It’s not a cake! It’s a Blue Jays donut! And not just any donut! The official donut of the Toronto Blue Jays!

Available at your local Tim Hortons, it is most refreshing when paired with this quote from Henry Miller’s Tropic of Capricorn:

“If I longed for destruction it was merely that this eye might be extinguished. I longed for an earthquake, for some cataclysm of nature which would plunge the lighthouse into the sea. I wanted a metamorphosis, a change to fish, to leviathan, to destroyer. I wanted the earth to open up, to swallow everything in one engulfing yawn. I wanted to see the city buried fathoms deep in the bosom of the sea. I wanted to sit in a cave and read by candlelight. I wanted that eye extinguished so that I might have a change to know my own body, my own desires. I wanted to be alone for a thousand years in order to reflect on what I had seen and heard–and in order to forget. I wanted something of the earth which was not of man’s doing, something absolutely divorced from the human of which I was surfeited. I wanted something purely terrestrial and absolutely divested of idea. I wanted to feel the blood running back into my veins, even at the cost of annihilation. I wanted to shake the stone and the light out of my system. I wanted the dark fecundity of nature, the deep well of the womb, silence, or else the lapping of the black waters of death. I wanted to be that night which the remorseless eye illuminated, a night diapered with stars and trailing comets. To be of night, so frighteningly silent, so utterly incomprehensible and eloquent at the same time. Never more to speak or to listen or to think. To be englobed and encompassed and to encompass and to englobe at the same time. No more pity, no more tenderness. To be human only terrestrially, like a plant or a worm or a brook. To be decomposed, divested of light and stone, variable as the molecule, durable as the atom, heartless as the earth itself.”

This has been your Friday cake and quote.

Shout out to Dayn Perry. Always remember: Dayn Perry is everything, and Dayn Perry is everywhere. And thanks to @BBaxTwitts for the donuts.

Raul Ibanez.
He gives and gives, yet asks for
Nothing in return.

This has been a NotGraphs Haiku.

And this was entirely an excuse to post the above GIF, for which all praise goes to @lonestarball. And Raul Ibanez.

When Lawrie met Kawasaki.

During the offseason, the Blue Jays acquired Jose Reyes, a four-time all-star with a batting title on his résumé; Mark Buehrle, who’s thrown a no-hitter and a perfect game, and 12 consecutive 200-innings seasons; Josh Johnson, a two-time all-star who’s struck out over 20 percent of the batters he’s ever faced; Melky Cabrera, an all-star game MVP with a, uh, checkered past; and R.A. Dickey, arguably the greatest human being alive, who with his magical knuckleball struck out 230 batters last year, and won the Cy Young.

Yet on Monday and Tuesday nights at the Dome, it was Munenori Kawasaki – signed to a minor-league contract in early March, and called up from Triple-A Buffalo to replace the injured Reyes – who was being feted by the crowd, with chants of “KA-WA-SA-KI! – Clap, Clap, ClapClapClap!”

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DETROIT — It wasn’t supposed to end this way for the 2013 Toronto Blue Jays. Not after The Trade with the Miami Marlins. Not after acquiring R.A. Dickey and his magical knuckleball, in exchange for Travis d’Arnaud and Noah Syndergaard, two of the franchise’s prized top-three prospects. But after losing 7-3 to the Detroit Tigers on Tuesday afternoon, and falling to 2-5 on the season — last place in the American League East, an insurmountable three games behind the Boston Red Sox — the Blue Jays knew their season was all but officially over. Off to their worst start since 2004, players and managers alike wondered where it all went so wrong.

“I remember Opening Day like it was last week,” said Dickey. “The emotion, the excitement, the expectations; it was amazing. I truly believed that this team was going to do something special. I’m sorry we let the fans down. I’m sorry I let the fans down.”

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Watching Jose Bautista do what he’s done since arriving in Toronto has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my baseball-watching life. And Bats did it again on Wednesday night, moments after being fooled by a first-pitch breaking ball from Indians closer Chris Perez.

Trust me: Jose Bautista is worth the price of admission. He will get you out of your seat. He’s done it before, and he will do it again. And, as you can see from the reactions of the paying audience, above, the act never, ever gets old.

All praise be upon my friend the @BlueJayHunter for the GIF. He’s one of the hardest-working bloggers in blog business, and a Canadian gentleman, to boot.

As Chairman Cistulli would say: The following tweet is entirely and in-no-way altered from the original (click to embiggen):

Dear Haters,

This is why the World Baseball Classic exists. And it is bello.

Cordially,
Navin

P.S. This, and the Canada/Mexico brawl. That was bloody fantastic.

All praise be upon @MikeAxisa, The People’s Blogger, for the GIF.

So, some dude was spotted in Dunedin, Florida wearing an Alex Anthopoulos jersey. I’m assuming it wasn’t Mr. Anthopoulos himself, because, well, that would be weird.

I’m curious: is this happening elsewhere? Any Duquette jerseys in Baltimore? Dipoto jerseys in Anaheim? What about Wren jerseys, in Atlanta? Anybody rocking a Mozeliak jersey in St. Louis? What about a shirsey? Any Alderson jerseys in Queens?

I fear this is a very slippery slope. The cult of the general manager, and all that.

H/T: My man Jerry, @NorthYorkJays.

The image above, found in a pub in Markham, north of Toronto, comes to us from one of our many intrepid correspondents in the field. Look at those uniforms. Let no one ever say Lyle Overbay didn’t leave his mark on Canada’s finest metropolis. We remember 2006. It inspires us.

NotGraphs’ Investigative Reporting Investigation Team has uncovered that in 2009, The Lyle Overbays led Markham’s 4-Pitch Hardball League with a .566 on-base percentage, and .577 batting average. They finished first in hits, runs, home runs, and RBI, and second in doubles, all while striking out only 12 times in 1,203 plate appearances. The Overbays’ 2009 championship was the first of three in a row, and came following their stunning defeat at the hands of Deez Nuts in the 2008 final, after winning their first title in 2007. All The Lyle Overbays ever wanted was to make Lyle Overbay proud.

And they did. The Investigative Reporting Investigation Team reached Mr. Overbay for comment, via text message, about the dynastic success of the team named in his honor. Mr. Overbay, never a man of many words, responded:

“Flags fly forever.”

Indeed, Mr. Overbay. Indeed.

H/T: My cubicle mate, and the hardest-working man in Canadian public broadcasting, @DanielKitts.

First, Brandon Morrow said he’d “rather look at the nerd stats.” Then he shows up to Ricky Romero‘s first start of the spring with notes on Romero from Brooks Baseball, which he passed on to his teammate.

Witness, via John Lott in the National Post, a fine Canadian newspaper:

Brandon Morrow’s research startled Ricky Romero. It showed that Romero had almost given up on a key pitch during his disastrous 2012 season.

In 2011, when his ERA was 2.92, Romero threw sinking two-seam fastballs 22% of the time. Last year, his sinker rate fell to 11%. His ERA was 5.77, worst among big-league starters.

Morrow found those figures on the Brooksbaseball.net website, printed them out and gave them to Romero.

“I was a little bit amazed by it,” Romero said Tuesday, pulling the sheet from his locker.

Brandon Morrow is going to, hopefully, start a revolution.

Every now and then, usually on my walk to work in the morning, I whisper to myself: “Brandon League for Brandon Morrow.” I can’t let myself forget; I won’t. And I can’t wait for that no-hitter.

Image credit: David Lykes Keenan Photography.