ALVIIIIIIIIN

Ok, I'm not going to do any MSPaint-o-shop on this one.  I just imagined Dave from Alvin and the Chipmunks yelling at Henderson Alvarez last night.  Because Alvarez was horrific.  Like, headachingly bad.  And it's so hard to get really mad at him, because he's like 22 or 23, and it's not like there's a better option sitting around in the minors or anything.  Anyway, I don't know if people liked the Chipmunks when they were kids, or if they even remember or care or whatever, so I wasn't about to go do several hours' (i.e. 4 minutes) worth of work on a photoshop that 9 people are going see when most of them either aren't going to get it or just don't give a shit about the cultural reference, or a reach at one, at least.  That's not to insult my readership, it's just... whatever.  Anyway, Dave is me, Alvin is Henderson Alvinrez, and that picture is right before Alvin goes and eats all the cookies, or shits in someone's mailbox or something and gets yelled at or some bullshit story.

It would have been cool to see him at least get in to the 7th inning, for glaven out loud.  Bullpens can't just go out there and throw a fucking infinity of innings without breaking down eventually, and I'd be shocked if things weren't in a bit of an emergency in terms of arms getting too many innings in, which is the exact point of Operation "Hey Henderson, get your fucking sinker down since we're going to have Jesse Chavez and Fuck knows who pitching the next two games."  Having said that, John Farrell kind of fell ass backwards in to managing his bullpen reasonably well yesterday, but only if we consider today as his main objective.  I'm sure his thought process kind of sucked (Tie game, 7th inning?  Let's leave Coello in for two more batters, and then get Oliver in there for a batter so we can pinch-hit immediately!), but it should actually work out alright for him, at least coming in to tonight's game, where the wild card of wild cards, Jesse Chavez, will almost certainly need some 'pen help.

Let's go back to Sunday, where Farrell sacrificed a full day of Luis Perez in order to save the rest of his bullpen (presumably?).  Cecil threw 5 innings, and Perez came in for the 6th, 7th and 8th, which kind of eliminates him from playing in Monday's game unless we're talking some kind of real emergency (which is actually where we were headed through Alvarez' first two innings), before Jason Frasor came in for the 9th.  Frasor, as we all know, is nothing special when pitching in back-to-back days, so ideally, he'd not pitch in Monday's game either.  Anyhoo, Farrell got through yesterday's game (and almost won!) without using Janssen or Frasor, and Darren Oliver only threw one pitch, so if, heaven forbid, Jesse Chavez can't close this one out himself, there are some decent options available and healthy, for a change.  I dunno though, we might  just see fucking Coco again, especially if it's a nice spot to use Oliver or Janssen. Because that's just how Johnny fucking rolls.

As an aside to this, I assume that Coello and Laffey probably aren't entirely available tonight, which makes it kind of stupid that Evan Crawford was optioned to AAA, in my opinion.  If both are good to go for tonight (Laffey is probably either starting or being used as a kind of insurance policy for whoever starts tomorrow for the Jays, so whatever).  Still, if Crawford was always going to be sent down (and maybe that wasn't always the plan), it would have been convenient to see him get the mop-up duty instead of Laffey, considering the bullpen wear and tear lately.

Zaunhead for Jose Bautista for his game-tying homer, though Lawrie gets honorable mention for having a real nice game, and Edwin as well, for hitting a massive homerun.  Bautista's HR came with a +.337 WPA.

Stuff
And you thought Buck tripped over his words a lot.  This might have been some kind of miniature stroke on the behalf of Dave Barnett, Rangers' play-by-play guy.

Aaron Hill hit for the cycle last night.  Not that it fucking matters any more than being a 4-hit night.  I've seen better.  Also, Aaron Hill drives me bananas and I don't really care if he sucks for the rest of his career.  Having said that, he's been on a complete tear lately.

Tyler Thornberg will start for Milwaukee tonight against the Jays, having been called up this afternoon or something.  The Brewers DFA'ed Brooks Conrad to make room.  Thornburg's minor league numbers look pretty good, and Marc Hulet ranked him as the 2nd best prospect in the Brewers' system this offseason.

Jays' Quarterback Anthony Alford hit his first pro HR today for the Gulf Coast League version of the Jays, according to John Lott.

The Jays announced the signing of Matt Smoral for $2MM, twice the suggested bonus.  The Jays have about $1.7MM or so (plus 5% of that, technically*) left to sign Chase DeJong and Marcus Stroman without penalty.  Stroman's suggested slot is $1.8MM, and DeJong's in $620K, so both probably aren't going to get there.  As of right now, this isn't updated to include Smoral's bonus (as far as I know), but this is a pretty extensive look at the Jays' draft, thanks to Baseball America.  If that link is updated (and it could be; the Jays drafted a bunch of 4-year college guys who signed for peanuts, after all), pretty well everything changes, I guess.  Stroman and DeJong could be signed to slightly over-slot deals in that case, and the Jays might even have some extra money kicking around for the guys they picked outside the first 10 rounds**.

*: Teams can spend between 0 and 5% of their draft budget, and incur a 75% tax on that particular overage.  After that, above 5% incurs a 100% tax and a potential loss of future draft picks.

**: Players taken in the 11th round or later are subject to a $100k max bonus.  If those players sign bonuses above $100K, the overage counts towards the aforementioned draft budget.  Obviously, if the Jays use up their entire remaining budget on Dejong and Stroman, they won't be able to give overslot deals to the highschoolers taken in rounds 11-40 or whatever.