Blake Murphy Sports Writing

Title: A Response to the Thigpen Article
Date: May 27, 2007
Original Source: The On Deck Circle
Synopsis: My friend Erik had a response to my earlier Curtis Thigpen article, disagreeing. So we discussed.

Note: I received this e-mail from Erik Arnold in response to my Curtis Thigpen article and touching on some other areas about the Blue Jays. What is below is his e-mail and my response, just to expand on the Thiggy piece. Erik made some good points that I skipped over, so I thought it was only fair to bring light on those points and Erik’s baseball genius. If anyone ever has a response like this one, don’t hesitate to e-mail me and I’ll discuss it further. Booyakasha.

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Sup Dude,Just read the blog… kick ass review of Canadian Sports TV, bang on in my opinion.

Have to go ahead and disagree with your call on Thigpen. You take a look at Phillips and Fasano and, sure, it makes you a little sick. But I think it has more to do with context and roster management than anything else. About the latter, the Jays are already a pinch over the 40 man roster and when some of the guys get healthy in the coming month, they’re gonna need to purge some players. Zaun is back soon and I think given his rapport with the staff and the way he calls the game behind the plate, he’s earned a spot for the rest of the year. Anything he gives us at the plate (decent pop and a little bit of clutch hitting and hustle at the bottom of the order) is gravy. I think with the staff struggling so severely earlier this month, Fasano and Phillips provided a stabilizing presence behind the plate for some of the young pitchers. Both spent time with these guys in the Spring and Fasano had a little more time to work with them in Syracuse. The team is already allowing Lind to experience his “growing pains” just like they did with Aaron Hill a couple years ago. I think any other position I’d agree, but having a rookie at catcher has such a cascading effect on the rest of the staff. I agree with JP keeping him down and saving an option on the contract. Snider still has a ways to come too so there is no hurry at the position. Who knows, talk is that the Jays are looking at that Mesoraco kid in the first round this year so between him, Thigpen and Snider we could be stacked at the position for a long time to come. But that will require JP to take ANOTHER highschooler… so maybe not.

Anyways, I’m rambling… keep those trades rolling. At this rate you’ll have a completely different squad by year’s end.

Erik

PS Want to talk about poor roster management? When’s the last time Towers or Vermilliya pitched? A week ago and 16 days ago respectively…. tell me we couldn’t have used an extra bat off the bench over these last couple weeks (and 1 series in an NL park at that… ugh). We need to cool it on the three musketeers (Accardo, Downs and Jannsen) or their arms are going to fall off.
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Thanks for the feedback bro. Allow me to make a few comments.

I liked your rebuttal of the Thigpen thing. Obviously, I didn’t explore the effects of using one of his options or the 40-man roster situation (I wrote that piece in half an hour). Zaun has since stated he should be back sooner than originally expected, so the article would have been more in context directly after his injury. At the same time, I still think it would have been beneficial to Thigpen to get the call up and get some experience. In the past two seasons, he’s worked with Litsch and McGowan at AA and AAA, respectively, and has a reputation for being a solid game caller.

As for the draft, we pick 16th and 21st because of Texas taking Frank Catalanotto, and word is that J.P. will look to take one high schooler and one college player. On Buster Olney’s ESPN Insider Blog, he mentioned this topic briefly and linked to a story at This Link, A Toronto Sun article that is surprisingly researched. It would appear that we’ll be going the one high school/one college route, which I’m completely fine with. Travis Snider is a few years away as a RF or 1B (tearing up low class Single-A with Lansing though), but the future outfield of Lind/Rios/Snider with Thigpen behind the plate, Hill at second, and LaPorta at 1st is a decent core. Our system is deprived of shortstops though (Russ Adams update: 4/5 on Saturday to bring his average to .229) so it’d be nice to see a pick at that position as well. And obviously, pitching prospects never hurt. Should be an interesting 537 rounds of MLB drafting.

Don’t worry man. Accardo allowed a run now so maybe he’ll get a break. But yeah, pitching management, not Gibbons’ strong suit, in case you haven’t read my opinions on that assclown before. And yes, I’m trying to trade my entire team.

-Blake