Managers can't win can they. Yesterday Charlie Manuel was a fool because he didn't start Cliff Lee on short rest, tonight Joe Girardi is a fool because he had A.J. Burnett pitch on short rest. It really isn't fair, managers don't really have a crystal ball. It is impossible to know whether a pitcher will be able to handle the short rest. AJ has pitched well on short rest before but it hasn't happened often.

I take a little joy in him being thumped, maybe not as much as some, I don't really blame him for going where there was more money. I wouldn't turn down that much money if offered it either. But then I don't feel bad at all that he lost. He pitched 2 innings and 6 runs. 

Chase Utley is amazing, isn't he. Two more homers today gives him 5 in the series so far. Raul Ibanez also had a homer. Cliff Lee wasn't terrific, but was good enough. He went 7 innings and gave up 5 runs.

Phil of the Day is Chase Utley (.239 WPA).

ARod would be Yankee of the Day (.097). Suckage Yankees are AJ (-.377), Derek Jeter (-.181) and Mark Teixerira (-.101).

Game 6 is Wednesday in New York. Pedro Martinez on normal rest against Andy Pettitte on short rest. It should be interesting. 

I guess the Rain Delay is over....

Game three is tonight in Philadelphia.

If Cole Hamel can pitch like he did last year in the playoffs it should be great fun.

Join in if you are watching the game.

Phillies 1 Yankees 3

That wasn't as fun as yesterday. A.J. Burnett was terrific, striking out 9 in 7 innngs, and Mariano Rivera was good, as well as getting his usual very wide strike zone. Strike 3 to Ryan Howard must have been at least a foot off the plate. If I was Howard I'd have gotten myself thrown out of the game. That was just a terrible call, but Rivera gets it all the time. 

Pedro Martinez was very good too, but Charlie Manuel left him out there too long. He did strike out 8 in his 6 innings and looked unhittable early.

There were several former Jays in the game. AJ as mentioned was great. Matt Stairs DHed for the Phillies, went 1 for 4, driving in their only run but he did strikeout to end the game. Jayson Werth was 1 for 4 as well, but was picked off at first by Jose Molina. Scott Eyre got both guys he faced out, coming in in relief. 

The umpires had their moments too. As well as the wide strike zone. The first base umpire blew a call on a line drive at Ryan Howard that he short hopped but was called a catch, which cost the Yankees a double play. Then in the 8th, with runners on first and second, Chase Utley ground out into a double play but replays showed he was safe at first. Charlie Manuel should have sent the runners on the full count pitch. He reminds me of Cito. Minimalist school of managing: leave pitchers out there as long as you can and make as few moves as possible.

No Phillies of the Game, Suckage Phillies are Howard (-.131 WPA, on an 0 for 4) and Utley (-.189, on a 0 for 3 with a walk). 

Yankees of the Day are Burnett (.338), Hideki Matsui (.232) and Rivera (.156). Suckage Yankee was Johnny Damon (-.132 on an 0 for 4). 

So they go to Philadelphia to play game 3 Saturday tied at a game. We'll likely put up a game thread again so join us if you are done trick or treating by then. 

After the very exciting news of the Jays picking up Sean Henn off waivers (yeah I know, during the off-season teams make lots of little moves that generally don't end up meaning much), the hired former major league second baseman Mike Mordecai to be their roving Minor League infield instructor. Alex Anthopoulos isn't wasting anytime making the changes he feels the organization needs. 

Anyway the game....Pedro Martinez starts for the Phillies and everyone's favorite former Jay A.J. Burnett goes for the Yankees. I won't wish for A.J.'s arm to fall right off or anything like that but I will hope he has a bad night.

More photos » Eric Gay - AP

Three more of these, please. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

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Phillies 6 Yankees 1

That was an amazing start by Cliff Lee. Lee wasn't my favorite pitcher until tonight, just cause I thought Doc should have has the Cy Young last year. But whoever beats the Yankees becomes my favorite pitcher. Lee went 9, gave up 6 hits, no walks and struck out 10. The only run he gave up was only because of a Jimmy Rollins error. I would have pulled him after 8 since the Phillies were up by 6. and had thrown 106 pitches up to that point. Lee also made the best (or maybe the luckiest) behind the back catch I've seen all year in the 8th inning. 

Rollins also made a very interesting play on a popup with a runner on first. He looked like he intended to let the ball bounce and turn the double play, but he just barely caught it. Hedeki Matsui, confused, run off first and was easily doubled off. The umpires had to talk it over but they got the call right. They say the fun of watching baseball is you'll see something you've never seen before. I don't think I've ever seen a play quite like that one. 

CC Sabathia was very good when he wasn't pitching to Chase Utley. Utley hit two homers off him. Then the Yankees pen was terrible. They gave up 4 runs in 2 innings. 

The best part of the game was that ARod was 0 for 4 with 3 strikeouts. 

The only former Jay who go into the game was Jayson Werth who went 1 for 2 and took 2 walks. 

Phillies of the Day were Lee (.500 WPA) and Utley (.226). Suckage Phillie was Pedro Feliz (-.096) on an 0 for 4 night. 

Yankees of the Day was Sabathia (.106). Suckage Yankees were Robinson Cano (-.154), David Robertson (.095), ARod (-.093) and Johnny Damon (-.091).

We had great fun in the thread, so we'll run one again tomorrow.

More photos » Gail Burton - AP

4 months ago: Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Ricky Romero delivers against the Baltimore Orioles in the third inning of a baseball game Sunday, Oct. 4, 2009, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Gail Burton)

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The Jays' season came sputtering to a close this afternoon with a series sweep at the hands of the Baltimore Orioles. Today's game was an extra-inning affair the Jays lost in the bottom of the 11th.

On the Mound:  Ricky Romero pitched pretty well for the Jays, though he gave up 4 runs.  Three walks in 7 innings hurt him, but he struck out 8 and only gave up 5 hits (one of which was a 2-run home run by Nick Markakis). The long ball has been a thorn in Romero's side all season and will surely be something he works on next year. 

At the Plate:  Edwin Encarnacion hit another home run, which was encouraging.  Edwin had a very good close to the season, batting .261/.343/.500 from September 1st on.  If his wrist issues are behind him, he could have a good season at the plate next year.  Jose Bautista and John McDonald also hit solo shots, and Travis Snider added an RBI double.  Randy Ruiz had 2 doubles, a single, and a walk for a nice afternoon at the office. Vernon Wells had one of those days, going 0-5 and leaving a lot of men on base before Joe Inglett took his spot in the lineup to give him a bit of an early end to the season.

From the Pen:  Jesse Carlson and Shawn Camp combined to hold the line for three innings, giving the Jays the chance to tie it at four on J-Mac's home run in the 7th, but Brandon League had some serious problems in the 11th, giving up a leadoff single and then throwing two away in a row and allowing the run to score.  His focus just wasn't there - understandable, I suppose, given the circumstances - he has had a ridiculously hard-luck season and likely just wanted it to be over.  I'm going to go ahead and pencil him in for a big season next year. 

The Jays finish the season at 75-87, pretty poor considering how hot they started.  Their pythagorean record, however, was over .500 (83-79), showing that the Jays have been the victim of poor run distribution.  Normally, I might say bad luck, but this is the third straight season that the Jays have underperformed their pythagorean record and particularly struggled to hit with runners in scoring position, so that really won't fly.

More photos » Gail Burton - AP

Cito is wondering if someone can take these knives out of his back. (AP Photo/Gail Burton)

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Blue Jays 3 Orioles 6

For the second day in a row a long interesting day for the Jays ends with an uninteresting loss, but let's waste a few words talking about it. 

For the first time in a while we didn't hit a homer. We had 8 hits on the day, Travis Snider, batting 9th behind John McDonald and Kevin Millar, among others, was the only player with more than 1 hit and the only Jay to hit for extra bases with a double. Everyone else had 1 hit except for Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion, but the way those too have been going lately the can be allowed an off day.

Scott Richmond had another crappy start to finish off his season with a 5.52 ERA, a season that started so well for him, being named Rookie Pitcher of the Month for April in the AL. He is going to have to have a great spring to start next year in the majors. Jeremy Accardo gave up a run in his 2 innings of work. Casey Janssen and Brandon League had a shut out inning each to end the game. 

No Jays of the Day today. Rod Barajas deserves honorable mention. Suckage Jay was Richmond.

Tomorrow we close out the season with Ricky Romero (13-9, 4.26) going against Jeremy Guthrie (10-7, 5.05). The good news? Guthrie is a righty so we should have seen the end of Kevin Millar's time in a Jay uniform. Please, please.

Odds and Ends:

Paul Beeston on Alex Anthopoulos:

Anthopoulos said he plans to lean heavily on Blue Jays assistant general manager Tony LaCava, who has been considered for general manager roles with other teams in recent years. Beeston noted that Anthopoulos is not serving as the GM on an interim basis, though there is always the possibility that the new team president might want to hire his own staff.

"Alex is the general manager," Beeston said. "Having said that, there will be a CEO, and when that CEO comes in -- and I've told Alex this so that everybody knows -- he will have a blank canvas. ... Alex is a special person with a huge upside, and he'll be my recommendation to be the general manager."

So Alex is not an interim GM, but if/when we get a new team president he might pick is own guy. I have been hoping that the new man has been chosen and I'd imagine that he has signed off on Alex. I gotta hope that we aren't spending another season looking him. 

Roy Halladay on JP Riccardi:

"He is probably the biggest reason I was here for the last eight years," added Halladay.

Aaron Hill:

"It's unfortunate," Blue Jays second baseman Aaron Hill said. "But it's something that I think everyone, not knew was coming, but it was just one of those things. Bad timing, I guess. He's done a lot of things. He drafted me. He gave me a job, so I'll never say anything bad about him. He's been great to me and he definitely wants to win."

And on the team mutiny over Cito's managing:

"The players being on the ledge was kind of brought up by people who aren't associated with the situation," Halladay said. "I think it's a lot different than how it was brought up. I think things were obviously handled very professionally and I think Paul's done a great job of that. Again, I feel good about a lot of the things I've heard today, and things that have happened."

It sounds like everyone is blaming the reporters in general and Ken Rosenthal in particular for taking comments made by some players and making the leap too there being a revolt. Every one sees to be falling behind that view. It seems to be the easiest spin to put on the comments. Is it true? Well, I'd guess that the reports were exaggerated, it makes for a better story if all the players want Cito fired. Richard Griffin said:

No, some significant discontent is definitely there towards Gaston, but it is far from as rampant as Rosenthal insists it is.

And I'd expect that is likely right. 

After months of having little to talk about, at least it looks like the off season will be interesting. 'May you live in interesting times' might be a Chinese curse, but for us bloggers, it's a very good thing. 

More photos » Rob Carr - AP

Hang on to that ball Purcey, throwing it won't work out well.(AP Photo/Rob Carr)

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Blue Jays 7 Orioles 13

With everything else going on you would be forgiven in forgetting there was a game tonight. Our 6 game win streak is over. David Purcey was terrible, allowing 7 runs on 8 hits and a walk in 3.2 innings. Josh Roenicke and Dirk Hayhurst were no better giving up 6 runs between them in 3.1 innings. The only Jay pitcher to do good was Brian Wolfe who pitched a scoreless 8th.

Offensively we did quite well, Randy Ruiz, Edwin Encarnacion and Jose Bautista continued their home run hitting ways, of late, though they each only hit one. The way we are going lately not hitting at least 2 in a game is a disappointment. John McDonald had 3 hits and Kyle Phillips had 2 but Phillips didn't show off a good arm behind the plate. I don't know if his glove is good enough at catcher to merit a big league job. 

Jays of the Day are Encarncion (.144 WPA) and Ruiz (.105). Purcey gets the Suckage award. 

On the Cito thing, Aaron Hill says 'there are issues', and well, if Hill says there are problems between the players and Cito, I tend to believe him. On the classy scale, Roy Halladay sets high scores saying 'Any concerns I have will be addressed to the right people." He impresses me more all the time.