Despite Brandon Morrow's best efforts, the Jays actually made it close.

The Jays are close to signing a Venezuelan righty named Adonis Cardona. I'm guessing a cross between Adeiny Hechevarria and Fausto Carmona? I'll take it.

The farm split their four games on Monday night, and this week we take an in-depth look at New Hampshire's season-to-date.

The good people at Information is Beautiful linked to some sports-related stuff today, here. Some of it's baseball-related, but it's this one that captured my attention. It's an attempt to display, visually and intuitively, how much fan support major league baseball teams get relative to the size of their market and their won-lost record and what have you. (The formula is given.)

...who's that team bringing up the rear?

Oh.

I remember everything
I knew all along we were pushing our luck

Back to Fenway....

Well you should.  Because he threw a shutout today.

Oakland Athletics pitcher Dallas Braden has pitched the 19th perfect game in MLB history. Less than a minute ago, the hurler completed a 4-0 gem against Tampa Bay.

Story on ESPN.com ...

It was an ugly night on the farm.  Las Vegas went down early and couldn't mount any kind of comeback.  New Hampshire kept it close until the fifth when the floodgates opened.  Dunedin, like New Hampshire, kept it close, but couldn't win as Henderson Alvarez was a bit shaky again.  Lansing took a 4-0 lead to the bottom of the ninth and lost thanks in part to two errors.

 

New Hampshire trailed 5-0 after seven innings and they had only one hit in the game.  But they exploded for seven runs in the eighth and won.  The win masked a rough start by Zach Stewart.  The Lugnuts racked up 16 hits to support Chad Jenkins on their way to a win.  Las Vegas and Dunedin were losers Friday.

Bauxite China Fan requested an Eveland-discussion thread, so here ya go! Discuss!

Ryan Schimpf had four hits to lead the Lugnuts to the win.  The pitchers allowed only one hit, Evan Crawford pitched five shutout innings.  Dunedin also won with Sean Shoffit delivering the big hit and Chuck Huggins pitching well.  New Hampshire lost a close one while Las Vegas were blown out.

There was a split on the farm last night, with the middle two affiliates losing while Las Vegas and Lansing won their games. Las Vegas was powered by the top of their lineup and patience, while Lansing made their few opportunities count. Meanwhile, New Hampshire and Dunedin could not get the big hit and combined to strand 27 runners on base.

Royal blue turned out to be better than powder blue on the scoreboard this day but I'm glad the retro look has not gone away in 2010.

Okay, this is probably more of a poll question, but I haven't been able to get the [expletive deleted] poll gadget to work for me since early in '09. So anyway  ...

Your Toronto Blue Jays are 16-13 and solidly in third place in the AL East and tied for second in the Wild Card "standings." No doubt about it, they're a real surprise. But in the big picture, now that we're a month into the season, what is THE most surprising ball club in the major leagues this season?

We have MANY options ...

Any idea what kind of odds I could get in Vegas predicting a Jays no-hitter this year?