As we count down the hours and minutes to the return of playoff baseball tonight (its been too long) and yours truly waits for something resembling a memorable game...
Christina Kahrl's must-read Transaction Analysis is up with our Royals making an appearance thanks to last week's roster juggling.
Claimed RHP Ken Ray off of waivers from the Braves. [10/12]
Announced that RHP Adam Bernero elected to become a free agent instead of accepting an assignment to Omaha. [10/13]
I suppose Ray makes for a nice token veteran reliever to bring in to a club with no settled spots, and add in that he's made it back from shoulder surgery that cost him nearly three full years, and he's certainly a human interest story more compelling than Jim Morris. An Atlanta native, Ray made the Braves last spring on the strength of a changeup that could fool some of the people some of the time, but as the season progressed, that number of fool-ees dropped, and he was reduced to human interest story as punching bag. Maybe he's supposed to provide veteran leadership, but on the Royals, he joins equally nondescript thirtysomething journeymen like Joe Nelson and Joel Peralta, and it isn't like Todd Wellemeyer or Scott Dohmann are kids any more. Obviously, not all of these guys are all that likely to still be on the 40-man by next April, and you can assemble a big league bullpen out of the strangest assorted parts, but if this doesn't sound like the start of something good to you, it doesn't work so well for me either. I guess Ray's really just an example of Dayton Moore's willingness to bring in former Braves--that didn't work so well for Chuck LaMar when he took over the D-Rays, certainly.
Still, you throw enough live arms out there and theres a chance you assemble a serviceable pen. Its certainly a better approach than overpaying for the next version of Andy Sisco certainly. Still, the fact remains, Ken Ray, umm, OK.
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Under the radar last week was the resignation of Mark Gorris, a team Senior Vice President. Not sure if there's much of a story here, but between Team Glass' Wal-mart cronies and Moore's ex-Brave connection, it should be a battle to see gets hired next.
Ohh, Carlos Beltran is like, good, or something. But we already knew that, didn't we? He's hitting .292/.469/.667 this postseason, after having one of the best postseasons ever in 2004. Lastly, remember to check out "JQ"s diary on Emil Brown. While we're on the subject, I must repeat "marbotty"'s question, "why is Huber in the doghouse?"