Red Sox, Yankees...Red Sox, Yankees....
I was reading the March 14th issue of Sports Illustrated on the plane ride home from Vegas yesterday (I practically own that town). In SI, theres some crazy bootleg article about a SI writer participating in a day of Blue Jays spring training. The article was pretty dumb, but it contained this lil nugget from Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi.

Red Sox, Yankees....Red Sox, Yankees....I don't care about the Red Sox and Yankees. We have to take care of ourselves. This is the most important year in the four years I've been here. This is your chance, from right now, to decide what kind of team you want to be.

I've always wondered what the leaders of teams tell their players when both players, management, and the fans know a team has absolutely no chance of playing baseball in October. Now I know, they try and cover their own asses.

I'll translate Ricciardi's statement for you:

Yeah, the Red Sox and Yankees will finish 1-2, making our chance of picking up even the Wild Card a negative number, but I don't care. I'm not here to win the division, I'm just trying to make this team respectable so they don't fire my sorry ass.

But as fans, we all know, just like Ricciardi knows, just like the Blue Jays players know: they don't have a chance.

The Blue Jays lost 90 games last year. The Blue Jays also lost their best player, Carlos Delgado, to free agency. The Blue Jays will attempt to replace Delgado's production with Shea Hillenbrand and Corey Koskie. The Blue Jays don't have a chance.

Other than Hillenbrand and Koskie, the Blue Jays won't be much different this season. I don't blame Ricciardi for going out and spending millions on free agents when he has to look up every day at the insurmountable obstacle the Red Sox and Yankees have become in the AL East. Ricciardi would get a pass. Would. If. Only.

Ricciardi would get a pass if only this were his first year at the helm. But Ricciardi has done nothing to improve the big league club since he being hired after the 2001 season. The minors? Too early to pass judgement, but their best (and most major league ready) prospects were drafted before he arrived.

And what good do the minor leagues do for a team when the General Manager displays absolutely no talent for finding contributing talent (whether it be cheap or expensive) at the major league level.

And to think, the Red Sox had an opening for a GM right around the time the Worcester native Riccairdi took the "challenge" up in Toronto. Red Sox, Yankees.....Red Sox, Yankees......
Curt  ¶ 1:30 AM