Tomo-mania Running Wild Tomokazu Ohka has signed a 1-year deal worth a reported $1.5 million with the Blue Jays.

This is another depth move by J.P. Ricciardi, as the Jays try to parse out just who will be in the rotation after Halladay, Burnett and Chacin.

The list of candidates now includes: Ohka, Shaun Marcum, Casey Janssen, Ty Taubenheim, Josh Towers, Dustin McGowan, John Thomson, Francisco Rosario, Davis Romero, Ricky Romero, Cesar Romero and maybe the return of Jack Morris.

When league average is worth $10 million annually, this is a sound strategy: collect as many arms as you can and at least a couple of them should turn in good years.

The art here is to figure out who those guys are going to be before you waste a bunch of starts on the guys who are going to get shelled (see Towers, Josh 2006).

Ohka's addition to the "Ligaments of the Willing" should, if nothing else provide some relief to the organization's younger arms, either allowing them more time to hone their craft in Syracuse, or by soaking up long (read: blowout) relief assignments and allowing the pen to rest.

A quick haiku in honour of Tomo:

His healing right arm
Hurls the baseball slower now.
Could still outpitch Meche.  ¶ posted by Chris C. at 3:39 PM