By Brendan T. Gleason
Mark you dream crushing, Lionel Ritchie hating, Decision to let Doogie Howser skip all those grades disagreeing, trying to keep kids from playing on your lawn by calling them “whippersnappers” and “hooligans,” “No Man.” Take a page out of the Jim Carrey movie and start saying yes to life. Donʼt be like the college basketball rules back in the day that said the freshman had to play on a separate team. Donʼt you think, if given the capability to play Pete Maravich his freshman year, the LSU varsity coach wouldʼve jumped at the opportunity? He wasnʼt allowed…We are.
Brendan wants to see DJ...All Night Long
Ok, I admit, the Lionel Ritchie line was obscure, but he called people to say he loved them, and I think the Raysʼ front office should make some loving calls of their own. Bring up these young guys. The platoon leftfield and bullpen doesnʼt need to be a platoon for the second half of the season. The positions need to be filled by 2 young
guys who deserve the right to play at the big league level. Not because theyʼre prospects, not because theyʼll sell tickets (if they would…weʼd have already tried that. Iʼm sure weʼd adopt the “throw back opposing team home runs” strategy if we thought there was a Henry Roengardner in the stands who could sell more tickets)…itʼs because theyʼve earned it, and itʼs because we need them.
When we made our run a few years back on our way to the world series, we did it with youth, speed and defense. Desmond Jennings is young, he has 17 stolen bases and has only been caught once (my guess is he tripped on the way to second or third), and he has a total of 0 errors in the outfield. Not once has he made an errant throw or dropped a flyball or misplayed a double to the gap and let a runner get an extra base. That sounds like someone I want to see playing at the Trop. Heʼs the reason we didnʼt mind losing Carl Crawford. He is Carl Crawford(but with 12 home runs at the all star break, he probably has more power).
Another big factor in our Pennant Winning run was our bullpen. And as much as I like our 3, 4 and 5 pitchers, seeing them pitch into the 8th inning scares me…regardless of the command they show for the first 7. We need relief pitchers we can count on, and I think I have a solution, and I think you know what that solution is. (If youʼre this far into the point/counterpoint and donʼt know what my solution is, than remind me not to ever
ask you for help with anything.) Call up Jake McGee. Heʼs been closing in AAA Durham, and I know we got JP Howell back, but that just means we have a reliable set-up man from 2 years ago. We need the young fireballer to beef up an unreliable pen.
I think this one is a no-brainer. Regardless of rules that let us keep a player one year longer or pay him $14 less per game in the future…let these young talents showcase their stuff in front of the world and help lead us where we need to be. Iʼm not saying we should call up every young player that we have in our farm system…Iʼm saying call-up the guys who will help us win right now. It seems hard to argue with.
I’m not saying that Lionel didn’t/doesn’t make perfectly loving phone calls, but based on what I’m reading above, you are mixing him up with Stevie Wonder, who famously just called to say he loved you. And for that reason, I give the point to Mark and heap shame upon you. I would also like to remind you that I am always here for you as a soft rock/easy listening reference.
of course it was stevie. i have brought shame upon myself and my family.
lionel may have partied all night long, dancing on the ceiling, saying hello as if it were easy like sunday morning…but he never called anyone just to tell them he loved them. at least he never recorded that he did.
i am once, twice, three times embarrassed.
The upshot is, I would not have felt comfortable putting Brendan’s face on Stevie Wonder’s face. So it all worked out.
July 8, 2011 Yum!! Now with the gralic, do you just use minced raw gralic? (Still a newbie, here! )
At this point in the season, barring some particular reason like injury or poor play from a regular, why not just wait for September’s expanded roster? If a great trade came along for BJ, great. Last year at this time that wasn’t likely. This year, could be.
It would be nice to see Jake step into a strong spot in the bullpen. But how likely is that at this point? September makes more sense for both Desmond and Jake unless there’s a major change on the team that forces one (or both) of them to be moved up. It seems more likely that either Wade Davis or Jeff Neimann gets moved to the Bullpen and Alex Cobb moved up if either of them continues to look like they’re not quite at full strength. As for Neimann, I think Joe should think about moving him to the pen long-term anyway. (Another pitcher burnt out at Rice, possibly.)
Last winter, during the bullpen rebuild, I had the same thought on Niemann but, upon further review, thought better of it. I am not sure Jeff is a guy that can get ready quickly. He is a big trade candidate in the next few weeks. Maybe our top trade candidate.
I think the Rays are committed to Wade Davis as a long-term SP. That is why they gave him that nice extension earlier this summer. Cobb will break in somewhere, but I don’t think it will be in Davis’s spot. The Rays will deal either Shields or Niemann.
I agree on Wade. And I think he’s a stud. Last year David led the team with 21 starts giving up 2 or fewer runs. Wade was 2nd with 19. My comment as it relates to him was purely very short term. The Rays need him to be at full strength in September for the stretch run. I also don’t know about Jeff as to whether he can handle the demands of being always ready in the bullpen. But what he does seem to be showing is that he can’t handle the long haul in the rotation. Is that Rice Syndrome, something specifically to do with him or some problem in the Rays conditioning program? I don’t know. But I do think that if Joe and Andy aren’t taking a good hard look at that conditioning program, they’re messing up.
Unfortunately, that’s a next season thing. BUT, my feeling has been that for many teams, including the Rays, this has been a wait and see year. Noone knows what the new CBA will look like and that CBA affects the Rays perhaps more than any other franchise. It will determine how they handle virtually their entire roster. No sense doing too many long term things until you know what it will be. So I agree that signing Wade long-term was a big show of commitment.
As for trading. I doubt many teams would give much for Jeff, seeing that he could have durability issues. James is hot property right now and maybe there is alot of sense in trading him when he would be one of the tops, if not the top, pitcher on the tradewires. He’s made huge strides this year. But he’s also shown some signs of being possibly one bad play away from another mental breakdown.