Take me away, I don't mind
But you better promise me, I'll be back in time
He's been reactivated in time for the start of the World Series and he can add this to the list of his accomplishments - a starring role in the Batter's Box POTD!
The Jays announced today that Paul Beeston has been appointed President and CEO for a three year term.
"We are thrilled that we were able to convince Paul Beeston to take on this role," continued Tony Viner. "Paul's background with the club, his credentials in the baseball world and his enthusiasm for this sport will be incredible assets." Paul Beeston will work with newly appointed General Manager, Alex Anthopoulos.
Alex Anthopoulos's first order of duty is to come up with a philosophy for the team. What is a team philosophy you ask? Beeston and Anthopoulos stated in their first Saturday press conference that the organization first needs to define a philosophy and from there decisions regarding payroll and free agents and roster composition can be made. The philosophy covers how the team will compete, it is a baseball equivalent of a business plan. Alex and Beeston were supposedly meeting over the last couple of weeks to determine the philosophy. This week they might be presenting it to Rogers. So we at Batters Box, at no charge to the Blue Jays, will help define what the philosophy should be.
There has been a lot of discussion in other threads about what the Jays should do but a lot of it is based around specific players such as JJ Hardy or Hanley Ramirez that the Jays could target. However a philosophy cannot be based on what other teams might be willing to do, it has to be more abstract than that, it is what will wo do, in general, to make this team competitive. Here are three offerings from members of the roster.
Two hits, two walks and two RBI from this man helped extend the American League Championship Series to a sixth game tonight (and hopefully a seventh!) in New York. He's the focus of our POTD.
This is NOT a repeat. You know the drill ...
First pitch is in a few hours. You know the players and all that's involved. So take a shot here -- who wins? Who stars? Who wears goat horns? What happens?
Wildest and most outlandish prediction (that doesn't involve a cuttlefish) wins a home edition of the coveted Batter's Box No-Prize!
Me? Well ...
The man who'll give Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon plenty of nightmares this off-season gets top billing in our POTD.
First pitch is in a few hours. You know the players and all that's involved. So take a shot here -- who wins? Who stars? Who wears goat horns? What happens?
Wildest and most outlandish prediction (that doesn't involve a cuttlefish) wins a home edition of the coveted Batter's Box No-Prize!
Me? Well ...
According to Friend of Batter's Box (FOBB) Jamey Newberg, the Texas Rangers "have announced that hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo has declined a contract offer and will not return to the coaching staff next year. The remainder of the big league coaching staff has been invited to return for the 2010 season."
Rumor has it that the Cubs are looking to seriously overpay Rudy to come fix Alf Soriano and Milton Bradley (both Texas exes he had some success with previously), among others. Here in North Texas, we saw how much effect a single new coach can have when Mike Maddux showed up to turn the Rangers into a model pitching-centric organization, And Rudy is generally seen (around these parts anyway) as one of, if not THE best hitting coaches in the game.
So ... does this matter at all to the makeup of the AL West and possibly the NL Central?
If you've been reading Da Box over the past four or five years, you know one of the sidelight features in Baseball's Hall of Names deals with players who share(d) certain initials. We've assembled teams for every possible double-initial, as well as many other obvious ones like MD, PR, BS and others.
Recently I got to thinking about baseball initials ... you know, the kind you scratch on your scorecard during a game, abbreviations like HR, RBI and HBP. Forget building a roster of these guys -- it'll be hard enough to find representatives for all the obvious baseball abbreviations we can think of. So go ahead, play along ... what initials are missing? And who would be better to fill a role in the existing All-Baseball-Initials roll-call that follows? ...
