Mamma Said Punch You Out

Yes, Ian, I totally stole your Tweet there. Sorry man, had to do it.

In case you were out of touch tonight, as I was for the first five innings, RR Cool J (i.e. Ricky Romero) carried a no hitter into the 8th inning tonight in what was far and away the best game of his young career. He punched out 12 White Sox batters in the first seven innings of tonight's game as well. With only 90 pitches thrown, in a crisp quick game in which the Jays were leading 4-0, Romero seemed on track to make his mark in the Jays' record books.

Then, in what is always an assholish move but is particularly annoying tonight given the situation, the White Sox catcher - who's name I won't mention in an impotent attempt to spit on him - managed to convince home plate umpire Tim McClellan that a pitch in the dirt hit his foot (it didn't, according to all accounts) to put on the White Sox' second runner of the night. That brought to the plate Alex Rios.

You remember Rios, right? the perennial disappointment in a Jays uniform? The supposed unmotivated unconcerned lackadaisical under-achiever, who was showered in boos last night?

Yeah, that guy.

He hit a homer.

I have no idea what the post game reporting will be and I never get to actually WATCH the games but my guess is Romero was momentarily distracted by the phantom HBP, which is ultimately on him but still, fuck that guy (and I don't mean Rios).

Romero finished the eighth and got the win, and given the groove the Sox hitters were in last night it's impressive as hell to pitch eight innings of one hit ball. But ah, what might have been . . .

In other news today, the Jays finalized the Adeiny Hechavarria signing. The soon to be 21 year old (as of Thursday) became Blue Jays' property officially by way of a 4 year $10 million contract (don't panic, he won't be a free agent at the end of the deal, though there is a somewhat complex condition in his contract which requires him to begin his major league options in 2013).

Hear Alex Anthopoulos discuss him on the Fan 590 here. Alex seems real excited about the guy. Apparently he's going to EST (as I predicted) for a month or so and AA suggested he might get at least a few weeks in Dunedin before moving up. But he also mentioned that some scouts thought he could step right into AAA and be in the majors by the end of the year so there's room for that plan to be modified in favor of a faster track. Apparently how fast he acclimates to the North American culture is perhaps more of a factor than the baseball skills.

Nothing here mitigates the growing sense that AH! (How's that for a nickname?) will be in contention to break camp with the Jays next spring.