I'm watching the O's-Yanks game on New York TV, listening to a team that I think must be Michael Kay and Ken Singleton, and it's really surreal. I don't like it. This is the first game I've watched since I moved to New York three weeks ago. It's strange listening to other announcers.

I'd even take Jim Hunter and Rick Dempsey. Well, maybe not. But I would love to hear Gary & Co.

Michale Kay just said Mussina is going to get Cy Young votes. Which is dumb. dumb. dumb. dumb.

pretty steal.

ed. note - use this as the game thread, since y'all were anyway. Crafty people, you bunch. -duck

Steve Trachsel pitches against the Royals tonight. This is very, vary bad. According to theorioles.com Trax has "the manager's vote of confidence."  Still, he seems to need to pitch well in order to keep his job.

Pitching well against the Royals is really, really easy. They have an inept, historically bad offense. In many ways they're like the Orioles, in that their pitching staff is actually pretty decent and their offense stinks. Trax will probably go out there and pitch a quality start with 4 walks, 2 Ks, 7 hits, and a decent amount of luck. This will fool Diamond Dave into thinking he's worth keeping around for a while longer, that he still has something left in the tank.

I almost would prefer to see him get shelled by this terrible group of hitters in order to get rid of him. Nothing against him personally, of course, but I just don't want him on the team any more. He's not good.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3215817

Seriously, what the hell is he doing? This is not how a successful sports franchise is run. He fires his highly-paid assistants, hires two relative no-names, and yet still doesn't name a coach. If he was gonna hire Fassel he should've already done it, and he just fired his other frontrunner.

Next season is gonna be a disaster. He's the new Al Davis, except without the early success to kinda excuse his behavior.

According to ESPN.com's Rumor Central:

"Orioles owner Peter Angelos killed a 7-for-2 trade that would have sent second baseman Brian Roberts and left-handed pitcher Erik Bedard to the Cubs, the Chicago Sun-Times reports.

"I don't think we're going to do anything, to be honest with you," Cubs manager Lou Piniella told the newspaper when asked about trading for an infielder. "If we do, it'll be in the outfield. ? It would be a right-handed bat to help out in center field. I would think that's probably a possibility, as opposed to the other things you all have been hearing about."

The Cubs reportedly are interested in Rangers outfielder Marlon Byrd."

Goddammit. I dunno whether this deal would've been good or not. But I thought we were done with this bullshit.

On another note, FEAR THE TURTLE!

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3155417

So, basically, the D-backs trade a bunch of prospects for Dan Haren (wow...he's really good, and they didn't trade any ML guys that i've heard of for him...bad or good for bedard trade?), and also trade Jose Valverde (overrated, but to Ed Wade, which makes sense) for a bunch of different guys.

Can I just say that I dunno who the D-backs gave up, but Dan Haren is gonna eat the NL West for breakfast. He gets to pitch against terrible lineups in San Fran, San Diego, and LA all the time. Even pitching in Phoenix and Coors won't hurt that too much. He was awesome in the good league. Now? Big money, and the quotes in the article show he knows it.

http://baltimore.orioles.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070825&content_id=2170149&vkey=news_ bal&fext=.jsp&c_id=bal

...and the twist is that his name is Adam Dunn! One can only hope that this is a whacky attempt to lure slugger Adam Dunn here by making the rest of the team already familiar with his name.

Or maybe the guy is good at his job. Whatever that job happens to be. I'm not really clear on what the bullpen coach does anyway.

Perhaps this has already been adequately covered, but I miss Gary Thorne and wonder where he's been.

It took me a little while to get used to him, but now I love him, especially compared to the perennially-optimistic (and stupid) Jim Hunter. Gary Thorne is a professional broadcaster. Jim Hunter seems like some fan they pulled out of the box seats. Well, a fan from like 1997, because he still thinks the team is good.

Is Gary Thorne on a monthlong vacay or something? I want a team of Thorne and Buck back out there. Not the two Jims and their platitudes.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/baseball/bal-sp.osnotes14jun14,0,852255.story?coll=bal-sports-bas eball

Dr. James Andrews, etc. etc.

He'll be ready for '08, they claim.

"We expect him to be ready from the get-go [of spring training]," Flanagan said. "We don't see this being a problem at all."

http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/boxscore?gameId=270612106

I'm not gonna lie. I thought he was due for a decline this year. Maybe he still will have one, but hats off to him. I didn't watch, but the way bbtn is sucking his cock right now it sounds like he was pretty good.

Since they usually just suck on large-market teams.