Thursday Morning Links

Is this really the team that's only a game out of first?

Anthony Andro tells us that last night was another bad showing from the offense. Jeff Wilson says that Nick Tepesch's poise and a Leury-less offense were still not enough to get it done against the Indians. T.R. Sullivan offers a near-literal post-mortem of the Ranger offense... a pale corpse split open like an overdone weenie with Sullivan droning "fatty liver, hardened arteries, a Leury Garcia where the heart should go..." Ripped from the pages of Duh! Weekly, Todd Wills at ESPN Dallas says the offense is in desperate need of reinforcements and has his rapid reactions.

Jeff Wilson says that Jurickson Profar's future is uncertain with Ian Kinsler nearly back from the DL. Frankly, at this point I feel like Theon Greyjoy: just cut off my finger if it will make the pain stop. No more Jurickson, fine, will it make the offense stop hitting like the Mariners? I say that even while acknowledging that Profar is awesome, he had a great intervieww on The Ticket yesterday where he said he doesn't go in the water because of Shark Week and that he's better at soccer than he is at baseball.

In T.R. Sullivan's notes column we learn that Matt Harrison hopes to begin a throwing program soon, Ian Kinsler should be starting his rehab assignment today, and Ron Washington has more effusive praise for the groundskeeping crew, interestingly, than he did for Josh Lindblom the other day. Also, there's some discussion from Jon Daniels about what to do with Profar when Kinsler comes back, my interpretation of which is that were a full Major League season like an Ocean's Eleven movie (that is, something with a gazillion moving parts that somehow still needs no contingency plans) Leury Garcia is a fine backup infielder.

"It's important to remember that, according to modern portfolio theory, the benefits of diversification are increasingly attenuated after 20 - 23 individual positions."

Jon Daniels says that moving Alexi Ogando back to the bullpen is "not a consideration at this point," but does allow that a purely hypothetical crime against nature that he termed "Colbi Lewgando" had been proposed by Dr. Keith Meister and was "an intriguing possibility."

The local press asked "what is Jurickson Profar's short term future," shook the magic Ron Washington eight ball, and received the answer "the future is hazy." I was so inspired by Washington's cryptic opacity that I went and threw the I Ching, and got the following:

Fire on the Mountain, catastrophic to man, a passing annoyance to the Mountain:
The Superior Person waits for wisdom and clarity before exacting Justice, then lets no protest sway him.

Find satisfaction in small gains.
To move constantly forward is good fortune to a Wanderer.

So BREAKING NEWS, MUST CREDIT LONESTARBALL, Jurickson Profar will be traded for something that brings only marginal gains.

Don't worry, everyone, Ron Washington was not motivated to shake up last night's lineup by sheer horror at the offensive ineptitude of our current infield, but merely by completely understandable Jeff Baker pity.

Finally, here's a link to one of my favorite parts of The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul, when Dirk Gently discovers and then immediately covets an electronic I Ching calculator.