Friday Bantering: Bits of Blue Jays news

There isn’t a lot of Blue Jays news this afternoon.

Danny Jansen and Bo Bichette have been named to the American Team of the Futures game. If Vlad Jr wasn’t hurt he would have been part of the World Team and would have been the only Canadian on the team.

Maybe, after the Futures game we could call up Jansen?

Darnell Sweeney was outrighted off the 40-man roster and has been assigned to Buffalo, to make room for Thomas Pannone. Pannone suspension is ending. He’s made 3 rehab starts, 1 for Dunedin and 2 for New Hampshire. He gave up 7 runs off 10 hits, 1 walks with 1 strikeouts in 4.2 innings for Dunedin. His two Fisher Cats starts totaled 9 innings with 9 hits, 3 earned, 5 walks and 12 strikeouts.

The Jays gave us an injury list update:

• Danny Barnes has been doing ‘long toss’. He’ll begin throwing off a mound next week.
• Jaime Garcia threw a bullpen today, and all went weel.
• Aaron Sanchez is doing long toss, he’s a bit away from throwing off a mound.
• Ryan Tepera is starting a throwing program.
• Vlad Guerrero is running and doing baseball drills. He’ll begin base running next week and, all going well he’ll be playing soon after that.
• No news on Tulo and Josh.

The Jays announced they signed 27 international free agents. The big name is Orelvis Martinez, a SS, who was number 4 on MLB’s top 30 international prospects list. He’s getting $3.5 million, not a bad paycheck for a 16-year-old.

Tonight’s lineup. No Lourdes tonight. Pillar still batting 5th. After 3 hits Wednesday, Morales isn’t playing today.