Friday links

If this post seems abrupt, just know that I’m still adjusting to the lack of autosave feature or a “Warning! You’re about to click away from unsaved data!” dialog box in the engine that powers Bloguin.

TJ Beam is gone, plucked off waivers by the Blue Jays. He was kind of decent last year, but he’s almost 29 and that makes him at least three years older than any of the other candidates for removal from the 40-man. I think age probably had a lot to do with him being the one that went to make room for Hinske. This is hardly worth losing sleep over.

I was sad to see Baseball Toaster close up shop. When I started blogging 2005, they had some of the best baseball writers on the web there and a few links from them really encouraged me to keep going. Most of the blogs are going to new homes, but it feels weird to know that the Toaster is gone. If you’ve got time, Ken Arneson (writer of Catfish Stew and founder of Baseball Toaster) wrote an epic farewell post. Thanks for everything you did for the baseball blog world, Ken.

You should head to BP and check out Will Carroll’s latest post about the evolution of steroid usage by athletes while it’s still free. It’s both incredibly informative and Raymond Chandler-esque.

And finally, Eron provides some substance to the argument that ¡Romulo! is more deserving of a bobblehead than Honus Wagner.

You know what will happen with a Honus Wagner bobblehead? Every 9-15 year old kid at that ballpark will say “This isn’t (insert popular or current Pirates or other player name here). I’m breaking this thing apart!” I can guarantee there will be hundreds of Honus Wagner pieces laying around PNC Park by the time Matt Capps throws his final pitch against the Dodgers and picks up his 60th save of the year.

Vote for ¡Romulo! right here. Do the right thing. And if anyone makes “Vote for ¡Romulo!” campaign propaganda, I’ll be happy to post it.

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