Plus, it's starting to fluster J.A.(y) Happ, who seems destined to head to Toronto if the Phillies can manage to throw enough Future into the pot. Then ESPN's A.J. Mass trots out this theory: the Phillies are awesomer than awesome right now and do not need Halladay to be awesomest. (I'm paraphrasing.) Mitch Williams is convinced the Phillies can repeat if they land Roy. The Phillies are reluctant to part with both Kyle Drabek and J.A. Happ. Take one, just not both they say, even though as Jayson Stark sagely points out, neither one of those guys will ever be Roy Halladay. Thank you, you hair-helmeted beacon of reason.

The worst thing the Phillies could do here is dick around too much and then end up overpaying for Cliff Lee, Zach Duke, or Jarrod Washburn. That would be disastrous. Oh, and whatever happened to Mike Grace?

The Jays wanted J.A. Happ, Kyle Drabek, and Dominic Brown. The Phillies were all, "no way!" And the Jays were all, "way!" And the Phillies were all, "Nuh-uh!" And the Jays were all "Aww." I'm pretty sure those are standard trade operating procedures.

Is It Possible To Will A Trade Rumor Out Of Existence? There's some kind of information going around the the Detroit Tigers want to trade for Milton Bradley. I'm guessing it's part of the Tigers' new philosophy: "Trade for Farnsworth twice, shame on us, Trade for Farnsworth three times, shame on humanity."

Holy crap, the Tigers do not need another outfielder. Unless, of course, he's secretly a fantastic setup man. And perhaps the rumor is just a load of fertilizer, as the Tribune says there've been no talks between the teams. Phew.

The Mets Are More Than Willing To Part With Victor Zambrano For Him. Scott Kazmir might go to the Angels, who are looking for some kind of starting pitcher. They might also try to lure in Cliff Lee or Roy Halladay.

Actually, everyone wants Roy Halladay. I want Roy Halladay on my baseball team, which I am starting right now. I'd like 25 All-Stars, public funding for a stadium, and some kind of cool logo, please.

There. Baseball news. We now return you to your regularly scheduled weekend hijinks involving references to Crystalis and Gauntlet.

-SI launching Swimsuit Issue iPhone app. Hey, it'll cut down on the rustling of magazine pages when you have to rub one out in the bathroom stall at work.

-Jays GM says he's unlikely to trade Roy Halladay, after being unimpressed with offers. Translation: teams have been offering the moon for him. Now let's see if we can bluff them into offering more.

-The commish plans to give Michael Vick a "conditional reinstatement," which means if a team wants him, and he doesn't kill anything, he'll be back for opening day.

-It took this long? After his team loses on an unreviewable blown call, Ron Gardenhire calls for an NFL-like system of challenge flags in baseball. In related news, average game time still hovering around 3 hours.

-Kimo Leopoldo: Not dead! Though life's probably not going so well when you have to hold a press conference announcing that.

-For all the babies he ate and puppies he kicked, Jim Rice saved this guy's life.

-Figures that Hedo Turkoglu is a marketing dream in Turkey, but nothing will prepare you for his Roald Dahlian nightmare of a world that they call a cell phone commercial.

-With Tim Wakefield on the DL, Clay Buchholz is back up. Smoltz and Penny should probably just fight to the death, because one of them's gone when Wakefield's back.

Tell Your Crew To Be Easley - The Nigh Mets have put a decent little string of wins together, using Damion Easley's 8th inning homer to propel them to a seventh victory in a row, this one over the Rockies at Shea 2-1. Easley is hitting his age (.422) over the last 13 games since relieving an injured Luis Castillo.

A-Rod Took A Halladay. Took Some Time To Celebrate - Well, I guess it could not be so nice. The Jays' Roy Halladay went all complete-game-two-hit-shutout on the Yankees, striking out eight to win his third straight start. He might even start the All-Star Game, if that sort of thing is important to you. (Hey, I remember as a kidlet joining the uproar when current Jays skipper Cito Gaston didn't pitch Mike Mussina in the All-Star Game in Bawlmer. Now it's Mussina who I wish would swallow a marlin spike. How things change.)

A Werth's Worth - The Diamondbacks pitched around Jimmy Rollins to get to Jayson Werth in the 12th and the guy with the hot mom picked up his third hit of the night to drive in So Taguchi for the winning run as the Phils win 6-5. Ryan Howard pushed his hit streak to 14 games with his league-leading 28th homer.

If Only He Were Still Doping - Brian Roberts got the single, double and triple of the cycle down last night, but failed to do that thing where you thing where you hit the ball rull far and it goes over the fence and you cross your heart and thank mommy, daddy, Veronica Lake and the president of the United States. Whatever that's called. Anyway, the Orioles had a 4-3 lead over the Red Sox in the 8th until 37 lb. slugger Brandon Fahey broke it open with one of his five hits, a two-out, two-run single to lead the Oo-ree-oos to a 7-3 win.