Marty Pevey has been in professional baseball since 1982 when Marty was selected by the Twins in the 19th round of the 1982 draft. Marty's only big league time was spent with the Expos in 1989. Marty also spent two years playing for the Syracuse Skychiefs where he is now the manager. Marty has been a manager in the Blue Jays minor league system since 1996 and, in that time, has managed Blue Jay teams in Rookie ball, A ball, AA and now AAA. Marty also spent 1999 as the bullpen coach for the Blue Jays under Jim Fregosi. When Robert and I were in Buffalo we talked Skychiefs with Marty Pevey who kept us on our toes through our chat.

It looks like Jimy "one M" Williams has reached the end of the road in Houston. Speculation abounds that Jimy will not be the manager come Thursday. Houston has been a major disappointment this season after many pundits forecast the Astros to win the division. Houston sits 10 and a half games back at the all-star break.

Of a thousand rainy days since we first met
It's a big enough umbrella
But it's always me that ends up getting wet

They are under way in Houston, with a leadoff double by Ichiro off Clemens.

Syracuse rested while Pulaski romped. In close contests, New Hampshire won and Charleston lost. Dunedin couldn’t walk their way to victory, not with flammable pitching. Auburn finished up a thrashing, and then didn’t bother with offence, just to make it interesting in their regularly scheduled game.

In this guest column, Thomas takes a closer look at three notable events from around baseball last week.

Robert and I caught up with Gabe Gross when we were in Buffalo last week. We had a very enjoyable conversation as Gabe was very accomodating and actually looked happy to be answering our questions. We interviewed Gabe in a corridor outside the dressing room and the lighting was bad. Robert took an in-game picture, it's long distance, but it is the best we could get. The Chiefs did not take batting practice the day we were there.

As I first mentioned in this thread, one of the things I want to do is collect little bits of information about Blue Jays of the past - things that we remarked on at the time, but may have forgotten now. For example: we all remember Tom Wilson's batting stance, in which he appeared to be hitting out of an invisible rocking chair. But will we remember this 10 years from now, or 20?

Curveball2 lives close to Charleston and attends many of their games. Some of you might remember Curveball2 broke the story of the promotion of Marcum, Roberts and James to Dunedin back in June. Curveball2 has recorded his impressions of the first half of Charleston's season. If you have questions ask, and hopefully Curveball2 will answer them.

Jamie Vermilyea returns to earth. A Chief hit a grand slam to turn a loss into a win. Syracuse had a winning week. Aaron Hill and Robinson Diaz each doubled in their only at-bat to represent the Blue Jays with distinction at yesterday's Futures Game.

It's a street in a strange world.
Maybe it's the Third World.
Maybe it's his first time around.
He doesn't speak the language,
He holds no currency.
He is a foreign man,

It's easy to forget, as real baseball begins its second half, that our league is about to pass the two-thirds point of the regular season. There's only eight weeks until the playoffs. Actually, it's more like seven and a half, with the MLB All-Star break making this "week" a mere four days, in which anything can happen. In fact, six teams (including the Jays) have Thursday off, so many of our fantasy wins and losses will be determined by just three games. Luck is a huge factor in Head-to-Head play at the best of times, even more so in Week 15.

Birds beware, expect me up there
me and air are feeling light today
jets should hide, I'll fly alongisde
me and pride are bolted tight today

It certainly seems that in every second thread the conversation invariably turns to whether or not Carlos Delgado and Miguel Batista will be traded. This is my attempt to keep all the discussion in one place.

Here's my thoughts. Everything that follows is 100% speculation; I have absolutely no idea what the Jays will do.

Today, it's former World Series hero John Lackey against reliable pro Miguel Batista, but that's not what we're going to talk about. In honour of the Double Infinity Game (turn the 8s on their sides), we're going to look yonder into the future and predict: how many of the Blue Jays on today's 25-man roster will still be with the club on Opening Day 2005? (That's next April, for those scoring at home). The correct guess will be awarded nothing, since I'll probably have forgotten all about this contest by next spring.