Thursday Banter: Jays Sign Biagini and Bird

The Blue Jays made a couple of minor-league signings today.

One was our old friend Joe Biagini. You'll remember that he was a Rule-5 pickup from the Giants before the 2016 season, and he had an excellent year, with a 3.06 ERA in 67.2 innings of relief work, with 62 strikeouts.

After that, they tried him as a starter, and that didn't go well, and moving him back and forth didn't work out either. So we ended up trading him to the Astros, along with Aaron Sanchez and Cal Stevenson for fan favourite Derek Fisher.

Things didn't go well for him in Houston (a 10.42 era in his 19 innings, over two seasons, deserves something more potent than 'didn't go well'). He spent last year with the Cubs Triple-A team (with 1 appearance with the major league team).

Joe will be 32 in May. He'll add some depth for the Bisons' staff. He is more memorable for his humour-filled interviews than his pitching.

And the Jays also signed former Yankee Greg Bird. Bird is 29. At one time, it looked like he would be the Yankees' first baseball for years to come. As a rookie, he hit .261/.343/.529 with 11 home runs in 46 games in 2015. But injuries and poor play followed that. Maybe he can shake the injury bug and be depth for us, but he can only play first and DH, so a lot would have to go wrong for him to get much playing time with the Jays.3

I don't want to write about the CBA negotiations. Thankfully Al Yellon did it for me.

I do agree with this:

How many of the owners are 'self-made men', and how many just inherited their money?

I'm starting to think that this would be a good yeah to take up golf.

But then.....perhaps there is a chance of baseball:

But I'd imagine the owners will tie a pre-game hot dog eating contest to their next offer. I refuse to feel optimistic about it.