As a lifelong Blue Jays supporter living on the east coast, in Toronto, I’ve always had an affinity for the western road trip. The western swing: games in Oakland, Anaheim and Seattle. And as I inch closer and closer to 30 — Dirty Thirty — there isn’t much I enjoy more than a Blue Jays game that begins shortly after 10:00 pm eastern time on a weeknight, when all the duties of the day have been completed.

Tonight, the Blue Jays kick off their first western swing of the young season in Anaheim, against the Los Angeles Angels. Ervin Santana is scheduled to throw the first pitch at 10:05 pm. And tonight, along with Monday and Tuesday nights next week when the Blue Jays are in Seattle, I’ll be kicking it old school, like I used to do so many years ago — I’ll be listening on the radio.

Back in the day, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, I don’t remember if every single Blue Jays game was televised, like they are today. I don’t think they were, but it hardly mattered, back then. I was young; I’m talking between seven and 12 years old. I had to be in bed. But I remember those late games. I remember catching an inning or two on the telly, if the game was on, and then retiring to my quarters, where my Walkman and headphones awaited. I remember falling asleep to the “Voice of the Blue Jays,” Tom Cheek, and his partner, Jerry Howarth. Tom and Jerry, yo. The voice of my fleeting youth. The best.

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In honor of NotGraphs prose hero W.J. Slattery and as sorta-kinda suggested by Notgraphs reader and thinking-man’s pugilist Reillocity, I’m giving the Slattery-style treatment to yesterday’s Red Sox-Indians tilt. Long may you run, W.J. Slattery. Long may you run.

CLEVE’S-LAND OF THE OHIO – The Blood-Colored Leggings of Boston Town entered this docket in the Land o’ Cleve with expectations as heavy as President Taft, that flatulent Yalie, but, lo, they have buckled and sunk under Job’s burdens like the U.S.S. Maine.

It shouldn’t have been such a tight scratch, but the Injuns charged at them, hammer and tongs, and dropped the anointed champeens to zero and five plus another, which be this one.

Mr. Carmona, the fizzing Cleve’s-Land tosser, betokened the approaching misery by setting down a trinity of swingers in the first frame. Among the Red bats-men, only Mr. Scutaro brought his barking-iron and his dash-fire to this row. He smote the ball favorably and recorded a deuce of safeties on the day, but his messmates left him stranded each and every times both.

Across the way, Mr. Lester tossed with the honest flint of a Christian and a Virginian (tho’ he is not the lattermost, and recent fates make this scribe doubt he’s the formermost), but, thanks to the Boston bats soft as kidney pie, his efforts in the end were but ragamuffin’s gullyfluff in an urchin’s trouser pocket.

The real konk on the smeller came in the eighth turn, when Mr. Cabrera, of the A. not the O., plopped down an Irish hoist, plated Mr. Everett — that discommoding rusty-guts — and made the tally nothings to the ones. It stood. It stood because as warm and rightwise a patriot as Andrew Jackson could not have tamed these Indians on this day.

Wiseacres without wit, money or manners will observe that the season is not yet weaning age, but that’s merely the tune the old cow died of. Be it what it would, the Leggings have a buckskin’s toil in front of and aweather them. God’s blessing, they’ll return to the hearth on the morrow. There, they can fill the bellows with New English air, have some hochmagundy with the wives, enjoy a plate of butchered beef’s haslet, pull up their sit-upons, shut their mewling bone boxes, and get to business.

As for the Royal Rooters, their cogitations are too abundant to chronicle. If the catarrh or the Pock doesn’t get them, then the home-town nine surely will.

Love that scruff.

If this picture was worth a thousand words, maybe about nine hundred of them would be about hair. And as anyone who has seen my twitter feed might know, I appreciate hair.

It’s too bad that our sport has to be played with a cap on, in some ways. Looking at the 1978 Phillies, the rarity is an un-interesting ‘do.’ The butt-cutts, the afros of all persuasions, the mustaches, the chin straps, the hints of mid-eighties style beginning to emerge – it’s all awesome. If they were allowed, like in basketball, to play with their freak flags flying, we might have had some really interesting pictures of that era – not that the sight of Oscar Gamble with a hat on didn’t have its’ own charm.

But if we did have a game without hats – if we did, we could then have an interesting hair watch here at the NotG. Heck, maybe we’ll do it anyway.

H/T: Tommy Bennett pointing to the Mighty Flynn on Tumblr

This is Brandon McCarthy’s actual Twitter profile photo. Yes, really.

For those wondering, Brandon McCarthy is firmly in the sweet potato camp, and I’m not talking about an attractive-soft-around-the-edges person. Then again, who’s to say he isn’t into that. But sweet potatoes – the vegetable – yea… McCarthy can get jiggy with that.

How do I know?

Is it my access to clubhouses? No.

Is it that I saw him at an all-you-can-eat sweet potato buffet? No, but I wish.

Is it because I follow his twitter feed? You betcha.

For those who argue Tweets are the banal inner monologue to the bored, I’d say, sure you’re usually right. But McCarthy – or as he dubbed himself, “the West Coast Joe Blanton” aka WCJB – has made having an account well worth my vastly dispensable time.

And without knowing any of you, I’m sure it’s worth your time, too. But what’s your favorite tweet of his? And WCJB, if you’re reading this, I too feel you on Arrested Development. Just do me the favor of buying a really nice suit (because you, not I, can afford it) then continually mention how much it costs.

Now that you mention it, I would like to buy a Volvo.

One thing I find interesting about the MLB.tv experience is the “commercial breaks.” To my knowledge they don’t show actual TV ads. Instead, they show either 1) the team logos or 2) MLB promos or 3) pictures of Volvos (and other static image ads).

Contrast this with other inter-inning experiences. In the olden days, watching games on cable TV, commercials gently enwrapped my attentions from the moment the game action paused until the moment it returned. Unless I desperately needed the fridge or some other domestic facility, I’d stay put between innings. At the ballpark, by comparison, there isn’t a lot of worthwhile inter-inning entertainment (apologies to Cotton Eye Joe). Normally I’ll chat with companions or buy beer.

MLB.tv is different. When I’m watching on my computer, I can flip to another game when whatever I’m watching goes into a break. This is fun, although it comes with an ADD factor; I find myself less immersed in the atmosphere and discrete drama of each game when I’m switching between two or more.

The real conundrum is what to do with myself during commercials when I’ve hooked MLB.tv up to my living room TV, because then it’s too much trouble to get up and switch to another game. And until I figure something out I’m stuck on my couch watching slideshows of Volvos.

The MLB.tv-from-the-couch experience is, if you will, the developing world/final frontier of baseball watching, and sitting here at the brink of the abyss I feel a vertiginous indecision over how to conduct myself. Read a book? Check email? Play a very short game of Call of Duty? Think about… junk? Frankly, I’m not quite sure why corporate America is leaving this decision up to me.

The lovely and talented Heidi Watney learns, in the hardest of ways, that here in the Midwest we do atherosclerotic food pairings almost as well as we do unemployment and the vague suspicion that nothing matters …

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qDjOamp9P0&feature=player_embedded

This is the angina-pains city, and this is what we do.

(Gut-bump: HBT)

Actually, it’s a pretty short list. But I’ll argue that Adam Dunn comparing himself to even one X-Man (singular?) merits some attention.

Discussing his return from an appendectomy, Dunn said the following to reporters:

One thing I definitely don’t want to do is miss Opening Day at home. I’m going home tonight and planning on playing tomorrow and we’ll go from there. If it’s really sore and if I’m feeling like this tomorrow, we might have some problems. I’m anticipating it getting better. I’m a quick healer, like Wolverine. I asked the doctor yesterday how long these things take and he gave me a general answer for the public. I’m subtracting 15 days off it. If I can tolerate [the pain], then I want to play. I don’t mind playing when I’m not 100 percent.

Technically, the emphasis is mine. In reality, the emphasis is everybody’s.

Stolen shamelessly from the Mighty Flynn. Image courtesy Houston Chronicle.

We have, as my man Drew Fairservice, don of ESPN SweetSpot’s Ghostrunner on First, wrote on Twitter this morning, “the best baseball photo of the year.” Already! And he’s right.

If you don’t know by now, touching Adrian Beltre’s noggin is frowned upon. By Adrian Beltre. And by “frowned upon,” I mean: “Touch Beltre’s head, and Beltre looks like he may actually kill you.”

In lieu of flowers, donations for the Marco Scutaro Memorial can be sent to the Boston Red Sox at 4 Yawkey Way, Boston, MA 02215.

Image courtesy Jim Davis at The Boston Globe. A tip of the hat to Ranting of a Boston Sports Fan, where I originally found the photo. I trust the rants will be epic over the next few days. And to Drew, of course. Hat tips, all around, yo. For everybody. Especially Scutaro. What a brave man.

In the vital interests of your fleeting amusement, I’ve done the Lord’s work of going through “The Onion” archives to find the 25 greatest Onion baseball articles in the history of ever.

It is of course possible that you will disagree with my authoritative decisions, but you should know that my opinions are actually facts with large muscles. So instead blame the divining powers of the The Onion’s search function or the immutable laws of this, our grim human existence.

After the jump, the rankings, which I assembled for you at great personal hazard …

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These two delightful souls were photographed by The Associated Press at the Rogers Centre SkyDome Wednesday night, taking in game two of the three game set between the Toronto Blue Jays and Oakland Athletics. No, they weren’t the only people there, but I appreciate you asking.

I can’t tell you how much I loathe the tweets and stories bemoaning attendance struggles throughout baseball. After a busy Opening Weekend at the gate in Toronto, and back-to-back crowds of 11,077 and 11,684 on Tuesday and Wednesday night, the sky is falling. Again. It fell last year, too.

Anyway, the picture. I love it. That’s fandom, right there. And those two guys are close; they’re tight. All those empty seats, and they didn’t use a buffer. Bros. For life. And I’ve no doubt: His was the most polite heckle in the history of heckles. Now, you tell me, what’s he yelling?

Image courtesy The Associated Press, via the fine folks at Yahoo! Sports.