TAKE ME OUT TO THE BRAWL GAME

Ladies and gentlemen, your 2006 Toronto Blue Jays.

Loads of offence, not-so-stellar pitching, a strange tendency to take their disputes public ... and frustrated fans.

Last night, when lefty Ted Lilly blew an eight-run lead against the A's, argued with manager John Gibbons, and the two wound up fighting in the dugout, was a perfect storm of all three and perhaps embodied the Jays' season in microcosm.

The timing couldn't have been worse, since Wednesday night's special promotion was Guaranteed Manager-Player Fight Night. Just kidding.

Since yours truly was at work when it happened and the game wasn't on any of the TVs in the newsroom (NFL pre-season ... you gotta watch the NFL pre-season), the only comment that can be offered here is on what the fallout is going to be for both the manager and ballplayer.

Declarative statements such as "Gibbons just signed his own pink slip" have a tendency to come back to bite you in a fairly uncomfortable place. The skipper came out of the Shea Hillenbrand contretemps last month smelling like a rose. For the first year and a half of his tenure, he'd been the most low-profile of the leaders of Toronto's four sports teams. Not as quotable as Argos coach Pinball Clemons or Pat Quinn, then of the Leafs; and not certifiably nuts like Raptors coach Sam Mitchell. After he challenged Hillenbrand to a rumble, Gibbons was elevated in the eyes of some. Besides, Hillenbrand was known to be a me-first malcontent, so it was pretty easy to side with the manager.

This time, not so much. The case can be made that in the past month, as the Jays slowly but surely fell away from the playoff contenders and back into the middle of the pack, Gibbons' competency has been called into question. No one's quite sure what anyone could have done with the pitching staff, but the bottom line is a manager can't be fighting with his players. It just can't happen. The Billy Martin era is long gone, and nowadays, the guy in the dugout is pretty much middle management, a supervisor reporting to the suits who have the real power and control.

So this maybe endears Gibbons to a certain meathead segment of sports fans, or the miscreant faction who would like him to stay around just for sheer entertainment value, but really, tonight probably marks the beginning of the end of Blue Jays tenure. Can you really imagine this guy being the manager who's going to lead us (the royal us, the editorial us) back to the playoffs?

Lilly's Blue Jays tenure only had another six weeks. In his mind, he was probably gone already, since he's a potential free agent and the feeling on him leaving was mutual. Not to choose sides, but Lilly probably didn't do himself any lasting damage. He's still got another 3-4 years to trick otherwise savvy baseball men into paying for his arm, not his stats.

Last night could be excused as just one bad night, but you wonder why this is a pitcher who's been in five organizations in the past eight seasons. Teams always covet him for what he's supposed to be capable of, but when you actually have Ted Lilly, most of the time is just waiting for the good starts he has every now and again. So yes, it will probably be good riddance come Oct. 1.

That's all for now. Sned your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.