KEOUGH FINDING FORM IN INSTRUCTS:
Oakland A’s Instructionals are underway, which means the best of the class of 2007 (and beyond) are in a field in Arizona being told to shift their feet and raise their elbows.

Scout.com has an interview with Oakland Farm Director Keith Lieppman, in which he says Shane Keough is showing some strong improvement in his first few days of camp.

Keith Lieppman: It?s hard to pinpointsomeone specifically because they don?t keep a whole lot of stats. Wekeep some records of it, but nothing to specific. In terms of someindividual performances, Shane Keoughis having a pretty good Instructional League. He is starting to makebetter contact and looks to be using his speed tool a little bit betterin terms of stealing bases. He is kind of getting some of the roughedges off.

OC: With Keough, do you think his struggles this season were a result of coming back from his back injury last season?

KP: No, I think with him it was just that he hadn?t played verymuch baseball in high school. He?s just somebody who hasn?t had thatmuch experience out there on the field. I think it is just a matter ofgetting the repetitions and being out there. The talent is there. Ijust think he?s just a little bit behind because he got a little bit ofan opportunity at the JC level, but prior to that, he hadn?t playedmuch.

Lieppman went on to name early 2007 C’s first baseman Sean Doolittle as someone who is mashing, and will likely move through the system fast, while 2006-7 C’s outfielder Matt Sulentic is also having a good time of things and will likely not only get back to Kane County next year, but will "definitely" stay in the outfield.

HEAVY HITTERS HURT:
Uptown Corey Brown’s injury has stopped him from getting to Instructionals, and now Amblin’ Danny Hamblin, the other half of Vancouver’s 2007 power duo, has had to pull out after injuring a groin. Also ailing is Josh Horton; The Hornet having injured his hand to the point where he can’t wear a glove, although he’s still able to swing a bat and is doing just that.

Meanwhile, Craig Italiano, who was drilled in the head with a line drive this season, seems like he’s fit and ready for action, having pitched a couple of simulated outings. You always wonder, when a kid takes a shot like that, whether he’ll be gun shy in future, so it’s good to hear about his progress.

In other injury-related news, 2004 NWL MVP and Vancouver Canadians center fielder, Javier Herrera, has been cleared to play Venezuelan Winter Ball with Caracas after two seasons riddled with injury (and suspension).

More suspicious people than I might look at Herrera’s steroid suspension two years back, and his subsequent inability to stay healthy since, and think the two might be related…

Lieppman also makes note that chronically injured 2004 C’s catcher (and 1st round draftee) Landon Powell is likely to have further troubles with his knees in the future, saying, "the chance of reoccurrence is probably great", and, even more interestingly, that the likelihood of a move to another position is not strong. "His catching skills make him what he is," says Lieppman, adding, "He?s aswitch-hitter with power and the whole thing, but with his greatreceiving skills and his throwing, there are really no other places forhim right now."

So you’ve got a guy with bad knees, who will have more knee problems, but isn’t worth shifting to another spot, so they’re going to keep him in the one place that is hardest on a guy’s knees and just see if he can luck it out? Wow - I’m not sure I’d want to be buying Landon Powell futures right now.

That said, Powell can mash. I know nobody likes to spend too much time on a DH-only guy in the minors (a la Jack Cust), since that’s the spot you’d normally put your washed up veterans, but surely it would make more sense to have Powell lose some weight and then actively push him towards first base - or even (I can’t believe I’m saying this) - third? He certainly has the throwing arm for it, and though he’d be a defensive liability, he’d be a defensive liability who could poke 30 dingers for you, from either side of the plate.

Hit the link below for more news. 

Every groom-to-be has doubts at the zero hour. Every one. I know I did, and I’ve never met a guy yet who could honestly say he didn’t have the ‘is this for real?’ conversation with himself as he struggled with his tie and chased a caterer around the room.

That said, there are three things that will end that nagging doubt on the spot. 

The first is if she says, "If you want to bring in a third, I’m cool with that. No, seriously."

The second is if she says, "No, you should go with your friends to Vegas without me. I don’t want to be your Yoko." 

The third is if she says, "Of course I’ll get married at home plate! That’d be awesome!" 

I can’t vouch for whether Canadians VP Delany Dunn’s fiancee, Lisa Marie, has ever said those first two, but the fact that she would agree to get married at home plate after a Nooner at Nat Bailey Stadium is just entirely all kinds of fantastic. That’s a keeper, right there.

Be there for the game, stay for the nuptials - just don’t throw rice. The last thing we need is a rice paddy growing on the base path to first base.

If anything, throw grass seed. The Nat’s infield could use it.

One warning: If Dancing Hans busts out the Chicken Dance, I’m outta there.

The AAA Sacramento Rivercats (AKA: the former Vancouver Canadians) are gearing up for their playoff run in the Pacific Coast League, and as a result of their desire to rest their pitching staff, they’ve grabbed a couple of former C’s from High-A Stockon to cover them through the next week.

2005 Vancouver Canadians reliever, ‘Dangerous’ Bradley Davis, started last night for the Riverdancers against the Tucson Sidewinders and performed pretty well, despite struggling at times in high-A ball this season (6-6, 5.17).

In fact, he was downright ornery:

TUCSON, Ariz. — Pitcher Bradley Davis picked a perfect time to have one of the best outings of his summer.

Davis started Sunday for the River Cats and held Tucson scoreless for seven innings, allowing just six hits in the River Cats’ 7-0 win at Tucson Electric Park. Just Saturday, he was playing for Class-A Stockton.

He comes up and pitches a heck of a game for us," said River Cats manager Tony DeFrancesco. "He did a great job. We needed that. We’re trying to rest our (pitchers) for Wednesday."

Unfortunately, the chances that Dangerous will remain with the AAA club are less than 100%. Davis told the Sacramento Bee that he’s been told he’s going home Tuesday, which is the day post-season rosters will be set. Doesn’t seem to have phased him much, however:

"They alreadyhave a spot in the playoffs, so I came in thinking I have nothing tolose," said Davis, who struck out two and walked two. "It feels great,of course. There was no pressure and maybe they weren’t expecting a lotout of me. I made the best of it."

Tonight’s pitcher for Sacramento will be another rookie and former C, Andrew ‘Bam Bam’ Bailey, who went 2-5 with a 2.02 ERA for Vancouver last year before showing great stuff for Kane County earlier in 2007 (1-4, 3.35) and Stockton later on (3-4, 3.82).  

Congrats to both guys, even if it is only temporary. There are plenty of guys in the AAA and the Majors who were ‘only temporary’ once… 

August 6th 2007: Tacoma Rainiers vs Nashville Sounds (AAA)
Four-freaking-AM is too damn early.

Today it was revealed that Uptown Corey Brown’s season is over. He’ll be having surgery on a torn ligament in his pinkie finger, which came from a face first slide into home plate last week.

What’s odd is that Brown [seen left] says he slides head-first because he’s "not the best person" at sliding feet-first. Apparently this is the second time he’s damaged a finger sliding head-first, and he’ll be having both seen to with season-ending surgery, but maybe a few sliding sessions might be in order over spring training.

Big news coming out of Tri-City is that the Dust Devils have set a new single season attendance record, with 70,004 paying customers having walked through their gates thus far. Good for them.

Of course, that figure puts them at second last in the entire leaguein terms of home attendance, and if Yakima can raise 6500 people overtheir next two home games, they’ll pass the Dust Devils and leave themin last place, so take it with a grain.

In other news, Ian Walker, who you might recall did a series of video blogs for The Province earlier this season when he was granted a walk-on tryout for the team, is engaged to be married on the 29th of September.

Why is this newsworthy?

Oh, because he’s marrying Bif Naked [seen right].

Meanwhile, the Volcanoes want to eat our souls. Inoel Deaza, on the other hand, is looking to save us all. 

The lineups:

VANCOUVER CANADIANS:
Bomber Pruitt DH
Runway Richard SS
Excellentic Sulentic RF
Amblin’ Hamblin 1B
Destructor Desme LF
The Frashmaker 3B
‘Given up on a nickname’ Rivera C
Lost Correa 2B
3-0 Keough CF
Dealin’ Deaza P

SALEM-KEIZER WITCH-KINGS:
‘Shufflin’ Shane Jordan CF
‘Bouncin’ Brock Bond 2B
‘Syndrome’ Downs 1B
‘Shakin’ Baker LF
‘Tetherball’ LaTorre DH
‘Undangerous’ Davis 3B
‘Billy Dee’ Williams C
‘Filthy’ Flores SS
‘Eh’ Edwards RF
‘Bow Wow’ Bauer P 

Listen to the game NOW by clicking here, or you can check back often as we live-blog it.

On to the game.

It’s about time, is all I can say.  The newest member of the 2007 Canadians is none other than Lee Land, a pitcher out of UNC Greensboro, a school that has been mentioned a lot when Oakland has drafted players in the past few years.  This 6′2, 210 lbs hurler has played at the University of Arkansas and Wake Forest, before coming to his home state of North Carolina to play for the Spartans.

Land, made his Canadians debut tonight in Tri-City, and after two and two-thirds innings on the hill, has yet to allow a run, and has given up only two hits, while striking out two and walking one.

He’s only a couple years removed from Tommy John Surgery, but this 92-93 mph pitcher is sure to make a difference for the C’s.

With a three-game home stint starting tomorrow night, and Land pitching tonight, don’t expect the projected closer to do much in the way of pitch at the Nat for a while, but his presence is sure to help this ballclub aim at winning a couple of ballgames before the season comes to a close.

During a busy Friday in the way of sports, ‘Easy’ Earl Oakes left the Vancouver Canadians to play for the single-A Stockton Ports of the California League.  Oakes played a full season in Vancouver in 2006, and started off the ‘07 campaign with the C’s as well.

Oakes’ Friday night debut with the Ports was spoiled by an 8-5 loss, but ‘Easy’ Oakes pitched an inning of two-hit no-run baseball.

No word on who’s coming to Vancouver to replace Oakes, and the other significant number of players that have left Vancouver in the last couple of weeks, but perhaps this is a chance for AZL Athletics’ Pitcher Francisco Pena, who has an ERA under 1.00 to return to Vancouver after a brief stint in Canada last season.

Nick Walters was sent down from Stockton back to Kane County, one week after the former ‘07 Canadian was promoted to the Cal League.  Walters had a 3.00 ERA in Stockton, and his demotion made room for Oakes and 2005 C’s hurler John Herrera.

Best of luck to Earl in the Cal League!
 

This is one of those cases where, depending on who you ask the question, you’re going to get a different answer every time, but the mystery of Where In The World Is Shane Presutti has been answered; the trigger has finally been pulled after nigh two weeks of downtime, and he’s now back in Rookie Ball.

We’ve been asking for a while where Presutti is, noting his absence from the team for all but a few innings, and the last update we got from the team was that he was down with a ‘virus’. That’s now been switched to ‘health concerns’, which to me sounds like something a little trickier than a runny nose and a sore throat, though I’m going entirely on gut instinct in that assumption.

Oakland does have a tendency to play their injury cards close to their chest (if we hadn’t have heard it from the player himself, we STILL wouldn’t know that Jimmy Shull got a second injury after recovering from Tommy John surgery, and let’s not even talk about what really happened to Landon Powell’s knee way back when), so we’ll not likely get the full details about Presutti until he’s back and fighting fit - if at all.

In the meantime, just as with the Josh Horton promotion, there’s been no word on a replacement coming back the other way so the C’s will have to make do.

Well, it was due, wasn’t it? Josh Horton has been hitting well forthe C’s and the Kane County Cougars are all sorts of terrible, so whynot throw the high draftee up a level and see how he handles the pressure? Throw in a couple of injuries up the ladder, and the promotion was a sure thing. 

From Scout.com’s Oakland Clubhouse:

Horton will be replacing shortstop Mike Affronti, who was promoted to High-A Stockton. Affronti, a Midwest League All-Star in 2007, was batting .264 with five homers and 29 RBI. He was selected in the 17th round of the 2006 draft.

Affronti will replace Isaac Omura on the Ports’ roster. Omura broke his thumb on his glove hand attempting to field a throw from the catcher on Wednesday. Ports’ SS Justin Sellers left Tuesday’s game with a minor injury, but he is expected back in the Ports’ line-up on Thursday.

So how did he do in his first full-season outing? 

CF Mike Massaro led off the four-run inning by nailing a double to left-center field. Recently promoted SS Josh Horton followed by hitting a double in his first at bat with the Cougars to plate Massaro and even the score at 1-1

Nonews on whether the C’s will replace him with a promotion from Arizona,but the way our infield has been playing, one woud hope.
 

UPDATE: The Kane County Chronicle was all over Horton’s debut.

?I was just trying to get him over to third,? Horton said. ?I honestly thought [Hunter] was going to catch it. I got kind of lucky with that.?

The Cougars went on to score three more times in the frame, highlighted by Sean Doolittle?s two-run double off losing pitcher Steve Delabar (2-3). Horton was 2-for-4, adding a single to lead off the seventh.

?He did a nice job up there,? Cougars manager Aaron Nieckula said. ?He took some nice aggressive swings, worked the count and put some good wood on the ball tonight. He made a couple nice plays in the field.?

Horton did bobble his first fielding chance as a Cougar in the second inning, but calmly recovered to flip the ball to second for the third out. He admitted to being a little nervous making his first appearance with a new team.

?You just got to get out there and try to get comfortable,? he said. ?Getting that first hit helped. Obviously, there?s going to be a little bit of nervous tension.?

Holycow, this is some news. The A’s have dealt away a major salary drain(albeit one of my favourite proponents of ‘grit’) in Jason Kendall, whowill go to the Chicago Cubs (who burn money for fun) in return for RobBowen and a minor league pitcher.

This means Kurt Suzuki [seen left], 2004 Vancouver Canadian, is now the starting major league catcher for Oakland.

People this is great news for:

• Oakland fans
• Kurt Suzuki (who goes from draft pick to MLB starter in just three years)
• JD Closser (who may get called up to shadow Suzuki, since Bowen isn’t hitting)
• Jeremy Brown (who finally retakes the AAA starting catcher job)
• The Oakland front office (who free up a ton of salary for 2008)

People this is crappy news for:

• Cubbie fans
• Jason Kendall [seen right] (who will share time with Henry Blanco, and sit a lot more often than he’s used to)
• Landon Powell (whose knee always picks the WORST possible times to blow up, and would otherwise have been shadowing Suzuki)
• The Cubs front office (who will be paying $13m a year - or $8m ifPittsburgh is still on the hook for some - for a sometime-catcher whocan’t get the ball out of the infield, and can’t throw out oppositionbase runners)

You’d normally say that, when a big league team let’s a pair of bigname players go for (let’s be honest) a bag of balls (in Kendall andMilton Bradley), they’ve given up on the season. But in this case,losing Kendall may actually help Oakland’s numbers.

The big question for me is… what the hell are the Cubs thinking? 

Now, if the A’s can just lose Mike Piazza, Esteban Loaiza, Bobby Kielty and Mark Kotsay, they’d have about $25m with which to sign a replacement for Bobby Crosby.

UPDATE: Turns out the A’s are going to pay all but $1m of Kendall’s wages for the remainder of the season (yikes!), and the other player in the trade has now been named.

[Jerry] Blevins [seen left] began the 2007 season at Single-A Daytona but was promoted to Double-A Tennessee on May 15 after going 1-0 with six saves and a 0.38 ERA in 15 relief appearances.  He was 2-2 with three saves and a 1.53 ERA in 23 relief appearances with Tennessee and was a combined 3-2 with nine saves and a 1.02 ERA in 38 relief appearances overall.  The 23-year old left-hander walked just 13 while striking out 69 in 53.0 innings and allowed just one home run.  He allowed a .190 opponents batting average, including .133 with runners in scoring position.  Blevins was originally a 17th round draft pick of the Cubs in the 2004 draft. 

You can’t even call this a salary dump now, since Oakland is paying Kendall’s salary anyway. Granted, it was unlikely they were going to get any compensation for him when he hit free agency later this year, but surely someone would have taken him, even just for a PTBNL.

Then again, we know Oakland can spot a good pitching prospect, and Blevins sure has nice numbers in High-A/AA ball, so maybe they just REALLY wanted to get their mitts on a middle reliever…

If the name Jerry Blevins is familiar to Vancouver Canadians fans, that might be because went 6-1 with a 1.62 ERA in the 2004 NWL Championship winning Boise Hawks team that kicked our hineys in the playoffs. He also turned out for the Hawks in 2006, where he got the tar beat out of him over 16 games (1-2, 6.04).

On a trivial aside, it’s been amusing to watch the Cubs fans find reasons to cheer their new acquisition. If there was a ‘cherry-picked stats and gormless optimism’ competition at the Blog Olympics, this post would have to win the gold in a trot:

Some NL Central Splits on Kendall
vs B. Sheets: 42ABs .286/.318/.333/.652
vs S. Chacon: 13ABs .385/.471/.692/1.163
vs D. Weathers: 18ABs .389/.500/.556/1.056
vs A. Harang: 15ABs .267/.389/.400/.789
vs B. Looper: 10ABs .500/.545/.600/1.145
vs R. Oswalt: 36ABs .417/.462/.472/.934
vs W. Williams: 35ABs .514/.553/.657/1.210
vs J. Jennings: 13ABs .308/.400/.385/.785
by SackMan

It didn’t take long for reality to rain on his parade, however:

Not enough of a sample size
vs J. Isringhausen: 14ABs .143/.368/.357/.726
vs R. Franklin: 14ABs .143/.250.143/.393
vs C. Carpenter: 7ABs .143/.143/.143/.286
vs M. Mulder: 6ABs .167/.286/.167/.452
vs T. Wellemeyer: 3ABs .333/.500/.667/1.167
by SackMan